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135 new currencies at Stripe

stripe.com

131–140 of 149 posts

Re: 135 new currencies at Stripe

#131
post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Stripe is a bit younger, except Pin (which was operating in Australa first though). Pin did mention somewhere that they had a very special partnership with one of the 4 pillar banks that would have been difficult to create.

Pin Payments is owned by the big four Australian banks. They have a vested interest to make sure it is harder for competitors to enter the market, not easier.

Where do you come up with something like this?

Re: 135 new currencies at Stripe

#132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't think of a reason. Competition is good.

I sense ambiguity. For clarity: I meant "why can't it be both that bitcoin reduces the need for Stripe and that Stripe reduces the need for bitcoin", not "why can't we have both services?". You may well have understood - your answer could be appropriate either way. Competition reducing the need for a particular offering is a big portion of the reason competition is good.

I agree that it goes both ways.

The ideal behind Bitcoin that I find appealing is its decentralized nature. Stripe lacks this feature so I deny its future viability.

Re: 135 new currencies at Stripe

#133
post #121
post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, yes; 100 yen is represented as amount=100 currency=yen. We should probably write something about this.

Technically, the yen has a 1/100 subdivision called a sen, and a 1/1000 called a rin.

Similarly, 1/10 of one chinese yuan is called a jiao 角, and 1/100 is a fen 分. (Jiao are common in prices; fen are so rare that you could live your life without being aware of them. I would own a big pile of one-jiao coins if I didn't habitually discard them for being near-worthless.) What are stripe amounts denominated in if they're coded CNY?

Re: 135 new currencies at Stripe

#134
post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you please make a blog post about the difficulties involved in serving new countries? Obviously it's related to bullshit regulations, artificial barriers to entry and so on, but it would be lovely to know any specifics.

We've actually considered doing this. Why would you like to see it, out of curiosity? Just because it'd be interesting, or in order to better understand why we're taking so long? :-)

How about a generalised list of things you need to do for each country.

1) Decide country 2) Hire finance lawyer for that country 3) Deal with banks / APIs 4) Make applications to governments etc.

Give us some example timeline based on past experience etc for each step, maybe with some anecdotes when Stp X was particularly difficult /easy with country Y.

Re: 135 new currencies at Stripe

#135
post #2

I was just wondering, to the customer user would this cost more if the foreign currency was used or their local one given the exchange rate is sometimes very good (e.g paying in US dollars instead of the local currency)

Sometimes is the opposite. In Argentina, for example, it is better to pay in Pesos, because if I pay in dollars, I have to pay 1) the local bank conversion rate, and 2) the conversino rate at the end of the month, which may be higher.

plus retentions that might eventually be used to pay other taxes (or not)

Re: 135 new currencies at Stripe

#136
post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand how this is the case when younger competitors like Braintree and Pin are able to offer it.

Stripe is a bit younger, except Pin (which was operating in Australa first though). Pin did mention somewhere that they had a very special partnership with one of the 4 pillar banks that would have been difficult to create.

Both Pin and Braintree go through NAB; they seem to be the only bank that's willing to deal with international payment gateways (not sure why exactly). I know you can go through their API directly, but I'm not sure anyone would want to.

Re: 135 new currencies at Stripe

#138
To Stripe employees:

So let me get this straight - a US based company can accept UZS (Uzbek Sum) payments from clients in Uzbekistan and Stripe will convert the UZS funds into USD?

I DO NOT BELIEVE THIS!!!

What are the strings attached? Any limitations?

I mean Uzbekistan has one of the most messed up economies in the world. Only here a used car costs more than a new car (I am not kidding) and Uzbekistan practically has non-existent conversion. People usually use black market to convert UZS to USD.

Thus, I cannot believe you pulled it off. And if you did do it, who do I talk to at Stripe to find out the details and rates?

Re: 135 new currencies at Stripe

#139
post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Note though that those pounds (I have a 5 Jersey Pound bill somewhere) are not legal tender in the UK [1]. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jersey_pound

Good luck defining legal tender in the UK; a lot of English retailers won't take Scottish notes.

[deleted]

Re: 135 new currencies at Stripe

#140

Holy shamoly! This is incredible! I'm actually checking to make sure it's not Apr 1. I'm beyond-amazed at the sheer breadth of this list. I mean, PayPal itself only supports 20-odd currencies, I think. I mean, the Brazilian Real? Literally almost no payment processors support that. And believe me, I've looked for them. This is amazing news. (As a side question, if anybody from Stripe is listening here: how exactly is…

I dont't think Stripe is being misleading, but many people might be overstating the importance of this feature.

Even without this conversion, you can always (try to) accept payments denominated in U$ from people with Brazil-issued (or Uzbekistan etc) cards. Say you charge 10USD for a product. You get paid (10-fees)USD. Later the issuing bank will convert (say) 10USD into 20BRL and the customer will pay in BRL as usual. But the customer doesn't know beforehand what is the exact exchange rate, so at the time of the purchase they don't exactly how much it will cost them in BRL.

With currency conversion, you can instead charge some of your customers in BRL. In this case, the customer knows exactly how much the cost will be in BRL. Instead, the USD value you get becomes variable. But this doesn't solve the problem of Brazilian (or Uzbekistan) banks denying the payment (due to fraud prevention or because they aren't connected to Stripe's acquirers or whatever), and it doesn't solve the problem of accepting payments via Stripe as a Brazilian-based merchant.

(To be clear, this is not a critique of Stripe)

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