Editor's take: In the crypto community, there’s a popular expression that applies here. “Not your keys, not your coin,” meaning that if you don�

PayPal is working on a cryptocurrency withdrawal function

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2021-05-27 18:30:03

Editor's take: In the crypto community, there’s a popular expression that applies here. “Not your keys, not your coin,” meaning that if you don’t own the private keys associated with your cryptocurrency, you don’t really own it. With PayPal, you essentially trust your crypto to a third party, but the ability to move your holdings off the platform is coming soon.

Since mid-October and up to this point, PayPal has offered users the ability to buy, sell and hold four types of cryptocurrency on its platform: Bitcoin, Ethereum, Bitcoin Cash and Litecoin. Notably, the crypto you buy can’t be moved off PayPal into a standalone wallet.

For some, the risk versus reward of letting someone else manage your keys is worth the gamble. Some casual crypto players may not want the stress of managing their own coins. We’ve heard time and again of people that have lost or forgotten their private keys, negating any chance that they’ll ever recover their holdings.

While it seems highly unlikely that PayPal would vanish overnight with all of its customers’ holdings, that situation wouldn’t be of concern if you had your own keys stored in a private wallet. And that is exactly what PayPal is working towards.