Elon Musk’s X inks deal with Visa to launch digital wallet, peer-to-peer payments on social media platform

Elon Musk’s social media platform X on Tuesday announced the launch of a digital wallet and peer-to-peer payment services provided by Visa.

X struck a deal with Visa, the largest US credit card network, to be the first partner for what it is calling the X Money Account, chief executive Linda Yaccarino announced in a post on the platform.

Visa will enable X users to move funds between traditional bank accounts and their digital wallet and make instant peer-to-peer payments, Ms Yaccarino said, like with Zelle or Venmo, both popular in the US.

It’s the first concrete move from X to create a financial ecosystem for the social media site, which was called Twitter before Mr Musk purchased it in 2022. At the time, Mr Musk, who’s also chief executive of Tesla, said the $44 billion acquisition was a way to create an “everything app.”

He later said the platform would enable users to conduct their “entire financial world” on it.

In 2021 while Jack Dorsey was at the helm of Twitter, the company launched a bitcoin tipping feature that allowed users to add their crypto wallet addresses and receive payments in the world’s largest digital token.

But attaining status as a money service business in the US required navigating a far more complex regulatory landscape.

For over a year, Mr Musk has been applying for these licenses for X. According to its website, X Payments LLC is licensed in 41 states and registered with the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, or FinCEN.

The X Money service is expected to launch in the first quarter, and deals with more financial partners are likely, according to a person with knowledge of the situation.

One of the first use cases for X Money is to allow creators on the site to accept payments and store funds without external institutions, said this person, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal matters.

In November 2022, Mr Musk suggested to the platform’s advertisers in a meeting publicly broadcast on Spaces that its coming payments product might ultimately offer certain banking features, such as a high-yield money market account.

Representatives of Visa declined to comment on the matter.