Ronin, Philippine exchange 'Coins.ph' partner up... stablecoin payment support

Ronin blockchain developer Sky Mavis on the 21st announced plans, together with the Philippines' largest crypto exchange Coins.ph, to support payments with the Philippine peso (PHP)-based stablecoin 'PHPC' via the Philippine national standard QR code payment system 'QRPH'.

The announcement was made at the Web3 game conference 'YGG Play Summit' held in Manila on the 20th. The two companies plan to, after obtaining the necessary regulatory approvals, enable PHPC to be used at more than about 600,000 QRPH merchant locations across the Philippines. From groceries to food delivery and utility bills, Filipino users will be able to make Ronin wallet-based crypto payments in everyday life.

QRPH is a national standard payment system introduced under the leadership of the Philippine central bank and is a core digital payment infrastructure in the Philippines that handles billions of transactions annually. According to the BSP, digital payments accounted for 57.4% of total retail transactions the year before last, exceeding the national target, and more than 66% of individual merchant payments were made digitally. The Philippines was also one of the world's largest recipients of remittances last year, recording remittances of USD 40.2 billion (approximately KRW 58.96 trillion). These figures suggest the large size of the payments market within the Philippines and high demand for new payment options.

PHPC is a cryptocurrency issued on Ronin in July 2024 and is designed to be pegged so that 1 PHPC equals 1 Philippine peso. Reserves and liquidity are managed by Coins.ph, a virtual asset service provider (VASP) regulated by the BSP, and it is currently operating within the BSP sandbox.

Wei Zhou, head of Coins.ph, said, "If we obtain the relevant approvals, the integration of PHPC into QRPH will change the landscape of the payment market," adding, "In the future, scanning a QR code and paying with PHPC will become as simple as using a regular mobile wallet."

Jeffrey Zirlin, co-founder of Sky Mavis, said, "This is the moment when the trend that began in 2021 during the pandemic—when some shops started accepting payments in Axie Infinity's core assets AXS (governance token) and SLP (in-game reward token)—is finally coming full circle," adding, "Many Ronin wallet users in the Philippines will be able to naturally convert in-game items and tokens into food, transportation costs, and everyday necessities."