Binance marks Australian expansion with 0% fees when buying BTC with POLipay
Binance Lite has greatly expanded its services, with online trading now and more to come later.
Binance's first AUD onramp in Australia, through a branch called Binance Lite, was absolutely perfect for anyone who wanted to buy only Bitcoin with cash at newsagents while paying a 2.5% commission fee.
But it wasn't so great for anyone else.
It was also very different to Binance's regional offerings elsewhere, such as Binance.US, Binance.je (Europe and UK) and Binance Uganda, all of which offer several coins with a bite-sized 0.1% trading fee.
But now Binance Lite is getting more on the same page, adding POLipay as an option, introducing online cryptocurrency purchases and making plans to expand its services more widely in Australia.
It's also marked the occasion with a 0% fee promotion from now until 20 March 2020, for users buying Bitcoin with POLi Payments on Binance Lite. After the end of the promotional period, fees for POLipay transactions will be 0.5%.
"This new service through the integration with POLi Payments marks the start of our larger plans to make crypto more accessible in Australia," said Binance CEO Changpeng "CZ" Zhao. "We are looking forward to seeing the increase of utility across the region with many Australians already transacting in crypto for booking travels, buying coffee and more. I would love to visit Australia one day and spend bitcoin and BNB there."
In addition to online payments, Binance Lite is also introducing an escrow feature to help protect users from fraud, and let traders lock in Bitcoin prices at the time of purchase, while waiting for their bank transfer to clear.
While it's just Bitcoin in the beginning, additional digital assets will be added throughout the year.
Also in Australia, a partnership between TravelbyBit and Binance recently saw the creation of a prepaid Binance-branded travel rewards card, which is expected to arrive in early 2020. It's expected to be compatible with thousands of merchants and major travel sites, with some exclusive travel deals and cashback programs.
In a similar vein, it's also worth noting the existence of the burgeoning cryptocurrency "savings account" space, as another growing part of the crypto space. You can earn interest on cryptocurrency holdings, easily cash funds in and can soon spend more easily in more locations (potentially including all IGAs) with a cryptocurrency rewards card.
The DeFi lifestyle is coming together Down Under.
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Disclosure: The author holds BNB, BTC at the time of writing.
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