American online shoppers who buy something from Aliexpress can now get 3.5 to 5 percent of their money back in bitcoin thanks to Lolli. They announced a partnership with Chinese shopping giant Alibaba Group on Monday November 11th. The announcement covers AliExpress and all other online websites within the Alibaba Group.
Consumers are able to get bitcoin back by installing the Lolli browser extension, activating the app and shopping on partnered websites. Besides website from Alibaba, the bitcoin-back customer loyalty service also works on websites like Hotels.com, Walmart, Gap, Hilton, Booking.com and many more websites worldwide.
Our partnership allows our users to earn free bitcoin on millions of products online every day. Arguably the most important piece of this partnership is that it supports our mission of connecting the entire world through commerce.
CEO and Co-founder of Lolli, Alex Adelman (press release)
The fact that the announcement happened on Singles Day (11th of November) is marketing genius. This is the biggest shopping day in the world. Last year consumers worldwide spend over 31 billion dollars within 24 hours. It's a day comparable with Black Friday, but much bigger.
Lolli wants international expansion
Lolli already has partnerships with several major online retailers. However, these companies are based in the United States. Stacking sats is something that's mainly accessible for American consumers. The crypto startup has the ambition to make international moves in 2020.
The partnership with Alibaba is a big first step into that direction. Alibaba is helping American Lolli users to stack sats while shopping online. Aliexpress now gives online shoppers from the United States money back in bitcoin through the Lolli app.
Alibaba already into blockchain
Even though it's not yet possible to pay with cryptocurrencies on AliExpress, Alibaba is already active in the blockchain market. Alibaba owns a Cloud Blockchain-as-a-Service (BaaS). Just like other major Chinese companies they've been investing a lot into the blockchain space. Now with the presidential approval, it's only more likely that the Chinese blockchain business will flourish.
The Chinese government is working on a Central Bank Digital Currency. When this digital yuan will be available is still a bit unclear. In July a court declared bitcoin to be a virtual property. As a result this meant that cryptocurrencies are protected by law. In addition the Chinese government has passed a new law for cryptography, creating a regulated framework for the blockchain industry.
Posted from my blog: https://www.nederob.nl/2019/11/11/buy-from-aliexpress-and-get-bitcoin-back-with-lolli/