Western Union announced a partnership with Coinbase

Official source http://www.coindesk.com
Speaking at the MoneyConf 2017 conference in Madrid, the technical director of the largest Western Union money transfer operator, David Thompson, spoke about the concerns of the company's clients about the relationship between crypto currency and money transfers.
"I do not have an answer to the question whether the digital currency will destroy money transfer business," he said. - Demand for crypto currency in many markets of developing countries Western Union is growing, but regulators are afraid of their anonymity, so they refuse to use them. "
Despite this, since the fall of 2016, Western Union has been cooperating with the Coinbase digital wallets platform - as part of the pilot, the company will appear in the Exchange web application. Thompson specified that the application is not intended for operations with digital currency, but for the transmission of fiat.
"Until the digital currencies are regulated and incorporated into the law, we will not include it in the platform. We are directly connected with the regulators, they will not allow us to accept the crypto currency, "he said.
Within the framework of the conference, Thompson also talked about other projects related to the blockbuster on which Western Union operates.
After the pilot project with Ripple failed (apparently, there was not a wide acceptance among banks), the team continued to explore possible options for using this technology.
According to Thompson, one of the main projects will be the standardization of banking integration on the basis of the blockbuster - now the Western Union application unites about 2 billion bank accounts.
Other options include the use of blockage in the project to implement KYC, in particular to reduce costs in this area, which reach about $ 240 billion a year and the use of blocking equipment for real-time calculations using "smart contracts".
"Can alternative methods of payment include digital currencies?" It can happen over time, as changes take place in regulation around the world, "Thomson said.