PayPal, Mastercard, Citi and Others Join New Economic Opportunity Coalition

PayPal, Economic Opportunity Coalition

PayPal has joined the White House’s new Economic Opportunity Coalition (EOC) to address economic disparities and move things forward for various underserved communities, the company said in a press release Thursday (July 28).

The coalition will include 21 corporations and three foundations, working on aligning major investments for communities of color. Additionally, the Biden-Harris administration will provide some investments, and the EOC will reportedly work between public, private and social sector organizations to develop products and get resources where they’re needed.

Alongside PayPal, other founding members of the EOC include Mastercard, Citi, Bank of America, Capital One, McDonald’s, Netflix and PNC, among others.

There will be four main areas of focus, including investing in community development financial institutions (CDFIs) and minority depository institutions (MDIs). Alongside this, the EOC will work to support entrepreneurs and minority-owned businesses, expand access to credit for financial health and make infrastructure investments that promote affordable housing and homeownership in underserved neighborhoods.

Per the White House’s press release, the government wants to “help communities recover, address inequities made worse by the pandemic, and provide more pathways to economic growth for historically underserved communities.”

PYMNTS recently wrote that activist Elliott Management has reportedly taken a stake in the payments giant, though PayPal hadn’t confirmed or denied the reported stake at the time of the report.

Read more: Activist Investor Elliott Management Now Has Stake in PayPal and Pinterest

CEO Dan Schulman previously said the company is looking to get frequent users to try other services like online checkouts or digital wallets, rather than trying to pursue less active consumers.

PayPal found several digital payments-driven successes at the height of the pandemic, and despite a bit of a post-pandemic comedown, the company still has a market value of around $90 billion. Elliott reportedly managed more than $51 billion in assets as of the end of 2021.