Today In Payments: PayPal Acquires Happy Returns; Coinbase Trading Volumes Hit $334 Billion

In today’s top news, PayPal acquired Happy Returns, Coinbase reported $1.8 billion in revenues in its first-quarter report and AirBnb sees a travel boom for the rest of 2021.

PayPal Acquires Happy Returns

Happy Returns, a startup that aims to make eCommerce returns easier for both shoppers and sellers, has been acquired by PayPal, which first invested in the company in 2019. The company has more than 2,600 drop-off locations in more than 1,200 metro areas in every U.S. state and in Washington, D.C.

Coinbase Gears Up For Dogecoin, Trading Volumes Hit $334 Billion

Coinbase, a U.S.-based crypto exchange, reported results Thursday (May 13) that showed just how much bitcoin and other digital offerings have captured popular imagination. Competition is ramping up — and get ready for Dogecoin.

Airbnb Sees Historic Travel Rebound, Teases Big Announcements

Another strong earnings report out of Airbnb for the first quarter of 2021 as the vaccine rolls out and consumers nationwide gear up to get back out there again, spurring what CEO Brian Chesky forecast to investors would be a heretofore unprecedented recovery for the travel market as a whole over the course of 2021.

Amazon, Safaricom Explore Enabling M-PESA Wallets On Amazon

Safaricom, the largest telecom company in Kenya and the surrounding area, is discussing using its mobile money service M-Pesa on Amazon’s eCommerce platform. The move spurs out of Safaricom’s global expansion efforts to recover from its first profit decline in 10 years.

NEW DATA: 46 Million Consumers Plan To Use Cryptocurrency To Pay Merchants

U.S. consumers see cryptocurrency as more than just a store of value: 46 million say they plan to use it to pay for everything from groceries to real estate. In the Cryptocurrency Payments Report, PYMNTS surveys 8,008 cryptocurrency users and nonusers in the U.S. to examine how they plan to use crypto to make purchases, what crypto they plan to use — and how merchant acceptance of crypto can influence merchant choice and consumer spend.

Soul Machines Puts A Digital Face On The Connected Economy

The connected economy is getting a bit more personal … face to face, you might say. Soul Machines Co-Founder and CEO Greg Cross tells Karen Webster that “digital people” — avatars that coach, advise and guide people through various tasks — can make everything from quitting smoking to baking cookies to getting a loan a bit more intuitive, and easier.

Regulations Could Be In The Works For Stablecoins

The debate continues to rage over whether cryptos like bitcoin and XRP are currencies or securities. In the meantime, regulators are likely to broaden their scrutiny of stablecoins — Diem, and others, included.