Reportedly, Epik’s support of far-right leaning groups and matters related to controversial financial transactions with Epik’s Masterbucks cryptocurrency has led to PayPal terminate their partnership with the hosting service provider.
Within a week after PayPal Holdings Inc (NASDAQ: PYPL) announced its entry into the crypto market, it has now cut ties with the domain registrar and hosting service provider Epik. The American payments multinational provider arrived at this decision following some financial risk issues and other problems related to Epik’s digital coin services.
It means that PayPal won’t be supporting any of Epik’s transactions henceforth. In response to PayPal’s move, Epik also posted a series of open letters. PayPal cited “service risk” as the reason behind withdrawing its support. It further added: “The matter has been reviewed at length, this decision is final, and there will be no appeals to the decision.”
Reportedly, Epik has been hosting websites controlled by far-right organizations like Gab and the Proud Boys. Earlier, Epik also offered services for 8chan but later decided to cut ties. As reported by Mashable, the major problem is with Epik’s “Masterbucks” cryptocurrency. Users used this digital currency for converting to fiat or purchasing domain services at Epik. Unidentified sources said that this Digital Coin hasn’t been processed with “legal steps”. Although PayPal went to clarify this matter a month ago, they couldn’t arrive at a resolution.
Epik has disputed PayPal’s recent actions calling them politically motivated since it happens only a few weeks before the U.S. Presidential Elections. Epik further added that PayPal’s actions seem to be against the conservative viewpoints within the country.
PayPal’s Actions “Biased, Targeted and Subversive”
Epik SVP of strategy and communications Robert Davis said that PayPal’s decision “defies logic”. He also noted that PayPal left no option for a dialogue or a review before terminating their services. Also, in the correspondence published by PayPal, there’s no mention of Masterbucks.
David thus called PayPal’s actions “targeted, biased, and subversive”. Such actions by PayPal could “serve to reduce the amount of freedom we all experience in the future,” he added. Talking to Mashable, a PayPal spokesperson said:
“PayPal has sophisticated risk controls in place to alert our teams to potentially violative activity occurring on our platforms. The company independently reviews each matter and bases its decisions on the management of risk and compliance with our long-standing User Agreement.”
All these developments come while PayPal is looking to enter the crypto space very soon. As per the market report, PayPal is also in talks of acquiring cryptocurrency custodian BitGo.
Bhushan is a FinTech enthusiast and holds a good flair in understanding financial markets. His interest in economics and finance draw his attention towards the new emerging Blockchain Technology and Cryptocurrency markets. He is continuously in a learning process and keeps himself motivated by sharing his acquired knowledge. In free time he reads thriller fictions novels and sometimes explore his culinary skills.
