Visa, a major payments company, is testing Ethereum's (ETH) Goerli testnet for fee-free transactions using smart contracts.
For this purpose, special contracts called "Paymasters" are used, which can perform complex tasks and manage transaction costs for users.
The main purpose of these contracts is to make it easier for people to use Ethereum by eliminating the need to own Ethereum's native cryptocurrency (ETH) to pay fees. They will be able to use any token instead. Visa's report states that this method is more flexible than the usual fee system on the main Ethereum network.
Visa has been working with Ethereum since at least 2021, when it started paying with the USDC stablecoin on the blockchain. This made Visa the first major payment network to use stablecoins to process payments.
Visa first showed interest in these private contracts in December 2022, but this feature was not available on Ethereum at the time. In March 2023, the developers made progress and introduced a system called ERC-4337 that allows these contracts.
Catherine Gu, a Visa executive, stated in a tweet that they were testing two things: paying with ERC-20 tokens using custom contracts and being able to cover transaction fees for users.
By connecting the USDC stablecoin to Ethereum, Visa could potentially use these custom contracts to make stablecoin transactions easier for users. This means it will cover transaction fees or allow users to pay with any token they want, including stablecoins.
*Not investment advice.
