Latin American E-Commerce Giant Mercado Libre Expands Crypto Trading to Chile

Mercado Libre, Latin America’s largest e-commerce company by market value, has enabled crypto trading in Chile via its digital wallet, Mercado Pago.

Users of Mercado Pago in Chile can now trade bitcoin (BTC) and ether (ETH) with a minimum amount of 50 Chilean pesos (equivalent to about 6 cents), Mercado Libre’s fintech vertical director, Osvaldo Gimenez, said in a LinkedIn post.

Mercado Pago is offering the trading feature in partnership with Latin American crypto company Ripio. The company previously enabled crypto trading in Brazil in December 2021 and started the same service in Mexico last year.

According to Gimenez, more than 2 million users have traded crypto on Mercado Pago in Brazil since December 2021, while more than 150,000 did so in the first month after the launch of that feature in Mexico.

“Entering the crypto business is another step to continue transforming and expanding access to financial services in Chile and Latin America,” said Matías Spagui, senior director of Mercado Pago in Chile. “Through this new service, we seek to give millions of Chileans access to the crypto world in an educational, secure and simple way, in order to generate greater financial inclusion.”

In Brazil, Ripio recently worked on the development of the mercado coin, Mercado Libre’s cryptocurrency token.