Fold is officially out of beta and has added a handful of new merchants and services — just in time for Black Friday.
The sats-back app[1], which leverages the Lightning Network, announced today, November 25, 2019, that it is now available for all iOS and Android users. Previously, it was only open to select users who requested access to the private beta (out of 11,000 requests, Fold CEO Will Reeves told Bitcoin Magazine that 3,000 users were permitted to test out the beta). These initial users spent over a quarter of a million dollars through the app for a total of $20,000 in bitcoin-back rewards.
Now, the application is open to everyone.
“We intend to become one of the top on-ramps for new users into bitcoin. Being the most accessible and rewarding way to gain first exposure to bitcoin, we hope to educate and navigate them about how to use it, save it and share it with friends and family,” Reeves told us, sharing his aspirations for the company.
Fold works a lot like the cashback giant Ebates. Except with Fold, you receive satoshis (not dollars) back each time you shop at one of its participating merchants with gift cards you purchase through the app. You can pay for the gift cards with bitcoin, or credit/debit cards if you’d prefer to hodl[2]. Once you receive your reward, you can keep it in your account, spend it on your next Fold purchase or withdraw to an external wallet.
Since you are buying store credit through Fold, the transaction on the merchant’s end isn’t subject to the charge-backs and fees that credit cards bring. These savings are kicked back to the end users, Reeves told us. This is primarily where Fold differs from other
