Author: Wu said blockchain

The contents of this article are a comprehensive compilation of public information, do not represent Wu Shuo’s views, and do not provide any investment advice. Readers are requested to strictly abide by local laws and regulations and not participate in illegal financial activities.

In early June, the founder of Infini was still accepting interviews to promote the U card, but just a few days later, a sudden announcement of closure was issued, which triggered a huge discussion:

At noon on June 17, Infini suddenly announced that we have decided to stop the service of infini card. From now on, the use and new application of Global card, Lite card and Tech card will be suspended. We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience caused. Core functions such as top-up, withdrawal, Earn income, etc. are not affected, and your assets are safe and controllable. In order to properly handle this change, we will automatically refund the card opening fee actually paid by the user (minus any form of discount) to your Infini account balance for all users who have applied for the card but are affected. The card opening fee will be credited to your account within 10 working days without your manual operation. Refunds in progress will be returned to your Infini account, which is expected to be completed within 5-21 working days. The security of your funds is not affected.

Infini co-founder Junzhu explained: Infini will no longer do to C card business. The reason is that the compliance cost is extremely high, the profit is extremely thin, and the operation is extremely heavy. At present, the to C card business occupies 99% of the time and cost, and contributes 0 income. Financial management and asset management business have become the focus. The current path of Crypto card is still to offramp USDT and USDC and then realize the payment path from stable to fiat through the traditional payment network. It is too tortuous, too long and too expensive. Without subsidies, it is difficult to match the rates and cashback of web2. U card is not the ultimate solution for web3 pay with stablecoin. At present, infini is a centralized product, and we will fully embrace decentralization in the future. Think about embracing decentralized payment solutions. Definitely do not follow the old path of centralization.

The princess also talked about how she had sought advice from OneKey when making U Card, but she didn’t expect the same outcome as OneKey. Hardware wallet OneKey also launched U Card, but then suddenly shut down the service.

There are also speculations about the closure of the service and the recent bewildcard incident. WildCard is a platform that focuses on providing virtual credit card services, through which users can easily register and subscribe to overseas services. The platform has specially optimized the user experience of OpenAI, including automatic registration and upgrade of ChatGPT Plus functions. The platform is rumored to be under investigation.

Infini founder Christian once introduced the features of Infini Card in the latest space, including: Infini Card has always focused on serving the public and retail investors. This is also the original intention when we were founded. Unlike the VIP user-oriented Crypto Card launched by the exchange, our card is more user-friendly and practical for ordinary users. Crypto Card itself is actually a "thankless" product, but we always insist on starting from the user's perspective to improve the experience. The rate is transparent and very competitive. Especially in terms of US dollar standard, our current card swiping fee is one thousand (ie 0.1%), which is the lowest in the entire market. In the future, we also plan to further reduce costs through more optimization methods and maintain long-term price advantages. It is also the most special part that we provide the income function of the balance in the card. This is not common in the market. Many users will keep some U (USDT) in the card for daily use, and we provide current financial management income to hedge the wear and tear during consumption. These profits come from the strategies we are building that have performed well in actual tests. Some of these strategies are even unique solutions that are difficult to find on other DeFi platforms. We are also willing to open them up to users for sharing.

@knowyourself518 tweeted that for the U card business, the fine for an internal report-induced investigation may far exceed the license cost, and a heavy fine may be the end; if the ambiguity of the on-chain capital flow (such as proving the source of funds) is added, the compliance cost will rise exponentially. There are endless cases of U cards being abused by fraud gangs, but the platform does not have the "contract fee" hematopoietic ability of the exchange, and is forced to directly undertake the risks of retail investors, which is easy to cause problems in long-term operation.

What’s even more cruel is that the card organization/upstream bank will pass all the fines for AML vulnerabilities to the card issuer, and the deposit will be deducted at the lightest, and the license will be revoked at the worst — while the intermediary agency only collects money. Buying a bank is useless. If the card organization is not satisfied with the fine, the bank will be the main body. If the fine is not paid, Visa/Mastercard will be kicked out, so buying a bank does not solve the fundamental problem. The actual cost borne by users is far more than 1-2% transaction fee: card opening fee, exchange loss, recharge friction... The average real rate of the industry without subsidies is 3-5%. Compared with the handling fee advantage of traditional credit card giants (Visa/MC) under huge turnover, U card has no competitiveness in small-amount scenarios. If there is no large subsidy, ordinary users will not pay for it at all. Crypto Card is a low-profit project that requires a large amount of turnover and asset precipitation to make a profit. It is also very resource-intensive, but with the expansion of business scale, compliance costs and operating costs will increase significantly. Therefore, in general, being able to scale up is the key, and it is best to have synergy with the main business.

It is worth noting that the card organizations, upstream banks and payment channel providers collect fees and fines, while all operational risks (asset management failures, regulatory fines, fraud losses) are borne by the startups. This essentially becomes a gamble for compliance arbitrageurs to reap Web3 VCs. Therefore, U Card is not a good business. Payment itself is not very profitable, and C-end finance with strong compliance attributes is not a bone that startup teams can chew.

Although Infini eventually announced its withdrawal, the U-card track is still very hot. On March 14, 2025, RedotPay announced the successful completion of a $40 million Series A financing round led by Lightspeed. Following the commitment in December 2024, HSG and Galaxy Ventures also provided a large investment. DST Global Partners, Accel, Vertex Ventures (a venture capital firm backed by Temasek) and other investors also participated in this round of financing.

At the State of Crypto conference in June, Coinbase announced a partnership with American Express to launch the "Coinbase One Card" credit card, which provides Bitcoin consumption rewards and staking rewards. The company also joined hands with Shopify and Stripe to expand the USDC payment map, allowing stablecoins to move from on-chain to physical consumption.

@portal_kay once disassembled the birth of a U card, including card organizations, BIN providers, card issuers, card program managers, fiat-cryptocurrency exchangers, card production & technology integration service providers. In the U card (virtual credit card or payment tool) ecosystem, the upstream and downstream partnerships have clear division of labor, covering the following roles: card organizations (such as Visa, MasterCard) as the upstream, formulate rules, build a global payment and clearing network, and assign bank card identification numbers (BIN) (the first 6 digits of the card number) to licensed financial institutions. BIN providers (such as Evolve Bank, Railsr) are licensed banks or payment institutions responsible for applying for and managing BINs, reviewing cooperation qualifications, allowing project parties to issue cards, and assisting in supervision and settlement. Card issuers (such as REAP, Airwallex) create user card accounts, perform KYC/KYT compliance, host fiat currencies and handle transaction clearing, and usually do not directly handle cryptocurrencies. The card program manager (such as Bybit Card, Bitget Card) is the core of the U card project, responsible for product design, user operation, API development, risk control strategy, KYC with the card issuer, and marketing coordination with the card organization. Fiat-cryptocurrency exchangers (such as MoonPay, Circle) handle the exchange of on-chain assets and fiat currencies, such as converting user USDT top-ups into US dollars and depositing them into a custodial account. Finally, card production and technology integration service providers (such as IDEMIA, G+D) provide physical card manufacturing or virtual card API integration, support wallet binding such as Google Pay and Apple Pay, and modern BaaS companies provide SDK integration solutions. All roles work closely together to support the operation and compliance of the U card business.

Compliance risk is still the biggest obstacle for U cards. FinTax pointed out that the use of U cards also requires attention to several legal risks. For example, in some countries with strict foreign exchange management, although U cards do not set an upper limit for personal deposits and withdrawals, the outflow of funds exceeding the foreign exchange quota will also violate foreign exchange management regulations. If discovered by the foreign exchange management authority, administrative fines will be imposed, and even crimes will be involved. For example, the legal status of cryptocurrencies in some countries is still unclear, and some countries completely prohibit the use of cryptocurrencies. At this time, the use of cryptocurrency U cards for transactions may also be considered illegal. Therefore, before using U cards, users should understand the basic compliance requirements of their countries and regions. In addition, users should not use U cards as a tool for illegal crimes. For example, if a user uses a U card for high-frequency, large-value transactions, or helps others cash out, it will also be considered illegal operations or money laundering activities and face criminal penalties.

Due to the support of anonymity or fewer real-name requirements, some users hope to evade taxes through U cards, such as using U cards to conceal the source of income, thereby reducing the amount of tax payable. However, this behavior of evading taxes through U cards is actually not feasible. First of all, although U cards have a certain degree of anonymity, most U cards still rely on international payment networks (Visa, Mastercard, etc.). These payment networks will record the data of each transaction in detail, including transaction amount, merchant information, transaction time, etc. Therefore, the tax authorities can actually still track the flow of relevant funds through these transaction records. Secondly, for cross-border transactions, tax authorities can also track cross-border capital flows through foreign exchange monitoring systems, bank information exchanges and other means. Many countries have signed the Common Reporting Standard (CRS), and cross-border capital flows are relatively transparent. In this way, tax authorities can also obtain transaction information related to U cards. Finally, in actual use, payment platforms may also conduct strict real-name reviews for large transactions. If users are involved in frequent large-scale capital flows, the platform may require additional information such as proof of the legality of the source of funds. Therefore, tax evasion through U cards is not actually feasible and may lead to tax audits and penalties.