Everex: A Blockchain-Based Payment Platform That Makes Both Domestic and International Money Transfers Fast, Efficient, and Accessible

In a Nutshell: Everex is a blockchain-based platform for domestic and cross-border payments, which uses fiat backed stablecoins for currency settlements. Everex leverages its blockchain infrastructure for fast, efficient fund transfers. Users can convert fiat funds to stablecoins, cryptocurrencies or digital tokens and turn digital value back into fiat via Everex’s global payment gateways. The company is working to refine its offerings to bring more inclusive and accessible financial services to SMEs and consumers around the world.

Many investors and social media users have heard of Libra — the cryptocurrency under development by the Libra Association, co-founded by Facebook. Libra’s mission is to simplify the process of sending and receiving money online. In the process, it may offer valuable financial services to underbanked individuals around the world.

But Libra has been scrutinized by authorities around the world — including regulators in the U.S. and the U.K. They have voiced concerns about a lack of regulation and oversight of the cryptocurrency. While governments and regulatory agencies around the world take a longer look at cryptocurrencies, Everex has built a blockchain-based solution that works to make existing financial services providers more efficient and inclusive.

“We are a fintech company that focuses on the implementation of blockchain solutions for non-cryptocurrency use cases, such as international remittances and payments”, says Alexi Lane, CEO and Founder of Everex. “We work closely with the banks and financial regulated institutions to integrate instant settlements and low transaction costs to legacy payment systems used today.”

Everex is a pioneer in the stablecoin movement and cross-border payments via Ethereum blockchain technology — which allows for greater customization, speed, and savings for all parties involved.

The platform — available on iOS and Android — enables domestic and international money transfers, direct payments, and exchanges between digital and fiat currencies. Everex currently supports the U.S. dollar, the euro, and the Thai baht.

Everex has earned the approval of U.S. regulators to conduct international crypto transfers as well as crypto/fiat exchanges. The Central Bank of Thailand also signed off on the platform conducting cross-border transactions between Thailand and Myanmar.

Those government endorsements allow Everex to advance its mission of helping underbanked consumers and SMEs around the world gain access to financial services and capital needed for prosperity and growth. The company injects innovation into today’s financial services while striving to modernize the payments of the future.

Current payment processes have two significant drawbacks, the first of which is cost. Consumers end up bearing that burden of the price of the goods and services they purchase. Second, payment processing is slow and can take as long as two days — or more — to settle a transaction. And that time frame is contingent on the provider’s business hours — holidays and weekends can extend the processing time.

“Banks don’t work on weekends and holidays. If you’re a merchant, you’re sitting without the money for days,” Lane said. “You need the capital. You need to pay salaries. You need to pay rent.”

Stablecoins representing fiat currencies such as USD or Euro present an effective solution to these issues. This coin is tied to the value of a fiat currency, sidestepping cryptocurrency’s volatility — a significant drawback of holding and transacting in other internet-native currencies. But Everex also maintains many of the benefits of cryptocurrency, including security and speed. The blockchain is difficult to hack, making digital currencies tough to steal or counterfeit. And the technology is always up and running, meaning transactions can go through in about a minute.

“It doesn’t matter if the bank is closed. The blockchain is open 24/7,” Lane said. “We can send stablecoin as payment to any address any time of the day, and it costs virtually nothing.”

This technology is beneficial to merchants, but it offers advantages to consumers as well. For example, when transacting with Everex stablecoin, consumers need only the platform’s wallet app; no credit card or bank account required.

Consumers in Asia, Europe, and the U.S. can send and receive British pounds, U.S. dollars, euros, and Thai bahts. And recipients can withdraw the funds in the currency of their choice, making Everex a fast, cheap, and effective way to send and receive money.

Everex stablecoin solution is just one way the platform helps make transactions easier. Another is the platform’s EVX utility token. The stablecoin may be used for payment, and it represents select national currencies and retains a steady value. It can be used to transact in that currency while also carrying all the benefits of blockchain-based currencies, described above.

EVX tokens, on the other hand, play a different role in the Everex ecosystem. They can be used on major exchanges to convert cryptocurrency into fiat currency and vice versa.

“It acts as a gateway between fiat and crypto,” Lane said. “You can convert your cash to EVX, move EVX to the exchange, and buy Bitcoin. If you want to cash out, you just come back to EVX, move to the wallet, and cash out.”

Users who hold EVX also gain access to additional benefits on the Everex platform. One perk is a 0.5% discount for users who withdraw assets in cash or transfer funds anywhere in the world.

“By design, EVX is similar to a loyalty point,” Lane said. “When we start monetizing, your fees are paid with EVX, and you’re saving up to 50% of the cost.”

EVX tokens can be purchased directly through the Everex Wallet, and users can pay for them using fiat or cryptocurrency. They can also acquire the tokens on select major exchanges, all of which are listed on the Everex page at CoinMarketCap.

Security is understandably a major concern for anyone dealing in finance, whether with digital currencies or otherwise. At the same time, users also want easy transactions. In the realm of blockchain technology, transaction process may not seem simple, especially for novice users.

Digital currency platforms often seek to alleviate that difficulty by creating simple and intuitive interfaces. But that ease of use may come at the expense of security because, if users can easily access their funds, that means a malicious actor may also be able to access and use those funds.

“It’s always a compromise between convenience and security,” Lane said. “We’re choosing the latter because so many exchanges and wallets have been hacked. We chose this path to be more secure for the end user’s interest.”

Everex takes a three-pronged approach to safeguard its users and their money. First, for transactions that fall under a certain threshold, it deploys a two-factor authentication system.

When sending an amount of money over a certain threshold, Everex also requires the user to input a six-digit PIN code. And, finally, Everex does not store any private user information, eliminating any potential vulnerability that could be incurred from hacks.

“We take it quite seriously because we know once it’s gone on blockchain, it’s gone. There’s no way of retrieving that, and that’s the mindset we work with for customers,” Lane said.

As the debate over the regulation of cryptocurrencies — including Libra — continue, Everex focuses on using blockchain technology to bring speed and efficiency to current financial services companies and practices. To accomplish those tasks, Everex had to hit the ground running.

“The startup approach is to learn from customer experience, find the problem, then work backward to the technology,” Lane said. “But we couldn’t do that because we didn’t even know if the technology would allow us to. That’s why we had to develop a product first then apply it to use cases.”

Everex is currently looking to expand into the United States and Europe, but it is still acquiring more users and learning what they want. That information is crucial to meeting expectations and pursuing its mission of providing efficient solutions.

“You have one hypothesis, like ‘They need item A,’ and you launch the campaign and you figure out that’s not what they need. Instead, it’s service B,” Lane said. “That is constant — to learn on the job. That’s normal for startups because we’re the first to be a pioneer.”

Ultimately, Everex won’t be exclusive to major, developed markets. One of the platform’s goals is to promote greater financial inclusion around the world. SMEs can make international transactions with fewer intermediaries and lower costs. Fast settlement times also means they will have more money on hand, enhancing growth opportunities.

Everex wants to provide critical financial services to underserved consumers and help them achieve greater financial stability.

“We know what use cases we need,” Lane said. “We know what kind of users we need and the problems they have. And we keep developing the platform.”