I recently went down a rabbit hole of checking out one crypto debit card after another. YouTube is practically filled with people selling you these cards for $20 or so in referral kickback. But everyone reading this blog knows 8% is too good to be true. After all, no bank is stupid enough to offer even 2% debit cards. The only time we see 1.5-2% cashback debit card in this hobby is when some naïve fintech bank comes along. The whales of this hobby jump on it and eventually the fintech ends up going out of business or removing/reducing cashback feature.
So, the natural question is what is the catch behind getting 8% cashback, especially on a debit card? Well, the answer is simple – you’re risking a ton of money to make that 8% cashback happen. You may be required to stake (i.e. hold for certain period of time, say 6 month) a rather large amount of the company’s crypto currency. And in today’s market crypto currencies are more volatile than ever.
But before you completely dip out, know that there are some soft spots. Often there is no commitment required to get 1% cashback earning debit card. There are some cases where commitment required to get 2 (and maybe even 3%) cashback card is “low enough” and you also get other benefits like free Spotify, Netflix, and Amazon Prime.
Before you commit to a card, especially one with higher tier I strongly recommend you do some research of your own. Some of the dedicated subreddit might be subject to some degree of censorship so I might suggest seeing what other folks are saying on (possibly neutral) subs like r/Cryptocurrency. More or less all the cards I will mention has a telegram channel so it might be worthwhile (and it certainly was for me) to join their telegram channel to get the feel of their community.
Binance Card (Currency: BNB)
Useful Links: BNB price history | r/Binance
This would have been a lifechanging investment if you had invested few months ago. Since then the coin has gone up in price by 16 fold. On January 1st 2021, 1 BNB was $37.97 and as of writing this article 1 BNB costs around $623. Anyway, Binance card is not yet available in US but should be available soon.
| Card Level | Average BNB Held Within 30 Days | BNB Rewards on Your Purchase |
| 1 | 0 | 1% |
| 2 | 10 | 2% |
| 3 | 50 | 3% |
| 4 | 200 | 4% |
| 5 | 500 | 5% |
| 6 | 2000 | 6% |
| 7 | 6000 | 8% |
Clearly getting the 1% cashback debit card does not require you to hold any BNB but getting 2% cashback card requires you to hold 10 BNB which is equivalent to around $6230 today. If you believe in BNB then I suppose committing $6k for 2% cashback isn’t too bad but committing to higher tier at today’s price would practically be insanity.
Now if you only care for 2% card for the sake of 2% card, then keep reading as you will find cheaper alternatives.
BlockCard (Currency: TERN)
Useful Links: TERN price history | r/TernioToken | website
| TERN Required | Cashback |
| 30,000 | 1 |
| 57,500 | 2 |
| 82,000 | 3 |
| 105,000 | 4 |
| 120,000 | 5 |
| 145,000 | 6 |
The coin amount may seem like a lot but it is worth noting that TERN is currently a penny cryptocurrency. For example, today TERN is valued at $0.010 which means 6% cashback in TERN requires you committing less than $2k.
Sometimes TERN can be found for cheaper price in other exchanges such as Bitmart and StellarTerm, so you can buy them there and transfer it to the block card.
There is a $10 referral going around. You can ask for it in our crypto currency telegram group.
CoinZoom (Currency: ZOOM)
Useful Links: ZOOM price history | r/CoinZoom/ | website
This one was mentioned by one of the readers so I wasn’t aware of these folks beforehand. Anyway, they have an exchange of their own and holding one of their card can give from 0-50% in discount in trading fees. Card rewards range from 0-5%. Platinum and above get free wire transfer while Gold and above are eligible for air drop (in short this means you can randomly get free coins). Currently the coin is trading for around 6 cents which means less than $1000 will get you Gold.
Crypto.com Card (Currency: CRO)
Useful Links: CRO price history | r/Crypto_com | website
Crypto.com’s cards are probably one of the better known crypto cards. The lowest tier, Midnight Blue, provides 1% cashback but doesn’t require you to stake any CRO. The 2nd lowest, Ruby Steel, pays 2% cashback in CRO while requiring you to only stake $400 worth of CRO. Ruby Steel also reimburse you monthly Spotify subscription fee.
It is also worth noting that Crypto.com allows new users to buy crypto with credit and debit card at no fee for a limited period of time. Obviously at this point most banks will not work but you might be able to find a unicorn, likely with your local credit unions. They currently allow you to buy over 70 cryptocurrencies which is a rather impressive number.
If you’re interested in this please consider signing up through the referral link provided below. You will “get” $25 worth of CRO upon signup. You can unlock this value by getting Ruby ($400 staking required) card or above. https://crypto.com/app/weaap29q5n
You may have noticed that the top 3 tier cards offer Lounge Key and you might be curious if it is any different than Priority Pass. Well, Lounge Key is also owned by the same company that owns Priority Pass. The key difference is that with Priority Pass you have access to more lounges. Also, carrying the card itself is sufficient for Lounge Key but as you know you need a separate Priority Pass card to get Priority Pass benefits. Anyway, I would 100% recommend against getting one of the top tier cards just for Lounge Pass as you can get similar benefits for cheaper via credit cards.
STormX (Currency: STMX)
Useful Links: STMX price history | r/stormxio/ | website
The debit card isn’t available yet but the details are as follows.
| Membership Level | STMX Required | Bonus Reward | Reward Reduction Time |
| Purple | 1x | ||
| Bronze | 3,000 | 1.25x | |
| Silver | 31,000 | 1.5x | |
| Gold | 310,000 | 2x | 25% |
| Platinum | 31,00,000 | 2.5x | 50% |
| Diamond | 6,200,000 | 3.5x | 75% |
As of today STMX is trading for 0.52 so getting 1.5x requires $1550 which isn’t too impressive. You can currently get waitlisted for the debit card.
Others
Swipe.io had a card similar to that of crypto.com but it is not available for new applicants as of late April. I think the existing card holders will get switched to the upcoming Binance card.
Almost all of my readers are US based, but if you’re EU based or have EU documents then you may want to look at 3% crypto rewards card from Plutus.
Fold App is another crypto based debit card but it doesn’t fit the mold above. Currently you can get wait listed for the app using my referral. The app has potential so it might be worthwhile getting on the waitlist now. I may have have a separate review on it later.
Both you and I get 5000 Satoshi if you join through my referral link. How much is 1 Satoshi? 0.00000001 bitcoin.
Closing Thoughts
Most of these coins will have huge volatility so there is a huge risk in getting involved in this. I also want to point out that most, if not all, of the above mentioned cards do not have 24/7 hour support.
Some, if not all, of these are really prepaid debit card so they might not work everywhere. Regardless, even if you get these cards, you should definitely not be carrying crypto as your only card.
Obligatory Disclaimer: This post is not a financial advice. Please proceed at your own risk.
6 comments
Nice Write up. Different than most.
Thanks Phillip. Took a little longer than usual articles.
I’ve tried to get the BlockCard recently, and another similar card called CoinZoom. I never got past their KYC screening, so they must have some really stringent requirements or I’ve got some unsavory features on my BSA/AML report. Crypto Card is great, but I staked a while ago before the hiked the staking requirements.
Hi Chris, I wasn’t aware of CoinZoom but I read a few things about it since your comment. Anyway, I have added it to the above list.
Have you tried contacting support? In one instance that I have interacted with BlockCard, they responded pretty fast. I think I am still in KYC phase with them 🙂
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