Two New P2P Startups Rely on Bitcoin, Social Media to Differentiate in Crowded Field

There will soon be two more ways to use your phone instead of your wallet to pay back your friends for dinner.

Two new startups offering person-to-person payment functionality have appeared on the scene: Paidly and Cashtag. Neither is yet available — Paidly is set to launch within six months, while Cashtag, founded last July, has no date set. For differentiation in this crowded field, Paidly will rely on simplicity and the use of multiple currencies including bitcoins, while Cashtag is betting on using efficient payment rails and social media.

P2P functionality is becoming commonplace in mobile banking apps, so why might users choose these apps rather than using their banks’ functionality?

Paidly is a product from entrepreneur Pranay Shah and offers payments in “three simple steps.” (The third step, the company says, is drooling over how easy the first two steps were.) Users pay a one-time fee of .01 bitcoins — about $1.23 at the moment — to use the service and can make payments in a number of different currencies. The service will also offer military-grade encryption with SSL/TSL and multi-factor authentication and is expected to be released in “a maximum of six months.”

Cashtag, as its name implies, relies on social media, primarily Facebook and Twitter, to facilitate payments. The company was founded by two veterans of Portugal’s startup scene, Celestino Alves and Ruca Sousa Marques. The service promises to be as easy to use as sending a text message (or, presumably, sending a tweet or posting on Facebook,) and is free. Instead of relying on card networks, the company says, Cashtag will use “efficient European retail payment systems” to connect bank to bank. Users will also be able to send payments using Facebook and Twitter,  and are encouraged to share “playful transaction descriptions” with friends. Cashtag is based in Lisbon, Portugal. The company has yet to launch a website.

Both services present interesting use cases for those needing to move money across an international border. Insular Americans, however, may be fine with Venmo.