Visa shuts down WaveCrest - hundred thousands of debit cards not working any more

Due to non-compliance Visa Inc. shuts down the partnership with WaveCrest.

"[It is] not a visa move against cryptocurrencies, but the alleged misconduct of a single issuing bank."

The affected debit card providers are TenX, Bitpay (US exluded), Bitwala, Wirex, Xapo and Spectrocoin. WaveCrest is a payment service provider located in Gibraltar and was the only service for existing crypto debit cards.

Visa stated:

"We can confirm that WaveCrest’s Visa membership is being terminated due to continued non-compliance with our operating rules. All of WaveCrest’s Visa card programmes will be closed as a result.
Visa has other approved card programmes that use fiat funds converted from cryptocurrency in a number of jurisdictions. The termination of WaveCrest’s Visa membership does not affect these other products.”

There aren't any other debit cards shipped yet but Visa mentioned that they won't ban cryptocurrencies in general. TenX already mentioned that the will be their own issuer with a banking license soon. However, their PAY token went down in price -15% today.

Promising partnerships with Visa has been made last year with Klarna and Monaco. Klarna does not provide any cryptocurrencies and Monaco hasn't released​ their cards yet. The race for the first long-term Visa crypto provider is still going on...