Coins.ph Adds BTC, ETH to QR Ph; 700,000 Merchants

Coins.ph has integrated bitcoin and ethereum into the Philippines’ national QR Ph network, allowing consumers to pay with BTC and ETH at nearly 700,000 merchants across the country.

The company added support for the two largest cryptocurrencies after earlier linking dollar-pegged stablecoins USDT and USDC to the standardized QR Ph system in April. Initial weeks of the bitcoin and ethereum rollout recorded thousands of retail transactions worth millions of Philippine pesos.

Coins.ph uses a backend process that converts crypto values to Philippine pesos in real time so merchants and shoppers see stable peso amounts at checkout. According to Wei Zhou, Coins.ph’s CEO, “The true ‘Aha!’ moment for our community occurs when they realize they no longer need to manually sell their crypto to a PHP balance first. This automation removes the psychological barrier of cashing out, allowing stablecoins to finally function as actual money rather than just a speculative trading pair.”

Transaction records from the early rollout show payments for groceries, school tuition and home appliances, indicating a range of everyday uses rather than concentrated luxury spending. The company also reported that the system uses immediate liquidation to reduce exposure to price swings during checkout.

A distinct group of users appears to be crypto-native earners-freelancers, remote workers and gig workers-who use direct crypto spending to avoid multiple fiat conversion steps between receiving and spending funds.

Regulators have issued new rules for virtual asset service providers. The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas published a memorandum requiring stronger screening, monitoring and delisting standards for tokens and coins offered to local users. The central bank set six due-diligence pillars: issuer background, market maturity, use case, transparency, traceability and security, and legal compliance. The memorandum also bans anonymity-enhancing privacy tokens and requires platforms to set thresholds that trigger suspension or delisting during severe market events, cyber threats or non-compliance.

Coins.ph completed testing for a Philippine peso-backed stablecoin, PHPC, inside the BSP’s regulatory sandbox and is in the final stages of securing approval to exit the sandbox. Pending regulator sign-off, the company plans to list PHPC on the QR Ph network alongside USDT and USDC to reduce foreign-exchange spreads tied to dollar-pegged assets. Wei Zhou described PHPC as “the natural bridge for local commerce by eliminating the foreign exchange spreads typically associated with dollar-pegged assets.”

Fintech analysts note the integration will test whether cryptocurrencies can function as practical retail payment tools in markets with high remittance flows and large unbanked populations. Coins.ph and regulators are monitoring liquidity demands, transaction patterns and consumer protection as the program scales. Transaction volumes tied to crypto payments remain a small share of the Philippines’ overall electronic payments market, and authorities continue to observe effects on market resilience and consumer safeguards.