Key takeaways
- Tobias Lütke, the CEO of Shopify, has been a long-time supporter of cryptocurrency.
- Millions of merchants use Shopify’s online shopping tools.
- The appointment of Lütke is expected to be finalized later this month.
Tobias Lütke, the CEO of e-commerce giant Shopify, will join Coinbase’s board of directors, the company announced on Monday.
Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong praised Lütke’s early support for cryptocurrency in a blog post, suggesting that Ottawa-based Shopify could play a key strategic role in the cryptocurrency’s future.
“Shopify sits at the nexus of three important areas that crypto seeks to revolutionize: Finance and payments, web applications, and the internet itself,” Armstrong wrote.
It’s not the first time Shopify and Coinbase have collided. The latter has long used Coinbase Commerce to provide crypto payment options to the millions of merchants who use its web-shopping service, including Pepsi and Tesla.
The addition of Lütke to Coinbase’s board of directors raises the possibility that the company, which recently announced that Mastercard would be accepted for NFT payments, is considering new retail or shopping initiatives.
“We hope to unlock crypto’s potential to increase economic freedom with his guidance, just as Shopify democratized online commerce,” Armstrong wrote.
However, a source close to Coinbase claims that Lütke’s appointment to the board was influenced in part by his good relationship with Armstrong and their shared views on keeping politics out of their businesses.
A crypto vision that is shared
Coinbase and Shopify, according to Lütke, share a similar vision of the benefits of decentralization, which is a core tenet of the crypto industry.
He said in a statement “The concepts of decentralized finance and entrepreneurship exemplify the promise of Web3 where opportunity exists for the many, not the few”
Shopify’s recent announcement that it would help clients like the NBA’s Chicago Bulls offer NFT sales, as well as the company’s decision to join Facebook’s now-defunct stablecoin consortium, reflect Lütke’s interest in crypto.
