Blog
Insights on cross-border money movement.
Deep dives, product updates, and field notes on cross-border payments, FX, stablecoin settlement, and global money.
From Crisis to Infrastructure: How We Built an API-First System for Moving Money
Bolivia went from banning cryptocurrencies to regulating them in less than 18 months. What accelerated this pivot was not a public policy vision, but rather a foreign exchange crisis that forced people to seek solutions on their own. We built Mesa de Pagos right at that crossroads: when the banking system was broken and the regulatory framework was beginning to open up.
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API vs. Banking Portal: How Companies Automating International Payments Gain up to 5 Days of Cash Flow per Month
There is a cost that does not appear on any invoice. It is not charged by the bank, it is not shown on the account statement, and almost no company calculates it. It is the cost of the time your money spends in transit: days in which the payment has already left but has not yet arrived, and during which that capital does not exist for anyone. For a company operating internationally, this limbo has a concrete price. And the difference between managing it with a banking portal or with an API can be several days of cash flow per month.
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How to Structure Corporate Treasury for Operations in Multiple LATAM Countries Without Opening a Bank Account in Each One
Regional expansion in Latin America carries a hidden tax that no one mentions in the board meeting: the operational cost of managing money across multiple countries. A bank account in every market. Local teams to execute payments. Capital tied up in each jurisdiction "just in case." What should be a competitive advantage turns into a chain of administrative frictions. Today, there is an alternative that does not require a single additional bank account.
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How We Built a Payment Solution for Bolivia When the Banking System Collapsed
Since 2023, Bolivia's dollar crisis turned something as basic as paying abroad into an ordeal. Banks capped debit cards at $25 a week. International transfers became nearly impossible. Businesses were trapped between a fictional official exchange rate and a black market that tripled it. We lived that problem firsthand — and instead of waiting for the system to fix itself, we built infrastructure to go around it.
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Why Blockchain Is Redesigning International Payments
The traditional financial system charges you for its own inefficiency: fees as high as 7% and five days of waiting to move money between countries. In Latin America, where remittances exceeded $160.9 billion in 2024 and represent up to 26% of GDP in countries like El Salvador and Guatemala, that cost isn't a minor inconvenience — it's money that never reaches the families who need it. Blockchain changes the equation entirely. Settlement in minutes. Fees between 0.5% and 2%. No invisible intermediaries charging for their existence. Bitso already processes 10% of the US-Mexico corridor with this model. The change isn't coming. It's already here.
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