Novi is rolling out its pilot programme to a limited number of Whatsapp users in the US. Credit: Christian Wiediger on Unsplash.

Meta, formerly known as Facebook, has expanded the pilot of its cryptocurrency wallet, Novi, to its messaging platform WhatsApp in the US.

The digital wallet, which was previously called Calibra wallet, allows users to send and receive money from within a chat using Pax Dollar (USDP).

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Novi is rolling out its pilot programme to a limited number of Whatsapp users in the US.

They will be able to make payments such as sending any attachment by selecting payments on WhatsApp and logging in to Novi account or create a new one.

Novi said in an update: “Using Novi doesn’t change the privacy of your WhatsApp personal messages and calls, which are always end-to-end encrypted.”

Meta first rolled out the Novi pilot programme this October in Guatemala and the US, through a tie-up with Paxos and Coinbase.

At the time, the social media giant said that it aims to make Novi ‘interoperable with other digital wallets’.

Other moves by Meta in payment space

Meta has been looking to tap into the payment space, taking advantage of its huge user base across the world.

While its global plans for the launch of a digital currency Diem met with regulatory roadblocks, it has been advancing its efforts in other fields.

This week, Meta launched Split Payments, a new feature that will enable its messenger app users to calculate and split expenses in group chats.

In August last year, the company established a new financial group Facebook Financial – internally called F2 – to run its payment projects.

In 2019, it rolled out a new payment service called Facebook Pay to enable its users to send and receive money across Facebook, Messenger, Instagram and WhatsApp.