Visa recodes memecoin purchases as crypto

TLDR

Visa is closing a loophole that let memecoin buys look like digital media and is recoding them as crypto transactions instead.

1. Visa told processors to move Crossmint-powered memecoin purchases from a digital media merchant code to its official crypto codes, ending ordinary card rewards on these buys.
2. Users can still buy memecoins with Visa cards via apps like Robinhood Wallet and Fomo, but transactions will face crypto-specific rules, tighter compliance, and likely more issuer scrutiny.
3. This shift signals card networks are less willing to treat gray-area memecoins as harmless collectibles and may tighten card rails for other token types over time.

Deep Dive

1. What Visa Actually Changed

For Crossmint-powered checkouts, memecoin purchases were being coded under merchant category code (MCC) 5815, which is meant for digital media, not crypto. That let cardholders earn normal points or cash back and bypass crypto-specific restrictions.

Visa has instructed processors such as Checkout.com to stop using MCC 5815 for these transactions and instead apply its designated cryptocurrency MCCs (6051 for nonfinancial firms, 6012 for financial institutions), in line with its Merchant Data Standards Manual, as summarized in a community note.

A separate investigation found users of Robinhood Wallet and Fomo could buy memecoins via Apple Pay or Google Pay with those misclassified codes, a setup Visa now considers inappropriate for memecoin purchases and is moving to close, according to Decrypts report.

2. How This Affects Users And Memecoin Apps

After the recoding, memecoin purchases will still go through but will be treated as crypto transactions under Visas rules. That typically means:

1. Issuers can block or cap these transactions more easily and may no longer award standard card rewards.
2. Purchases are more likely to trigger crypto onramp-style checks, including stronger KYC and risk controls.
3. Chargebacks, fraud handling, and reporting will be governed by crypto-specific policies rather than generic digital-goods treatment.

Crossmints own policy framed supported memecoins as collectible-style fungible tokens, leaning on a 2025 SEC staff statement, but Visas move shows the network is not willing to rely on that distinction for card coding.

3. Broader Signal For Crypto Payments

Visas intervention targets the coding mechanism, not the existence of Crossmint-style checkouts, yet it sends a clear signal that card networks are tightening how they treat borderline crypto activity.

Regulators like the New York attorney general are already reviewing aspects of these flows, and banks such as Chase have challenged misclassified transactions, which likely accelerated this change.

If other platforms try similar collectible routing tricks for tokens, they should expect closer scrutiny and eventual recoding to crypto categories, especially where fraud, rewards gaming, or AML concerns appear.

Conclusion

Visas recoding of memecoin purchases as crypto turns a clever rewards workaround into a more conventional, regulated crypto payment flow. For retail users, that means fewer points and more checks; for memecoin platforms and onramps, it is a reminder that card networks and regulators are converging on stricter treatment of token purchases, even when they are framed as memes or collectibles.