Payy Card
Payy · Visa
Data verified on unchanged since the sources
Worth it if you want to spend USDC without exposing amounts on-chain: a non-custodial Visa card with zero-knowledge proofs, no annual or issuance fee, keys on your device.
Avoid it if you count on cashback or SEPA transfers: there is no cashback by design, SEPA deposits are only planned and the physical card is often sold out.
A prepaid Visa stablecoin card (USDC) built on zero-knowledge proofs, focused on maximum privacy: it hides amounts and on-chain traceability. Launched on 6 August 2025 by Polybase Labs ($6M seed), it is non-custodial — keys stay on the user's device — with 100,000+ users across ~120 countries. No cashback by design; ~1% FX (Visa pass-through). EU/Italy coverage is still expanding (SEPA deposits planned).
Data & conditions
| Network | Visa |
|---|---|
| Fund custody | Self-custody (funds in your control) |
| Issuance fee | Free |
| Annual fee | Free |
| Free ATM limit | Not disclosed |
| ATM withdrawal | Free |
| FX markup | 1% |
| Cashback | Not disclosed |
| On-chain settlement | Yes |
| Contactless | Yes |
| Virtual card | Yes |
| KYC | Full |
| Privacy | 9/10 |
| Supported countries | US, EEA, APAC, LATAM · 100+ countries |
| Estimated net annual cost | €0/year |
| Regulator | Not disclosed |
| Segment | B2C |
| MiCA / License status | MSB (presumed) |
Plans & pricing
Strengths
- Non-custodial stablecoin Visa card with zero-knowledge privacy: no on-chain data exposed; live since 2025; privacy 9/10.
- Self-custody: funds stay in your wallet — the platform cannot touch them.
Weaknesses
- No cashback (by design); EU/Italy availability not yet officially confirmed (SEPA support planned); physical card often sold out.
- Full KYC required: verified identity, zero pseudonymity.
Verdict
The top-tier rating reflects a product that is now live (launched 6 August 2025) and genuinely non-custodial: keys stay with the user and zero-knowledge proofs protect amounts and on-chain traceability. The protection-side limits are the absence of cashback (by design), EU/Italy coverage that is still expanding (SEPA deposits planned), and the fact that, being self-custody, key-management responsibility falls on the user without a bank's safety net.
For the crypto-native profile Payy is among the best: a non-custodial Visa stablecoin card with zero-knowledge privacy that aims for zero personal data and hides amounts and on-chain traces. It is now live, no longer just a promise: a first-rate sovereignty tool, with full KYC at onboarding as the only real constraint.
Promp's editorial rating based on real fees and net annual cost. Promp reviews third-party products independently.
"Sovereignty" rating: score computed on privacy/anonymity (30%), fund control (20%), censorship resistance (20%), trustless/auditability (20%) and costs (10%). Same data, different weights.
Reputation
What happened to people who used Payy Card, and what users say. External signals: they do not feed the promp.it rating.
Incidents & regulatory actions
Notable incidentsDocumented events with consequences still open. Each entry carries a source and a date.
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Hack / funds theft Critical $2M ● open
Payy's Ethereum bridge contract was emptied: the company confirmed an exploit, about 1.83 million USDC taken and all operations suspended, including the card
On 24 September 2026 at 04:21 UTC, Payy's bridge contract on Ethereum was emptied. The company confirmed it the same day at 16:04 CEST: "Payy's bridge contract on Ethereum was exploited and drained of its full balance", with the investigation ongoing and "all Payy Network transactions paused including deposits, withdrawals, transfers and card transactions". In the hours that followed, Payy added that it had notified law enforcement and was working with multiple incident response organisations, that attacker addresses had been shared with law enforcement, exchanges and blockchain analytics firms, and that Payy Wallet functionality had also been paused, with guidance for users to follow later. We verified the facts directly on-chain rather than from summaries: in Ethereum block 26044909, timestamp 2026-09-24T04:21:23Z, a single successful transaction moved 1,832,149.468132 USDC out of contract 0x367c1eaF14AA06b78ce76bd0243297de79d85270, of which 1,828,589.378132 in one transfer to address 0xaa4985dbdabfaca344237d40f7e06c4a0bb57e70; the other eleven movements in the same transaction are small, from 1 to 3,039 USDC, and in size and shape look like ordinary user withdrawals caught in the same batch. The contract's residual balance is 700.752696 USDC and was unchanged as of 19:35 CEST on 24 September: nothing has come back. According to press reports the attack went through a malicious transaction on the verifyRollup function, and the funds were routed through the Railgun privacy protocol and swapped into roughly 683 ETH spread across several addresses — a reconstruction by analytics firm Specter Investigation, not confirmed by the company. Press estimates range between 1.83 and 1.92 million dollars; we report the figure we were able to verify on-chain ourselves. Payy is non-custodial and built on zero-knowledge proofs — keys stay on the user's device — but the USDC backing the Visa card sat in that contract. So far the company has not said how many user balances are affected, whether and how they will be reimbursed, or when the service will be restored.
↗ source
verified on
Public reviews
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Google Play ↗
4.1/5
362 reviews
Values from the Play page structured data (ratingValue 4.11; ratingCount 362) for the "Payy" app, same package as the iOS version (com.polybaselabs.wallet), developer Polybase Labs. US storefront. Here too the score covers the wallet app, not the card alone.
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App Store ↗
4.2/5
34 reviews
Exact figure from the iTunes Lookup API (app "Payy", id 6474760518, bundle com.polybaselabs.wallet, registered seller Zeplo, Inc., declared site payy.link), US store. Small base: 34 ratings, against the 100,000+ users claimed by the company. The score covers the wallet app as a whole, not the Visa card alone.
Weighted average across 2 public review platforms (396 reviews in total), weighted by volume. This is not our rating: it is those platforms’ average.
FAQ
Is Payy Card a safe card?
Payy Card is a non-custodial Visa card: your stablecoin funds stay in your wallet, with keys on your device, and zero-knowledge proofs hide amounts and on-chain traceability. It is not a guaranteed bank-deposit scheme: security depends on how you manage your keys.
How much does Payy Card cost?
There is no annual or issuance fee. FX carries an ~1% markup (Visa/bank pass-through). No conversion or top-up fee.
Does Payy Card offer cashback?
Payy Card does not offer crypto cashback.
Is Payy Card available in Italy?
Payy is available globally across ~120 countries; for the EU some services (SEPA deposits) are coming. Check eligibility during sign-up.
Is Payy Card custodial or self-custody?
Payy Card uses a self-custody (non-custodial) model: funds stay in your wallet and you keep control of the private keys.
Sources
- Official service page Plans & pricing · Regulatory framework · Corporate site Data verified on Jun 14, 2026
- coindesk.com Founders Data verified on Jul 10, 2026
- spendnode.io Cashback.staking richiesto · Cashback.cap eur · On-chain settlement · Annual cost Data verified on Jul 10, 2026
- cardpilled.com ATM fees · Cashback · Staking richiesto Data verified on Jun 14, 2026
Show 4 more sources
- crypto.news Latest funding round · Investors Data verified on Jun 14, 2026
- linkedin.com Legal name Data verified on Jun 14, 2026
- theblock.co OAM Italy registry · Company type · Stock ticker · Stock listing · +1 Data verified on Jun 14, 2026
- opencryptocards.com Blockchain Data verified on Jun 13, 2026