After a year of secret development, Lava is introducing the first two in its suite of financial products—Lava Free Pay and Lava Exchange—that are poised to transform the way we interact with digital dollars and access Bitcoin. Speaking to Bitcoin Magazine , Lava CEO Shezhan Maredia gave an in-depth look at what these new offerings have to offer and how he hopes they can redefine the mobile self-custodial experience.
Lava Free Pay: Liberating Global Payments
The promise of digital dollars has always been seamless, global payments. But Maredia argues that the current user experience falls short. “Imagine if every time you wanted to send money via Venmo, you had to first buy volatile VenmoBucks, which incurs a fee, and then pay an additional transaction fee in those same volatile VenmoBucks.”
Lava abstracts away those issues to provide Bitcoin users with seamless access to stablecoins. “The traditional friction of dealing with other chains is completely removed. No unnecessary details are exposed in the app.”
Lava Free Pay is a trustless broadcasting service for users that offers the best stablecoin integration of any Bitcoin wallet on the market. This innovation unlocks free, instant, and global payments, making digital dollars more practical and accessible for everyday use.
Maredia explains that he plans to support multiple networks and eventually allow users to send payments across them. “Bitcoin-based alternatives can be considered once they mature.” These upgrades will integrate smoothly into Lava’s existing infrastructure, so users don’t have to worry about the technical details.
Lava Exchange: Your Gateway to Self-Custody Asset Management
Navigating the world of Bitcoin and digital assets can be overwhelming, especially when it comes to finding the best exchange rates and lowest fees. Lava Exchange tackles this challenge by allowing users to purchase assets directly for safekeeping and withdraw funds to their bank accounts with minimal fees.
“We thought long and hard about how we could provide users with a cheap and easy way to board Lava independently,” says Maredia.
After considering every market option, his team decided to build their own exchange aggregator. Using your location and market data, Lava can connect you to the exchange that offers the best rates and lowest fees for your desired trades. These services are embedded directly into the Lava Vault, reducing the steps the user needs to take to acquire Bitcoin.
“We believe that people should continue to save Bitcoin and spend dollars, and we want to give them the best tools to do so. I built Lava for those who live a Bitcoin-based lifestyle.”
Under the hood, Lava is powered by a state-of-the-art self-custody solution called the Lava Smart Key. Building on a decade of mobile Bitcoin development, Maredia believes his company offers the most secure mobile key custody system available today.
Lava plans to continue rolling out new products and is already preparing for the launch of its long-awaited lending protocol using trustless Bitcoin smart contracts.
Users can get started by downloading Lava Vault from the App Store at iOS or Androidor by visiting lava.xyz.
Lava is a portfolio company of UTXO managementa regulated capital allocator focused on the digital asset industry. Bitcoin Magazine is owned by BTC Inc., which UTXO Management. UTXO invests in several Bitcoin companies and has significant holdings in digital assets.