SoFi also mentioned "Bitcoin" and reached an agreement with David Marcus's Lightspark.

The San Francisco-based financial technology firm SoFi announced that David Marcus has entered into a new partnership with the company Lightspark. The firm, which has a market capitalization of approximately 30 billion dollars, will enable cross-border money transfers for its users thanks to the Lightspark partnership.

First to Bitcoin, then to local currency...

The system will be able to perform many transactions quickly. For example, the US dollars to be sent from the USA to another country will first be converted to Bitcoin, then rapidly delivered to the destination country via the Lightning Network, and there it will again be instantly converted to the local currency. Finally, the recipient will be able to see the money in their local bank account.

This way, SoFi users will be able to transfer money 24/7 at low cost instead of high fees and days-long transactions.

SoFi had not offered direct international money transfer services through its own app until now. Users had to turn to third-party providers like Western Union, MoneyGram, or Wise for this need.

The service will initially start with money transfers to Mexico, and later other countries will be added to the system.

After Facebook, it turned to Bitcoin

As is known, David Marcus was one of the most recognized executives at Facebook. He chaired the project created for Facebook's own currency, initially called Libra and later Diem, from 2018 to 2021.

However, states that do not want a currency outside of their control pressured large companies to leave this project unsupported.

Finally, the project could not be launched at all, and Marcus had to leave Facebook after 7 years.

The ambitious executive, who was aggressive in payments, finally established his own company. Marcus, who wanted to develop a corporate payment infrastructure built on the Bitcoin Lightning Network, founded Lightspark in May 2022, just a few months after his departure from Facebook.

Lightspark has also managed to attract investment from major venture funds such as a16z, Andreessen Horowitz, and Paradigm.

Published: August 19, 2025 17:06Last Updated: August 19, 2025 17:12