PayPal goes global with payments in euros and pounds as well as dollars

PayPal Inc. is making its online payment service available in euros and pounds sterling. The new functionality, which PayPal calls "Multiple Currencies," enables users to send, receive, and hold funds in euros, pounds sterling, or U.S. dollars. Until now, transactions between PayPal users in 38 countries were in U.S. dollars only.

In coming months, PayPal plans to support additional currencies, including Japanese yen, Australian dollars and Canadian dollars.

"The ability to send money in a local currency online is a tremendous convenience to PayPal members outside the U.S.," said Sandeep Lal, senior vice president of PayPal International Product. "Instead of paying other Europeans only in U.S. dollars, you can now give them what they want -- euros or pounds."

A subsidiary of eBay Inc., PayPal has more than 20 million user accounts and, in the first half of 2002, processed more than $3 billion in payments.