After the final collapse of the acquisition negotiations, the international payments giant Mastercard( shifted to a different approach—according to insiders, the company is evaluating the feasibility of making a strategic investment in the crypto financial infrastructure company ZeroHash.

This move signals an interesting trend: while traditional financial institutions remain cautious about certain mergers and acquisitions, they continue to actively explore key Web3 infrastructure investments. ZeroHash, as a provider of on-chain transaction and settlement solutions, has core business that precisely meets the needs of traditional payment systems expanding into the digital asset space.

It is worth noting that such cross-industry collaborations are gradually becoming the norm. The integration of traditional finance and the crypto ecosystem not only brings capital injections to emerging projects but also creates conditions for establishing more standardized market infrastructure.