Free to issue, free to keep, but the Mastercard only goes to Argentina

Updated October 2026

Licensed

Available in US

Fast payouts

18+ Only

Belo is a crypto-linked payment card that comes with a virtual and a physical Mastercard and no issuance, delivery or monthly fee. That sounds like the ideal everyday card, and for the person it was actually built for, it is close to that. The catch is that the account and the card are two different things with two different rules: the account can be opened in twelve countries, while the Mastercard itself is issued only against an Argentine identity document and delivered only to an address in Argentina. If you are reading this from outside Argentina, the honest headline is that this is not your card.

I gave it 5.5 out of 10. That is not a rejection of the product; it is a reflection of how narrow the door is. The cost profile is genuinely excellent — zero for the card, zero for delivery, zero for keeping it — and the everyday-use mechanics are strong. But a 2 out of 10 on access means that for most people reading a card review, the decision is made before the fees ever come up.

The conditions described below are current as of October 28, 2026.

Verdict: 5.5 / 10

The score breaks down into six criteria, and the shape of that breakdown is more informative than the total. Belo is a very good card that very few people can hold.

So who is this for? Argentine residents holding an Argentine ID, who want a card that spends either pesos or crypto from one balance without paying to keep it. If you live there, the combination of a free physical Mastercard, Google Pay, and a crypto balance that feeds the same card is unusual and appealing. If you do not, the card is not merely inconvenient — it is marked unavailable, and no fee arrangement changes that.

Will they give you the card?

Two questions hide inside one, and conflating them is the single most common mistake people make with this card. The first is whether you can open a belo account. The second is whether you can get the Mastercard. The answers are different, and the difference is everything.

The account is available in twelve countries: Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay and Venezuela. You need identity documents issued in one of those countries. That is an unusually wide footprint for a crypto card, and it is the part of the offer that most comparison articles lead with.

The Mastercard is a different proposition entirely. It goes only to people with an Argentine ID — a DNI or an Argentine passport — and only to a delivery address in Argentina. For the other eleven countries on the account list, the card is explicitly marked unavailable. The rule follows both the identity document or citizenship *and* the address, not one or the other. Someone living in Chile with a Chilean ID is a legitimate belo customer and still will not receive a Mastercard.

Let me put that plainly, because it decides whether the rest of this review matters to you: if you cannot produce an Argentine identity document and receive post in Argentina, stop reading. Everything below describes a card you cannot hold. Nothing in the fee structure, the top-up routes or the daily-use details changes that.

That said, the account is still a real thing for non-Argentine residents in those eleven countries, and if you are one of them, it is worth knowing that you are being served by the same app and the same support — just without the card.

How to get it

Assuming you clear the two gates above, the path is short and entirely in the app.

The identity documents accepted in Argentina are: a DNI, a foreigner’s national ID, or a passport. The stated rule is blunt — only the documents listed will be accepted, and anything unlisted is rejected automatically. This is worth pausing on. If you have, say, a driver’s licence or an emergency travel document in front of you, it will not be considered, and there is no appeal described in that rule. Check what you actually hold before you start.

Two things that often appear at this stage are not stated on that page: proof of address and proof of age. Proof of address is mentioned elsewhere as something you need in order to raise your limits, so bring it even though the signup page does not ask for it up front.

The steps themselves:

1. Open the belo account.
2. Verify your identity with an accepted document.
3. Request the card in the app, in the section called “Tarjetas”.
4. Activate the physical card once it arrives.

The card is prepaid — the pages describe it as a local prepaid card with international validity. It spends either pesos or crypto, drawn from your belo balance, and you choose which balance is debited first. You get a virtual card and a physical one.

Delivery goes to an address in Argentina only. The stated estimate is approximately 3 business days from request to arrival, and shipping is $0. If you lose the card or it is damaged, a replacement physical card costs 2.50 USDT.

What is not stated anywhere on the pages I read: what happens to your balance if you close the account. That is a real question, particularly for someone who opened an account, added crypto, and then decided the card was not for them. The virtual card can be deleted within seconds from the app. The balance question is not answered there.

Fees: what it really costs

This is where Belo is genuinely good, and it is worth saying so without hedging. Issuance is $0. Shipping is $0. There is no monthly maintenance fee. There is no tier structure at all — one card, virtual plus physical, with limits adjustable in the “Tarjetas” section. You are not being walked through a subscription ladder.

Two gaps in that table matter more than they look. The crypto conversion spread and the percentage FX fee are not stated on the card pages. If you are paying from a crypto balance, the conversion is where the cost usually hides, and here you are being asked to trust a number that is not published. The 0.30 USDT minimum on international transactions is a floor, not a rate: it tells you the smallest fee the card can charge, not what a given payment will cost. Budget for the conversion spread being the real cost until you can measure it yourself in the app.

The limits table is odd on its face, and the oddity is worth understanding rather than glossing over. The default daily purchase limit is listed as $20,000,000 in Argentine pesos — an enormous figure, editable in the app. But the consolidated monthly cap is 5,000 USDT and the annual cap 50,000 USDT, across both physical and virtual cards combined. So in practice the monthly cap governs your real spending, and the peso figure is a nominal ceiling, not a budget. To raise them you go through your profile with proof of address and proof of funds origin.

Cash withdrawal works at any ATM in Argentina, 24 hours a day, for a fee of 3% or 0.50 USDT minimum, whichever is higher. Your PIN is set in the app. You can also withdraw at participating merchants. Whether there is any free allowance is not stated.

Now let me run three ordinary payments through that table, because abstract fee tables hide the thing you actually care about.

A coffee in Buenos Aires, paid from pesos. You are spending Argentine currency from a balance that is already in Argentine currency. No conversion, no international minimum, no ATM fee. This is the cleanest possible case and the fee is effectively nothing. This is the payment Belo is best at.

An online subscription billed in dollars. Here the international minimum of 0.30 USDT applies — or 0.40 USDT at selected merchants — and foreign-currency taxes apply, with amounts not listed. Payments abroad are settled in USD and carry the same taxes as any Argentine-issued card. The exchange rate and any markup are not stated. So the fixed part of this bill is known and small; the variable part is exactly the part you cannot see in advance.

A crypto purchase paid from your crypto balance. You pay no international minimum, but you do eat the conversion spread, which is not published, plus the percentage FX fee if the merchant prices in a currency other than the one you hold. This is the payment where I would want to see a number from the app before I trusted the process with meaningful size.

Top up: how the money gets in

The mechanism is simple and, in one respect, refreshingly unbundled: the card spends from your belo account balance, and that balance is either pesos or crypto, with the order of debit chosen by you. That is the whole model. There is no requirement to hold one asset, no separate card-wallet, no reload step.

What you need to know before you send money is what the pages do not tell you. The specific coins and networks are not stated on the pages I read. That is not a small omission in this category. Blockchain transfers are irreversible, so a deposit sent on a network the provider does not support, or to an address belonging to a different network, can simply be lost or need manual support recovery with no guarantee. Networks are the single most consequential piece of missing information for anyone topping up with crypto.

Deposit fees, minimum deposit amounts and the fiat funding options are also not stated on the card pages. So the practical sequence is: open the app, read what coins and networks it lists for your region, and confirm the fee before you transfer. If those details are not visible in the app before you send, that is a reason to pause.

The withdrawal side is thinner still. Cash is available at ATMs in Argentina only, at 3% or a 0.50 USDT minimum. There is no stated mechanism for pulling your balance out to your own bank account or wallet as cash-equivalent, and there is no stated rule for what happens to funds on closure.

Paying with it every day

The daily experience is the strongest part of the card, and it is worth separating what is confirmed from what is absent.

Google Pay is confirmed. Apple Pay is not mentioned on the pages I read — which is not the same as unavailable, but it is not something I can tell you to rely on. The card is also savable in Mercado Pago, which is a genuinely useful local detail if you are in Argentina. You have both a virtual and a physical Mastercard, so you can add the virtual one to a wallet immediately and wait for the plastic to arrive.

Blocked merchant categories are not stated. This matters more than it sounds: gambling, for instance, runs on its own merchant category code, and issuers block it by policy rather than by law, with the list differing from issuer to issuer. If gambling is something you do, you would want to ask Belo directly rather than assume.

Rewards are not stated on the official pages. Unofficial figures circulate: Rankia reported crypto cashback of up to 21% in 2026, and an earlier interview with the CEO described a range of 2% to 21%. I am giving you those numbers because you will find them, but they come from third parties, not from Belo’s own pages, and I have not confirmed them. A cashback headline of that size deserves scepticism until you see the terms attached — particularly which payments count, whether there is a cap, and what currency it pays in.

What I found absent in the other direction is just as notable. The app’s own qualities are not described on the card pages, so I cannot tell you how good it is to navigate, and there is no mention of 2FA or insurance there either.

Disputes are documented, which is more than many crypto cards manage. For a rejected or reported purchase, refunds are credited in pesos within 8 to 30 calendar days. An unrecognised-charge dispute can take 30 to 120 days. A controversy claim waits 31 days from the transaction, and claims must be filed within 90 days. Escalation runs to the processor, Pomelo, and then Mastercard. Read that timetable before you assume a small sum is worth chasing.

Two general facts apply here as they would to any card, and both bite hardest on a foreign-issued BIN. A merchant can look up the issuing institution and country from the first six or eight digits of the card number, and may apply extra scrutiny when the issuer country differs from the billing address — which is one reason a card issued in one country can look “foreign” in a shop in another. Some merchants decline prepaid or foreign-issued cards for that reason alone. And a declined authorisation can leave a hold on your funds that stays for several days, typically up to seven.

What can go wrong

The most significant risk here is not a fee. It is that I cannot tell you who issues this card.

The pages I read describe the card as a local prepaid card and do not name the issuer or the BIN sponsor. The company and its licences are not stated there either. The payment processor is Pomelo, named only in the dispute procedure — which tells you who processes, not who is liable for your money. On top of that, a 2026 third-party source (Rankia) says Belo is registered as a crypto asset service provider with Argentina’s CNV. That is unofficial and not confirmed by the card’s own pages.

Why this matters beyond completeness: a card’s issuer is the institution that owes you the money when something goes wrong. When a crypto card is really a programme front-end, the brand you interact with is often not the party standing behind the balance. The general rule for this category is that the card network routes the messages and sets the rules, the licensed issuer holds the programme and your balance, and the crypto brand is frequently only a manager or front-end. Neither Visa nor Mastercard issues crypto cards to consumers directly — they license issuers, and they can suspend a programme. Visa said in November 2022 that it had terminated its global agreements with FTX, and the FTX US debit card programme was wound down by its issuer. WaveCrest, a Visa issuer that supplied crypto card brands, was suspended by Visa in Europe in 2018, closing all its Visa programmes. If your card’s programme is wound down, the typical sequence is a notice period, then loading and spending stop, then you are asked to withdraw remaining balances. I saw one 2026 closure reported by a secondary source where new loads ended 8 July 2026 and spending stopped 8 August 2026 — a single unconfirmed source, so treat it as an illustration of the shape rather than as data.

On complaints: the official pages carry none that I could find. The dedicated search turned up no Reddit threads and no Trustpilot page for the Belo Mastercard, and no Trustpilot or Google Play rating surfaced. What does exist is third-party and secondhand — one report of Brazilian App Store reviews, on a paid-report page, undated, citing problems with international transfers, delayed transactions, weak support and account verification. None of that is official evidence, and the absence of a Trustpilot profile is as likely to reflect a small user base as a clean record. But note the direction of the complaint: international transfers. That is the same edge where the card is least useful, since the Mastercard is Argentine-issued and the complaints concern exactly the payments that cross borders.

The operational risks on the security side are handled competently: report a lost or stolen physical card in the app via “Reportar”, which deactivates it within seconds; pause and resume the card at will; set a 4-digit ATM PIN in the app. Two-factor authentication and insurance are not stated on the card pages.

Support is an in-app Help Center plus email, listed on the help pages, in Spanish, with hours not stated. For an Argentine card aimed at people who may be holding funds across time zones, unstated support hours are a real friction point.

One more risk worth naming because it is invisible until it happens: transaction reversibility. Blockchain transfers do not reverse. Tether says it disables tokens in wallets on the OFAC sanctions list and has frozen funds tied to illicit activity, so stablecoins are not censorship-proof in either direction. And if due diligence cannot be completed, the applicable rules require the institution to decline the transaction or end the relationship — which is the ordinary, lawful reason an account freezes while documents are chased.

What to take instead

None of the alternatives below solves the Argentine delivery problem — that constraint is Belo’s own. But if you are outside Argentina, or inside it and unconvinced, these are the cards I would actually compare against. I have kept their scores on the same scale.

Bitrefill is the strongest of the three on score, and its funding list is the most explicit of anything in this comparison: the card page’s “Buy with” list names Bitcoin, Lightning, Ethereum, USDC, USDT, Solana, BASE, Polygon, Li.Finance, Apple Pay, Google Pay, Visa and MasterCard, with SEPA transfer supported per the terms. That is a real answer to the question Belo leaves open. Against that: a deposit spread on crypto-to-euro conversion with the percentage not stated, a SEPA pay-in fee of 1.99%, and spreads from payment processors or ATM operators on spending. Its reward is clearer than Belo’s — 2% total cashback described as uncapped, split 1% on each crypto deposit and 1% on each purchase, though the payout currency is not stated on the page and the terms say the rate is published on the website.

UPay‘s distinguishing feature is its KYC partner accepting only ID documents issued by the same country as the user’s — the same logic as Belo’s Argentine gate, but framed as a general principle rather than a single exception. You top up a wallet with BTC, ETH or USDT, with USDC also listed among supported coins; networks are not stated, which puts it in the same documentation gap as Belo. No cashback appears on the card page, though the home page lists an “Earn While You Sleep” product by title only.

Kemy is the one to look at if you want to spend on crypto terms without a home-country card — “190+ countries” is the widest access claim here, and unlimited virtual cards plus one physical Mastercard is a different shape of product. It is also dramatically more expensive: virtual cards at $15 issuance (valid 3 years) and $2 per month, or physical at $250 issuance with DHL Express included, one card per user, valid 3 years, at $10 per month. Fees run higher too — top-up $1.5 under $100 or 1.25% from $100 with a $5 minimum, transaction fee 3.5% plus $1, and $0.80 for a failed transaction. Its main-account deposit fee is shown as 8% in the summary but 5% in the section, an internal conflict on its own site. Cashback is not mentioned.

The pattern across all four: every one of these cards leaves something unstated — networks, spreads, issuer names. That is the category, not a Belo defect. Belo’s actual problem is different and simpler: it is a low-cost card for a single country, and if that country is not yours, no amount of comparison helps.

Who I would recommend it to

To an Argentine resident with an Argentine DNI or passport who wants one card for pesos and crypto, does not want a monthly fee, uses Google Pay, and is comfortable holding a balance with a provider whose issuing institution is not named on its own card pages. For that person the free issuance, free delivery, free maintenance and low ATM fee make this one of the better-value crypto cards available. Just know what you hold: funds in a prepaid balance, not a bank deposit; a processor named, an issuer not named.

Not to anyone outside Argentina. Not because the fees are wrong, but because the Mastercard will not be issued to you. If you are in Chile, Brazil, Mexico or any of the other nine account-eligible countries, you can open an account and you will not get the card.

Not to anyone planning around the cashback. The 21% figure is third-party and unconfirmed, it appears alongside a 2% floor, and the official pages state nothing about rewards. If the rebate is the reason you are looking, you are building on sand.

And with care, to anyone sending a meaningful crypto amount. Before your first transfer, confirm in the app which coins and which networks are supported for your country. The pages do not say, and a wrong-network deposit is generally unrecoverable.

Frequently asked questions

What is the Belo card?

Belo is a crypto-linked payment card offering both a virtual and a physical Mastercard that spends from your belo account balance — either pesos or crypto, with the debit order your choice. It is described as a local prepaid card with international validity, priced at $0 for issuance, $0 for delivery and $0 monthly maintenance. The Mastercard itself is issued only to people with an Argentine ID and an Argentine delivery address.

How does the Belo card actually work?

You hold a balance in the belo account in pesos or crypto, and the card draws on that balance when you pay. Choose which balance is debited first in the app. A standard debit card asks your bank to withdraw from a linked account at the moment of purchase; a prepaid card like this draws on money already stored, which means it cannot overdraw. Payments abroad settle in USD and carry the same taxes as any Argentine-issued card.

Is Belo a bank?

Not one that I could confirm. The pages I read describe the card as a local prepaid card and do not name the issuer or BIN sponsor, and the company and its licences are not stated there. The payment processor is Pomelo, named in the dispute procedure — that tells you who processes transactions, not who holds your balance. A third-party source reported CNV registration in Argentina, unofficial and unconfirmed by the card.

Who owns Belo, and who issues the Mastercard?

I could not establish either from the official pages. The issuer and BIN sponsor are not named, and the company and licences are not stated on the pages I read. This matters more than it sounds, because the issuer is the institution that owes you the money if something goes wrong, and the crypto brand is often only the front-end of a programme held by someone else.

Can I get the Belo card in my country?

Only if the answer is Argentina. The account is available in twelve countries — Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay and Venezuela — for people with ID documents issued there. But the Mastercard is issued only against an Argentine DNI or Argentine passport, with delivery to an address in Argentina. For the other eleven it is marked unavailable.

Does Belo require KYC, and what documents work?

Yes. In Argentina the accepted documents are a DNI, a foreigner’s national ID, or a passport, and the stated rule is that only those documents are accepted — anything unlisted is rejected automatically. Proof of address is not listed on that page but is required to raise limits. In the EU, comparable due diligence covers name, address, date of birth, nationality, ID documentation, sanctions screening and PEP status.

How do I activate the card and use the virtual one?

The sequence is: open the account, verify with an accepted ID, request the card in the app under “Tarjetas”, then activate the physical card when it arrives. You can start using the virtual Mastercard before the plastic is delivered — Google Pay is confirmed, the card is also savable in Mercado Pago, and Apple Pay is not mentioned on the pages I read.

How do I top up, and which coins and networks work?

Funds must sit in your belo account balance — the pages put it plainly: you need funds in your belo account. Coins and networks are not stated on the pages I read, which is the most important gap on this card. Blockchain transfers are irreversible, so a deposit on an unsupported network, or to an address belonging to another network, can be lost or need manual support recovery with no guarantee.

What are the fees for international payments and ATM withdrawals?

The minimum cost on an international transaction is 0.30 USDT, or 0.40 USDT at selected merchants. The crypto conversion spread and the percentage FX fee are not stated. ATM withdrawals are available at any ATM in Argentina, 24 hours, for 3% or a 0.50 USDT minimum. Whether any free ATM allowance applies is not stated.

Is Belo card safe, and what if I get a chargeback?

A lost or stolen physical card can be reported in the app and deactivated within seconds; you can pause and resume the card; the ATM PIN is set in the app. Refunds for rejected or reported purchases are credited in pesos within 8 to 30 calendar days, an unrecognised-charge dispute can take 30 to 120 days, and claims must be filed within 90 days. Two-factor authentication and insurance are not stated on the card pages.

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