Earlier in the week we covered the news that issues were being reported by Steam users who wanted to make purchases using PayPal. These issues seemed to be linked to smaller, or less commonly used currencies and PayPal’s partner responsible for processing those payments.
As spotted by the folks over at Rock Paper Shotgun. Several Steam users had noticed that they weren’t able to make payments using the PayPal option. We had covered this news earlier in the week too, Valve made the following statement:
“In early July 2025, PayPal notified Valve that the acquiring bank for payment transactions in certain currencies was immediately terminating the processing of any transactions relating to Steam”
Valve noted that this issue was not affecting the following currencies: Euros, Canadian Dollars, British Pounds, Japanese Yen, Australian and US Dollars.
Valve reached out to RPS and stated that the support issues from PayPal’s acquiring banks were linked to content issue controversies. These controversies refer to reports that Mastercard and it’s partners had begun denying purchases that may be linked to NSFW content over concerns that they might inadvertantly damage the brand. These reports were denied by Mastercard who said that they allowed all lawful transactions. Valve reportedly addressed the issue speaking to PC Gamer and suggested that these statements made by Mastercard might not be wholly truthful as payment processors had cited Mastercard rules regarding damaging the brand. Mastercard reportedly refused to discuss any of these issues directly with Valve. Check out PC Gamer’s coverage for a more info.
If this is the case then there may be no immediate end in sight as this is appears to be more than just a bug in the system. If you’d like to read our original coverage of this issue, click here.
