What is the future of Bitcoin for the electric business?

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With the sharp rise in the value of Bitcoin, which attracted the attention of the general public to this digital currency, in 2013 the value of Bitcoin rose from $13 to $1000. As we can see, many mainstream economists are talking about the digital currency, and several countries around the world are questioning the legality of Bitcoin, and some well-known hedge funds are also buying bitcoin in their portfolios, which makes it a bit speculative. Last year, for Bitcoin, it was definitely the busiest year.

But is it the right time for businesses and E-commerce sites to start accepting Bitcoin as a means of payment?

"In the retail industry, we've seen some companies that have a crush on Bitcoin," he said. Some retailers believe that they are just businessmen and that they do not reject any form of payment transaction as long as they can sell the goods, "Mahesh Gandhe, a product marketing manager at Rackspace Digital," but on the other hand, some people are skeptical of Bitcoin , they believe that the federal government should normalize it before formally accepting and adopting bitcoin. ”

When online retailers decide whether to use Bitcoin as a way to pay, consider some of the points that are mentioned in this article:

Spend the money that you won from the dealer.

Those early owners of Bitcoin were lucky to see that the digital currency suddenly became a real tangible asset. When Bitcoin's value jumped from a few cents to $ hundreds of trillion, many early-stage Bitcoin owners suddenly got a windfall.

In essence, this feeling is like suddenly pick up a lot of money, also like a Las Vegas gambler, in the continuous win money, will be a lot of time to spend the pocket from the dealer to win the money.

In fact, many of the early bitcoin holders were easily dominated by emotion, and although they had a windfall, they were not satisfied, and recently they wanted Bitcoin to become a mainstream currency. This may mean a benefit for those early adopters who use Bitcoin for payment on e-commerce sites.

Here is a good example, that is, the electrical business website Overstock.com, they recently accepted bitcoin. Just before they formally accepted Bitcoin as a means of payment, Patrick Byrne, the company's chief executive, posted a tweet on Twitter, saying that the company had received more than 780 orders in Bitcoin, with a total sales of more than 124,000 dollars. For the merchant, they simply provide a channel for those passionate Bitcoin users to spend their new wealth, obviously, in the beginning of the Bitcoin feast, those who walk in front of the e-commerce companies will gain some benefit.

Free Publicity

Now, the number of retailers who accept Bitcoin as a digital currency is still relatively small, that is to say, the application of Bitcoin on the electronic business site is still in its infancy, so if your website accepts bitcoin payments, it will cause mass media coverage. Roger Wu is the co-founder of Cooperatize.com, and the site is now being paid for in bitcoin. In a recent article in Forbes magazine, he said, "accepting Bitcoin payments is both a novelty and a risk, but it also gives you a certain amount of exposure, as if it were an initial public relations operation." ”

Online dating site OkCupid is also one of the first big companies to accept Bitcoin, which began accepting Bitcoin in April 2013. In fact, the sales of OkCupid using Bitcoin as a payment is not too big, only about 1000 people paid on their websites with Bitcoin, but the company received a lot of free publicity, and many articles on the Internet were introduced to them because they were the first dating site to accept bitcoin payments.

Of course, as more and more companies begin to accept Bitcoin, the number of news reports will decrease, but more recently, if your company accepts Bitcoin payments, there is still a big chance of getting some media exposure.

The volatility of Bitcoin value

The current value of Bitcoin is very unstable, the companies that accept Bitcoin are now unable to convert the digital currency into their own currency in real time, so there is a risk that the value of the bitcoin will evaporate and, of course, it is likely to appreciate.

Not only that, Bitcoin also has the possibility of getting out of control, Gary Le Masson describes a specific situation on the platform prestashop of e-business Open source solutions, and assigns this possibility to a noun in which the bitcoin is out of control (Bitcoin crack). Basically, the meaning of this noun is that the price of Bitcoin will appear a sharp decline, it is possible to fall hundreds of times in a day, but Bitcoin may then appear in kind "buy up" situation, the value appears to float, in short, the value of Bitcoin is not stable, difficult to control.

Instead of using their devalued bitcoin to redeem dollars, bitcoin owners will quickly board your ecommerce website and use the digital currency to buy some tangible goods. If your site cannot update the associated Bitcoin price in real time, then as an e-commerce company, the result is likely to be the following: You receive a flood of purchase orders, but at the checkout, you will find that you have received a devalued currency.

Currency security

Nowadays, almost everything is digitized, so the holders of Bitcoin have to take some precautions for their digital assets. For bitcoin wallets, a number of security precautions have been deployed, one of the best ways to keep most of the money in an offline, encrypted wallet.

As the bitcoin.org website gives advice, they think, "a Bitcoin purse is like a wallet full of cash, for example, you certainly don't put 1000 dollars in your wallet, because it's too much cash and dangerous, and in fact, the Bitcoin wallet, you should have the same consideration. ”

If you are using a bitcoin offline storage strategy, it is imperative that you back up your wallet quickly, preferably with multiple backups. For example, if your hard drive is broken, the digital photos stored in it may be lost, as are the bitcoin wallets, and your wallet may be lost if there is a hardware failure. Backing up multiple offline digital wallets is critical because it protects your digital assets effectively.

Reduce volatility and enhance security

Many online retailers are very concerned about the volatility and security of Bitcoin, in order to help them to eliminate related concerns, the author provides some tools and platforms, may be helpful to the electric company. Coinbase, for example, is a platform that can help merchants easily accept Bitcoin as a means of payment. In addition, in order not to be affected by the fluctuation of the price of the bitcoin, the merchant may specify the price of the domestic currency corresponding to the goods or services provided by them.

At the end of the day, Coinbase can help the merchant to sum up the goods and sales of all bitcoin transactions, then calculate a total sales, and the money into the merchant's account, Coinbase will charge a certain fee, but the fee will not exceed 1% of the total transaction amount.

"For instance, the merchant can price a toaster for 30 dollars, in the background, this amount will be converted into a corresponding amount of bitcoin, and then the user can pay with Bitcoin, Coinbase will be paid by the user's Bitcoin converted into dollars," Fred Ehrsam at the SXSW convention, "said He is co-founder of the Coinbase Company, "for businesses, there is no exchange rate risk, the entire payment process seems to give the merchant more than one payment option, and faster and lower costs." ”

Not only that, but online retailers don't have to worry about the security of Bitcoin as they convert their daily Bitcoin sales to their own currencies, nor do they have to worry about too much money in their bitcoin wallets.

However, e-commerce companies must be very cautious when choosing a third-party payment platform. At the end of February this year, the world's largest bitcoin exchange Mt.Gox closed, estimating that about 744,408 Bitcoin units were unaccounted for. Since Bitcoin has become a double-edged sword because of its unregulated nature, it is important to evaluate each Bitcoin exchange and Bitcoin platform in a very cautious way if your electric company decides to use Bitcoin.

Future monetary or financial structure?

While Bitcoin cannot be seen as a real currency at the moment, its use is becoming wider and stronger. With this momentum, the future of Bitcoin seems to be moving in two ways. One way is for it to become a mainstream currency, where people can actually buy, sell, and hold bitcoin without tossing and turning, constantly swapping the bitcoin for their own currency.

The second way is that Bitcoin will become an agreement dedicated to the online currency exchange service, so that a Bitcoin trading platform such as Coinbase will offer exchange services between buyers and sellers, and in the current situation the Bitcoin trading platform will typically charge no more than 2.5% of the rate. Today, regardless of whether or not the merchant accepts Bitcoin, the changes brought about by e-commerce companies and online merchants are certainly very interesting.

(via TNW/fast carp)