My Journey Down The Crypto Rabbit Hole - New Insights Lead To New Opportunities
I'm pretty new to crypto but I have definitely got the crypto bug and have fallen down the cryptocurrency rabbit hole.
I first heard about crypto when Bitcoin first came out but, like many people, didn't think much about it until I was introduced to Steemit. Steemit is what I credit with my introduction to the crypto world and since then I've read quite a few whitepapers, done a lot of research, and started investing in crypto and so far I'm seeing some gains from my investments.
Dash, Ethereum, Bitcoin, Steem, and Ripple are a few of the altcoins in my portfolio and recently I have bought some PIVX and New Economy Movement (XEM).
PIVX in particular looks very interesting. PIVX stands for Private-Instant-Verified-Transaction and is an offshoot of Dash and Darkcoin which I guess were one and the same at one time.
Their website looks good and it seems to be gaining momentum and they appear to have a well thought out road map and reaching their milestones. Like Dash, 10% of their coins go to a treasury to fund future proposals.
If anyone reading this knows anything about PIVX (or any of the coins mentioned in this post) or has some insight to share please let us know in the comments below.
Some of you may know I'm moving back to the Cancun area soon so I did a little research to see if there were any groups meeting up there that were into crypto and I found a group called the Bitcuners who are doing weekly meet ups at Starbucks. I also noticed that Bitcuners got a proposal funded by the Dash community to host their meet ups which is really cool.
When I get there and get settled in I plan to sign merchants up to BlockPay. I have been talking with BlockPay CEO Christoph Hering and love what they have been up to.
BlockPay is an easy, fast & free platform that supports all of the new digital currencies (like Bitcoin, Steem, Ethereum, Dash and Smartcoins) plus Loyalty Points and eReceipts. credit
Dash has also been partnering with BlockPay on applications that are going to take crypto to the next level as far as ease of adoption for non technical people. BlockPay is ready to launch its Echo app and Dash is almost ready to launch their Dash Evolution app and the two apps have a lot of similar features.
Once I'm in Mexico, I want to invite the Bitcuners to host their meet ups at the different places that I sign up the merchants to accept altcoins. As I network with more altcoin users I will be introducing them to Steemit as well. I have already reached out to them and we've been chatting about the crypto scene in Cancun. It will be interesting to see how that develops.
I really think that Mexico is ready to embrace altcoins in a big way. The research I've been doing on it has been enlightening. Mexican bitcoin exchange Bitso are making headway into the Mexican market but what I find interesting is the number of unbanked people in the country.
Mexico has 120 million people of which 100 million have smart phones. 66% of the population (80 Million) have no banking services right now. That's a huge potential market.
Andreas Antonopoulos, a renowned Bitcoin advocate, often points out that bitcoin and altcoins like it are of particular interest to the millions of people that do not have access to banking services.
One of my favorite quotes of Andreas's is this.
“ITS NOT GONNA BE COMPANIES, I THINK THAT’S THE REALLY IMPORTANT UNDERSTANDING HERE. THE BARRIERS FOR COMPANIES TO DEVELOPS THINGS ARE MUCH HIGHER THAN SAY, OPEN SOURCE PROJECTS AND GRASSROOTS ADOPTION. IF YOU BUILD A COMPANY AROUND BITCOIN REMITTANCES, THEN THE GOVERNMENTS OR BANKS THAT DON’T WANT THAT TO HAPPEN HAVE A COMPANY TO TARGET. A COMPANY IN ITSELF IS A FORM OF CENTRALIZATION; IT PROVIDES A TARGET.” credit
That seems to be true and still the sheer size of the market in Mexico is tempting many companies to try to position themselves as the go to source for cryptocurrencies within the country. Bitso's CEO and the World Bank see the potential markets there as a huge opportunity.
“The poor rely on a variety of alternatives to formal banking services,” explains the World Bank. Savings are typically held in cash, and informal borrowing from family, friends, and unregulated lenders is extremely common. Banking is thought of as a tool for the rich in much of Mexico, while Banks in Mexico, “do not aggressively pursue low‐income clients.”
Daniel Vogel, the Co-founder and President of Mexican bitcoin exchange Bitso, claims “around 80M of the 120M people that live in Mexico lack access to basic financial services like bank accounts and credit cards. However, there are over 100M cell lines in the country.”
“People have found a way to leverage their cellphones and Bitcoin to gain access to financial services they were previously shunned away from. These include things like e-commerce payments via Bitcoin (there is no alternative if you don't have a credit card), savings/investments (it's impossible to invest small amounts of money in the Mexican Stock Exchange or to have a USD denominated bank account in Mexico.)” credit
According to the World Bank Mexico does over $27 billion in remittances a year. Remittances charge huge fees that could be greatly reduced by using altcoins instead of traditional money transfers like Western Union. Trump has hinted at putting restrictions on remittances to leverage Mexico into paying for the border wall he promised to build during his presidential campaign. This would be another nudge for Mexico to start using altcoins to transfer money across the border.
Trump also promised to halt remittances to Mexico during his campaign, until his infamous wall has been paid for. The threat has recently been scaring Mexicans into sending home larger-than-normal amounts. “We have started to see more and more people leveraging the Bitcoin network to send remittances to Mexico,” Bitso’s Vogel told BNC.
“The remittance channel to Mexico is very significant,” the company President explained, “with over 27 billion USD sent every year, there are always new players approaching us looking to improve or build new remittance offerings.” Although the exchange co-founder estimates current bitcoin volumes are “still less than 0.1%” of the total market, it is growing. “This is still minuscule compared to the amount processed by traditional remitters, but an interesting area that is seeing strong growth.” credit
I'm not sure if the network could handle that many transactions at the moment but even a small slice of it would be good for the people there and for crypto in general.
Yes, I think the time is ripe to go to Mexico and sign some people up, both merchants and customers. Maybe I can do a promotion and have some Bitcoins fall out of a Donald Trump pinata. I can just see it now, a bunch of Mexican kids beatinng the crap out of a Trump pinata and running picking up some coins. That would make a funny video and should get some interest down there.
Ref:
https://bravenewcoin.com/news/bitcoin-adoption-accelerating-in-mexico/
I'm hooked too.
Hey, I saw your proposal on the Dash forums. Good luck. I love the idea.
yeah, thanks....It's showing as passed right now...
That's great news. Glad to hear it.
his proposal passed a lot faster than mine.....I had to hustle.
Also, I met a woman who is an entrepreneur like me in Dash. She created a women of dash slack channel that is a place where we're getting a lot of traction......
Charlie has done the credit card thing before which adds credibility to his pitch. I keep hearing about slack. Got to check it out. Glad to hear your idea is getting traction.
thanks! It was quite an ordeal, but Charlie Shrem helped me through it
That is some good help. I saw his proposal passed too.
Look into adding Burst coin to your portfolio. If you have a hard drive you can mine it and its fairly simple to do. Check out https://www.burstnation.com forums. Specifically the asset exchange. If nothing else, mine it for free and turn it into coins you want on Poloniex.
What is is, a casino? Looks like it.
I really like what Blockpay is doing for cryptos. It is highly necessary for the direction cryptos are moving in. POS using digital currencies.
It's wild this new world that has opened up thanks to steemit. I would never have dreamed in dabbling in crypto if it hasn't been for this platform. Now, like you. I am a holder of several different coins and am loving the whole ride!
Me too. Steemit has got me into crypto.
I can remember early on when the crypto bug bit me in 2013, I became convinced of how it will power the unbanked when I learned about M-Pesa in Kenya and Tanzania. When I learned about how a group was developing an application called Kipochi to integrate Bitcoin remittances with the M-Pesa network, I felt Western Union and other money remittance services would eventually get displaced.
I then moved solidly into regular investment after I met a young man from the Democratic Republic of Congo. We spoke about his side business of exporting unlocked cell phones to his business partners. He told me while he could easily mark the phones up 350%, he would lose about 40% of what he made to money transmitters fees. I helped him get into Bitcoin. He could even purchase his unlocked phones through Overstock and pay with the BTC, so he didn't even have to convert into fiat.
I think the market which is a natural fit for Steemit are banking services for the crypto community.
The SBD provides a fiat peg no other crypto offers with a relatively stable rate of interest established by the marketplace. That stability is unique for people who would like to place their nest egg somewhere "safe", which is not a brick and mortar bank. In light of the current events in the international banking community, a much greater demand for something like that will be on the horizon in the near future I wold think. Work out a deal like Dash is for a branded prepaid MasterCard/VISA and I think it will make user adoption explode faster than UX upgrades, new features and marketing.
Microlending services similar to Kiva and Prosper make a ton of sense. Wallets are already established and the currency is inflationary, so the pool of funds would be there and remitting would be easy at near-zero expense. The current blogging platform is perfect for writing the pitch and interaction within the community would give the loan applicants the ability to develop social credibility and network for funding. The loan recipients could even blog about how the loans impacted their lives and potentially earn rewards, which would encourage more lending and engagement in a natural positive feedback loop.
In that same vein, another natural fit for Steemit is to become an alternative to/displace Kickstarter and GoFundMe. Again, with teh built in social features of Steemit, The individuals/businesses who receive funding could continue to blog updates and receive rewards and engagement, which forms a very strong feedback loop.
I'd love to see Steemit begin to pivot towards banking services for the unbanked of the world. That would get all of us in the Steemit community to the moon at record speed and provide services which could truly change the lives of people who need them the most.
That would be a really great way to get more people using Steemit and the new busy.org site is easier for most people to use too.
This would also be another great way to use Steem. I think I remember someone was working on an app like Kickstarter for Steem but haven't heard anything else about it for quite some time. There was also a YouTube like app that was in the works but have not heard anything else about.
Cryptos are cool and I'm looking forward to introducing merchants to BlockPay which I'll be starting soon.