Ukraine ranks first in the world in terms of the percentage of the population owning cryptocurrency – 12.7% (5.6 million) of Ukrainians have it. And according to the estimates of the Ministry of Digital Development, the daily turnover of cryptocurrency in our country is UAH 1 billion. Assessing the scale of the digital currency market, the New York Times called Ukraine a potential crypto capital of the world.
The law legalizing the cryptocurrency market in Ukraine, adopted on September 8, 2021, confirmed the fact that money in the form of a digital code has become an integral part of our reality. Now any resident of Ukraine can open a bank account for transactions with digital currency, and it will become much easier to buy it – cryptocurrency exchanges can work officially.
Today, millions of people around the world buy coffee and movie tickets, paying with cryptocurrency. After all, it was created, first of all, as an alternative to fiat (ordinary) money, a means of payment that is not amenable to inflation, blocking, large commissions and the instability of the banking system, since the cryptocurrency does not depend on it. Now this alternative is slowly but surely taking its place in the market – and this is evidenced by three facts.
Fact 1. Cryptocurrency is accepted in stores
Even 15 years ago, paying with a credit card caused stress for cashiers and alertness for its users. We see something similar today when trying to pay with cryptocurrency. But the process has been launched, and every year the number of companies in the world that are ready to sell goods for virtual money is actively growing. Among them are the world famous giants PayPal, KFC, Starbucks, Shopify, Microsoft and others.
In 2015, the programmer Felix Weiss conducted an experiment – he visited 27 countries of the world, paying only bitcoins during the journey. This “crypto promotional tour” made many companies turn their attention to the new currency. After that, many hotels, restaurants, booking services and air carriers began to accept cryptocurrency. Especially their number has grown in recent years. Against the background of the crisis associated with the pandemic, tourism companies are ready to master new technologies, as long as it is convenient for the client to pay. Therefore, the advantages of non-fiat money are especially actively used in the tourism sector – firstly, this currency does not need to be converted, while losing on commissions, and secondly, hundreds of thousands of trading platforms are opened for the user, where they accept virtual coins.
Giant travel services such as BitcoinTravel, TravelbyBit, Destinia and others allow you to buy flights and book accommodation using bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies in hundreds of thousands of hotels and airlines around the world.
Among the companies in Ukraine that are ready to accept virtual money from the buyer are hotels, restaurants, shops and hosting companies. First of all – in Kyiv. You can check which establishments accept cryptocurrency, for example, on the relevant international sites usebitcoins.info or coinmap.org.
As a rule, these companies provide an opportunity to make online payment in cryptocurrency along with payment with a regular bank card. The process of paying on the spot is not complicated: the cashier asks the buyer which cryptocurrency he is ready to pay with, generates an invoice with a QR code, after which the client scans the code using his phone and pays the bill from his crypto wallet. The amount indicated in the invoice will be automatically recalculated at the rate of the cryptocurrency. As a rule, after receiving payment from the client, the cryptocurrency is put up for exchange on one of the electronic platforms and credited to your account already in hryvnia.
Fact 2. Cryptocurrency can be bought by anyone
And where does the cryptocurrency come from in a crypto wallet? Most often, Ukrainians buy it on the exchanges Binance (the largest exchange in the world) or Kuna (the first Ukrainian crypto exchange). The registration process is very simple and is similar to registering on a regular website. There are thousands of types of crypto-currencies, ranging from the most popular and expensive ones – Bitcoin (BTC, the rate is $20 thousand) and Ethereum (ETC, the rate is $1.5 thousand), ending with currencies that cost less than one cent. Moreover, it is not necessary to buy a whole coin, you can buy a part of it by spending just a few hryvnias.
There are also many services that offer to buy and sell digital coins in mobile applications, on P2p platforms, as well as in specialized exchangers. Every year the number of such services is growing, and their availability and ease of use are gradually turning cryptocurrency into a familiar means of payment.
The growing popularity of the new currency has led to the fact that now you can buy digital money even through crypto ATMs, which are similar to the banking ones we are used to. In 2021, the number of installed cryptocurrency ATMs in the world increased by more than 70%. Now new ATMs are being installed at a rate of more than 52 units per day. Most of them are in the USA. For example, the American retail chain Walmart recently installed 200 terminals in its stores and plans to increase their number to 8,000. There are still about 20 such ATMs in Ukraine – in Kyiv and large cities, but their number is constantly growing.
They store purchased digital money in crypto wallets. And here the market offers a variety of options: online wallets, hardware, paper, etc. The most reliable way is to buy a virtual safe on one of the well-known marketplaces. In fact, a crypto wallet is a program, so you can install it on a computer or phone in order to have access to your money at any time and, if you wish, pay with it when buying a product.
Fact 3. Cryptocurrency is easy to pay
Until recently, the process of paying with cryptocurrencies had only one drawback – the duration of the operation. Sometimes this process took more than an hour, and this, of course, scared away many users.
But in September 2021, just after the adoption of the law on legalization, the BitsWallet service began to operate on the Ukrainian market, which, with the support of the Concord Fintech Solutions fintech ecosystem, makes it possible to significantly simplify and speed up the process of cryptocurrency settlement in retail outlets. With the help of BitsWallet, the user links a bank card to his crypto-wallet and, when buying a product, it is calculated with digital money as simply as traditional ones, including using the familiar GooglePay and ApplePay services.
The service allows you to safely buy and sell hundreds of types of cryptocurrencies, exchange, transfer, pay for goods and withdraw money from ATMs.