Just yesterday, Live Bitcoin News reported that Amazon – arguably the biggest retailer in the world – was going to begin accepting cryptocurrencies by the end of the year as forms of payment. However, now it looks like this idea was a simple rumor, and Amazon has come out to suggest that it has no plans whatsoever in accepting bitcoin or other forms of digital assets as payments for goods or services. Amazon Says “No” to BTC Payments… For Now At this stage, bitcoin lovers should be relatively numb to information like this. The same thing happened with electric car company Tesla, and everyone’s hope and confidence were brought down almost as quickly as they jumped up. Bitcoin and other types of crypto were initially created as means of pushing checks, credit cards and
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Just yesterday, Live Bitcoin News reported that Amazon – arguably the biggest retailer in the world – was going to begin accepting cryptocurrencies by the end of the year as forms of payment. However, now it looks like this idea was a simple rumor, and Amazon has come out to suggest that it has no plans whatsoever in accepting bitcoin or other forms of digital assets as payments for goods or services.
Amazon Says “No” to BTC Payments… For Now
At this stage, bitcoin lovers should be relatively numb to information like this. The same thing happened with electric car company Tesla, and everyone’s hope and confidence were brought down almost as quickly as they jumped up.
Bitcoin and other types of crypto were initially created as means of pushing checks, credit cards and fiat to the side. These assets were designed to take over as the world’s primary forms of payment, but the journey has been slow to say the least. The currencies are often vulnerable to volatility and price swings, and thus many companies have been reluctant to engage in BTC or crypto acceptance for merchandise.
To an extent, we cannot really blame them. Say, for example, you walk into a store and decide to buy $500 worth of items. At the end of the day, you go up to the register and decide to pay with bitcoin. Well, perhaps the store is not able to transfer the BTC you paid with into fiat right away. The next morning, bitcoin’s price slumps and that $500 you paid is now worth $400. You still get to keep everything you bought, but the store has lost about $100 in profit. Does this seem like a fair scenario?
Companies are looking to avoid situations like this, and so long as bitcoin and its digital counterparts remain as volatile as they have been over the past year, it’s not likely that stores or retailers will become any more open minded.
Things Can Still Change
The biggest example of volatility arguably arrived in the past three months. Bitcoin was trading for a new all-time high of approximately $64,000 per unit back in mid-April, though not too long after, the currency fell below the $30,000 mark, thereby losing more than half its previous value. Now, with the latest news about Amazon accepting BTC payments, the currency rose back up to the $40,000 level, but with this data being null and void at the time of writing, it is hard to say if BTC will maintain its present price or fall back down again.
Despite Amazon stepping away from crypto payments, the company is keeping its blockchain expert job post up, suggesting that perhaps the company will change its thoughts in the future once it is able to understand the benefits and protocols of the space a bit more.