I wish bitcoin hadn't become the go-to crpyto.
As a world, we shouldn't be encouraging the use of a currency which is literally churning out CO2 into the air when there's so many less wasteful cryptos out there
El Salvador makes Bitcoin legal tender
51–60 of 732 posts
Re: El Salvador makes Bitcoin legal tender
#52> The El Salvador President has previously said the move will open up financial services to the 70% of Salvadoreans who do not have bank accounts. Right. People who can't even afford a bank account would now all be using financial services by paying 10 dollars per transaction.
Shortsighted. If you make one legal tender, suddenly they all are more useful there. Doge transactions outside of their system for small things, their corpo BTC chain for larger things? Maybe.
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Re: El Salvador makes Bitcoin legal tender
#53Earlier quoted context omitted.
What the normal people will use in the beginning is going to be non-custodial LN based solution like strike. Minimal fees, easy to use. If you get a bit more, move to custodial LN wallet/onchain transactions. More fees, more security and less trust. And once you have too much BTC start storing them in an offline cold storage.
LN still requires periodic on-chain transactions to close and open payment channels. So either these costs are being passed along to the users in El Salvador or the wallet provider is subsidizing it.
I run 1 node and in a year I haven't yet had to reopen an existing channel.
And 3 channels are good enough for most
Re: El Salvador makes Bitcoin legal tender
#54I don't see how this is going to benefit Salvadorans. As much as I try, I can't find a use case beyond money laundering, ransomware and extortion.
They're using Strike, which has no fees, nearly instant transfers, can send globally (again for free) and only need a name and phone number. Isn't that better than a bank aside from clawbacks?
Re: El Salvador makes Bitcoin legal tender
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
What the normal people will use in the beginning is going to be non-custodial LN based solution like strike. Minimal fees, easy to use. If you get a bit more, move to custodial LN wallet/onchain transactions. More fees, more security and less trust. And once you have too much BTC start storing them in an offline cold storage.
I can see someone explaining to their grandmother about having to move her BTC to offline cold storage and storing her private keys securely or she could lose her life's savings in an instant with no recourse
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Re: El Salvador makes Bitcoin legal tender
#56Sigh. Bitcoin BTC, at 3 transactions per second, doesn't have the capacity to support El Salvador's economy. Even if Lightning worked (it doesn't), BTC doesn't have enough capacity to open channels for users at a reasonable cost. Salvadorians will end up forced to use proprietary payment networks denominated in BTC.
BTC is not cash anymore, it won't work as such. There are other cryptos that could work, we'll have to see how broadly 'bitcoin' is interpreted.
The CGT exemption will be of interest to crypto whales and entrepreneurs and may attract some, but organized crime is a concern given the nature of the asset.
Re: El Salvador makes Bitcoin legal tender
#57Re: El Salvador makes Bitcoin legal tender
#58Other governments are already accumulating BTC silently. Way too many eyes on the topic lately. There will be some FUD along the way (maybe even El Salvador banning/unbanning BTC up to few times - the classic) but I believe at some time news will start popping left and right that other countries hold BTC on balance sheets. Will eventually start with ETH too if it hasn't already. Re people below: I don't have any sour…
I’m hoping ETH and BTC are mostly sideways over the next year or so. I’d like to continue buying while it’s (relatively) cheap.
Re: El Salvador makes Bitcoin legal tender
#59> The El Salvador President has previously said the move will open up financial services to the 70% of Salvadoreans who do not have bank accounts. Right. People who can't even afford a bank account would now all be using financial services by paying 10 dollars per transaction.
Where I live ordinary bank transactions are free for ordinary consumers. I never pay a transaction fee or any annual fees. My bank used to charge an annual fee for a credit card but they have stopped charging now.
In fact in my whole life (I'm 65 so about 50 years of having bank accounts) I have never paid transaction fees for ordinary transactions (in the UK and Norway).
Re: El Salvador makes Bitcoin legal tender
#60> The El Salvador President has previously said the move will open up financial services to the 70% of Salvadoreans who do not have bank accounts. Right. People who can't even afford a bank account would now all be using financial services by paying 10 dollars per transaction.
Where I live ordinary bank transactions are free for ordinary consumers. I never pay a transaction fee or any annual fees. My bank used to charge an annual fee for a credit card but they have stopped charging now. In fact in my whole life (I'm 65 so about 50 years of having bank accounts) I have never paid transaction fees for ordinary transactions (in the UK and Norway).
Greece here, transactions cost 3 EUR. I think they're possibly free if you use the same bank, but the apps are cumbersome to use and the potential for fees is a deterrent, so nobody uses them for transactions of less than hundreds of EUR.