Who wants to use this most?
Porn companies. Their chargeback rates are obscenely high. And Bitcoins can't be "clawed back," as grubles put it.
ed: "wants to" instead of "will"
Stripe: Bitcoin
141–150 of 374 posts
Re: Stripe: Bitcoin
#142Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, but of course the exchange rate matters as well. It's trivial for Bitcoin payment processors hide an extra "fee" in the exchange rate by giving you a worse exchange rate than you'd get at Bitcoin exchanges and pocketing the difference. (I have no idea if Stripe does that or not)
We're not marking up the exchange rate. 0.5% is the only fee.
Marking it up from what? There isn't really a canonical exchange rate.
Re: Stripe: Bitcoin
#143Interesting that Stripe invested in Stellar (https://stripe.com/blog/stellar) which I couldn't help think of as a 'Bitcoin competitor'.
It makes sense that they still increase support for the more established/famous cryptocurrency that is Bitcoin but I thought they would still be interested in somehow relating this to Stellar.
Re: Stripe: Bitcoin
#144Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sounds to me like you just explained why you shouldn't want anonymity in your transaction.
There are benefits to anonymity, which arguably outweigh disadvantages. I was just pointing out that bitcoin is anonymous when used by someone with a brain. (I.e not Ross Ulbricht, who apparently sent money to an assassin from his personal wallet, without using a mixer.)
I understand that there are benefits to anonymity, but I don't think anonymous transactions are really a priority at this time, except for people doing illegal business. I certainly don't want politicians to be able to receive anonymous funding.
It's different with something like speech, where we have a rational principle that says "people can speak as a general proxy for hypothetical positions." But you can't make hypothetical purchases, and you can't represent a general population with anonymous purchases. So anonymous purchases don't have a social basis for the same protections.
Re: Stripe: Bitcoin
#145Any idea how stripe is handling confirmations? (I'm a bitcoin newbie, but I know that consensus took a minute or so the last time I had done anything with BTC.) Has that changed?
(Christian from Stripe here.) We credit USD to our user's account when we see a transaction that we believe will become confirmed. The time-delay between when the customer pushes the transaction and when we notify our users is typically less than 15 seconds and almost always less than 60 seconds.
What happens if it does not get confirmed. Do you debit the account by an equivalent amount or eat it?
Re: Stripe: Bitcoin
#146Earlier quoted context omitted.
It may not be that appealing for a dollar/euro economies, but for emerging markets where their currency is not that stable and average inflation is around 3-5% it could have great potential.
BTC is not an investment for stability [1]. And the OP is still asking a valid question, why pay BTC when that's several extra steps rather than pay debt or credit? [1] http://www.coindesk.com/price/
Mass adoption of bitcoin would certainly lower volatility, however bitcoin won't be massively accepted until volatility gets lower. It's a catch 22 game. So you are right, bitcoin doesn't seem such a good option for now, I was thinking a little bit down the road.
Re: Stripe: Bitcoin
#147What a fantastic product page. After less that 30 seconds, I knew exactly what Stripe was doing with Bitcoin, how to use the new feature and integrate it. This is great news for Bitcoin. If all it takes is one extra line of code for online retailers to start accepting the currency, widespread adoption could sky rocket. That's always been Bitcoin's crutch, simple integration. Others like Coinbase and Bitpay have made…
I think the crutch now is not that it's hard to acquire bitcoins (thanks to coinbase and friends) or pay with bitcoin (thanks to stripe and friends), no, the only crutch is why should I buy bitcoins with my dollars when I can just pay with my dollars directly? It can be useful for people who either don't have access to credit cards but have access to bitcoins, people who already have a lot of bitcoins and curious tec…
The problem with Bitcoin though is it isn't a currency. If it was a currency, if $1 USD was paid for a Bitcoin, that USD would be destroyed, not pocketed. The only people promoting Bitcoin are those who have something massive to gain, e.g. they own a lot of Bitcoin or they have vested interest in the ecosystem. Stripe facilitating this would allow them to start gathering Bitcoin, at a rate of .5% per transaction, and if perhaps will have the impact of increasing Bitcoin's value - further increasing the value of Bitcoin they own.
Re: Stripe: Bitcoin
#148Earlier quoted context omitted.
Keep in mind that the merchant fee is .5% with Strip/Bitcoin. With regular credit card payment processing, the fee is something like 2.25%. The difference could be shared equally between the merchant and their customers. Life would be 1% cheaper for everyone (kind of).
The problem with this is that, from the buyer's perspective, the price is almost always the same when using a credit card or alternative. And with a credit card, the buyer gets rewards back, typically 1% or so. So, sadly, using a credit card continues to have more protections, costs less, and has deferred payment. I don't think this is a good thing, just saying. I hold some bitcoins, but I never buy anything with the…
Ok imagine next time you buy flights or concert tickets, instead of invariably paying some $6 credit card surcharge per booking, you are offered the option of booking with bitcoin for a $2 or even no surcharge. I will definately at that stage start looking at paying with bitcoin.
Then as a significant proportion of the population (say 20%) starts paying with bitcoin, other online shops like amazon will start seeing that they are saving a LOT by not paying 2% interchange fees to cover bullshit credit card reward programs and fees. And then the number of stores charging an additional credit card levy will increase as shops are not automatically building the credit card fee into the price, and then the number of people being pushed into bitcoin will increase.
The only thing that can stop this is credit card companies effectively lobbying that shops cannot charge more for credit card payments. this has happened historically in some juristictions, but is really pretty hard to justify for any sane reason so will be unlikely to stick.
This will either really marginalise credit card companies significantly, or really force them to put the screws on their interchange fees (and greatly reduce their rewards programs).
Re: Stripe: Bitcoin
#149Earlier quoted context omitted.
It may not be that appealing for a dollar/euro economies, but for emerging markets where their currency is not that stable and average inflation is around 3-5% it could have great potential.
To be fair and somewhat blunt with facts: * Today's bitcoin / USD High/Low trading price shows a swing of a bit more than 3% * Today's Argentine Peso (ARS) / USD High/Low trading price shows a swing of 0.1% (Argentina being a country with high inflation problems)
Bitcoin might not be the current answer for Argentinians, but I believe that it has the potential to be. Just take a look at this chart: http://www.xe.com/currencycharts/?from=USD&to=ARS&view=10Y
If I were to work in Argentina I would rather get paid in BTC than ARS, due to liquidity constrains. I would probably convert most of the money to USD, EUR o CHF, but I would keep some bitcoin if I had where to spend them.
Re: Stripe: Bitcoin
#150Earlier quoted context omitted.
It may not be that appealing for a dollar/euro economies, but for emerging markets where their currency is not that stable and average inflation is around 3-5% it could have great potential.
> currency is not that stable Do you mean like a currency that was worth $650 against the US dollar a year ago, and today is worth $250 against the US dollar? That kind of stability?
In many developing countries the bar is pretty low, and while bitcoin is not that stable yet, it may well become a suitable option in a few years.
Look at the Argentinian Peso, it has lost almost 90% of its value against the USD since 2001. http://finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=USDARS%3DX+Interactive#%7...