Bitcoin, the technology who’s whitepaper released exactly 11 years ago today, is moving forward into the mainstream slowly but surely.
The world’s first cryptocurrency now has futures options, has inspired a variety of different projects based on its idea, and can be used to purchase a variety of goods and services online. That latter fact, especially, is expanding even more.
According to SEMRush and reported via La Stampa, in Italy, Bitcoin is now the third-most used method of purchasing, beat out only by popular platform PayPal and then PostePay, a pre-paid service card in the country. The former averages 1.3 million transactions a month and the latter is 1.2 million.
That’s right, Bitcoin beats out traditional debit cards, cash, and more. While it isn’t the most convenient way to buy things due to its scalability issues, it’s certainly on its way there. This is also due to the fact that Italians are buying more online. In fact, the publication notes that 62% of citizens in the country have bought at least one thing online last year, and that number is likely higher this year. In total, they spent around 40 billion euros in 2018.
However, if we want Bitcoin to be seen as more of a mainstream asset in the rest of the world, it will have to increase its network speeds and potentially even fall into the regulatory policies such as know-your-customer and anti-money-laundering that are consistently lobbed at it.
