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> Sending remittance to family overseas without 10% wasted in fees. I just looked at TransferWise, and it seems like the rate is about 0.7-2.5% depending on th

> Sending remittance to family overseas without 10% wasted in fees. I just looked at TransferWise, and it seems like the rate is about 0.7-2.5% depending on the pair of currencies. I found this post of transferring 1000 USD -> EUR via BTC which claimed to have done so for $14: https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/25583/does-it-make-sense-to-use-bitcoin-to-transfer-money-to-yourself-internationally https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/25583/does-it-ma... TransferWise asks $10 for this. So in the same ballpark, but not necessarily any better. > Escaping inflation in Venezuela/Argentina/whoeverisnext. Who is going to sell you Bitcoins for Venezuelan Bolivars? The only people who want Bolivars are those who need it to purchase goods in Venezuela, and are only going to buy enough Bolivar for their spending in the next week tops because keeping any more in Bolivar would be crazy. It also assumes that the people with capital (eg Bitcoin) haven't already just fled the country, e.g. https://www.economist.com/news/americas/21721944-latin-america-wakes-up-its-biggest-headache-venezuelas-crisis-spills-over https://www.economist.com/news/americas/21721944-latin-ameri... And how do they get Bitcoin anyway? I mean, you could use your subsidised electricity to mine it, but then you get arrested because it's sort of obvious: http://reason.com/blog/2017/02/03/venezuela-surbitcoin-arrests-mining http://reason.com/blog/2017/02/03/venezuela-surbitcoin-arres... > Allowing merchants to save 2% in credit card fees (which doubles their profit margin if it was 2% to begin with). Well that would be cool, but Bitcoin has it's own fees, and an unacceptably long delay for any IRL purchases and inherent currency risk on every transaction. >> Allowing merchants to sell in industries prone to credit card fraud. Etc. WRT fraud, merchants certainly want transactions to be irreversible, but since we're all terrible at security, being able to reverse transactions is quite useful for dealing with criminals who would try and steal your money.

marcosdumay 9y ago
> WRT fraud, merchants certainly want transactions to be irreversible, but since we're all terrible at security, being able to reverse transactions is quite useful for dealing with criminals who would try and steal your money. It's more a point about how the horrible service from the current transfer processors is opening a niche for different kinds of transfers to prosper. Somehow, that niche hasn't attracted good quality processors (I blame it on widespread corruption), so it's left open for unofficial money. That's an opportunity, yes. But I am nor sure it can be fully taken before official processors close it.
mrb 9y ago
"I just looked at TransferWise, and it seems like the rate is about 0.7-2.5% depending on the pair of currencies." Average remittance fees, worldwide, are ~7%. "Who is going to sell you Bitcoins for Venezuelan Bolivars? " No Bolivars involved. Venezuelan bitcoiners typically acquire BTC by selling services or products (sometimes internationally) while receiving payment in BTC. "Well that would be cool, but Bitcoin has it's own fees, and an unacceptably long delay for any IRL purchases" Fees are low: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14926127 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14926127 There is no delay, IRL merchants usually accept 0-conf tx. "we're all terrible at security," Hardware wallets have largely solved this. There has never been a single case of BTC stolen from a hw wallet.

marcosdumay 9y ago

> WRT fraud, merchants certainly want transactions to be irreversible, but since we're all terrible at security, being able to reverse transactions is quite useful for dealing with criminals who would try and steal your money. It's more a point about how the horrible service from the current transfer processors is opening a niche for different kinds of transfers to prosper. Somehow, that niche hasn't attracted good quality processors (I blame it on widespread corruption), so it's left open for unofficial money. That's an opportunity, yes. But I am nor sure it can be fully taken before official processors close it.

mrb 9y ago

"I just looked at TransferWise, and it seems like the rate is about 0.7-2.5% depending on the pair of currencies." Average remittance fees, worldwide, are ~7%. "Who is going to sell you Bitcoins for Venezuelan Bolivars? " No Bolivars involved. Venezuelan bitcoiners typically acquire BTC by selling services or products (sometimes internationally) while receiving payment in BTC. "Well that would be cool, but Bitcoin has it's own fees, and an unacceptably long delay for any IRL purchases" Fees are low: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14926127 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14926127 There is no delay, IRL merchants usually accept 0-conf tx. "we're all terrible at security," Hardware wallets have largely solved this. There has never been a single case of BTC stolen from a hw wallet.