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The main one I know of is international money transfers (remittances). Usually these have to go through an oligopoly that sets the fees and exchange rates to be
by jey 6y ago
The main one I know of is international money transfers (remittances). Usually these have to go through an oligopoly that sets the fees and exchange rates to be favorable to itself. This is the kind of market that's pretty big on the international scale, but it's completely boring and non-sensational to read about a bunch of people who are sending $400 to their moms on a regular basis.
- yyyk 6y agoAs far as I know, nearly everyone uses Western Union (Transferwise etc. etc.) for that. Bitcoin is too costly* and complicated for most people. * Two set of fees to exchange crypto to fiat + transfer fee compared to one set of fiat currency exchange + transfer fee.
- ehmish 6y agoI recall these services used to be pretty crap, bitcoin added a bit of much needed competition
- icelancer 6y agoBTC is not the only cryptocurrency used there. I've sent LTC and XRP most often, but XMR lately. tx fees need not be large (also Lightning Network exists).
- sonicggg 6y agoBut you're making an assumption here that both the sender and recipient will be using fiat currency in the end, and that crypto is only being used as means to make the transfer. This is not necessarily true.
- yyyk 6y agoIMHO, it's a pretty reasonable assumption, as very few businesses agree to be paid in crypto directly.