What can you buy with Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies?
If you didn’t buy a bitcoin on time, now is not the time for regrets. Digital assets are now above 37,000 euros. Their growth and popularity have made them go from being an unknown and residual phenomenon to symbolically appearing even in your neighbor’s purse. However, there is still a lot of mystery surrounding this product that is neither touched nor seen and that is in a constant Dragon Khan, with notable ups and downs in the last year. Some fluctuations that, according to experts, respond to the still speculative current more than to its short-term future as real money to use, with which to be able to pay.
According to data from Bitpanda, 10% of the Spanish population uses or owns cryptocurrencies, which means almost five million people within the crypto space. One of the key questions is what can I buy with these digital currencies and in what places? Well, for now not in too many physical places like restaurants or street shops, but you can pay. In Madrid, for example, there are 120 establishments or businesses that allow their customers with cryptocurrencies, according to Coinmap. In Barcelona there would be 77; in Malaga 28, and in Bilbao, 11. We can currently buy mattresses at the startup Morfeo, soaps and other cosmetic products from the Lush brand or take a tour of the Santiago Bernabéu with our digital assets. We can also get a house – there are more than 30 houses in Fotocasa that accept bitcoins), go to the Caribbean with the Destinia online agency, buy gift cards in multiple stores or buy some sneakers in Shopify. “Today you can live totally in cryptocurrencies. From filling the shopping cart to buying anything on Amazon,” says Santos Gutiérrez, head of Bit2Me Academy. “With Bitrefill you can acquire what you need with digital assets. The operation is simple. Through this page you can buy gift cards for a certain value of money -in euros- and use them to pay in a lot of stores in Spain. Some of the businesses attached to this platform and where you can pay with bitcoins are Amazon, Carrefour, H&M, El Corte Inglés, Media Markt, Ikea, Decathlon, Nike; spend at gas stations, such as Cepsa or take an Uber ride. You can also buy cards to recharge prepaid mobile phones », he points out.
10% of the Spanish population owns cryptocurrencies, which means almost 5 million users
The expert explains that we can book our vacations in a few minutes by paying cryptocurrencies through the Travala platform, a company associated with Expedia and Booking, the popular search engine for booking accommodation. In it there are more than two million accommodations in 195 countries. As curiosities that we can carry out with these digital currencies is the hiring of detectives, mosquito fumigations or a gastroscopy, they indicate in Bit2me. “It’s not just goods that are traded on the internet, but also the entire offline offer is available. Businesses have more facilities for its implementation every day and it is perfectly possible and legal at an accounting and fiscal level”, highlights the expert.
And even if you couldn’t pay for your favorite sushi with bitcoin, there are alternatives. You can transform these cryptocurrencies thanks to pages like crypto.com, which allows you to create a card that, when you pay, will transform your cryptocurrencies into euros.
The keys
What is a cryptocurrency? “It is a digital representation of value. Just as a piece of silver, a work of art or a collector’s item has a value because there are buyers willing to pay to own it, a virtual currency acquires the valuation that its supply and demand give it”, explains Santos Gutiérrez, responsible from Bit2Me Academy.
How is its value established? “They do not have a single or stable value, since it fluctuates according to supply and demand. Unlike other financial assets, fluctuations are not always related to the behavior of the macroeconomy, an industrial sector or a company. In the case of Bitcoin – the most popular – in January 2020, it was trading at more than 8,000 euros and a year later it exceeded 34,100. It has gone from 54,000 to 37,000 in the last four months.
Where are they kept? In a wallet or wallet, which is a computer program installed on your computer or mobile phone. “Technically, what is recorded in that software are the private or access keys to those virtual currencies, which really never leave the blockchain.” Both exchanges – cryptocurrency exchange markets – and custody companies are regulated in Spain through the Money Laundering Prevention Law, and are subject to requirements to prevent money laundering (KYC or ‘know your customer’) and , from October 29, also to a registry in the Bank of Spain to be able to carry out its functions.