Sad State of Trying to Spend Sats \ stacker news ~bitcoin

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1212 sats \ 16 comments \ @spiderman 14 Sep bitcoin

So, I read that Travario accepts Satoshis for flight bookings, and was checking their offerings for an upcoming trip.

For the flight of my choice, they are charging me 964, 089 Sats, which British Air (the carrier) website sells for GBP 647. That is, about a 26% mark-up for the privilege of spending my Sats.

Just an example here, but my feeling is, there, just, is not any competition among merchants to get my Sats, hence the few who do accept, enjoy an unreasonable pricing power, and Bitcoiners flock to those merchants keeping them afloat. And if any of those merchants sink, then of course, the industry takes notice as how accepting Bitcoin is not profitable at all. Sees like there is no-win for Bitcoin here.

So, the simple question is, what would it take for the merchant adoption to get to a competitive phase where they compete for Sats and Bitcoiners have more choice to use Sats as money without swallowing huge mark-ups?

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222 sats \ 0 replies \ @SimpleStacker 14 Sep

In my opinion, if you are a merchant looking to support bitcoin adoption, your first task is to build a sustainable business, even if it means accepting fiat. That means building a product that people actually want to use. Make sure you have a good product and that you can cover your expenses and be sustainable.

Alongside that, you will accept bitcoin, and you should accept bitcoin at a lower fare than you accept fiat. If your business is sustainable, you should be able to do that. Bitcoin provides some benefits to merchants, including 1) lower transaction fees than credit cards; and 2) no chargebacks from customers. These reasons alone should be enough to let you lower the rate on bitcoin purchases.

108 sats \ 4 replies \ @BlokchainB 14 Sep

I think when regulation gets better and the bitcoin wealth effect. As Bitcoiners increase their wealth and demand services to be paid in sats the market will adjust accordingly

83 sats \ 3 replies \ @fiatbad 23h

Why would Bitcoiners ever "demand services to be paid in Sats"?

If they haven't yet done so in the first 2 decades of Bitcoin's existence, what catalyst can you envision that would bring such a thing to fruition?

5 sats \ 1 reply \ @BlokchainB 22h

I think regulations is a big part. The accounting for accepting bitcoin isn’t easy since it’s not treated as legal tender. Plus the tech is still developing. I have yet to come across a seamless POS for Bitcoin in the wild.

10 sats \ 0 replies \ @zapsammy 21h

NO; say NO to regulation of all kind, and little by little people will stop paying attention to fiat; wen u KNOW, u say NO! rules already exist, they are summed up in a sentence "do no harm, do not steal;"

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @zapsammy 21h

what catalyst will bring real fruits? - activation of pure reason (meaning action is required); realizing that fiat is bad, and the more participants FIAT Inc. gets, the worse the products and services will become;

112 sats \ 1 reply \ @anon 14 Sep

Travala has a much lower markup

But use lightning (not coinjoin) to avoid shotgun kyc

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @stack_harder 22h

boltz swap from cold storage to a fresh lightning address to purchase the tickes?

20 sats \ 0 replies \ @standard_sats 14 Sep

It is not a competition of merchants to get your sats it is no KYC offramp service offering most of the time.

5 sats \ 3 replies \ @Undisciplined 14 Sep

The economic pressure will be towards lower markups and ultimately discounts. It just takes time to move towards the competitive equilibrium.

Right now, few merchants accept bitcoin, which let's the ones who do charge a premium. Given bitcoin's lower transaction costs, this is a nice profit opportunity for them. Other things equal, this makes them more profitable than their competitors.

Eventually, competitors notice this and begin accepting bitcoin too, and at lower markups. This drives markups down to the level that's consistent with the relative costs of handling fiat vs bitcoin.

69 sats \ 2 replies \ @spiderman OP 8h

As always, it is the critical mass and network problem. Merchants will have to pay their taxes, labours, suppliers and rent in Fiat, hence accepting Bitcoin just adds a layer of complexity, which I sort of have to agree with.

That is why I always believe the most positive signs of adoption would be when the goods

whose demand curves are less elastic
which are more essential at a survival level (for an individual, or polities)
critical industrial components or supply chain bottlenecks

are available via Bitcoin and those merchants discount it, then it will trigger a stronger avalanche than small consumer facing businesses. Here are some present examples and some others that I hope to see.

There are shops in Texas (unsurprisingly) that sell Firearms and ammunitions for Bitcoin
Emarat (one of the largest oil companies in the Arab world) allows you to fill up your gas tank for Bitcoin
Real estate sales in Florida to Dubai are being settled in Bitcoin
Apmex (Gold/silver dealer) accepts Bitcoin
Sino Global (a shipping corporation) accepts Bitcoin

But I myself have not checked whether they have outrageous mark-ups like my example in the original post.

I am hoping some copper, Aluminium, oil refiners, steel makers, ship builders, Lockheed Martin or Boeing, some cement companies, NextEra Energy etc. will get on-board with Bitcoin settlement (especially for global payments and final settlements worth like ~100 BTC or such).

They can have more base layer (pun intended) impact than cafes selling a latte or pizza for Bitcoin. But I will always wonder, what (if anything) will give them the nudge.

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @AG 6h

Merchants will have to pay their taxes, labours, suppliers and rent in Fiat

That's where this is wrong, exactly at the root. There will be no change until the majority of us continue believing in this.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @spiderman OP 5h

There will be no change until the majority of us continue believing in this.

Not the majority, but the most economically powerful and influential suppliers (I already gave examples) demand hard money in exchange for their produces.

5 sats \ 0 replies \ @Solomonsatoshi 14 Sep

Airlines are about as close to banks and governments as you get and so you are not logically going to get a better deal from them by paying in BTC.

Look at smaller businesses more removed from the fiat debt slavery bankers cartel and its associates.

I have found that when traveling Bitcoin accepting hospitality businesses tend to be above average in quality- especially food outlets.

Remember there is limited profit motive incentive for most businesses to accept bitcoin and in many cases they are actually risking adverse reactions from both their bankers and customers by accepting Bitcoin. Plus any business that asks their accountant how can I go about accepting Bitcoin is likely to get told its more trouble than its worth due to the tax recording requirements.

Just support businesses who accept Bitcoin and offer equal or better service than average- and remember that's very unlikely to be any business closely associated with the banks and governments...like airlines.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @tomlaies 16h

There are too few people trying to spend Bitcoin; there are too few merchant trying to accumulate Bitcoin.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @d680ecaa8e 14 Sep

It needs purchase from P2P can't for example earn from stacker news.