Bitcoin has had an interesting couple of months. Previously, the world’s largest cryptocurrency set records. At one point, it almost reached to $20,000 mark before averaging to around $10,000. That meant bitcoin payments were on the rise. However, bitcoin dropped below that $10,000 mark thanks to a number of factors like regulations in countries like South Korea.
Does this mean that we’re in a bitcoin bubble? Not necessarily.
“These prices go up and they go down as well and there are two ways to frame this,” Spencer Bogart of Blockchain Capital told CNBC.
“We could frame it as ‘this is 50 percent off of its highs’ and to a lot of people that is a scary story.”
“Or we could frame it completely differently and talk about how bitcoin is up 100x or 1000 percent from a year ago. It’s a volatile currency and it’s going to up and it’s going to go down.”
“Bitcoin is definitely not dead. We’ve seen this story many times before,” said Bogart.
Rise of Bitcoin and Cryptocurrency
“Overall this pullback that we’ve seen so far is relatively mild. In 2014 we saw bitcoin fall 80 percent from its highest only to recover to fresh new highs over the past year.”Kay Van-Petersen, an analyst at Saxo Bank, adds that bitcoin could hit between $50,000 and $100,000 in 2018.
“First off, you could argue we have had a proper correction in bitcoin, it has had a 50 percent pull back at one point, which is healthy. But we have still not seen the full effect of the futures contracts,” Van-Petersen said.
Secondly, as many experts — including Due’s Miranda Marquit — have argued, “the surge in price isn’t everything. If we want to get the most from blockchain, we should see it as something beyond Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. Instead, we should see it for the potential it has to streamline businesses in other ways.”
Even if we’re in a bitcoin bubble, businesses should still embrace the blockchain. The benefits are just too good to ignore.
For the time being, however, bitcoin is still the top dog of cryptocurrencies. While there are several reasons why bitcoin is so dominant, one of the reasons is that it’s accepted by an impressive number of businesses — both small and large — from all around the world.
Overstock
The plunge in bitcoin prices definitely hurt Overstock. However, the eCommerce site was the first major online retailer to accept bitcoins. In fact, Overstock has been accepting bitcoins since January 2014.
Overstock also accepts cryptocurrencies like Ethereum, Dash, Litecoin, Bitcoin Cash, and Monero.
Microsoft
You can add money to your Microsoft account with bitcoin. However, these funds can only be used to purchase apps, games, and movies in the Windows and Xbox stores.
Expedia
Like Overstock, the popular online travel booking agency has partnered with Coinbase. This allows customers to pay for hotels using bitcoin. Expedia is expected to expand this to flight bookings and other activities in the future.
Virgin Galactic
Considering that Richard Branson invested in the bitcoin startup, BitPay, it makes sense that this Virgin Group would accept bitcoins, which also includes Virgin Mobile and Virgin Airline. In fact, the company has been doing so since 2013.
FYI. If you want to travel to outer space that will set you back 250,000 US Dollars or 98 Bitcoins (at $2572/BTC).
Newegg
Speaking of BitPay, the electronic retail giant has teamed up with the payment processing company in order to accept bitcoins.
Keep in mind though sellers who are listing items on Newegg may not accept the cryptocurrency. Also, bitcoin cannot be used for pre-orders, gift cards, and premium memberships.
eGifter
Here’s a clever way to get around a store that doesn’t accept bitcoins directly; purchase a gift card. This popular gift card site allows you to use bitcoins to purchase gift cards to stores like Target, Amazon, Home Depot, Kohl’s, and Sephora.
Shopify
In 2013, the eCommerce platform gave all of its 75,000 plus merchants the option to accept bitcoin payments. Like many other stores, this was done by teaming-up with BitPay.
Zynga
For all you social gamers out there, you’ll be happy to know that Zynga has teamed-up with BitPay to accept bitcoins for in-app payments in selected games.
Dish
The satellite television and internet provider first began accepting bitcoins in August 2014 — thanks to working with Coinbase. As a result, Dish became one of the largest companies to adopt a cryptocurrency.
Subway
Select Subway sandwich franchises around the world accept bitcoin. In fact, a customer named Adam Welsh paid for his food using bitcoins at a Allentown, PA Subway sandwich shop in 2013.
Roadway Moving Company
Roadway became the first moving company to accept bitcoins as a valid form of payment at the end of 2017. The company decided to embrace the cryptocurrency because there’s no sales tax involved.
However, the company will only process payments from a hot wallet — a bitcoin wallet that’s connected to the internet.
Intuit
If you’re a business owner who uses QuickBooks then you can include PayByCoin on your invoices to accept bitcoin.
Save the Children
You can make a donation via bitcoin to the global charity organization.
Square
The popular point-of-sale payment processor accepts bitcoin as a payment method. It also allows small businesses to adopt the payment method via their services.
Additionally, at the end of 2017 Square announced that it would let more people buy and sell bitcoin on its Cash app. Here is one additional way to buy bitcoin that we love.
OKCupid
OKCupid, which is one the leading dating websites in the world, has introduced bitcoin as a payment option. This will allow users to access functions like PM’ing individuals with priority messages.
Gyft
Gyft is another site where you can purchase gift cards using bitcoins to over 200 retailers like CVS, Target, Southwest Airlines, and Whole Foods.
Tesla
Back in 2013, Lamborghini Newport Beach announced that it sold a Model S to a customer using bitcoin.
More recently, an extremely clever Tesla owner built a bitcoin mining rig in their Model S.
Reed Jewelers
This fine jeweler — which has stores in 13 stores, as well as a national online presence — accepts bitcoin at all of it’s locations.
Mint
Thanks to Intuit, Mint is accepting bitcoin as a payment. There’s also a bitcoin financial tracker as well.
Lionsgate Films
Via Gocoin, the production studio behind films like the “Hunger Games” is using bitcoin as a payment method.
MIT Coop Store
If you’re attending the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, then you can use bitcoins at the student bookstore.
Evermore Health
This health and fitness retailer welcomes bitcoin as payment.
Steam
Valve’s online gaming platform accepts digital currency as an alternative to traditional payment methods.
Wikipedia
Do you want to make a donation to the “Free Encyclopedia.” If so, you can do so using bitcoin.
Re/Max London
The UK-based franchisee of the global real estate network, has been accepting bitcoin payments, dogecoin, and litecoin as a form of payment method since 2015.
Other Places That Accept Bitcoin Payments
Above were listed just 25 of the places that accept bitcoin payments. Here’s a list of other businesses and organizations that do as well.
- 4Chan.org
- 93 Etsy vendors
- A Class Limousine
- Alphabay
- Alza
- Alza
- Amagi Metals
- Badoo
- BigFishGames.com
- Bitcoin.Travel
- Bitcoincoffee.com
- Bloomberg.com
- Braintree
- CEX
- CheapAir.com
- Coupa Café
- Crowdtilt.com
- curryupnow.com
- Etsy vendors
- Euro Pacific
- ExpressVPN.com
- EZTV
- Famsa
- Fancy.com
- Fight for the Future
- Foodler
- Grass Hill Alpacas
- Green Man Gaming
- Grooveshark
- Helen’s Pizza
- Humblebundle.com
- i-Pmart
- Jeffersons Store
- KFC Canada
- LOT Polish Airlines
- Lumfile
- Lv.net
- Magnificent Tea
- Mexico’s Universidad de las Américas Puebla
- MovieTickets.com
- mspinc.com
- Museum of the Coastal Bend
- Namecheap
- NCR Silver
- Old Fitzroy
- One Shot Hotels
- Pembury Tavern
- PizzaForCoins.com
- PSP Mollie
- PureVPN
- Rakutan
- San Jose Earthquakes
- Seoclerks.com
- SFU bookstore
- ShopJoy
- SimplePay
- Straub Auto Repairs
- Stripe
- Suntimes.com
- That’s my face
- The Internet Archive
- The Pink Cow
- The Pirate Bay
- T-Mobile Poland
- WebJet
- WordPress.com
- Yacht-base.com
Additional SMBs that accept bitcoin payments can be found here.
