Thursday 28 January 2021 9:48 am

Crypto AM shines its Spotlight on BitcoinPoint.com

By: Crypto AM: Spotlight

Benoît Marzouk, Founder & CEO of Bitcoin Point

With the largest ATM network in the UK, innovative ‘on-ramp’ solutions to instantly buy and ‘off-ramp’ to sell Bitcoin, BitcoinPoint.com brings cryptos closer to Mass Adoption, with the vision of bringing financial inclusion to the unbanked and the non-tech-savvy.

16,000 ATMs

Bitcoin sales from cash withdrawals have reached an unprecedented scale in the UK, as the Cryptocurrency became widely available at over 16,000 ATM Machines across the UK just before Christmas last year.

The East London-based Cryptocurrency company BitcoinPoint is allowing bitcoin holders to cash out bitcoin at Cashzone ATM machines across the entire UK. This collaboration with Pin4, an innovative solution that enables businesses to deliver cash at the Cashzone network made a convenient access to the Bitcoin market a reality for everyone living in the UK.

Products & Services

User-friendly processes to securely buy, sell and use cryptocurrency have long been a hurdle to widespread adoption. BitcoinPoint has helped to break down these barriers with a mobile app that makes it safe and easy to buy and sell bitcoin at a network of agents, from Bureaus de Change to newsagents, as well as online through an innovative instant bank transfer solution known as Open Banking.

“When we started the service early 2018, there was not enough emphasis on making it easier for people to simply buy £5 of bitcoin,” told BitcoinPoint CEO and former Credit Suisse VP Benoit Marzouk. “Since registering on a crypto exchange could be a complex process for non-tech savvy people, the scarce availability of bitcoin ATMs made accessibility of bitcoin problematic.“

Despite BitcoinPoint’s 20,000 successful transactions online and in store, it’s been clear that collaborative partnerships in the ATM and the Point Of Sale industries remained a necessary step towards the true democratization of Bitcoin accessibility across a wider audience and spread of locations.

Digital Inclusion

“We are currently speaking with two potential partners in Nigeria and in India (where the Supreme Court lifted the banking ban against crypto exchanges less than a year ago), the opportunity are huge” explains Benoit Marzouk:

“First, we’ll bring access to cryptos through branches or networks of merchants by replicating what we’ve successfully created in the UK including converting standard ATM into off-ramp (cash out) facilities. Second we’ll implement revolutionary instant cross border money transfer solutions through our transactional expertise with the different type of liquidity providers we’ve been using and last but not least we’ll engage with local central banks for our stablecoin solution, currently on the Stellar blockchain, related to their CBDC (Central Bank Digital Currency) problematics.

CBDCs…

Last year, more than 80% of central banks were studying the concept of CBDCs directly inspired by Bitcoin, with China planning to unroll a digital Yuan in 2022, Ukraine has announced last month developing digital infrastructure including a CBDC framework with Stellar’s development arm. The European Central Bank chief Christine Lagarde also announced that the EU will have a digital Euro.

In the UK, the HM Treasury called for a consultation for the ”regulatory approach to cryptoassets and stablecoins” with a number of questions to answer by respondents.

… and the implications for Bitcoin

All these developments may increase the momentum behind Bitcoin’s evolution towards becoming the world’s new monetary standard, one that could not be debased by governments and central banks printing money -digital or not- at will and most recently due to an unprecedented level of stimulus.

Financial Conduct Authority

The Financial Conduct Authority (‘FCA’) is now actively regulating the sector in accordance with AML / CFT regulations, and has required all crypto companies reaching the retail market to be registered by 2021 and only 91 firms received the temporary FCA registration permission to trade till July.

Marzouk welcomes the increased regulatory scrutiny mainly to enforce KYC, citing the benefits for consumer protection and law enforcement, and the resulting rise in credibility and the stability across the emerging Decentralised Finance (DeFi) sector.

Remittance & Flat Rate

The benefits of this emerging landscape will be felt across the world. The Global Remittance Market (money sent by individuals across national boundaries) is currently valued at over $500 billion per year, and is still very much dependent on physical cash, traditional banks, legacy systems, high levels of state control, and money transfer companies that often charge as much as 20% in commission.

As Bitcoin prices tend to be higher in emerging markets, foreign workers could avoid such high fees from money transfer companies by sending bitcoin back home that could be cashed out for local currency with a flat rate. The global availability of bitcoin trading through an existing network of widely available ATMs (backed by brick-and-mortar offices and live agents) will be revolutionary: an off-ramp pathway that promises to democratise access to cryptocurrencies worldwide.

Bitcoin characteristics and the opportunities for the unbanked

Bitcoin trading is censorship resistant, and seizure resistant if you choose to self-custody and therefore free of immediate corporate control, and a gift for the unbanked that would no longer need to keep all their salaries in cash with the inherent risks.

Bitcoin has also all the properties of a good store of value to compete with gold: scarcity, durability, uniformity and portability. But bitcoin is not just digital gold it’s also a peer-to-peer network, Programmable money, a settlement network and an alternative investment opening the Pandora box of the emerging crypto industry.

Monetary system and Hayek’s Theory

A truly universal economy cannot be forever subject to the limitations of national monetary policies especially if central banks can infinitely create money. The Nobel Laureate in Economics Friederich Hayek theorized it in his book “Denationalisation of Money ” after the US decision to suspend gold convertibility. BitcoinPoint’s move towards hyper-bitcoinization represents not only a resounding step towards universal bitcoin adoption, but also a transformative moment in the evolution of individual economic empowerment—a currency marker that is truly global, democratic, secure and universally accessible.