When we take a look at the cryptocurrency industry today, its safe to say that many individuals / businesses still have no idea how it operates. If you were to go up to 20 people on the street and ask them how to purchase Crypto, you would be lucky to have 2 people with a valid answer. As you can see from the figure below, Bitcoin ATM growth has skyrocketed since 2014. In 2014 there were about 4-10 Bitcoin ATMs. If we fast forward to the current year of 2019, we now have in excess of 5,000 Bitcoin ATMs worldwide. We argue that Bitcoin ATMs / companies are going to fuel the mass adoption of cryptocurrency.
In 1967 Barclays installed the first ATM system in a small suburb in London. At first, the automated teller machines were no big hit. As time progressed, consumers started using these machines and became more comfortable doing daily transactions. This movement essentially revolutionized the traditional banking system and changed the way people interacted for goods.
For this very reason, Bitcoin ATMs are currently undervalued in our opinion and have immense potential to fuel crypto adoption. For all the people today that know how to purchase cryptocurrency, they still won’t for various reasons. People fear purchasing cryptocurrency online because they aren’t familiar with exchanges, and don’t feel comfortable handing over their life info for an asset class they know nothing about. With how early Bitcoin and the Blockchain still is, this is fundamentally normal in our opinion. The average citizen will tell you either they heard of Bitcoin or are interested, but the second you run them through a verification process online they tweak out. In order to fuel mass adoption within cryptocurrency, society must feel more comfortable it’s that simple.
This is where Bitcoin ATMs will provide so much value. We truly believe Crypto ATMs will be one of the largest facilitators in mass adoption. We still think there is a long way to go, as many people don’t even know that Bitcoin ATMs exist. Eventually as marketing ramps up and word spreads, you could see a lot more individuals checking out these ATMs globally. As we showed above with the chart, the foundation is forming, which includes manufacturing more and more of these machines globally to get them in front of eyes on a daily basis. With many people hesitant to do business online right now in the crypto space, having an ATM experience will eventually aid in global comfort. This global comfort is what the crypto industry needs right now. If people can comfortably purchase crypto in person, chances are they will be more open to other avenues as well.
Which Companies Are Creating This Experience?
As more and more ATMs are being manufactures worldwide, there are a handful of companies working in the space right now. One company that has stuck out is Coinme. When it comes to the experience we talked about above, Coinme is doing everything right now to maximize this. Not only are they trying to make money accessible everywhere, they also strive to help “understand and utilize” the power of digital assets at a global scale. For those who have never tried a Bitcoin ATM before, take a look at the Coinme video below as it literally takes only minutes to go from cash to invested in digital assets such as Bitcoin. Coinme continues to expand its geographic regions and has a great tool on their website to locate the closest machines to you. Coinme essentially collaborated with “CoinStar” to give you the ability to purchase crypto in thousands of CoinStar Kiosk locations within the United States.
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