Autor Cointelegraph By Joseph Hall

A dozen Bitcoin ATMs planned at the largest EU electronics retailer

A dozen Bitcoin ATMs planned at the largest EU electronics retailer

Uverejnil používateľ | apr 21, 2022 |

Austrians have “sufficient funds” for more Bitcoin ATMs — hat’s the verdict that MediaMarkt, a German electronics retailer, reached following a successful Bitcoin ATM pilot in Austria. MediaMarkt will roll out Bitcoin (BTC) ATMs in 12 branches across the country, including Seiersberg and Klagenfurt. According to the Austrian newspaper Kleine Zeitung, the pilot project, which featured a lone Bitcoin ATM in a MediaMarkt shop, proved that “Bitcoin ATMs in shops offer an opportunity to attract new customers.” As Europe’s largest consumer electronics retailer, MediaMarkt operates in 13 countries, with over 850 stores and revenue exceeding 21 billion euros ($23 billion) in 2021. MediaMarkt partnered with Coinfinity, an Austrian Bitcoin company, to manage the pilot and subsequent rollout of the ATMs.Confinity and its spinoff ATM company, Kurant, manage over 200 Bitcoin ATMs in Austria, Germany, Spain and Greece. Cointelegraph reached out to Coinfinity for comment and has not yet received a reply. Bitcoin ATMs by Kurant (Coinfinity) across Europe. Source: KurantBitcoin ATMs (automated teller machines), sometimes jokingly referred to as BTMs (Bitcoin teller machines), offer Bitcoin enthusiasts a means to cash out their BTC or deposit fiat. By simply scanning a wallet address, they can receive satoshis (the smallest denomination of BTC) or cash.The news of more Bitcoin ATMs coming to Austria is welcome, considering that the growth in Bitcoin ATMs around the world has slowed in 2022. Related: Santo Blockchain to deliver 50 Bitcoin ATMs to PanamaThe United Kingdom recently clamped down on non-registered ATMs as its Financial Conduct Authority takes a tougher stance on Bitcoin ATMs due to a lack of regulatory structure.Bitcoin ATM. Source: BitBaseFor BitBase, a Spanish Bitcoin ATM provider seeking to operate in Portugal, the group has established physical outlets in Lisbon, but regulators have stalled official openings. In light of the EU’s “attack” on noncustodial wallets, the future of Bitcoin and crypto in the EU is uncertain. Given that Austria will add 12 more Bitcoin ATMs to its total of over 110, the rollout of Bitcoin ATMs in Europe may just be getting started. 

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From beer to Bitcoin as legal tender: a BTC education in Roatán

From beer to Bitcoin as legal tender: a BTC education in Roatán

Uverejnil používateľ | apr 21, 2022 |

Few crypto enthusiasts around the world could point to the remote island of Roatán prior to the Bitcoin (BTC) 2022 conference in Miami. Dušan Matuska was one of them, a Bitcoin educator whose plans to open a Bitcoin education center in a former brewery entangled with the Satoshi Nakamoto-inspired vision of a special economic zone in Honduras called Próspera. Located on Roatán, Próspera accepts Bitcoin as a de facto legal tender as of April 2022. But, how did a Slovakian Bitcoin miner stumble across one of the few locations worldwide to accept Bitcoin as de facto legal tender? And, what does a brewery have to do with it?In late 2021, Matuska’s Bitcoin mining friends mentioned the Honduran isle of Roatan, explaining their intention to buy a few plots of land on the picture-perfect island. Given the success of neighboring country El Salvador and the Bitcoin Beach Bitcoin adoption story, as well as his personal mission to teach 100 million people about Bitcoin by 2030, Matuska’s curiosity was piqued. Matuska flew over from Paraguay, where he was investigating renewable Bitcoin mining operations, and quickly learned Roatán is a “nice small island in Honduras” that has “beautiful views.” It’s like a “hidden pearl of the Caribbean.” However, it’s small, so “after two weeks having a holiday there, you start to get bored.” “Since our mission is always to educate people about Bitcoin, we began cooking up ideas about a Bitcoin education center in Honduras.”In line with other Bitcoin grassroots projects around the world such as El Salvador and Portland, Oregon, while drawing from his own experience educating people about Bitcoin at crypto cafés in Eastern Europe, Matuska began scoping out centers for Bitcoin education. The Paralení Polis alternative education café in Prague, Czechia. The space became a Bitcoin education center. Source: GoogleA curious coincidence, Matuska is Slovakian — Czechs and Slovakians are close and share similar culture and histories — and Czech is the second-largest expat population on the island after the Americans. What’s more, an old Czech brewery had fallen into disarray. Related: Seven times Bitcoin miners made the world a better placeThe former Czech brewery appeared to be the ideal opportunity to rejuvenate a tired space and convert it into a place where visitors could learn about the world’s largest cryptocurrency. “It looked like a Bitcoin Citadel,” Matuska told Cointelegraph. The beers to Bitcoin story had begun.However, the size and scale of restoring a large and derelict brewery into an education center were daunting. When Matuska and the team “checked it out, the building was rotten and damaged.” Restoring the relic would cost “maybe hundreds of thousands of euros to put back to a normal state.” In another happy accident, the Próspera business event was taking place on the island, just around the corner. Próspera is a special economic zone in the center of Roátan that hosts its own civil law and regulatory structure. Próspera’s laws take inspiration from the hugely successful Shenzen economic zone in China, as well as Dubai.The Próspera special economic zone. Source: Prospera.hnMatuska left the brewery to take part in the conference buoyed by conversations he had about Honduras potentially adopting Bitcoin as legal tender. He explained that in Roatán in early 2022:“You could pay some taxes in Bitcoin; businesses were super open to accepting Bitcoin, or any other currency, because there is a huge amount of freedom in the whole area.”During the conference, a golden opportunity presented itself: Matuska was asked to discuss his work with Bitcoin and education. “I was thinking, okay, should I present the potential Honduras Bitcoin Education Center? Like, Is it okay or not? In the end, I decided I should.”Shortly after the presentation about the brewery to Bitcoin project, Erick Brimen, founder and CEO of the Próspera special economic zone, turned to Matuska. “Come with me,” he said.“Erick Brimen took me to a building at the highest viewpoint on Roatán in Pristine Bay. It’s an amazing building. Right now, there’s a school but it’s outgrown the building. In June, it’s going to be free. And. it’s going to be where we start building the center.”Forget the derelict brewery, an even better Bitcoin education center had fallen into Matuska’s lap. Moreover, Matuska got the nod from the CEO of the organization that was the driving force for Bitcoin as legal tender in Próspera.Visited Roatan island in Honduras last week to find a place for our future Bitcoin Education Center. We were offered this wonderful building in @Prosperahn to start in one of the most #Bitcoin friendly jurisdictions pic.twitter.com/6zrWpXAzJf— Dusan Matuska (@dusan_matuska) April 11, 2022Brimen explained to Cointelegraph that the Bitcoin education center in Próspera aligns with their key strategic objectives of identifying “100 cocreators that will be ‘hands on’ in activating a string of strategic projects.” “Dusan’s project is one of them, he’s co-creating something important to the jurisdiction by installing a Bitcoin education center. Decentralized finance is key and Bitcoin is a much better form of currency than traditional fiat. We want to enable that.”Upon seeing the new building and the scale of the project, Matuska’s brain went into overdrive. He needed to talk to his girlfriend, his colleagues, immigration authorities and airlines as they had just “a couple of weeks or months just to set it up and start to put everything together.”Matuska told Cointelegraph that the Próspera project was keen to do “everything on Bitcoin.” A deal was struck just weeks before Bitcoin 2022. During Samson Mow’s keynote speech at Bitcoin 2022, Bitcoin as a de facto legal tender was announced in Próspera, Honduras and Madeira, Portugal, while a Mexican senator shared ambitious Bitcoin plans for her country.The announcement made during Bitcoin 2022 in Miami. Source: YouTubeMatuska jokes that Bremen almost mentioned the Bitcoin education center during the keynote speech, but the time constraints of just “90 seconds on stage” didn’t quite allow for it.Related: Stablecoins are the perfect Trojan horse for Bitcoin, says Tether CTOBack in Honduras, the Bitcoin education center is growing in importance as part of Próspera’s and Brimen’s vision for Bitcoin. Ultimately, Bitcoin should be understood and used correctly.The view from the top of the Bitcoin education center in Próspera. Source: MatuskaBrimen told Cointelegraph that “it is not enough to simply make it legal,” as people should “have the tools available to them as well as the knowledge to use it optimally.” He continued:“Since it is considered legal tender, we want to enable people to not just have the right to use it but to use it responsibly.”Related: Building businesses in the ‘spirit of Bitcoin’: The Bitcoin HostelAs a result, Matuska is keen for Bitcoiners around the world to visit, reach out and be part of the change occurring in Honduras. “Próspera actually asked us to be the leaders in terms of onboarding businesses in Honduras, helping them out and setting everything up. For us, it’s a huge leap toward our vision of accelerating Bitcoinization. And, that’s why I just couldn’t say no.”“Lecturers from Czechia and Slovakia are flying out to teach,” but the team is still thin on the ground. As Brimen concludes, “to use Bitcoin to the maximum benefit possible,” they are going to need all the help they can get. The Próspera Bitcoin education center. Source: MatuskaAs for the former brewery that’s fallen into disrepair, Matuska told Cointelegraph that “maybe” in the future, there will be a Bitcoin-related project taking place there. It’d be a shame to let such a beautiful building go to waste. 

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The €1M Bitcoin retirement plan reaches 200K: 'It's not too late to invest'

The €1M Bitcoin retirement plan reaches 200K: 'It's not too late to invest'

Uverejnil používateľ | apr 21, 2022 |

Motivations for buying Bitcoin (BTC) are numerous: a hedge against inflation, financial independence or even hopes for a Lamborghini and life in the sun. For “Mr. ERB,” a keen blogger and Bitcoin enthusiast, it’s all about retiring early. ERB keeps a detailed account of his finances on his blog and spoke to Cointelegraph about his Bitcoin retirement plan.He told Cointelegraph that he first “got interested in Bitcoin in summer 2017,” when a coworker briefly brought up the decentralized peer-to-peer currency.However, “the price was about 2,000 euros at that time and I thought it was too late for investment.”A familiar story for Bitcoiners when they first enter the space, ERB told Cointelegraph that he soon stumbled across a Bitcoin podcast where Trace Mayer predicted Bitcoin would hit one million dollars. Their interest in the FIRE moment (financial independence, retire early) coupled with their newfound passion for Bitcoin changed his mind:“That’s when I understood I’m not late, but actually early. I saw bitcoin as a great possibility for reaching early retirement, and bought my first coins in October 2017.”ERB’s Bitcoin strategy chooses Bitcoin over dollars. Source: er-bybitcoin.comERB hatched the retire with Bitcoin plan setting a target retirement goal of €1,000,000 by contributing €500 a month, every month. His first contribution–or the first time he ‘stacked sats’ was in 2017; five years later, “the success has obviously been great,” he told Cointelegraph. Green is the Bitcoin price, orange is the retirement pot in Euros. The dotted line is the amount of cash invested so far. Source: er-bybitcoin.com“I don’t think I could have made similar returns on any other strategy. Not to mention, the bitcoin strategy is extremely simple and doesn’t require active investment management. You buy and you hold, and then you keep buying more.”The blog ERB runs details how the current return on investment is over 450%. Compared to using the S&P as an investment vehicle (44%) “that’s a 10x, and it’s going to be 100x.” Over the course of the investing journey, ERB has gleaned valuable lessons and speaks cogently and wisely about how Bitcoin begins to underpin his values:“My worldview pre-Bitcoin was pretty narrow. Life looked like school – work – retirement – death. Nowadays, I think slightly differently. The ultimate goal [now] might be better described as entrepreneurship and self-sovereignty.’Related: Redditor stashes away BTC worth $100 for 100 years in public libraryERB shared useful nuggets of advice with those new to buying Bitcoin explaining to Cointelegraph:“Keep mining fiat, keep buying Bitcoin.” And don’t try to get rich quickly because “you’re not gonna.”“Give yourself 5 years” to really get to know Bitcoin (that works out at one year more than a Bitcoin halving), and really take the time to learn. Listen to the right podcasts, read the right books and learn if “it was a good idea to invest in Bitcoin.”“Resist the urge to orange pill everyone around you,” particularly early on in the Bitcoin learning curve. ERB admits he may have some “damage” to certain relationships due to his overexuberance in Bitcoin at an early stage of his Bitcoin education. Finally, HODL. While the March 2020 crash in the price of Bitcoin down to $3,600 “felt really bad,” ERB explains that “in hindsight, those were the best times to buy.”United States spot ETF looms closer, ERB is fast approaching the quarter of a million-dollar milestone–while a United States spot ETF looms closer. As his blog surmises, “cut costs, stack sats.”

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Seven times Bitcoin miners made the world a better place

Seven times Bitcoin miners made the world a better place

Uverejnil používateľ | apr 9, 2022 |

What do a swimming pool, beef jerky, a caravan, timber, animal waste, a Guatemalan lake and a high school have in common? They’ve all been saved by Bitcoin (BTC) mining. From reusing “waste” heat to getting the job done — to receiving a cool blast of air to dehydrate meat, to cleaning up pollutants, Bitcoin mining does more than just secure the network. Here’s a round-up of seven times Bitcoin mining lent a hand or simply made the world a better place.Free Bitcoin mining education in WashingtonSustainable Bitcoin mining company Merkle Standard has taken Bitcoin mining education into its own hands. In partnership with Bitmain, they recently gifted the latest in Bitcoin mining technology to Newport High School, a high school in Washington state. Plus, they donated $10,000 and are promoting education about Bitcoin in the hope that it will, “plant a seed that encourages lifelong interest in blockchain and digital mining.”Along with the check, Ruslan Zinurov, Merkle Standard’s CEO, told Cointelegraph that they will also invite students to their “data center to check on their machine that is hashing to their school’s wallet.” Zinurov told Cointelegraph:“It is our top priority to get the community excited about Bitcoin and we can’t think of a better way to do this than to educate the local students.”Adam Delderfield, business development manager at Bitmain — the holding company for the Antminer Bitcoin miners — told Cointelegraph, “Digital currency mining proceeds from this gift will go directly to education,” adding that “Bitcoin mining and proof-of-work represent an exciting new industry that opens up numerous new opportunities.”Adam Delderfield from Bitmain in the suit, and Monty Stahl from Merkle Standard with the students. Source: BitmainBitcoin miner beef jerky cooked up by the Business Cat chefBitcoiner Business Cat, who wishes to remain nameless, uses the heat vented by Bitcoin mining to dry out meat to be made into beef jerky. They told Cointelegraph, “Bitcoin miners have one hell of an excess of supply of dry, heated air,” so it makes sense to funnel that heat over strips of beef to make jerky. Good temps for jerky so far #Bitcoin pic.twitter.com/0WPnTuNwnF— ₿usiness Cat (@_business_cat) April 4, 2022Similar to Merkle Standard, for the Business Cat, the jerky cooking process is not about making money: “My normal food dehydrator uses much less energy than an S9, but hashpower dried jerky just tastes better.” They told Cointelegraph that “the support of the plebs on Bitcoin Twitter” persuaded them to try out the idea. They joked that “most of us [Bitcoin plebs] are natural loners, so a few words of praise or support from others on the path goes a long way.” The Bitcoin community is increasingly supportive of ideas that promote Bitcoin philosophy and Bitcoin-only ideas, from a Bitcoin hostel in Portugal to a Bitcoin lake project in Guatemala. The modified Bitcoin miner that cleans the air while funneling it for use on food. Source: TwitterBusiness Cat is delighted with their experience and suggests others take up home mining. They combined life advice with Bitcoin mining advice explaining to Cointelegraph:“Should you mine Bitcoin at home? Yes. Should you learn to be a better chef? Also yes.”Bitcoin heats my swimming poolBitcoin enthusiast Jonathan Yuan found a cheaper, faster and more stable way of heating his swimming pool in Minnesota, all thanks to Bitcoin mining.Thanks to immersion heating, Bitcoin now powers up his pool. Even though Yuan doesn’t care for swimming, his kids are happy to swim in the pool while he secures the Bitcoin network.Yuan’s Bitcoin miner heated pool. Source: Twitter Yuan told Cointelegraph that the whole experiment went so swimmingly that he’s now planning on heating “the whole house.” Propane gas tank heater broke down? Bitcoin miner to the rescue!Michael Schmid is a well-traveled, savvy Bitcoiner. When his caravan’s propane gas heater broke down, he refitted the vehicle to be warmed by the “waste” heat from an S9 Bitcoin miner.Schmid told Cointelegraph that he saves “around 50% of the propane costs, which is around $2.7 per day.” “Now the fun part, the miner produces around 0.00006259 BTC per day (with the current difficulty and 13 TH/s) on the current price of 38 thousand. This is $2.40 per day, so we technically heat the airstream for free.”Schmid’s airstream kept warm with a Bitcoin miner, in a box just behind the wheel. Source: SchmidPlus, a kick in the teeth to the anti-Bitcoin environmentalists — heating the Schmid family airstream with Bitcoin rather than propane gas is better for the planet. “Our Airstream has solar panels on top of it that can generate up to 400W of energy, so technically of the 1400W that the miner uses, 400W of them are self-generated and fully renewable.”Bitcoin miner waste heat dries out timber Kryptovault is a Norwegian Bitcoin mining company with arguably the greenest credentials among any industry. Powered by 100% hydropower, the energy it uses solves valid blocks on the Bitcoin blockchain and the heat generated by the miners blows over damp logs from a local timber mill.Timber waiting to be dried by Bitcoin miner’s waste heat at Kryptovault’s mining facility. Source: KryptovaultIn a video made by the company, Sveni Bjerke, CEO of local firewood company Varma, which receives the miner-dried logs, says that they are “only using excess heat from the data center.”The environmental success of the project has spurred further partnerships. Kjetil Hove Pettersen, CEO of KryptoVault, told Cointelegraph that drying out seaweed for local companies is coming soon, and they are “constantly looking for new ways of utilizing our waste heat.”Pettersen explained, “Approximately 99% of our electric energy turns into thermal energy.” “ As we know, energy is never truly lost, it only changes form. So this is a way of us to utilize this energy twice and support other local industries in the process. I can’t think of any better industrial use-cases than what we are doing.”Promoting financial and energy autonomy in Guatemala In south Guatemala, a team of Bitcoin miners donated an S9 to the local mayor and the mining proceeds are being used to repair a wastewater treatment plant. Bill Whittaker and Patrick Melder, on the right, installing the Bitcoin miner. Source: TwitterBitcoin mining in the economically disadvantaged region has boosted incomes while improving the air quality. Plus, as Bill Whittaker, a co-founder of Bitcoin Lake, told Cointelegrpah, the team is “self-funding carbon-negative Bitcoin mining R&D.” Two high school students, Madaket and Kate, are planning a trip down to “LakeBitcoin in early May to deliver the S17s they have been working on.”The Bitcoin miners they bring will join the first Bitcoin miner, and naturally will be powered by renewable energy — in this case, biogas. Biogas is growing in popularity as an energy source for Bitcoin mining.Madaket and Kate posing with their Bitmain miner under a solar panel. Source: WhittakerBitcoin mining grows flowers and foodA greenhouse in the Netherlands is heated by Bitcoin miners rather than natural gas. That’s according to Bert de Groot, founder of Bitcoin Bloem.The Bitcoin miner camouflaged among hydrangeas. Source: TwitterIn partnership with a large greenhouse, they “placed a Bitcoin miner to reduce the use of natural gas, the prices of which have skyrocketed, and heat the greenhouse with miner heat instead.” De Groot continued: “The family that owns the greenhouse first put electric heaters because of the 6x cost of natural gas, they now get paid for their electricity, which is used for mining, and receive the heat for free.”It’s a win-win situation. After all, who can say no to flowers? One of the Bitcoin flowers. Source: TwitterRelated: The Bitcoin shitcoin machine: Mining BTC with biogasAsked about the electronic waste issues that the mainstream media associates with Bitcoin mining, de Groot said, “A miner should last for at least five years. We don’t know of any ASIC (S9) that has been turned to e-waste yet.”Plus, they’re also fans of delivering flowers to their local community. We just delivered the flowers to the elderly home. Suus of @BrabantZorg received them. By coincidence the garden was renewed and they will put them for the 50 elderly outside in the new garden. They didn’t have money for the plants so they were really happy with the donation. pic.twitter.com/7CivmZxyjo— BitcoinBloem (@BloemBitcoin) April 6, 2022

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Kraken shuts down global headquarters as 'San Francisco is not safe'

Kraken shuts down global headquarters as 'San Francisco is not safe'

Uverejnil používateľ | apr 8, 2022 |

The Golden City is losing its shine as one of the largest United States-based cryptocurrency exchanges closes its San Francisco-based headquarters. Kraken CEO, Jesse Powell retweeted that Kraken will close its global headquarters on 548 Market Street, in the center of San Francisco. In the retweet shared by a San Francisco-based political commentator, Richie Greenberg, the decision cites that: “We shut down Kraken’s global headquarters on Market Street in San Francisco after numerous employees were attacked, harassed and robbed on their way to and from the office.”Cointelegraph reached out to the Kraken team for comment and will update if and when they reply. A poor advertisement for living in California’s financial center, the tweet also states that “San Francisco is not safe,” and crime is “dramatically underreported.” BREAKING: KRAKEN CEO Jesse Powell @jespow today issued a statement regarding rampant crime in San Francisco and the failures of DA @chesaboudin . pic.twitter.com/7gx7PldQM0— Richie Greenberg (@richieSF2016) April 7, 2022U.S.-based cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase will also close its San Francisco headquarters in 2022, however, no mention of crime or homelessness was made. Instead, Coinbase followed the lead of its competitor Binance in becoming a fully remote, global company. The Twitter community was quick to respond to the Kraken news, sharing dark anecdotes of working in San Francisco. I worked at Market St for few months, it is crazy, it turns into skid row after 6pm. I’m from Europe and never seen anything like it. Still have flashbacks of the things I witnessed. Just tried to look away and not get stabbed. Remember walking in the smell of skunk and pee.— Markus (@markustallinn) April 7, 2022

The living situation is so dire that rhere are applications that track human waste around San Francisco, Snap Crap is among the most popular. The applications help San Franciscans navigate the city without puting their foot in it. A San Francisco poop map. Source: arcgis.comThe Twitter and Reddit community comments shone a light on how soaring rental prices have made homelessness more common, while crime is “rampant.” The average rent is now roughly $3,000 a month, while the San Francisco Chronicle estimates that there are more than 18,000 homeless people in the city. Related: Bolt to enable Bitcoin and NFT access via Wyre acquisitionA report in 2020 revealed that San Francisco and the surrounding zone, the Bay Area, boasted the highest concentrations of crypto investments. In light of Kraken’s decision, and the social crises in San Francisco, the hold on crypto and the future of finance may falter. Other US cities and states have made clear their intentions to attract crypto capital: Texas, for example, hosts pro-Bitcoin Senator Ted Cruz,  (BTC) while Web3 and crypto payments have been lauded by the mayor of Austin.

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