In the last few months, the virtual currency known as Bitcoin has made enormous strides. Being the topic of conversation in Senate Committee Hearings, hitting all-time highs, and supported by a dedicated community, the latest headlines bear both positive and negative results. First off, now e-commerce platform Shopify accepts Bitcoin which was announced late last week. With this new integration, Bitcoin has exponentially increased it’s use on major websites and online stores. Unfortunately, Bitcoin faces some negative headlines as well. In the last few days a total of $100 million worth of Bitcoin (at current prices) were stolen from a community of users through the illegal marketplace website Sheep Marketplace. The silver lining to the latter is the complexity in either exchanging Bitcoin for cash or hiding the Bitcoin in a sum this large. At the end of the day though, all of those who had their Bitcoin stolen will more than likely never see their Bitcoin again.
Photo credit to: BusinessInsider.com
Online Holiday Sales Increase Shopify Accepts Bitcoin
To give you an idea of how much has changed for Bitcoin since last year, consider the following. In November 2012, BitPay (similar to PayPal) processed a mere 99 Bitcoin transactions. This year, they processed 6,296 on Black Friday alone, totalling 55,288 for the month of November. What’s caused this sudden spike in Bitcoin transactions? Besides the various awareness campaigns taking place around the globe, it’s infamous history, and anonymous appeal, Shopify became one of it’s newest allies. In a genius pre-Black Friday holiday sales strategy the e-commerce platform announced all sites using Shopify accepts Bitcoin as a method of payment. With this new development, Bitcoin users now have 75,000 more places they can use their Bitcoin with.
I said it prior, but Shopify’s recent campaign is definitely commendable. Not only does this open a new revenue path for e-commerce platforms, but it also helps the virtual currency get one step closer to being commercially accepted everywhere. Now that Shopify accepts Bitcoin it will be interesting to see who will be the next to follow.
Not All Bitcoin News is Good News
Unfortunately, Bitcoin’s news this week doesn’t end there. We have all gotten somewhat used to hearing only the finer aspects of the virtual currency in the months following the seizure of The Silk Road. In a predictable chain of events it did not take Sheep Marketplace to assume The Silk Road’s throne in the anonymous illegal marketplace. Though Sheep Marketplace shut down, it wasn’t because of the DEA or any other government agency. A hacker snuck his way through to the backend of Sheep Marketplace, accessing all of the members Bitcoin information. As they depleted a total of 96,000 Bitcoins, none of the account balances reflected a robbery, making it days before anyone realized what really happened.
Still, 96,000 Bitcoin ($100 million) is a lot to take, and would be pretty noticeable to move all at once. This is the problem the thief has encountered, in addition to very adamant Bitcoin owners who have done everything in their power to track the thief before all of their money is gone. One Reddit user believes he’s found the one, and is trying to raise awareness to others who were affected. What is unfortunate for them though is the fact that the thief is using a tumbler system to exchange and trade, which makes it very difficult to actually track. At this point many of the affected Bitcoin owners will have to accept the fact that they will probably never see that money again.
Find out more about this situation here.
What’s Next for Bitcoin?
So even though Bitcoin has hit an all-time high and Shopify now accepts it, it’s not invulnerable. It will be interesting to see how the Sheep Marketplace Scam plays out and if the thief is ever caught. What I am more interested in though is Shopify and their actions. Now partnered with BitPay, I’m curious to see how much this new integration will affect overall holiday sales. If the numbers are there, it won’t be long before others accept Bitcoin as Shopify has.
What do you think? Those of you with Bitcoin, will you be using it to pay for any holiday gifts this year? Or are you going to keep yours hidden and offline away from thieves?
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