Cryptocurrencies in the Bahamas

EDITOR, The Tribune.

THIS letter is in regard to today’s Business section; an article was posted about Bitcoin being a “game changer” according to Mario Curry. I, while a supporter of cryptocurrencies, do not agree on this for The Bahamas – at least not in the next few years.

Cryptocurrencies are a topic that’s seeing mainstream media recently and is being treated like a buzzword to make people seem smart or in line with the times. There’s a lot to look at before you can even take it into practice in a country like ours. These range from banking regulations to support for online payments, to more than just dealing with one of the dozens of crypto currencies, to handling the wildly volatile state of these ICOs (Initial Coin Offerings). The list goes on.

At present, we barely have a proper online shopping system in The Bahamas, most use countries that don’t support The Bahamas and so need to use US accounts or, if lucky, find a local vendor. I found one recently that ripped off the name of a major online payment vendor. Even then, we barely have any main places using online payments unless they’re a utility company or a hotel. Then again, some of the websites our biggest companies have here aren’t that great either.

There’s the matter that countries are trying to regulate the ICOs, with the US now set to tax earnings from them this year. Some banks across the world are against ICOs while some are for them and will likely start their own. Estonia is looking at building their ICO called estcoins.

There’s also the other cryptocurrencies other than Bit coin like Bitcoin Cash, which is a fork of Bitcoin, or Etherium or Litecoin or Dogecoin or Ripple or Tangle, which isn’t an ICO but works similarly, and the list goes on.

Oh, and let’s not forget that the reason people even started talking about Bitcoin with such fervor recently was because of how its price soared, but not as much after it then crashed by over $4,000 weeks later.

In sum, I say that until we can raise our technical savviness as a country, cryptocurrencies have no staying power for actual use other than investments. Certain companies may take it on, but they risk crashes of hundreds or thousands of dollars. Build a stable foundation before looking at volatile possibilities, and have people that know what they’re talking about to lead the way.

MICHAEL ARMOGAN

Host@Tech Talk – MOAR; Cookies

January 3, 2018.