Bitcoin is a relatively new form of currency that is just beginning to hit the mainstream, but many people still don’t understand why they should make the effort to use it.
Why use bitcoin? Here are 10 good reasons why
it’s worth taking the time to get involved in this virtual currency.
It’s fast
When you pay a cheque from another bank into your bank, the
bank will often hold that money for several days, because it can’t trust that
the funds are really available. Similarly, international wire transfers can
take a relatively long time. Bitcoin transactions, however, are generally far
faster.
Transactions can be instantaneous if they are
“zero-confirmation” transactions, meaning that the merchant takes on the risk
of accepting a transaction that hasn’t yet been confirmed by the bitcoin
blockchain. Or, they can take around 10 minutes if a merchant requires the
transaction to be confirmed. That is far faster than any inter-bank transfer.
It’s cheap
What’s that you say? Your credit card transactions are
instantaneous too? Well, that’s true. But your merchant (and possibly you) pay
for that privilege. Some merchants will charge a fee for debit card
transactions too, as they have to pay a ‘swipe fee’ for fulfilling them. Bitcoin
transaction fees are minimal, or in some cases free.
Central governments can’t take it away
Remember what happened in Cyprus in March 2013? The Central Bank wanted to take back
uninsured deposits larger than $100,000 to help recapitalize itself, causing
huge unrest in the local population. It originally wanted to take a percentage
of deposits below that figure, eating directly into family savings. That can’t happen
with bitcoin. Because the currency is decentralized, you own it. No central
authority has control, and so a bank can’t take it away from you. For those who
find their trust in the traditional banking system unraveling, that’s a big
benefit.
There are no chargebacks
Once bitcoins have been sent, they’re gone. A person who has
sent bitcoins cannot try to retrieve them without the recipient’s consent. This
makes it difficult to commit the kind of fraud that we often see with credit
cards, in which people make a purchase and then contact the credit card company
to make a chargeback, effectively reversing the transaction.
People can’t steal your payment information from merchants
This is a big one. Most online purchases today are made via
credit cards, but in the 1920s and ’30s, when the first precursors to credit
cards appeared, the Internet hadn’t yet been conceived. Credit cards were never
supposed to be used online and are insecure. Online forms require you to enter
all your secret information (the credit card number, expiry date, and CSV
number) into a web form. It’s hard to think of a less secure way to do online
business. This is why credit card numbers keep being stolen.
Bitcoin transactions, however, don’t require you to give up
any secret information. Instead, they use two keys: a public key, and a private
one. Anyone can see the public key (which is actually your bitcoin address),
but your private key is secret. When you send a bitcoin, you ‘sign’ the
transaction by combining your public and private keys together, and applying a
mathematical function to them. This creates a certificate that proves the
transaction came from you. As long as you don’t do anything silly like
publishing your private key for everyone to see, you’re safe.
It isn’t inflationary
The problem with regular fiat currency is that governments
can print as much of it as they like, and they frequently do. If there are not
enough US dollars to pay off the national debt, then the Federal Reserve can
simply print more. If the economy is sputtering, then the government can take
newly created money and inject it into the economy, via a much-publicized
process known as quantitative easing. This causes the value of a currency to
decrease.
If you suddenly double the number of dollars in circulation,
then that means there are two dollars where before there was only one. Someone
who had been selling a chocolate bar for a dollar will have to double the price
to make it worth the same as it was before, because a dollar suddenly has only
half its value. This is called inflation, and it causes the price of goods and
services to increase. Inflation can be difficult to control, and can decrease
people’s buying power. Bitcoin was designed to have a maximum number of coins.
Only 21 million will ever be created under the original specification. This
means that after that, the number of bitcoins won’t grow, so inflation won’t be
a problem. In fact, deflation – where the price of goods and services falls –
is more likely in the bitcoin world.
It’s as private as you want it to be
Sometimes, we don’t want people knowing what we have
purchased. Bitcoin is a relatively private currency. On the one hand, it is
transparent – thanks to the blockchain, everyone knows how much a particular
bitcoin address holds in transactions. They know where those transactions came
from, and where they’re sent. On the other hand, unlike conventional bank
accounts, no one knows who holds a particular bitcoin address. It’s like having
a clear plastic wallet with no visible owner. Everyone can look inside it, but
no one knows whose it is. However, it’s worth pointing out that people who use
bitcoin unwisely (such as always using the same bitcoin address, or combining
coins from multiple addresses into a single address) risk making it easier to
identify them online.
You don’t need to trust anyone else
In a conventional banking system, you have to trust people
to handle your money properly along the way. You have to trust the bank, for example.
You might have to trust a third-party payment processor. You’ll often have to
trust the merchant too. These organizations demand important, sensitive pieces
of information from you. Because bitcoin is entirely decentralized, you need
trust no one when using it. When you send a transaction, it is digitally
signed, and secure. An unknown miner will verify it, and then the transaction
is completed. The merchant need not even know who you are, unless you’ve
arranged to tell them.
You own it
There is no other electronic cash system in which your
account isn’t owned by someone else. Take PayPal, for example: if the company
decides for some reason that your account has been misused, it has the power to
freeze all of the assets held in the account, without consulting you. It is
then up to you to jump through whatever hoops are necessary to get it cleared,
so that you can access your funds. With bitcoin, you own the private key and
the corresponding public key that makes up a bitcoin address. No one can take that
away from you (unless you lose it yourself, or host it with a web-based wallet
service that loses it for you).
You can create your own money
In spite of the amazing advances in home office color
printing technology, most national governments take a fairly dim view of you
producing your own money. With bitcoin, however, it is encouraged. You can
certainly buy bitcoins on the open market, but you can also mine your
own if you have enough computing power. After covering your initial
investment in equipment and electricity, mining bitcoins is simply a case of
leaving the machine switched on, and the software running. And who wouldn’t
like their computer to earn them money while they sleep?
How to Buy Bitcoins with Mpesa
Mpesa is very popular in Kenya. So, there are many Mpesa
users in the country who want to know how to buy bitcoin in Kenya with MPesa.
There are several platforms and websites you can use to buy bitcoin through
M-Pesa without converting KShs to USD, GBP, or EUR. They include the following:
Binance M-Pesa: The Kenyan Shilling support on the Binance platform was
added in June 2020. However, Binance recently closed down the M-Pesa funding
option for Kenyan users. The closure follows a directive by the Central Bank of
Nigeria (CBN). Users only have the option of purchasing BTC on Binance using
debit cards (Mastercard or Visa) and P2P.
Paxful Mpesa
Paxful is
a global peer-to-peer (P2P) exchange with a simple registration process and an
excellent customer support. This makes it simple to buy, sell and exchange
bitcoin. To buy bitcoin with M-Pesa, you will first need to register for a
bitcoin trading account on Paxful. Then, verify your Paxful Bitcoin Account.
Before you buy any bitcoin, it is best to find a trusted bitcoin seller on
Paxful with good prices. Thereafter, credit the bitcoin seller’s M-Pesa account
with the amount you want to use to purchase bitcoin and the bitcoin value you
ordered will be sent to your Paxful bitcoin account. You have the option of
withdrawing your cryptos from Paxful to an external wallet.
LocalBitcoins Mpesa
LocalBitcoins deals in Bitcoin only. To buy
bitcoin on LocalBitcoins, you will need to register for a LocalBitcoins account
and verify your email. Your account will come with a free online bitcoin
wallet.
To start buying, choose a bitcoin seller with a good
reputation (preferably sellers with 100% feedback score) and one that meets
your ability. Then, click on the Buy Bitcoins button to get more information
such as terms and conditions of trade. Read the terms carefully before
submitting your request. After agreeing to the terms, enter the amount you wish
to buy in your currency, make M-Pesa payment, then confirm the payment to
receive your bitcoins.
Although LocalBitcoins only deals in Bitcoin, you can buy
bitcoin using altcoins such
as Ethereum, Ripple, and Litecoin.
LocalCryptos Mpesa
LocalCryptos Kenya is a peer-to-peer marketplace where traders can buy and sell cryptocurrencies. To buy bitcoin, you will first need to sign up on LocalCryptos then search for M-Pesa bitcoin sellers on the platform. When you find a reputable seller, transfer the amount of money you want to use to buy bitcoin from your M-Pesa account to the seller. Buying bitcoin with M-Pesa on LocalCryptos takes only 7 minutes.