When it comes to bitcoin (BTC) adoption, few countries can hold a candle – in terms of commitment at least – to El Salvador, a nation where you can now pay for everything from dental care to recording studio time in BTC. But once upon a time, Japan was the country everyone in the crypto world looked to with envy.To get more news about Huobi Indonesia, you can visit wikibit.com official website.
Roger Ver, once known as the “Bitcoin Jesus,” famously stated that Tokyo, the capital of the country where he now resides was “the world's most bitcoin-friendly city.”
How times have changed (even Roger has moved into the Bitcoin Cash (BCH) CAMP). Now paying with bitcoin has become a tall order in most parts of Japan, including the capital. Ironically, though, the Japanese hunger for BTC shows no sign of abetting.
Back in the early days of this website, Cryptonews.com reported that shoppers could buy everything from eels to eyeglasses using BTC.
Gone, though, are the days when big retailers were falling over one another in the rush to start accepting crypto pay. Instead, it has actually become harder to spend your BTC, but easier than ever to buy it.
Crypto is readily available at most of the nations thousands of 24-hour convenience stores in the form of prepaid cards, while big businesses – including e-commerce giants, chat app operators and financial heavyweights – have launched crypto exchanges they have linked seamlessly with their apps and financial platforms.
After such a promising start, bitcoin pay didn't take off in Japan. As observers cast an eye over at El Salvador, some have been asking why that has been the case.
In a report from The Sankei News, journalists explained that after peaking in late 2017, when the retail behemoths Meganesuper (eyewear) and Bic Camera (electronics) announced plans to accept BTC at stores nationwide, there had been “no big expansion” except for some outliers “such as online shopping malls and privately run restaurants.”
The media outlet quoted Takahide Kiuchi, a senior economist at the Nomura Research Institute, as stating that retailers were of the mind that BTC is too volatile to be used as a form of payment. The pieces authors suggested that Japanese firms have instead turned their attention to developing central bank digital currency (CBDC)-related adoption plans.