India is Paying $900+ for Bitcoin Amid Cash Crisis

Venezuela has ordered severe limits on bank withdrawals less than a week after India made changes to its cash currency precipitating long lines at the nation’s ATMs. Both of these government actions have led to an increase in interest on the digital currency, Bitcoin. Venezuela’s Superintendency of Banking Sector Institutions (Sudeban) forbade public and private banks from dispensing more than US $5.26 per day cash from branches or ATMs. Sudeban allows a maximum of four transactions allowing the withdrawal of up to approximately US $5. In the midst of crisis, Venezuela’s inflation has....

Fiat money has long been the dominant form of exchange for goods and services. But now, amid the throes of global economic and political unrest, new questions have emerged as to whether “cash is still king” in both developed and developing nations. The root of this discourse is being played out with great significance worldwide. India, one of the world’s fastest growing nations, is struggling with the effects of a demonetization crisis that threatens to cripple its promising economic advancements. In China, currency speculators are facing a weakening yuan. Venezuelans are under siege due....

Living in the chaos of a deep crisis, people in Lebanon have been turning to cryptocurrency, a new media report has confirmed. From earning much needed income through mining and work, to storing wealth and paying in stores, bitcoin, tether and other cryptos have started to push aside the hyperinflated Lebanese pound and the hard-to-get-hold-of U.S. dollar. Cryptocurrency Becomes Lifeline for Some Lebanese Who Try to Make Ends Meet in Meltdown With its capital Beirut once called the “Paris of the Middle East,” before the civil war broke out in 1975, and known as an....

Looking over the Google Trends page, it looks like “buy Bitcoin” is quickly gaining popularity. There seems to be a lot of confusion regarding the financial situation in India. Albeit the 500 and 1,000 Rupee notes are now illegal, that does not mean they are useless. Consumers can exchange them at 70% of face value at exchange offices. That said, the interest in Bitcoin continues to grow in the country, and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. Cryptocurrency enthusiasts remain hopeful Bitcoin will dethrone cash sooner or later. While that sentiment is shared by a lot of....

According to a poll conducted by Mastercard in 2013, 80 percent of consumer spending that year was cashless. Participants aged 18-24 years used cash less often the same year. When was the last time you saw a millennial paying by cash? Buying a coffee at Starbucks, shopping at the mall, grabbing a public transport ticket, gas bills and pizzas on a Friday night are but a few examples of transactions made by card or smartphone payments and where cash no longer seems to be the ideal method. All money becomes digital. People keep believing that there is a confrontation between cash and digital....