The source said:

My understanding is that they are going to allow buys and sells of crypto directly from PayPal and Venmo…They are going to have some sort of a built-in wallet functionality so you can store it there.”

It is worth noting that PayPal has been hiring for it’s Blockchain Research Group this year, so it seems likely that they will be making a move in this area.

If the “industry source” is correct this could be a huge step towards mass adoption of cryptocurrencies. At the very least, having cryptocurrency available to users of such a large payment platform would be a huge step for retail adoption.

Bitcoin was always intended for retail, rather than institutional adoption, as a means of freeing people from the financial system. While all adoption of cryptocurrency is positive, this type of mass market access is therefore particularly exciting if proven to be true.

Although PayPal has not commented about this issue directly. PayPal Chief Technology Officer Sri Shivananda has told CoinDesk that:

“We are a strong believer in the potential of blockchain. The digitization of currency is only a matter of when not if…”

With the potential for a financial depression on the horizon Bitcoin may be well placed to succeed. As discussed in a previous article in this blog about the history of Bitcoin, Bitcoin came out of the 2008 financial crisis and it’s first block even contained a message referencing this fact.

Additionally, with moves towards a cashless society on the cards, cryptocurrencies offer an option that cannot be censored by the Government or the Banks.

Whatever happens with PayPal, it looks like it is going to be a exciting time for Bitcoin.

As previously discussed in this blog, currency printing drives down each units relative value. However, due to the current down turn in the economy the negative impacts of the addition of new currency may not immediately be felt.

Longer term though, this, combined with low interest rates is bad news for savers. The inflation caused by this move will mean that the purchasing power of your bank balance will shrink faster than normal. There are ways in which you can mitigate this risk which we will discuss later in this article.

Deflation Before Inflation

It is likely that we will see asset prices drop considerably some time in the short to medium term before we see the type of uncontrolled inflation some are predicting. This is because we are coming to a peak in a bull market and many assets are already overvalued.

A good example of this is Hertz which was able to convince speculators to buy new shares while it was filing for bankruptcy. The company has since suspended the sale following discussions with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

It is likely that this deflationary period will create many buying opportunities for the right assets. However, some companies with weaker fundamentals may not survive the downturn. It may also be a good time to start a business with the likes of Airbnb, CNN and Uber all being started during economic downturns.

Limited Supply

Precious metals and cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin have limited supplies and therefore may be used as a store of value to protect against excessive money printing.

Bitcoin was created at a time of economic crisis partly for this very reason. A message was added to the first Bitcoin block about this exact subject, you can read more about that in an earlier blog post.

UK Property

With a limited amount of space and a growing population the long-term prospects for property in the UK look good. That said, areas like London which appear to be reaching a peak in valuations are likely to take a hit. Areas like Peterborough, Hull, Sheffield, Burnley and many others look more promising.

During any deflationary period demand for HMOs is likely to increase due to downsizing and family breakdown. This coupled with the increasing number of Councils implementing Article 4 (requiring planning permission to convert a residential house into an HMO) is likely to increase the value of licenced HMOs in time. Of course, this is dependant on area and where property is already overvalued decreases in price are likely to be seen.

Protecting Against Inflation

You can also protect against inflation by ensuring that your money earns enough interest to be able to withstand the loss in purchasing power. Unfortunately, it is no longer possible to do this with a savings account at a bank. However there are options such as peer-to-peer, cryptocurrency-backed and private lending. You can learn more about them in the blog post entitled Beat The Banks – Earn 8%+ PA On Your Savings!

It was once possible to mine Bitcoin directly from your laptop or PC’s CPU/GPU. As competition has heated up in the Bitcoin mining space it is now no longer viable to do so. Today, Bitcoin mining is done by computers specifically designed for the purpose. But you can still earn Bitcoin from your computer via mining. Honeyminer allows you to mine an easier to mine cryptocurrency and then they exchange it for Bitcoin for you!

What Will I Earn?

The way the program works is it runs in the background mining a cryptocurrency like Monero using your computer’s CPU or GPU. It then converts it to Bitcoin for you. If you have a new computer with a good GPU you will earn more than if you have an older laptop and can only use your CPU.

Either way though, you won’t earn a ton of money. It’s more about being part of the process of mining cryptocurrencies than earning a lot of money. If Bitcoin goes up in value as much as it has done in the past however, the small amount of money you make could become a large sum one day.

Are there fees?

Honeyminer is free to use. But they do take some of the mined currency in fees. At the time of writing it is 8% for 1 GPU and for 2 GPUs or more the fee is 2.5%. When you withdraw funds you will also need to pay Bitcoin’s network fee, this is not charged by Honeyminer but is the fee charged to transact on the Bitcoin network. The network fee is deducted from your withdrawal. Also remember that extra use of your computers CPU/GPU will mean that you use more electricity.

Honeyminer Referral Code

If you use a Honeyminer Referral Code when signing up you will get a small amount of Bitcoin fore free (1,000 Satoshis). Using a referral code also helps the person that refers you. You can try and find someone you know with a referral code or use mine. My referral code is 5c3dq to get 1,000 Satoshis free. Click here to use it.

Are the better options than Honeyminer?

If you are technically inclined you may prefer to mine various cryptocurrencies yourself as part of a pool. You would then be in control of when or if you convert them to Bitcoin. You may be able to earn more and pay a lower fee this way as well. But if you are a beginner, Honeyminer offers an easy way to get involved. If you are looking to make a fortune, this isn’t for you. If you want to get a little Bitcoin and be part of the fun of the cryptocurrency revolution, why not give it a go?

In this article we are going to look at Bitcoin…

Bitcoin’s History:

In the beginning there was the internet. The internet allowed people to share information with each other freely. The internet was decentralised, meaning that no one entity controlled it. It was simply computers (servers) connected to one another. Even in the early days, people predicted there would be a currency for the internet. But there was a problem. Things on the internet could easily be copied and shared over and over again. This was a problem for something like a currency. If people could create endless copies of the currency, that currency would be worthless.

For a long time, the only way to run a currency on the internet was to have a company (centralised third-party) to keep a check on who had what amount. This required that the company be trusted and the company also had to comply with the various money transmission laws in each location it operated in. For an internet currency to really take off it needed to be decentralised, like the internet itself.

An anonymous developer using the name Satoshi Nakamoto eventually found a solution. Blockchain. Blockchain allows transactions to be stored on computers all across the world without any central entity to run it. This is the technology Bitcoin runs on. Like the internet itself, Bitcoin doesn’t need a company to control it. It therefore means that anyone can send any amount of Bitcoin to anyone else anywhere in the world. It is almost impossible for governments to censor it without taking draconian actions like shutting down the web.

Why Is Bitcoin Useful?

There are many reasons why Bitcoin is useful but here are the two main ones:

1. Uncensorable.

It is almost impossible to censor Bitcoin. You can pay someone with it in another country which doesn’t have PayPal. You can transfer large sums of money without playing 20 questions with your bank. If you live in a nation with an oppressive government, or fear that one day your nation’s government could become oppressive, you can escape with all your Bitcoin stored with a code on a bit of paper or even just in your head (if you have a good memory).

2. Limited supply.

Bitcoin has a limited supply. This is why Bitcoin has become popular as an investment. Government-issued currency (fiat currency), like pounds and dollars, is continually printed. The supply of currency grows over time causing the value of your savings to go down. For more information about why printing currency causes inflation, see this article on fiat currency. There will only ever be 21 million bitcoins ever created. This is written into the code. This means as the demand for Bitcoin rises so does the price.

I hope this has helped you understand a little bit about why Bitcoin is so popular. Keep checking back for more in the ‘OVERSIMPLIFIED’ series to learn more about complex topics put in simple terms.

Bitcoin came out of the 2008 financial crisis and the choice of headline was, seemingly, no accident.

Although no one knows who Satoshi Nakamoto really is, his writings reveal a little about his feelings on the financial system. For example, in one forum post he said of banks:

“Banks must be trusted to hold our money and transfer it electronically, but they lend it out in waves of credit bubbles with barely a fraction in reserve. We have to trust them with our privacy, trust them not to let identity thieves drain our accounts. Their massive overhead costs make micropayments impossible.”

Bitcoin open source implementation of P2P currency 2009-02-11 22:27:00 UTC

In another forum post he talks about central banking saying:

“The root problem with conventional currency is all the trust that’s required to make it work. The central bank must be trusted not to debase the currency, but the history of fiat currencies is full of breaches of that trust.”

Bitcoin open source implementation of P2P currency 2009-02-11 22:27:00 UTC

Bitcoin, it appears, was created as an alternative to the fiat currency system of continuous currency printing. With a fixed supply, Bitcoin comes into existence in reducing amounts over time until it reaches 21 million coins. Then it stops. It is in sharp contrast to Government created currency like dollars and pounds which seem to be printed at greater amounts over time and have no fixed cap.

Satoshi and the community of coders around him leaned heavily libertarian. He said of Bitcoin in an email:

“It’s very attractive to the libertarian viewpoint if we can explain it properly. I’m better with code than with words though.”

Bitcoin P2P e-cash paper 2008-11-14 18:55:35 UTC

The libertarian world-view very much blames the central banks currency printing for the boom and bust cycles of depression and expansion we see today. Hence the importance to Nakamoto of the headline “[c]hancellor on brink of second bailout for banks”.

Since the creation of Bitcoin, until recently, we have been in a boom period. But Bitcoin was created as an alternative currency which really comes into its own in the busts. In busts, central banks tend to go into massive currency printing drives, thereby reducing the value of their currency. This is a perfect environment for a currency with a limited supply such as Bitcoin.

As a number of factors were coming to a head, the COVID-19 crisis occurred, almost certainly bringing a new long-term bust cycle into being. This will be a test for Bitcoin. Will it act as a store of value that protects people from massive money printing as Satoshi Nakamoto cryptically predicted? Will Bitcoin be the foremost asset of the coming collapse?

Bitcoin has done very well in the boom cycle. It has risen out of nowhere to become a household name, traded on futures exchanges and discussed by global governments. Its limited supply should allow it to prosper during the bust cycle too. But perhaps in a recession people will prefer more familiar assets with less perceived risk. That’s why this Time’s headline is so important, it represents a key question about Bitcoin and the future of finance: will Bitcoin thrive, as it is meant to, during a financial crisis?

It’s a question I suspect we will soon have an answer to.