The company’s research Chainalysis showed that the share of payments in bitcoin (BTC) has dropped significantly in the past year. The results of the study writes Reuters.
During the work experts have analyzed 17 the processors of bitcoin payments. In September, the total number of transactions with the cryptocurrency, which handled most popular services has decreased 80% since the beginning of the year. About the trend in the decline, and analysts say private payment systems. For example, a canadian company Coinpayments recorded a decline in the number of payments in bitcoin almost half during the period from January to October 2018. This is evidenced by the data of analytical site OXT.
“Bitcoin is experiencing a slow but constant decline,” stated Lex Sokolin (Sokolin Lex), one of the leaders of the research firm Autonomous Next, specializing in the financial sector.
According Chainalysis payments in BTC dropped from $427 million as of Dec 2017 to $96 million in September 2018. And it happened despite the growing stability of the exchange rate of the main cryptocurrency. By the way, this stability many believe the impetus to a proliferation of bitcoins as means of payment among both private clients and commercial organizations. However, some financial companies and individual entrepreneurs believe that mere stability is not enough.
As the expert in strategic development, financial firms UBS Joni Tevez (Joni Teves), bitcoin needs to become faster and cheaper, to acquire the status of a popular means of payment. In addition, according to Tevez, the adoption of the cryptocurrency will contribute to the development of clear regulations governing its turnover — so users will feel the legitimacy of digital money.
Meanwhile, large companies refuse to use bitcoin and other crypto-currencies as means of payment. Microsoft, which in 2014 added support for payment in BTC in the Windows and Xbox stores, last January announced that it would stop to accept this cryptocurrency. Games store Steam has also stopped accepting payments in bitcoin in December 2017, this option’s only a year.
Researchers from the auditing company KPMG believe that if cryptocurrency is the chance to become a medium of exchange, only after the institutionalization of the sphere. Presence in the cryptocurrency market large companies with a good reputation will also contribute to its legitimization.
