The different places you can already use and spend your Bitcoin
Bitcoin is now recognized as legal money in El Salvador. Therefore you can go into any Starbucks or McDonald’s and use it to pay for your food or beverages. This is one of the common instances that can be seen in the modern world. You may also use a Bitcoin lightning network to purchase bananas or papayas from a street seller instead of using traditional currency. You can do something like in Lugano, Switzerland, where customers may pay for their McDonald’s meals with Bitcoin. In addition, we have bitcoin island in the Philippines, which already has over one hundred establishments where you can spend Bitcoin.
Bctmap.org is something New for you to Explore
I’d like to tell you about a brand-new open-source initiative that goes by the name of https://btcmap.org/. This is a map of the whole world that shows you places you can spend Bitcoin, and the majority of these locations are physical stores rather than online stores where you may purchase products and services with Bitcoin.
This uses an underlying open-source project called open street map and can be found at https://www.openstreetmap.org/. This means that it is not reliant on Google Maps, which is a positive development. Going to the website’s homepage and clicking on the map should bring you to this page. Essentially, this is how it works. After that, you may zoom in on the continent or area of particular interest to you by scrolling. You can see that approximately ten or eleven thousand locations have already been posted.
Therefore, I strongly suggest you look at this map to see whether or not there are any places close to where you live or work that enable you to spend some Bitcoin.
Ways you can help this open-source Bitcoin project BTCmap
There are a few different ways in which you and I may contribute to the success of the open-source Bitcoin project btcmap.org. You first need to locate a retailer in your area who already conducts business with you using Bitcoin. You only need to click where it says “add location” in this box.
You only need to provide the merchant’s name and address, and that’s all; the company will be added to BTCmap immediately after you submit the information. If you want to become a more advanced tagger, which they call a shadowy super tagger, you can sign up for an account, have it approved, and then you’ll be able to add these locations directly to the map itself. This is an excellent way for people who maybe aren’t coders or designers to contribute to the Bitcoin ecosystem and an open-source project related to Bitcoin.
Donate to the project
If you want to give to this project, which I am not involved with in any way, they do have a support Us link. where you can donate either on a chain or through lightning to help expand this project, and I believe it’s vital to donate since it will benefit the project. Unfortunately, they depend on donations from the community to pay different expenditures. Still, they contribute their time to projects like BTC map.org to assist with the widespread acceptance of Bitcoin. BTC map.org is a free, open-source project whose developers fund its costs.
Suppose you want to encourage additional companies to accept Bitcoin. In that case, you can visit such establishments and strike up a conversation with the proprietor as you wait for your lunch or for your items to be wrapped. In order to prevent unpleasant situations, it’s best to get to know someone a little before bringing up the topic of whether or not they accept Bitcoin; you may go from there. Credit card processing costs range from 3% to 4%. In addition, you can show them the establishments in the region that accept Bitcoin by directing them to the location on the btcmap.org map we’ve been discussing today. By highlighting nearby establishments that take Bitcoin, you may gain a leg up on the competition and let them know they need to start thinking about Bitcoin, too.
You might also tell the person, “I’d like to tip you in Bitcoin if that’s OK.” After they agree, you can have them install the muun wallet software on their phone and give them some SATs as a tip; this way, the person receives non-KYC bitcoin straight from you.
In addition to this, you may follow BTCmap on Twitter at https://twitter.com/BTCMapDotOrg.
It is essential to note that Strike is presently working on integrating the major point-of-sale service providers into the lightning network. Therefore, this will happen in the future, and you can be sure that people are grossly underestimating the capacity of something like this to bring a significant number of new businesses into the Bitcoin network. Customers can settle their transactions with Bitcoin, or businesses can receive the profits of their sales in fiat currency, depending on their preference. This is an excellent method for increasing the size of the Bitcoin circular economy.
There are two ways of buying bitcoin
utilizing either the mobile app “strike” or https://strike.me/ website, which enables not only buying and selling of bitcoins but also freer and more anonymous money transfers than are possible with services like PayPal or Venmo. Consequently, I suggest you look into it.
If you want to take advantage of the reduced transaction costs on the lightning network and utilize bitcoin on the chain, you should check out the muun wallet. Bitcoin’s lightning network allows it to scale to the point that users are willing to spend a few dollars in settlement costs for a cup of coffee. However, using the lightning network to transmit a transaction is almost always free or costs less than a cent because of its speed and low fees.
The distinction between your long-term Bitcoin savings and paying for things using Bitcoin
To be clear, you shouldn’t withdraw your Bitcoin from cold storage (whether single Sig- or multi Sig), but it might make a lot of sense to work toward a more Bitcoin-centric circular economy. For example, utilizing resources like btcmap.org to maximize your chances of making bitcoin and paying for products and services using bitcoin.
Spend and replace is what it’s been referred to as online. So, you attempt to purchase things and services for which you would generally pay fiat currency. Still, you don’t touch your significant hoard of bitcoin since everyone lived on a few hundred dollars worth of bitcoin or whatever is spending change for you. Small quantities of Bitcoin, comparable to what one could keep in a wallet or handbag, may be spent and then replaced. Just like you wouldn’t want to spend all your retirement money at once, you shouldn’t spend all of your short-term savings here, either. To protect your privacy, you should keep these two things apart.
Spending Bitcoin in the U.S.
I’ve heard that there may be tax consequences if you’re a U.S. resident and spend Bitcoin that has increased in value relative to the U.S. currency, so it’s probably a good idea to check in with a local tax expert to make sure you’re doing things right. For example, if the price at which you purchased a Bitcoin differs from the price you sell or exchange it for goods and services, you will be subject to capital gains taxes on the difference.
Solutions might be:
- Keep good records.
- Buy the Bitcoin right before you spend it.
- Buy it on strike, send it to your muun wallet, and spend immediately.
Assuming Bitcoin’s volatility is normal, any potential cap games are minor. I wouldn’t recommend worrying too much about this since the IRS is unlikely to go after someone for failing to pay $2 in untracked taxes. In any case, this is not tax advice, so if you want to know how the IRS in the United States taxes Bitcoin, I’ve included a link to the relevant IRS website below.
To make Bitcoin transactions tax-free in the United States, legislation must establish a minimum exemption within the following years. The initial exemption value for the Lummus Scala Brand Bill was probably about $600. One wonderful thing about spending up to $600 on an item is that you may deduct the whole amount from your capital gains tax. So if you hold on to your Bitcoin for a long enough period of time, you may be allowed to spend it like you would regular money without having to pay any taxes on it. According to my research, the yellow brand of Lummus Bell had an exemption amount of about $600. However, other competing versions reduced it to $200.
I hope you found this information useful. I invite you to explore BTCmap and share your experiences with it with your loved ones. If you’re a business owner, it might provide free advertising for your company and give your customers an alternative option to buying your products. Please share this article if you found it helpful I would appreciate the encouragement.