Argentine here.
I'm gonna be painfully honest, but I've seen the "btc saviour of the 3rd world" used a lot and though I'd love nothing more than to agree with it, I've sadly come to the realization it is completely false.
Yes, at first BTC sounds ideal to countries like ours with devaluating currencies and hyperinflating economies, but the awful truth is there is no easy way for us to get BTC and no way to get it at market price. But even before that, we cannot get USD. We even got a black market for that, USD is expensive. If you get your USD as an Argentinian, you'll soon find out there is no way for you to inject it into one of the exchanges, they all require you to link a US or EU/Sepa bank, or a us payment system (dwolla,etc) or maybe use some retail moneypacks (which you guessed.. don't exist here). International bank wire from Arg have prohibitive costs.
Another sad truth is the fact we Argentinian's (and lots of other 3rd world countries) relyheavily solely on Paypal and CC's to buy internationally. We all know that's not happening for BTC, at least not on a regular basis, but truth be told, the BTC I was able to acquire at market price or closest to it I got them through Paypal, thanks to people who trusted me.
If we go through all this, and our btc investments do well, good luck getting those dollars back on the Argentine system. If you're a long bull like myself, that shouldn't matter for now at least..
Even if you disregard everything cost and acquisition related, another harsh truth is there's nothing I can do here in Argentina with my BTC other than use it as a (volatile) store of value. Again, sadly, over the last year I've also realized that bitcoin has placed all it's energies in building rich financial systems and infrastructure (very much like the ones we try to replace and prone to the same heavy abuse), all the while ignoring the development of a real economy and everyday commerce tools.
It's easy for big fish in the US or EU to buy huge loads of btc, and manipulate the market.
It's hard for small 3rd world guys to do 800 pesos = 90 usd = 1 btc, with fees all along and market markup.
The M-Pesa news sounds like a great step in the right direction, I'll take that.
At the moment though, and it hurts to say, btc is still almost exclusively a financial platform, a very speculative one at that. Not nearly ready to go helping the 3rd world.
I'm gonna be painfully honest, but I've seen the "btc saviour of the 3rd world" used a lot and though I'd love nothing more than to agree with it, I've sadly come to the realization it is completely false.
Yes, at first BTC sounds ideal to countries like ours with devaluating currencies and hyperinflating economies, but the awful truth is there is no easy way for us to get BTC and no way to get it at market price. But even before that, we cannot get USD. We even got a black market for that, USD is expensive. If you get your USD as an Argentinian, you'll soon find out there is no way for you to inject it into one of the exchanges, they all require you to link a US or EU/Sepa bank, or a us payment system (dwolla,etc) or maybe use some retail moneypacks (which you guessed.. don't exist here). International bank wire from Arg have prohibitive costs.
Another sad truth is the fact we Argentinian's (and lots of other 3rd world countries) rely
If we go through all this, and our btc investments do well, good luck getting those dollars back on the Argentine system. If you're a long bull like myself, that shouldn't matter for now at least..
Even if you disregard everything cost and acquisition related, another harsh truth is there's nothing I can do here in Argentina with my BTC other than use it as a (volatile) store of value. Again, sadly, over the last year I've also realized that bitcoin has placed all it's energies in building rich financial systems and infrastructure (very much like the ones we try to replace and prone to the same heavy abuse), all the while ignoring the development of a real economy and everyday commerce tools.
It's easy for big fish in the US or EU to buy huge loads of btc, and manipulate the market.
It's hard for small 3rd world guys to do 800 pesos = 90 usd = 1 btc, with fees all along and market markup.
The M-Pesa news sounds like a great step in the right direction, I'll take that.
At the moment though, and it hurts to say, btc is still almost exclusively a financial platform, a very speculative one at that. Not nearly ready to go helping the 3rd world.
Come on, don't whine. make the best of it. I live in Chile and it's already hard to get bitcoins here. 5% markup is a good deal but nobody (really almost nobody) here is dealing in bitcoins. But in Argentine you must be ready to help people out that come there and need pesos. Be flexible, be responsive at localbitcoins.com and the foreigners travelling to Argentine will be happy to make a good deal with their bitcoins. As mentioned before, work for bitcoin. If they are so horribly overpriced, don't buy them but mine (well, sorry if that's some months too late now) them, work for them or when you buy them, be the market maker. You will get MtGox rate even in Argentine if you are the market maker.
Even people in Iran manage to get bitcoins not despite the hassle they have getting dollars but thanks to the borderless nature of Bitcoin. Mohammad Rafigh is a musician and producer and he is quite happy with what he can earn thanks to bitcoin.
