Bitcoin Forum

If bitcoin acceptance reaches a critical mass where necessities of food, shelter, and clothing can be bought with it, it could reach a tipping point where it displaces national currencies in many developing countries. In this scenario, many areas of the world may leapfrog banking infrastructure and traditional money wire transfers. Most notably, the financial landscape in developing economies such as Africa is well positioned to leapfrog traditional banking and move directly to a bitcoin-enabled financial paradigm.

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Worldwide, approximately 2.5 billion people lack a formal account at a financial institution. Access to affordable financial services is linked to overcoming poverty, reducing income disparities, and increasing economic growth.

Sorry, but this is blatant propaganda of the established banking industry. "Linked to" must be interpreted as being based on correlational data. So the true relationship between the variables mentioned is most likely not that access to financial services leads to overcoming poverty. Instead it is merely the observation that people with a higher income are more likely to use financial services as well. It is complete nonsense to assume that giving bank accounts to poor people will make them rich.

You're right with your assessment, that for Bitcoin to become successful, people must be able to buy their daily necessities with it. That is the true mission that needs to be accomplished by the actors of the Bitcoin economy: Providing essential goods and services (food & shelter). If people in developing countries could use Bitcoin directly to buy their necessities, no remittance service would be able to compete with Bitcoin anymore.

ya.ya.yo!

I think it will be the same as it happened with the internet. They bypassed the cable infrastructures and it mostly runs through wifi signals. Similarly, africans will most definitely bypass the banking infrastructure and jump directly into bitcoin.