[2019-2-2]The Japanese Yen has Become the World’s Leading Currency in Bitcoin Tr

[Vladdirescu87]

The Japanese Yen has Become the World’s Leading Currency in Bitcoin Trading

It has been officially reported that the Japanese Yen (JPY) overtook the US dollar in the race for first place in Bitcoin trading volumes. The Yen has over 49% of the total Bitcoin trading volume in the world.

As Coinhills reported, the USD has been left behind, as the JPY has gained first place in the volumes of bitcoin trading all around the world. Over 490,000 BTC have been traded against the Yen over the 24 hours, making it 49% of the total Bitcoin trading volume. The USD has been down to around 46%.

Read the details in the article of Coinidol dot com, the world blockchain news outlet: https://coinidol.com/yen-bitcoin-trading/

[Harlot]

There is really no surprise here, having a country with a crypto-friendly regulation will be very evident to us all as it is really the main purpose for why a country would like to take advantage of such a blooming industry. It only shows that even if we let other types of currencies be used in our country it won't diminish the fact that our fiat currency is still the preferred choice for transaction. I really would like to see other countries follow the same type of regulation that Japan is doing or even South Korea  as literally the only bad news you are seeing at them right now are hacks and thefts happening to their crypto industry.

[crwth]

So more and more adaptation of Bitcoin in Japan? It's fantastic to see this country to quickly adapt to the latest technologies and how they can implement it. They are the powerhouse in Asia with trading Bitcoin, I guess. Their ruling government also made sure that they are following rules, what's better than that? Great news! I hope no more "hackings" soon.

[davis196]

This is temporary.If a global btc bull run starts(probably after 2 years) the USD will recover it's dominance.
Japan signed a free trade agreement with the EU and I hope that this will help for the Japanese economy to grow faster,which might lead to more people buying btc.

[buwaytress]

No surprise? Well I'm surprised. I know about all the undercurrents going on in Japan since Mt Gox, but the yen itself has been under a lot of pressure domestically, and losing some standing overseas in the SEA forex baskets.

I suppose there really is some underestimated effect of legalisation. One might think that Bitcoin being legal tender meant yen would be used even less, but if people are still trading with yen/btc, then are we seeing even more people getting into trading instead of just using btc as payment?

Get into P2P and OTC, though, and I think USD still trumps anything else.

[Betwrong]

~

Get into P2P and OTC, though, and I think USD still trumps anything else.

I bet it  does. After all, USD is the most used currency in the world. But even if those hidden markets weren't taken into account I still would be surprised by the percentages presented in the article. The site, Coinhills, on which the article is based, raise some suspicions. For example for daily volume they show these numbers:

24h Total Trade Volume 3,392,669 BTC ( 11,593,382,004 USD )

Where did they get those numbers from? The daily volume for BTC on the CoinMarketCap is more than two times lower. Are they claiming they monitor much more markets?

Also, looking at their page here https://www.coinhills.com/market/currency/

it looks like in the last 24h BTC was traded more for Nigerian Naira than for Chinese Yuan, which, I think, can't be true. According to the CMC, the pair BTC/CNY had the volume of $139,679,882 (almost 41k BTC) on one exchange, Fatbtc,  alone.

[gentlemand]

Apart from the website quoted I can't find one single source that makes those volume claims.

Also there are some zero fee places in Japan so whatever volumes are made are meaningless junk.

[1Referee]

USD leads in every possible way, market making, and volumes.

These articles are pure rubbish because they don't take into consideration how Asian exchanges incentivize people to wash trade and earn a few bucks in the process. It goes so far, that some of the most trashy coins generate 100x the volume of BTC. South Korea also fits in that category. It's ridiculous.

This is exactly why the SEC doesn't want to allow an ETF to be approved any time soon, and rightfully so. There is too much shady activity happening on Asian exchanges. The SEC isn't stupid, they know what's happening over there.

[BitHodler]

If you want to see real volumes, then pay attention to what's happening on BitFlyer. BitFlyer in Japan is what Coinbase is in the US, one of the most regulated exchanges within the country they operate in.

https://bitcoinity.org/markets/list?currency=JPY&span=24h

As of writing, BitFlyer generated just over 2200BTC in trading volume in the last 24 hours. That's not something you would expect from a country that many look at as the crypto capital. Quite a disappointment.

Volumes coming from other exchanges should be taken with a truckload of salt.

[gentlemand]

That's not something you would expect from a country that many look at as the crypto capital. Quite a disappointment.

It's not a narrative I've ever really bought.

Little to no Bitcoin development comes out of there. Very few native projects have come out of there.

The government has definitely been more progressive than elsewhere, apart from the murderous tax levels. It doesn't look like their actual population is all that turned on by the idea.

[buwaytress]

That's not something you would expect from a country that many look at as the crypto capital. Quite a disappointment.

It's not a narrative I've ever really bought.

Little to no Bitcoin development comes out of there. Very few native projects have come out of there.

The government has definitely been more progressive than elsewhere, apart from the murderous tax levels. It doesn't look like their actual population is all that turned on by the idea.

I think there's always going to be disappointment if people are expecting Japan to lead the way in technological progress re crypto (but not necessarily blockchain) - they've been focused for decades on innovation and adoption, less on invention, as that serves them and their interests well. So we're actually looking at encouragement from the social and entertainment streams to use crypto as payment, Japan after all, is still much in love with cash and paper money, so the slow uptake for digital and Point of Sale I think is what the merchants are focusing on for now.

It's also why Monacoin and Line will probably do better than Bitcoin or even NEM in the medium term. Sad but guess we all got to find our own way.

[figmentofmyass]

the devil is in the details. i will offer two counterpoints......

this data should be reflected in the p2p markets. check out localbitcoins volume for JPY. now look at USD. we're talking 2-3 BTC per week (JPY) vs 1000-2000 BTC per week (USD). that right there tells me to throw this analysis out the window.

and since the author cites data from coinhills, readers should keep this in mind:

Data Shows US Dollar, Not Japanese Yen, Is Dominating Bitcoin Trade

Japan may not be quite the cryptocurrency powerhouse that the world thinks it is.

A deep dive by CoinDesk has found methodological flaws in widely-cited bitcoin exchange data that appear to overstate the importance of the Japanese yen as a trading pair. Our analysis of trading data collected from July 26-30 suggests that the U.S. dollar, not the yen, is the dominant currency traded for bitcoin by a wide margin.

Currently, analytics sites CryptoCompare and Coinhills offer a breakdown of bitcoin trading by currency pair, and until recently the data from both sites indicated that over 50 percent of bitcoin trading is denominated in Japanese yen.

The problem is that the vast majority of yen-denominated transactions are not “spot” trades of actual bitcoin for yen. Instead, they are derivative products: contracts that derive their value from the performance of an underlying asset.

[gentlemand]

the devil is in the details. i will offer two counterpoints......

this data should be reflected in the p2p markets. check out localbitcoins volume for JPY. now look at USD. we're talking 2-3 BTC per week (JPY) vs 1000-2000 BTC per week (USD). that right there tells me to throw this analysis out the window.

It's all a bit woolly but if you were Japanese why would you bother with LBC? There are plenty of fully approved exchanges that you can rapidly move in and out of there. I know if my local exchange was 100% government approved and had no premium that's the only place I'd bother shopping too. I dunno how demanding KYC is there but the Japanese tend to defer to authority more anyway so are perhaps more content with the idea.

I remember our dear friend Roger Ver talking about evangelising. In every country he went to people were excited by the idea of Bitcoin except Japan where the main reaction was 'it sounds scary'.

I've seen nothing that indicates Japan is the powerhouse some claim it to be. It's nowhere near as empty as the claims made for China back in the day, but it's not all that impressive either.

[milewilda]

Japan is unstoppable when talking about progress, they were all so enthusiastic to the modern and advance technology even though they were one of the most successful in other country.

They never stop to seek knowledge and look at them now they were making a story in the cryptocurrency world.

[BLAST2MARS]

Because Japan is always the leader when it comes to technology. They won't abandone btc because they know that it is really the future of currency. Japan has influenced us with their cool and useful inventions so if they are focusing with crypto then we are on the right track.

[BitHodler]

The government has definitely been more progressive than elsewhere, apart from the murderous tax levels. It doesn't look like their actual population is all that turned on by the idea.

It's very likely just the mainstream media as always is overhyping what's happening over there. Bitcoin is accepted by more than 300k merchants, yet there has been nothing that actually indicates spending demand.

The same goes up for Bcash with how they also count a similar number in merchant acceptance, yet Litecoin with orders of magnitudes less merchant adoption has more on-chain transaction volume.

The funniest thing is that exchanges are starting to halt operations in Japan with how unworkable the legal situation is there. If there was a lot user demand, services as Binance would register themselves, but they left, which says enough.

[figmentofmyass]

the devil is in the details. i will offer two counterpoints......

this data should be reflected in the p2p markets. check out localbitcoins volume for JPY. now look at USD. we're talking 2-3 BTC per week (JPY) vs 1000-2000 BTC per week (USD). that right there tells me to throw this analysis out the window.

It's all a bit woolly but if you were Japanese why would you bother with LBC? There are plenty of fully approved exchanges that you can rapidly move in and out of there. I know if my local exchange was 100% government approved and had no premium that's the only place I'd bother shopping too. I dunno how demanding KYC is there but the Japanese tend to defer to authority more anyway so are perhaps more content with the idea.

i'm in no position to speculate, but i'd throw out KYC, banking delays, and the cash economy (japan is a heavily cash-based society) as a few reasons why the p2p market should be more relevant.

i am very skeptical about these numbers in any case. i had actually heard anecdotally that japanese volumes were dwindling to nothing, and bitflyer's chart seems to support that theory (compared to western exchanges). this just seems like garbage reporting from coinidol based on garbage analytics from coinhills.

[gentlemand]

i'm in no position to speculate, but i'd throw out KYC, banking delays, and the cash economy (japan is a heavily cash-based society) as a few reasons why the p2p market should be more relevant.

i am very skeptical about these numbers in any case. i had actually heard anecdotally that japanese volumes were dwindling to nothing, and bitflyer's chart seems to support that theory (compared to western exchanges). this just seems like garbage reporting from coinidol based on garbage analytics from coinhills.

All good points, the cash one especially. You'd think that it would be higher than elsewhere. There might be a Japanese localbitcoins equivalent. Just because a site is big in most places doesn't mean it's big everywhere.

My guess aligns with yours though - Japan is far less aroused by crypto than others like to claim. And of course this period of time is going to look rather hopeless wherever you look.

[coinmundial]

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