Argentina is not going Bitcoin

[dree12]

Argentina is our fourth largest source of traffic. Currently sitting behind North America, Canada and the UK. 

North America?

[freedomno1]

I don't agree with this. The situation is changing rapidly from what it used to be. The Bitcoin innovators have come from the Western countries almost exclusively, and most enterpreneurs (like me) are providing services over here. That's how it used to be, but now it is different.

I'm seeing enterpreneurs emerge that are actually out there in the countries that could benefit from Bitcoin the most. Things are happening there. A lot of things. China, Kenya, Argentina, Brazil, even Iran, things are happening. Finally. There was simply no one there to spread the word before now, that has quite clearly changed. There was a Bitcoin meetup in Buenos Aires that had 180 people attending, it's quite a drastic change.

Since Bitcoin is growing in Western countries as well, it will probably take a year or two for the others to properly catch up. The service infrastructure and entrepreneurial effort is only getting started, while over here it has developed for a few years already. Just give it time and things will happen big time in countries like Argentina.

+1

[moni3z]

There is still a government crackdown on leaking any money out of the country. I looked around and found a few ways through it, but they are high fee. You can use Rapipago and other payment gateways to accept money from Argentinians, convert it to USD/another currency, and then sell them bitcoins. It's like 5-12% fees though sometimes more, but better than smuggling cash over the border.

Argentinians can get an Okpay account, make a fake website that sells a service, and drop in a payment gateway on it that settles to your USD Okpay account. Now spend your own money on the gateway through your fake website which is dumped into Okpay, then go on btc-e (i think they still accept Okpay) and buy bitcoins. I just p2p buy on IRC with okpay and use exchanges as little as possible.

Or send wires from Okpay to other exchanges like Bitstamp or something. I successfully did this with an Argencard gateway (with close friends not letting other people use it cuz cards can be frauded) and now whenever they want coins they just buy it online with their credit card and the stupid government blockade is bypassed. I also tried a payment gateway that uses Inpay, which allows Argentinian bank transfers. It was high fees but worked as advertised, just most people don't keep any money in their bank (from what I was told) so they manually load Argencards and prefer that. This will never work on a large scale public basis because of fraud but you can do this yourself easily and for friends.

Right now it's virtually impossible to get legal US dollars or other currency inside Argentina, so they take a boat to Colonia Uruguay, withdraw all their money in USD through ATMs, and then smuggle it back or get an account there. Not everybody can do this every payday so bitcoins and even just Okpay USD is better than 25% inflation per year of the national currency, rendering all your savings worthless paper

[Anon136]

There is still a government crackdown on leaking any money out of the country.

what about physically carrying cash over the border. not smuggling or anything just staying within the legal limits. people who lived near the boarders could make a daily trip to carry what ever was within the legal amount physically in their wallets across the border. they could then buy bitcoins and bring the bitcoins back across. of course they would arbitrage for their effort.

[justusranvier]

What about not even trying to move cash across the border?

http://bitcoinmagazine.com/beef-and-bitcoin/

[Anon136]

What about not even trying to move cash across the border?

http://bitcoinmagazine.com/beef-and-bitcoin/

yes i like where this is going. here is an idea. find good useful products to sell on bitmit and underbid the other sellers. since its so difficult to get coins into the country you ought to be able to make up the difference with premiums on the coins you sell.

[leopard2]

it is probably really hard for Argentinians to convert local currency into BTC

even for people in the US, it was not really easy when Mtcocks stopped taking their money

And why should an exchange open up in Argentinia, to accept large amount of weak local currency, for BTC? What would they do with that local currency? They cannot move it out or convert.

In Cyprus the story was different, the currency was Euros. Only the bank transfers to the outside were halted.

[Lethn]

A lot of these rumours about various countries accepting Bitcoins or making them an accepted currencies seem to come from pretty unreliable looking sources, usually some idiot with a blog looking to get lots of views or actual conspiracy theorists. I have noticed though that there are plenty of private companies already making a move and it seems that countries who have long been independent of the major empires seem to like Bitcoin quite a lot even if they don't say anything, because you see a lot of the companies based in independent countries quite happy to use it.

See the known tax havens etc. countries that care about privacy rights, you could easily argue that Bitcoin is a common ally for these kind of countries.

[Anon136]

it is probably really hard for Argentinians to convert local currency into BTC

even for people in the US, it was not really easy when Mtcocks stopped taking their money

And why should an exchange open up in Argentinia, to accept large amount of weak local currency, for BTC? What would they do with that local currency? They cannot move it out or convert.

In Cyprus the story was different, the currency was Euros. Only the bank transfers to the outside were halted.

they would use it to buy things inside of Argentina... the fact that the currency sucks doesnt mean we should expect people to be unwilling to trade bitcoin for it, just that such transactions should be expected to carry a very large premium

[ivanlabrie]

it is probably really hard for Argentinians to convert local currency into BTC

even for people in the US, it was not really easy when Mtcocks stopped taking their money

And why should an exchange open up in Argentinia, to accept large amount of weak local currency, for BTC? What would they do with that local currency? They cannot move it out or convert.

In Cyprus the story was different, the currency was Euros. Only the bank transfers to the outside were halted.

they would use it to buy things inside of Argentina... the fact that the currency sucks doesnt mean we should expect people to be unwilling to trade bitcoin for it, just that such transactions should be expected to carry a very large premium

Agreed, I mine and trade for pesos, to then pay rent, buy food or whatnot.

[atomium]

there are a lot of bitcoiners that have translated most of the knowledge, i know of queesbitcoin.info is one

[fran2k]

Right now it's virtually impossible to get legal US dollars or other currency inside Argentina, so they take a boat to Colonia Uruguay, withdraw all their money in USD through ATMs, and then smuggle it back or get an account there. Not everybody can do this every payday so bitcoins and even just Okpay USD is better than 25% inflation per year of the national currency, rendering all your savings worthless paper

It's near impossible to buy at official rate (now about 6 ARS/USD) but you can buy at illegal market, the so called Dólar Blue cotization which goes around 9 ARS/USD. Yes, 50%.
The problem goes into the other side too, nobody is going to give you cash dollars, they will convert your dollars into ARS at official rate.

Now there is a limit on this, you can't withdraw more than a few hundred bucks per month in other countries ATMs.

And why should an exchange open up in Argentinia, to accept large amount of weak local currency, for BTC? What would they do with that local currency? They cannot move it out or convert.

Anyway the Gov. is not going to permit an exchange here.

[FeedbackLoop]

What about not even trying to move cash across the border?

http://bitcoinmagazine.com/beef-and-bitcoin/

yes i like where this is going. here is an idea. find good useful products to sell on bitmit and underbid the other sellers. since its so difficult to get coins into the country you ought to be able to make up the difference with premiums on the coins you sell.

+1

...and of course someone could offer to do this for other people looking for Bitcoins and charge a premium (or simple do this and sell the Bitcoins at localbitcoins in hand).

Why wouldn't this work?

[ronimacarroni]

Its because their government has a tight grip on their bank accounts.
They can't change ARG for USD, they can't wire money and they can't consequently they can't buy mining equipment (not that mining is worth much nowadays)
Their president is literarily a feminazi.

[vqp]

I live in Argentina. Land of large scale economic experiments

This is what people want to do with their savings:

1 - Get rid of ARS (change them for some other currency)
2 - Buy BTC to hedge against US inflation

For argentinians #1 is much more important than #2, they are perfectly happy keeping their savings in the "weak fiat"  the USD is. If you think the FED is destroying the USD, then try the ARS.  (inflation in ARS is 25% annual)

That said, many argentinians are using BTC to achieve #1 without the physical interchange of USD or EUR bills, but the amounts are tiny since wealthy people is already invested in USD.  The BTC is used as a temporary tool, and is far from perfect.

Other funny facts that will make into economic research papers:
- A BTC/ARS exchange will never be approved by Government (heck, even a USD/ARS exchange is forbidden)
- Nobody sells dollars at the official rate of 5.7 (rate that is used for "approved" imports and all exports)
- Informal traders put the rate at 9.3 ARS/USD. It is illegal to buy or sell foreign currency (law that is impossible to enforce anyway)
- Argentinians can use their credit cards to buy stuff in foreign currency (either travelling or online) paying in ARS at a 20% premium on top of the 5.7 rate (~ 7 ARS/USD). But this is probably going to end after October elections. There are practical limits for this anyway (CC limits for instance)
- Argentinian internal economy is not thriving, but is not bad at all.

[ronimacarroni]

- Argentinian internal economy is not thriving, but is not bad at all.

You guys have practically put an embargo on yourselves.
How is that not bad all.

[vqp]

yes i like where this is going. here is an idea. find good useful products to sell on bitmit and underbid the other sellers. since its so difficult to get coins into the country you ought to be able to make up the difference with premiums on the coins you sell.

+1

...and of course someone could offer to do this for other people looking for Bitcoins and charge a premium (or simple do this and sell the Bitcoins at localbitcoins in hand).

Why wouldn't this work?

That is very suitable for services. As per products, most products are more expensive in Argentina than in the US and if the goverment finds out you are exporting, they will force your client to deposit the dollars in the government account, and they will give you pesos (that they happily print at no cost) at the official rate.
 

[vqp]

- Argentinian internal economy is not thriving, but is not bad at all.

You guys have practically put an embargo on yourselves.
How is that not bad all.

I'm saying people are spending as if there is no tomorrow and the economy is moving.

[vqp]

There is still a government crackdown on leaking any money out of the country.

what about physically carrying cash over the border. not smuggling or anything just staying within the legal limits. people who lived near the boarders could make a daily trip to carry what ever was within the legal amount physically in their wallets across the border. they could then buy bitcoins and bring the bitcoins back across. of course they would arbitrage for their effort.

The problem is getting rid of pesos. People have pesos and pesos worth nothing outside Argentina.  Look at the paradox: the Argentina Central Bank does not buy them at any price. 

[cr1776]

I'm saying people are spending as if there is no tomorrow and the economy is moving.

I think that is because they KNOW that there IS NO tomorrow for the peso unless the government gets its act together.  And they know that is extremely unlikely.

The spending will not last, it is just going to make things worse because no one wants the currency, only goods (for obvious reasons). 

:-)