Why aren't cryptocurrencies successful as a medium of payment

[giancarlo01]

The global economy is nearly 80 trillion USD per year.  Payments using any type of cryptocurrency as a medium of payment is a tiny fraction of this total.

What are some of the reasons preventing cryptocurrency from being more successful as a medium of payment?

in my opinion, most part of the world are yet to know the basics of Crypto as a digital money. This news we are spreading every single day on and outside of this forum. and  definitely crptocurrency will be adapted by the mass. it's use of Decentralization(No Governing body) will also be adopted too

[Megababa]

We have to understand every great thing being adopted and used generally today took time. Cryptocurrency is currently in its early stage and it is gradually warming its way to the top please be patient and give our baby more years before you start expecting it to be everywhere.

[Julunguul]

The global economy is nearly 80 trillion USD per year.  Payments using any type of cryptocurrency as a medium of payment is a tiny fraction of this total.

What are some of the reasons preventing cryptocurrency from being more successful as a medium of payment?

Yes, almost of the cryptocurrencies today just focus on the trading and exchange listing, i mean we didn't see those developer trying to tell about the news and the development of the Apps and the Real objective of their project, if just they want to develop and focus to the goal of the project, we will really see it has a good price movement.

[Wicked Sick]

The adoption rate of cryptocurrencies is still very small and until that number reaches at least double digits globally I don't think we are going to see people using cryptocurrencies as a medium of payment. As cryptocurrencies need to be accepted everywhere before people shift to using it.

[gilad215]

Cryptocurrencies first haven't won the trust of people due to the non-stability in the region of investments, so people don't consider it much useful regarding that
The second government hasn’t accepted the crypto yet as a mode of digital payment so till then we cannot do much of anything in this
Third very few people know about the cryptos so that's also making a major issue if people don't know what crypto how will you be going to pay them through coins
So these are some of the factors playing the major role
But we can predict that maybe someday in future we will be using cryptos as a digital currency
Saving the environment with it.

[Levious]

The price of cryptocurrency has not been stable. This is the biggest difficulty for tokens to become the currency in life. You can think that if the price of the beverage we drink changes every minute! What do you think?

[kunsh]

There is over 70% people in the world who didn't hear about crypto at all...you can't tell to them to start using something what they don't understand how it's work
Time will pass until we have mass adoption of crypto but that time will come. We just need to be patient for now. Payment's also will come with more popularity.

[ThorWin]

Because they have so many holes and many people do not really believe in them, using electronic money also makes it difficult for some people, so watching e-money as a means of payment is impossible. any.

[jatoman]

The reason is that crypto is only starting to become popular last year so it still need a lot of time until normal people and business know about it and decided to adopt it as one of the payment option.

Yes, it will take some time and a lot of effort to get the public to understand how it works, why they should trust it, and why it is better than existing electronic payments, especially credit/debit cards.

It's similar problem to the early 1960s when Bank of America introduced the "BankAmericard".  They and American Express were trying to get the public to understand what a "credit card" was, how it worked, why they should trust it, and why it was better than using cash or cheques.  It took years and hundreds of millions USD in advertising to make it a widely use medium of payment.

Government also one of the factor of this slow adoption because they still want to regulate crypto before allowing business to accept them.

I agree.

What most governments want is way their regulators such as tax authorities and custom agencies can effectively regulate commerce paid with cryptocurrencies.  Existing blockchains make this virtually impossible because,

• they conceal the identity of payer and payee
• they conceal the nature of the transaction, where it is impossible to know what was purchased, what, if any, taxes were paid, or the tax nexus of the payer (buyer) and the payee (seller)

[MascharonoM]

There is no way to shortcut. You need to be patient. You can't do anything at a time. Lots of new ICO projects are launched every day. Not all develop overnight. As far as I know there have some good projects which are still doing great and got success PTC, BTC, Altcoin, SciDex. And also Bitcoin as well.

[lorylore]

As of right now, cryptocurrencies are still new to a lot of people, even a lot of people in my country also have trouble going cashless payment, so it gonna take quite a while for people to get used to fully digital/cashless.

[CryptoBry]

We will be celebrating next year the first decade for the introduction of the blockchain and cryptocurrency by Satoshi Nakamoto and yet things are not yet that massive though we are having many stride and accomplishments already. We are aware that there are many factors preventing the massive adoption of cryptocurrency and even last year's euphoria has now contributed to its slowdown as that was based mainly on over speculations that later on soured many people's interest when they lost the value of what they are holding. Despite the claim that the blockchain will wean us from the control of the government and the monetary system the fact is that the government is too powerful that any pronouncement deemed negative to cryptocurrency can drive the value of any coin to the ground...so much for the 'to the moon' adage. What happened in China last year is the prime example of what the government can do to cryptocurrency. People are still listening to the government and that is something we could not do anything too much for now. So are we facing a good outlook for cryptocurrency in years to come? I would rather wait for the details to come in rather than guess and be disappointed.

[cola-jere]

IMO, these prevents mass adoption:
1. Ease of use (not many people are technical to understand priv keys, addresses, mining, etc)
2. Security (in terms of preventing one's self to be scammed, goes back to item 1)
3. Media is still propagating bad image about crypto, we can understand that they are controlled by the banks anyhow.
4. Acceptance of merchants for daily use.

[looterrific]

Cryptocurrency is not regulated yet and its status are still neutral to most country. It's anonymity makes it quite hard for a country to trace a transaction and the fact that the fees are quite absurd to make a small transaction is terrifying enough for Bitcoin not being accepted a a legal way for payment.

[Biasaae]

The global economy is nearly 80 trillion USD per year.  Payments using any type of cryptocurrency as a medium of payment is a tiny fraction of this total.

What are some of the reasons preventing cryptocurrency from being more successful as a medium of payment?

I think to be a wider payment instrument, crypto should get global recognition first. And although it has gained global recognition, a crypto that will be a currency must be guaranteed by a particular authority. So I think we will not find crypto will be a global payment medium in the future.

[MascharonoM]

I looked for some other projects during few months SciCoin based on SciDex. What is the chance of growing this cryptocurrency?

[yeeyeyaya]

I would say that many are still unfamiliar with the technology that will be more effective and better, as is the case in society. public understanding of crypto very little and still many misunderstandings about crypto. the government is also not fully supportive and banking or very financial.

[xenomorphe1]

Value of cryptocurrencies are too volatile. Imagine buying a bread with crypto, tomorrow the bread is going to cost the double or more or will be worth two time less.
Also sometimes the network is too clogged and you will need 2 hours to get a confirmation of the transaction.

[incomefromcoins]

cryptocurrency should involve to mass adoption until then we cant accept to the medium of payments all over the world it is just like smartphone evolution which may happen in coming future most of the merchants accept bitcoin

[jatoman]

What are some of the reasons preventing cryptocurrency from being more successful as a medium of payment?

Innovation and the change of point of view the way people/users looking at it.

Crypto's are meant to become a medium of payment but as the days are passing by it is changing. We saw on how it's effective and profitable to become an investment, store of value and asset. But it's still being used the way it is and those other use that I mentioned just adds as its feature.

I agree.

When "Satoshi" invented blockchain the application "he" designed to use "his" invention was a medium of payment.  There are a variety of flaws in this design that creates obstacles for its use as a medium of payment.  Many of these obstacles posters highlighted in this thread. 

And, these and other design flaws are found in other blockchains and their cryptocurrencies.  So, they aren't isolated to Bitcoin.

My sense is there still needs to be a lot of innovation to arrive at a blockchain and cryptocurrency suitable for a medium of exchange that sees widespread use.