2021-05-12 CoinDesk - MoneyGram to Allow Bitcoin Buying and Selling

[acquafredda]

MoneyGram International said Wednesday it will allow customers to buy and sell bitcoin (BTC, -0.44%) for cash at 12,000 U.S. retail locations through a partnership with Coinme.

The cash transfer company plans to introduce bitcoin trades in 20,000 stores across 32 states by Q3, Coinme CEO Neil Bergquist told CoinDesk. His crypto firm already facilitates cash-for-bitcoin swaps at around 6,000 supermarket kiosks.

MoneyGram and Coinme will take 4% of customers’ transactions plus $2.75 in fees. Walmart-based MoneyGram locations will charge $2 more, he said.

https://www.coindesk.com/moneygram-to-allow-bitcoin-buying-and-selling-across-retail-network

Surprise, surprise!
MoneyGram is here too.
Before ending into irrelevance MoneyGram remembered that maybe they should allow their clients to go in and out of bitcoin. Imagine what a shitload of money they could have done if they opened to bitcoin in the past.

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[suzanne5223]

First, I am not surprised with the news cause whenever it bullish market, good news always happen to Bitcoin but I hate the part that this is also the season some people use to pump their died coin while they use some investors as scapegoat and yes MoneyGram ought to have open for this kind of business in the past, I guess they are thinking about the legal stance of the government which is why they partnership with Ripple instead of Bitcoin integration.

[Theb]

Imagine what a shitload of money they could have done if they opened to bitcoin in the past.

This is what non-crypto companies have been seeing recently this year and I think that will be a pattern we will see. Earlier this 1st quarter we have seen companies like JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs introducing crypto-based investment portfolio for their clients and this is just a hint that they are seeing a competition from crypto-based investment companies. Now that a remittance center has taken the first step to be part of the crypto industry it would be interesting to see how other companies will follow up namely Western Union and TransferWise which is their biggest competition, maybe they will match it just for the sake of not being left out as what other companies have shown this year.

[buwaytress]

I didn't read the news in entirety, so assumed it was MoneyGram international (it's just the US). Would have been big otherwise, as I grew up seeing MG long before I even knew what Western Union was, it's practically in every bank and post office in Southeast Asia and even students use it, so having Bitcoin prominent on their counters would be pretty, pretty big. Suppose doing so might jeopardise their reputation with these banks and post offices though (not so much that these establishments in the region view Bitcoin in a bad light, just not in a serious light, what with Elon headlines et al).

[Streets 2.0]

I think that the market has lacked such news lately. The more there are, the faster we will recover from the "Great Manipulator" and return to gradual and reasonable growth. I hope this is not the last positive news this week, and as many of these companies as possible will open this buy and sell option to their clients in the near future. We need to move on and not listen to those who just want to deceive everyone.

[Darker45]

I think that the market has lacked such news lately. The more there are, the faster we will recover from the "Great Manipulator" and return to gradual and reasonable growth. I hope this is not the last positive news this week, and as many of these companies as possible will open this buy and sell option to their clients in the near future. We need to move on and not listen to those who just want to deceive everyone.

There are actually a number of good news lately. However, it seems too much weight was being assigned to an uninformed tweet of a sarcastic influencer. Apparently, unstable newbies who are as uninformed as Musk himself, are dumping their Bitcoin holdings at a loss following Tesla's decision.

But there have been good news. For one, Bank of America indicates through a survey that Long Bitcoin is the most crowded trade in the world right now. That's bullish news considering that it involves big-time fund managers with hundreds of billions of assets under their management.^[1]

There is also the news that another $10 million worth of MicroStrategy funds are getting into Bitcoin.^[2]

Just hours ago, there is also this news: Luxury yacht firm accepts Bitcoin, hosts mobile and web services on blockchain.^[3]

And how about another tech giant showing belief in Bitcoin in this news published just a couple of days ago: Sony Publishes Patent for Bitcoin-enabled ESports Gambling Platform?^[4]

I could go on further but it all ends up on each individual's tolerance for correction, FUD, panic, and so on. Weak hands gonna sell. Diamond hands gonna stack Sats.

[1] https://www.coindesk.com/long-bitcoin-is-worlds-most-crowded-trade-bank-of-america-survey
[2] https://bitcoinmagazine.com/business/microstrategy-buys-229-bitcoin
[3] https://cointelegraph.com/news/luxury-yacht-firm-accepts-bitcoin-hosts-mobile-and-web-services-on-blockchain
[4] https://bitcoinmagazine.com/business/sony-plans-bitcoin-esports-gambling

[bryant.coleman]

This is actually confusing.. I have regarded PayPal and Moneygram as competitors to Bitcoin, and they seems to be embracing cryptocurrency. Perhaps, they have realized that accommodating BTC can be mutually beneficial for their growth. Once all the FUD from Elon settles down, I hope we will have more and more companies accepting Bitcoin (and hopefully we will never see Tesla again associating themselves with BTC). Who is going to be next?

[Streets 2.0]

I agree that as soon as all people who, like zombie biorobots, follow the advice of their "idol" throw off their bitcoins, the market will be cleared of its influence. The main question is that large funds, looking at this fall, do not begin to fix losses by waving their hand at the initially risky market and subsequently leaving for the areas of investment they are familiar with. I think it is important to understand that globally the array of news speaks in a positive way about the market and its prospects, and those fluctuations and vacillations that everyone now sees is just another important milestone in its history.

[Oceat]

This is actually confusing.. I have regarded PayPal and Moneygram as competitors to Bitcoin, and they seems to be embracing cryptocurrency. Perhaps, they have realized that accommodating BTC can be mutually beneficial for their growth. Once all the FUD from Elon settles down, I hope we will have more and more companies accepting Bitcoin (and hopefully we will never see Tesla again associating themselves with BTC). Who is going to be next?

There are large institutional investors out there that are possible to make a change and adopt Bitcoin quickly, for example the Apple product or the Microsoft company. These two giants in the market will possibly boost Bitcoin somehow in the future if they would actually allow Bitcoin on their products. But we can't change what decision they were made, so let's just hope some large institutional investors would suddenly surprise the Bitcoin market when they suddenly join the bandwagon to create another bullish market.

[bryant.coleman]

There are large institutional investors out there that are possible to make a change and adopt Bitcoin quickly, for example the Apple product or the Microsoft company. These two giants in the market will possibly boost Bitcoin somehow in the future if they would actually allow Bitcoin on their products. But we can't change what decision they were made, so let's just hope some large institutional investors would suddenly surprise the Bitcoin market when they suddenly join the bandwagon to create another bullish market.

Till now I haven't heard about any rumors which claim that Apple is considering Bitcoin as one of the payment methods. But regarding Microsoft, they are accepting Bitcoin since 2014 for some of the specific niches. But still the core business doesn't have BTC as one of the payment options. When the accept Bitcoin (if it ever happens), then it will be a surprise (similar to this instance). Even with Moneygram, we had no hint that they were going to accept BTC. The announcement was like a bolt from the blue.

[Karartma1]

The fees! OMG the fees! I can imagine already that this service is not gonna be active long; it can well functions for those who want to change some of their cash into btc but at a very big cost. MoneyGram and its partner will take 4% of customers’ transactions plus $2.75 in fees while Walmart-based MoneyGram locations will charge $2 more.