If there is one market in the world that has seen exponential growth over the last decade, it is the cryptocurrency market. What started out with Bitcoin as an obscure market that didn’t have any real worth has now transformed into a market worth $600 billion now. An integral part of its success has been Bitcoin, which started out with a value of a few cents but is now worth $60k per bitcoin.
Many investors who invested early in crypto are happy now because their investments have returned them with returns that are worth thousands of times more than their original investment. Seeing this, countless investors from all around the world have started investing in cryptocurrencies and if you too want to be a part of them, you can visit this site to do so.
The crypto investors who have already invested in cryptocurrencies are now utilizing them in other aspects apart from trading. Cryptocurrencies are now integrated by various shopping platforms which have allowed investors to buy at these stores using cryptocurrencies as payment.
While this move has been met with much support and assistance, there are many who are skeptical about online shopping with cryptocurrencies. If you too are unsure whether shopping online with cryptocurrencies is a good choice or not, then worry not. In this article, we will list several pros and cons that will help you make an educated decision for yourself and tell you what’s the best choice for you.
Pros
There are several pros attached to using cryptocurrencies and these are –
Lower transaction fees than credit card payments
Cryptocurrencies have much lower transaction fees than what you would get by paying with your credit card. Credit card companies not only charge high-interest rates when you go into negative credit card debt, but they also charge 2% to 4% interest with each of your transactions. While it may not sound much early on, this interest becomes quite formidable when you are making larger transactions which is why crypto is a better alternative to credit card payments.
No limit on transactions
Cryptocurrency doesn’t limit your paying or receiving capabilities, unlike banks. You can easily purchase a highly priced commodity without worrying about the transaction being canceled for going above the bank’s transaction limits. In fact, this is what many high-profile investors do when they need to purchase luxurious cars or real-estate online without worrying what their bank will say.
You can do your online shopping anonymously
The best part about cryptocurrency is the level of anonymity it provides you during transactions. The online shopping platform you are shopping at won’t know who you are unless and until you willingly tell them your personal information.
While the anonymity factor may not be relevant for many online shopping stores, since they require you to give some semblance of personal information to them to buy at their store, it doesn’t change the fact that your transaction details are still pretty anonymous and there are many stores that conduct crypto transactions in complete anonymity.
No banking fees
When you buy with cryptocurrencies, you don’t need to worry about the millions of problems your transaction might create – which just so often happens with normal bank transactions. Banks are liable to charge you fees for overdrafting your account, or for not maintaining minimum balance after transactions which can cut down on your finances really fast.
You can transact without using your bank accounts
You can, theoretically, pay in an online shopping platform with cryptocurrency without ever using your bank account once. If you open an account at an exchange and ask someone to transfer some cryptocurrencies to you, then you won’t need to use your fiat currency to buy cryptocurrency and thus, you remove your bank completely out of the equation.
Cons
Transactions can take a long time to process at times
While this doesn’t happen that usual, and is actually the problem of only a few cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, the transactions you do to pay for your online shopping ventures may take a long time to process and reflect in your account.
The chances of this happening are substantially more when the blockchain network receives heavy traffic for transactions. However, this can be avoided by simply using different cryptocurrencies or paying more in transaction fees, which brings us to…
You may be charged tremendous transaction fees, especially during busy times
One of the drawbacks of the most major cryptocurrency, i.e. Bitcoin, is that it has very limited blockchain capabilities to handle transactions. It can handle a very limited amount of transactions at a given second and if there are multiple people who are waiting for their transactions to finish, then you may find yourself waiting in a long queue.
The only way to bypass waiting in this queue is by paying substantial transaction fees to the exchange. Again, if you don’t want this to happen, use a different cryptocurrency like Ether.
Returning products becomes complicated with cryptocurrency
Cryptocurrency is still in its infant stage and shopping platforms have just started integrating it into their systems. There are several aspects of crypto payments that are still being developed and one such aspect is the return policy with products bought with cryptocurrency.
Many companies are still figuring out what their return policy should be (and if there is a need for one in the first place). If you put some thought into it, you will realize why it is such a pickle for many companies.
If you buy a product with 1 crypto, and the crypto’s value falls down and you ask for a return on your product, the company would technically be forced to give you your one crypto back along with some additional amounts of crypto to make up for the product’s value (since the cryptocurrency’s value fell after the time of purchase).
This volatility is what makes companies unwilling to accept product returns on cryptocurrency, a feature that you would have easily received if you had bought the same product with a fiat currency.
Conclusion
There are several pros and cons of using cryptocurrencies for online shopping, and we hope this article provided you insights on most of them. If this article was helpful to you, consider following our website for regular updates as it will help us out immensely.
