Bitcoin and cryptocurrency interest has been at an all-time high this year. Bitcoin reached a record of over $64,000 a few months ago before plunging more than 50%. The world’s most popular coin has recovered to just under $40,000 in the early hours of Monday, after a massive overnight rally. Bitcoin hasn’t just caught the interest of more retail investors this year. Corporations are paying attention to bitcoin and the entire cryptocurrency space. Elon Musk’s Tesla and SpaceX own bitcoin. PayPal supports several digital tokens and lets people pay for goods online with their crypto balances. That’s why it’s not surprising to hear that the world’s largest retailer has been working on bringing bitcoin payments to its platform. Amazon reportedly plans to support bitcoin by the end of the year. And it could turn out to be a big Black Friday surprise for Amazon shoppers.
Reports over the weekend said that Amazon is looking for a digital currency and blockchain expert. That’s enough for any crypto enthusiast to speculate that Amazon wants to bring bitcoin payments to its platform.
However, that’s not an official confirmation that Amazon will accept bitcoin payments soon. Blockchain technology isn’t used solely as an alternative for fiat payment transactions, of course. Amazon might want to research other aspects of the blockchain space that have nothing to do with actual payments.
Amazon’s crypto plans are bigger than bitcoin payments
A supposed insider told CityAM
that Amazon is “definitely” lining up crypto payments. Bitcoin is just the beginning, according to the report.
Amazon might enable bitcoin payments initially, but other digital coins will follow. Amazon’s goal is reportedly to create its own digital token. The company apparently plans to start accepting bitcoin payments “by the end of the year.” Its own digital token may follow in 2022.
The insider did not provide any firm dates. But if bitcoin payments are in the works for this year, then Amazon can’t ignore Black Friday. That’s its most significant and most anticipated shopping event of the year after Prime Day. Also, Black Friday sales extend from early November until late into the holiday season.
“This isn’t just going through the motions to set up cryptocurrency payment solutions at some point in the future,” the insider said about Amazon’s job ad. “This is a full-on, well-discussed, integral part of the future mechanism of how Amazon will work.”
“It begins with bitcoin – this is the key first stage of this crypto project,” she said, adding that “the directive is coming from the very top… Jeff Bezos himself.”
The Amazon token
Once Amazon sets a fast and secure method of accepting bitcoin payments, it’ll move to other digital coins. “Ethereum, Cardano, and Bitcoin Cash will be next in line before they bring about eight of the most popular cryptocurrencies online,” she said. “It won’t take long because the plans are already there, and they have been working on them since 2019.”
The project is said to be “pretty much ready to roll,” with the goal of creating an Amazon token. “When all these crypto ducks are lined up, there’s another twist to push things even further into Amazon’s favor – a native token,” the insider added.
She explained that we might be heading towards tokenization after a year of experiencing cryptocurrency payments for goods. Aside from online payments, the “multi-level infrastructure” could let users earn tokens in loyalty schemes.
“There’s little more to it, for now, but you can guarantee the Bitcoin plan will be monitored closely as opportunities with Amazon’s own version of a crypto will be explored,” she said.
