75% of retailers are ready to accept cryptocurrencies!
According to a Deloitte survey, retailers expect customers to be able to pay for goods and services with cryptocurrencies within the next two years.
75% of respondents from among the top managers of 2,000 retailers operating in the U.S. predicted widespread integration of digital currencies in the system of mutual settlements between sellers and consumers.
All survey participants came in equal shares (10% each) from the cosmetics, digital, electronics, fashion, food and beverage, home and garden, hospitality and leisure, personal and household hygiene, transportation, and consumer services industries.
Distribution of companies according to sales channels: 75% are focused on end consumers (B2C), 15% on trading with legal entities (B2B), and 10% on direct sales.
Business loyalty to cryptocurrencies is evidenced by the fact that nearly 50% of entrepreneurs surveyed have already invested more than $1 million in tools and technologies to enable digital payments. 83% of retailers also expect a consumer interest surge over the next year.
Problems and advantages
The main advantage of such integration is a significant increase in the solvent customer base. The convenience, security, and transparency of blockchain-enabled payments were also mentioned. This will contribute to higher trust in online payments.
The problems traditionally included the volatility of cryptocurrencies, storage issues, the ambiguity of legislative interpretations, and the tax consequences of using digital currencies.
Another unsettled item is the monthly subscription payments. They enable regular charge-offs from credit cards, which provides businesses with better forecasting and planning. Automatic withdrawal of funds from the crypto wallet using a “tick” will not be possible.
Stablecoins
The solution to the main weakness of cryptocurrencies lies in the use of stablecoins, which do not pose the same exchange rate risks as bitcoin or altcoins.
Entrepreneurs have also expressed the view that, while the value of cryptocurrencies depends solely on users’ faith, stablecoins are physically backed by some underlying asset (e.g., U.S. dollars, gold, or commodities).
Summary
Don’t get overly excited about “acceptance”: it seems to be a matter of pure pragmatism. The traditional business psychologically remains in the fiat paradigm. In particular, half of the managers count on the emergence of a large selection of third-party payment processing services to convert digital money into “paper” money.
It means they do not plan to actually HODL the cryptocurrency they will receive from their customers.
