Outside a 76 station on West Charleston Boulevard on a recent Friday afternoon, John Syntax takes a drag off of a Parliament cigarette and waits … and waits ... for five $100 bills to emerge at the bitcoin ATM, or BTM, inside. He’s been here nearly an hour.
A network that supposedly cranked up its processing speed in 2015, when it was seven transactions per second, still operates in the bike lane. Visa, by contrast, zips along at a Formula One-like 24,000-plus TPS. Syntax nods toward the yellow vehicle in the lot and says, “The worst part is my taxi (meter) is running.”
Such delays are the best part for 61-year-old manager Orlando Tolentino, who gets $300 a month from Coinsource (the largest bitcoin ATM network in the U.S. with 90 machines in nine states) to have its narrow white machine in his store and peddles Parliaments for $7.09 a pack. For those who consider digital currency bitcoin to be a niche phenomenon, fool’s gold, this episode evinces its impracticality.
Cryptocurrency proponents, enthusiasts of blockchain (a public ledger in which transactions made using cryptocurrency are recorded) and enemies of centralized fiat currency, however, believe bitcoin is more than golden, especially since its price surpassed the precious metal several weeks ago.
In “Digital Gold,” Nathaniel Popper details bitcoin developers’ ultimate mission to circumvent the restrictions, charges, fees and sundry whims of centralized banking institutions.
Syntax fervently supports the bitcoin approach. “My alias,” says Syntax, smirking, of his nom de guerre. He discusses associates who possess a thousand illicit credit cards, despise the banking system and relish anarchy.
Creating an alias might be in vogue, too, to emulate Satoshi Nakamoto, the pseudonymous crypto-legend who launched bitcoin in January 2009, having gleaned keen counsel in the online community Cypherpunk.
The digital currency’s alleged anonymity made it ideal for trade in drugs, weapons and prostitution. That cash dollars are the most commonly used currency for dope deals and money laundering, though, was not lost on the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network in a 2013 hearing before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. While noting reasons to remain vigilant, witnesses overall were positive about the innovation and legitimate uses in the hearing, which The Washington Post dubbed a “bitcoin lovefest.”
Locally, Derek and Greg Stevens confer Sin City legitimacy on bitcoin. The brothers have since early 2014 accepted it for room reservations at their downtown properties The D — whose curved Fremont Street marquee features a bitcoin logo — and Golden Gate.
At the end of every business day, the virtual take is tallied and transferred, via a BitPay processor, into U.S. dollars. As Derek Stevens had speculated, daily bitcoin fluctuations “come out in the wash,” or even out in the long run.
Today, gold might be the less-attractive proposition. On April 26, bitcoin ($1,275.85) overtook an ounce of gold ($1,269.15). On May 20, it broke two grand. As this is being written, it’s at $2,818.28 and growing. Many factors, however, drive the relative volatility of bitcoin compared to other currencies.
The Securities and Exchange Commission, mulling a bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF), injected some optimism and fuel for bitcoin, as has China’s continued exuberance, acceptance in Japan and Palestinian officials considering it for their national currency.
“Communities around the world are seeking alternatives to the dollar and traditional fiat currencies,” James Rickards wrote in his 2014 book “The Death of Money: The Coming Collapse of the International Monetary System.”
“It’s just gonna keep going up,” Syntax said. “Hackers are after bitcoin like it’s heroin. I see the good, bad and ugly in it. But whether you like it or not, it’s the future.”
It has weathered some uppercuts — the closure of online market Silk Road, best known as a platform to sell illegal drugs, for example — only to spawn offshoots, like Ethereum and Litecoin. The first quarter of 2017, when cryptocurrency’s combined market capitalization appreciated from $17.5 billion to $25.2 billion, could have portended this bullish second quarter. The market cap of bitcoin, the altcoin king, has zoomed to $37.88 billion.
None of which surprises 36-year-old pro poker player Russell “Dutch” Boyd. He comprehends DAOs, ASICs and GPUs like few laymen. He foresees a bitcoin worth $500,000, since only 21 million will be produced, the last in 2040. To date, about 16.34 million have been won, or “mined,” by the solving of a complex computer algorithm every 10 minutes.
“Bitcoin has the potential to completely eliminate that (financial) industry,” Boyd said. “They’re going to do what they need to do to make sure that never happens, but I’m not so sure they can. That’s the beauty of this. The fundamentals of bitcoin are way more solid than the fundamentals of the U.S. dollar, or any paper money. That’s what I love about bitcoin.”
Las Vegas seems lukewarm to it. Brooklyn Bagel, billed as bitcoin-friendly, no longer exists. Country Club Auto Spa has a BTM on the premises, but does not accept bitcoin for services rendered.
At CTR Investments, Tom Rein-
gruber takes it but nobody has paid him in bitcoin — “It’s too valuable,” he said. Likewise, Yoshiko Akiyama, who manages the law offices of Garrett T. Ogata, has had no takers. Jacki Cameron, owner of Hair by Jacki, beams about her bitcoin business.
A manager at The D’s American Coney Island Chili Dogs describes a simple transaction process, but he employs it only every five or six months. The woman behind the gift shop counter bemoans an arduous system but thankfully deals with bitcoin just a few times a year.
At spirited crypto-conferences, Derek Stevens has heard natives of Venezuela, India and certain African countries, threatened by economic turmoil or warlord overthrow, tell grateful tales of turning lifetime savings into bitcoin.
“We’re small potatoes,” Stevens said. “Bitcoin has value in areas throughout the world that are far more significant and material than what we’re seeing here; it’s something someone else, or governments, can’t take away. I was surprised how important bitcoin is in less-civilized countries.”
In culture’s cradle, as well. Syntax, of Greek heritage, deftly relocated the nest eggs of some relatives and friends in Greece, whose economy has been battered this decade, into bitcoin. Each of the half-dozen transactions, he says, was worth about $2.5 million, and he was rewarded with a $4,000-a-month lifetime stipend.
While his time-consuming BTM experience was unsatisfactory, it is not an anomaly. A Bitcoin Direct Mike Tyson-branded BTM didn’t last 18 months in Off the Strip steakhouse, near the Linq.
Of an estimated 1,195 BTMs in 58 countries — with average transaction fees of 9.71 percent buy, 6.38 percent sell — three-quarters are in the U.S. Las Vegas has 18. Coin Cloud, hatched by poker player Chris McAlary and a partner three years ago, runs seven, with respective 8.2 percent and 5.9 percent rates.
Over two 30-minute spans at The D, four different people eyeball the orange Coin Cloud display with suspicion. One tries, in vain, to locate the slit for his bank card. A young couple approaches it with a $251.55 slot machine voucher.
“Is that the one you need?” she says.
“No,” he says. “It’s bitcoin. … It’s like money.”