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If we’ve learned anything in the past few months about bitcoin ATMs, it’s that it’s big business. Last year, the first bitcoin ATM to be made available to the public (installed in a downtown Vancouver by Nevada-based Robocoin) did about $1 million in transactions in the first month.
But a new startup called BitAccess, based in Canada, is hoping to make a splash in the market. With $10 million in funding committed by BiT Capital, this ATM manufacturer has already launched a bitcoin ATM in Montreal, another in Ottawa, and Toronto, with other locations in Canada planned.
The company’s co-founder, Abdul Haseeb Awan, told newsBTC that on average, his machines are doing about $10,000 in transactions per day when we inquired about statistics on their newly-installed Montreal machine.
It’s not a mind-blowing figure, but it’s certainly a start. And despite the fact that Canada might seem like the Mecca of bitcoin ATMs, BitAccess is planning to expand outside of the country’s borders to places like Dubai, Caracas, Manila, and Beirut. It was even rumored a few weeks ago that the company would have a BTM installed somewhere on Wall Street — though we haven’t heard on developments on that since. Awan told newsBTC BitAccess would be launching another BTC in Geneva, Switzerland.
Meanwhile, competitors like Robocoin and Lamassu are all racing to bring their bitcoin ATM solutions to high-traffic locations around the world.
It’s all an attempt to make it convenient to get one in the possession of the digital currency. The first to plant their machine is likely to make the most bucks. Most people are not willing to jump through hoops to get bitcoin, and as such, you can expect these ATMs to gain extreme popularity moving forward.
