Amazon has denied reports that claim the company was planning to start accepting Bitcoin payments later this year. A statement released by the e-commerce giant noted that, even though Amazon remains very interested in the crypto space, there were no immediate plans to integrate Bitcoin into its payment options. Nonetheless, Amazon insisted that it remained open to exploring new ways that could add more value to shoppers on its platform.
London-based financial newspaper City AM had published the story citing insiders from Amazon. The report noted that in fact the e-commerce giant was ready to begin accepting Bitcoin payments by the end of the year. City AM went on to note that the e-commerce giant would then follow up Bitcoin with Ethereum soon after. There was even talk that Amazon was thinking of launching its coin token.
The City AM report said that the push to integrate crypto into the large Amazon ecosystem was coming from Jeff Bezos himself who recently stepped down as the CEO of the company. Despite this, it seems Amazon is not ready to disclose any details about these plans and is even arguing that they are all false. The report by City AM caused massive swings in the Bitcoin price over the past few days.
The cryptocurrency managed to hit a high of $40,000 but it would later fall during the day's trading. Bitcoin saw a rise of as much as 14.5% during this period. The City AM report also came as a much-needed boost for the crypto market which has seen prices plummet in recent months. In the weeks running up to the publication of the story, Bitcoin had been hovering around $29,000 and $32,000.
But shortly after the report was published, the price shot up as short-sellers moved to exit their position in massive numbers. Bitcoin has come from leaps and bounds ever since it was launched. Many experts believe that crypto still has a long way to go and if companies like Amazon can start accepting these payments, then it will be a huge boost to widespread acceptance.
However, even though landing Amazon would be a huge deal for Bitcoin, it is important to note that Amazon wouldn’t be the first major company to accept Bitcoin. Just the other day, Tesla also started accepting Bitcoin as payment for its cars in the United States. However, this did not last long as the electric car maker stopped the program citing several environmental risks.
This would probably be the case with Amazon and any other major corporation out there. Even though accepting Bitcoin is easy, there are many risks associated with the currency that would easily make the move unsustainable in the long run.
But there is still a lot that could change in the coming years. However, many experts argue that for Bitcoin to become accepted widely in major commerce, it has to welcome a measure of regulation from the authorities.
