Johannesburg will soon be home to the country’s first cryptocurrency ATM, Business Insider reports.
The ATM, which will be located at the Northwood Spar, is expected to launch by the end of the week, with Business Insider reporting that it will be able to process Dash, Ethereum, Bitcoin and others.
George Neophytou, General Manager of Northwood Spar is also the man behind the development, and according to Weetracker, was inspired by his travels in Europe. “Walking around in the streets of Germany you see signs with ‘Bitcoins accepted there,” Neophytou says.
According to the same report, the only thing holding up the launch of the ATM is the regulations behind trading virtual currency, and although not supported by the South African Revenue Service (SARS), Neophytou is confident that his ATM will be legitimate. He says that they are finalizing “the T’s and C’s” before launching the cryptocurrency ATM … “doing everything by the book, we don’t want anything to be done under the cover. If someone gets cryptocurrencies from this ATM, they must know that it is safe to use.”
There are an estimated 3,000 Bitcoin ATMs globally in 68 countries, including Zimbabwe and Djibouti in East Africa.
Cryptocurrency ATMs allow users to purchase digital currency such as Bitcoin tokens, for example. The user deposits cash (via paper currency) and the cryptocurrency is transferred to the user’s Bitcoin “wallet”. The wallet can be on the user’s phone or can be a printed piece of paper with a wallet address, and most often the user’s wallet’s QR code is required.
