Bitcoin Wiki - User contributions [en]

Bitcoin Days Destroyed

2017-01-21T01:20:51Z

Jacobbubble: /* External Links */ The link is no longer active.

Bitcoin Days Destroyed is a measure of the transaction volume of Bitcoin. <ref>[http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=6172.msg90789#msg90789 ByteCoin's Proposal to use Bitcoin Days Destroyed as a measure of transaction volume]</ref> A bounty for a script to compute the Bitcoin Days Destroyed by the transactions in a block has been awarded. <ref>[http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=9300.0 Bounty Award to develop a script to compute the BitcoinDays Destroyed by the transactions in a block.]</ref> [[Abe]] is a [[block chain browser]] that computes this statistic in real time.

==Calculation==

Bitcoin days destroyed for any given transaction is calculated by taking the number of Bitcoins in a transaction and multiplying it by the number of days it has been since those coins were last spent.

===Example===

If someone has 100BTC that they received a week ago and they spend it then 700 bitcoin days have been destroyed. If they take those 100BTC and send them to several addresses and then spend them then although the total transaction volume could be arbitrarily large the number of bitcoindays destroyed is still 700.

==Graph of Percentage of Bitcoin Days Destroyed==

Percentage of Bitcoin Days destroyed vs block number, as of June 17th 2011.
[[File:June-17th-days-destroyed.png]]

==See Also==

* [[Abe]] Alternate Block Explorer

==References==
<references/>

[[Category:Economics]]

How to accept Bitcoin, for small businesses

2015-10-21T05:15:14Z

Jacobbubble: /* Examples */

{{merge|Merchant Howto}}

This guide is intended for small business owners who wish to help promote Bitcoin by accepting it as payment for goods and services. It's written with the assumption that you operate a regular business that sells goods or services for regular national currency such as dollars, and that you wish to accept Bitcoin as another legal way to pay, and that you intend to pay taxes on your Bitcoin income just like any other income.

With Bitcoin being touted as a way to conduct anonymous transactions and as way to compete with government currency, many small business owners wonder what's the right way to accept and account Bitcoin, or if it's legal or ethical, or whether and how they should pay taxes on income received through Bitcoin.

As far as we know, Bitcoin isn't yet formally recognized by governments and authorities as a "currency". But in practice, Bitcoin is likely no different than accepting payment in other forms, such as cash, or gold, or scrip, or gift cards or foreign currency. We think that it is pretty much the same as the local businesses of Great Barrington, Massachusetts choosing to accept their locally-printed [http://www.reuters.com/article/2007/06/19/us-usa-economy-berkshares-idUSN0530157720070619 "Berkshire Bucks"] to support their local economy.

====Starting to accept Bitcoin for transactions====
Accepting Bitcoin at a small business is best started in whichever manner keeps the accounting simple for you. This will vary by the type of business you are operating.

===Start with a sign===
[[{{ns:file}}:WeAcceptBitcoin.png‎]]

If you expect that the number of people interested in using Bitcoin is small, you might simply start by posting a sign or a note: "We Accept Bitcoin", and ask people to contact you directly in order to make a payment. Even if hardly anybody uses Bitcoin as a payment method, you're helping Bitcoin in two ways: one, by increasing awareness, and two, by making your customers more willing to accept Bitcoin as payment from others in the future, because now they know somewhere they can spend it.

===Utilize a merchant solution===
If you sell things on your website (goods or services), you'll want to use a [[#Merchant Services|Bitcoin merchant solution]] to accept the Bitcoins (you can usually opt to have them converted to USD or other currencies automatically with some services).

If you sell things in a brick and mortar shop, customers can pay using hardware terminals, touch screen apps or simple wallet addresses through QR Codes.

[[File:Easybitz bitcoin pointofsale.png|400 px|alt=Accept Bitcoin without internet|EasyBitz ZeroClick System|link=https://easybitz.com/merchant]][[File:Coinktie Bitcoin Payment Buttons.png|alt=Coinkite Bitcoin Payment Buttons|link=https://coinkite.com/merchants]]

[[File:Bitcoin-pos-terminal.png|200 px|alt=Bitcoin POS Terminal|Coinkite terminal]] [[File:Mobile_Web_App_Bitcoin_Register.jpeg|100 px|alt=Bitcoin POS Terminal|CoinBox terminal]]

[[File:Mobile_Checkout_Phone.png|200 px|alt=Bitcoin Mobile Checkout|Coinify Mobile Checkout|link=https://coinify.com]]

===Smart Phone or Tablet===
You can use a wallet address with any wallet. For that it's best if you can place a QR code near your cash register to which the customers can scan with their phone and pay (use http://bitcoinqrcode.org/ to make a QR code sign). For a more convenient solution you can use a dedicated app or webapp that generates a QR code on the fly including the amount.

==== Examples ====
Solutions for smart phones and tablets:
* [https://bitcoin.co.th/merchants/ bitcoin.co.th] mobile Bitcoin Point of Sale for Thailand
* [[File:favicon_bp.png|20px|link=https://bitcoinpay.com/static/img/]] [https://bitcoinpay.com BitcoinPay], Mobile payment terminal with EUR, USD, PLN and CZK settlements.
* [[File:BitKassa_favicon.png|20px|link=https://www.BitKassa.nl]] [https://www.BitKassa.nl BitKassa] accept Bitcoin on mobile phone, tablet, computer; converts to Euro/Bitcoin (any percentage)
* [https://bitpay.com/bitcoin-for-retail BitPay] Mobile Checkout
* [https://bitpos.me/demo.html BitPOS] Merchant POS solution for Australia
* [[File:Airbitz mobile logo.png|20px|https://airbitz.co/bitcoin-wallet/]] [https://airbitz.co/bitcoin-wallet/ Airbitz] Merchant Mode for Android and iOS
* [https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=info.blockchain.merchant Blockchain] Merchant for Android
* [http://www.btcxpos.com/ BTCX] POS for Sweden
* [[File:CoinCorner_blue_logo.png|20px|link=https://coincorner.com]] [https://www.coincorner.com/ForBusiness CoinCorner] - Point of Sale solution available that allows physical retailers to easily accept bitcoin and automatically convert that to fiat, removing the risk of holding bitcoins.
* [https://coinify.com Coinify] Bitcoin Point Of Sale
* [[File:Coinkite.gif|20px|link=https://coinkite.com]] [https://coinkite.com/faq/pay Coinkite] Web Pay/Buy/Donate buttons with exchange rate and timers. Customizable via API and works over Tor.
* [[File:Coin_Of_Sale_logo.png|20px|link=https://coinofsale.com]] [https://coinofsale.com Coin Of Sale] - device-independent Bitcoin POS payment system
* [https://coinbase.com/docs/merchant_tools/point_of_sale Coinbase] Point Of Sale for Android
* [[File:BitcoinRegister.gif|20px|link=http://coinbox.it/merchant]][http://coinbox.it/merchant CoinBox] Bitcoin point of sale for Android
* [http://acceptbitcoin.coinpip.com CoinPip] - Bitcoin Payment Processor for Asia / Global Payment and Payouts for Businesses
* [https://cryptopay.me/products/ Cryptopay] HTML5-based bitcoin POS
* [[File:Paxful_how-to-buy-bitcoin.png |20px|link=https://paxful.com]] [https://paxful.com Paxful] Simplest Point of Sale, No Fees and a peer to peer market to buy bitcoin instantly
* [[File:Payful.png|20px|link=http://payful.io]] [http://payful.io Payful] Accept bitcoin - point of sale, shopping cart plugins and API. Supports USA, Europe and Canada.
* [https://pocketpos.ca/ PocketPOS] Bitcoin Point of Sale for Canadians, with exchange integration
* [https://gourl.io/ GoUrl] Bitcoin Mobile Checkout

===Point-of-Sale hardware terminal===
With custom hardware you can integrate with existing registers and point-of-sales solutions (examples: [[File:Coinkite.gif|20px|link=https://coinkite.com/promo/wikibiz]] [https://coinkite.com/promo/wikibiz Coinkite], [https://xbterminal.com/ XBTerminal], [http://www.bitstraat.nl BitStraat]).

===Accounting===
When a customer makes a payment, you might simply issue a credit to their account. Ideally, you want to enter it in a way that suggests you received a payment. You could consider entering it as a "discount", but you may want to consider whether this inappropriately disguises the nature of the transaction. If on the other hand, you're giving "discounts" for Bitcoins, but then you are selling the Bitcoins for currency and then counting that as income, then chances are good that your calculation of income is making up for it. Ask your accountant.

===Businesses that offer gift cards===
If your business sells gift cards or gift certificates, you may find that the easiest way to accept Bitcoin is to accept it only for the purchase of gift cards, and then require the gift cards to be used for actual purchases of goods or services. This way, the accounting practices you already have in place for processing gift cards can be put to use. The accounting for Bitcoins would then be minimized to tracking sales of a single SKU.

This method is also ideal for retail food establishments and convenience stores, where the payment of Bitcoins through a mobile phone for a small daily food purchase might be cumbersome or disruptive, especially in front of a line of other customers. Bitcoins in this case would be best used to reload prepaid cards that can then be swiped at point-of-sale.

If you don't accept gift cards, but you already accept credit cards through a swipe terminal, consider the possibility that you could add a retail gift card system through the swipe terminal you already own. Many point-of-sale terminals, including ones from VeriFone®, are designed around the ability to support multiple applications on the same terminal. Gift cards are also highly profitable because of "breakage", or in other words, the fact that a significant percentage of them never get redeemed.

You could consider adding a private label gift card program from a provider who specializes in this, not just as a jumpstart to accepting Bitcoins, but as an extra boost to income. A private label gift card service provider necessarily have to handle your funds - they can simply provide a solution that keeps track of the balance on the cards on your behalf, including features that allow users to check their balances by phone or by web. Such a solution, of course, is also what makes the cards swipeable through the card reader.

===Businesses that mail invoices===
Does your business send out invoices to customers? Adding one line may make a huge impact for the Bitcoin economy. Perhaps you list it as a payment option just after Visa, MasterCard, and American Express, even if that means your customer must call or e-mail to make a payment.

If you have access to the programming expertise such that you can generate Bitcoin addresses programmatically, consider generating a brand new Bitcoin address for each invoice, and print it on the invoice. When a Bitcoin payment arrives, you'll automatically know where it should arrive.

Customers might wonder how much BTC they should pay in order to satisfy an invoice in full. Your invoice might suggest an amount. For example, if your invoice is for $100 and BTC's are currently worth $1.24 each, your invoice might suggest that it can be paid in full ''"with a payment of 80.65 BTC if paid by (date)"''.

You might be able to anticipate the possibility that even though a Bitcoin address can be printed on an invoice or payment stub, that they are very cumbersome for most people to type, especially being a mix of uppercase and lowercase letters. However, you should probably still do it anyway. The customer is probably going to want some paper trail for his payment. Giving him a pre-printed payment stub with a pre-printed address will satisfy that, because the customer can independently and publicly prove through [[Block Explorer]] that the payment took place.

Does your business have a website? On your invoice, consider allowing them to go to a special URL to get the address to make a Bitcoin payment just by typing in their invoice number. For example, ''ht<nowiki>tps://ww</nowiki>w.yoursite.com/paybtc'' with a form they can enter their invoice number, or just ''ht<nowiki>tps://ww</nowiki>w.yoursite.com/paybtc/60365'' for paying invoice #60365. This way, they can see the Bitcoin address, copy and paste it directly into their Bitcoin client.

Use a brand new address for each invoice whenever possible, and use it only once. This benefits the customer as it removes any ambiguity as to which customer is making which payment and for which invoice.

Known payment systems supporting invoicing, and recurring invoice setup, [https://coinify.com/checkout/invoice/cb/bb Coinify]

Online wallet supporting invoicing, subscriptions and recurrent payments, [https://www.xcoinmoney.com/info/sending-paying-invoices xCoinMoney]

===Avoiding fraud===

You should also consider the possible risk that fraudsters could send counterfeit invoices to your customers, and entice them to make a payment to a Bitcoin address they control, instead of you. While that isn't likely in general - it depends on how well a fraudster could find out who your customers are in the first place - it would certainly be an unpleasant situation if it ever happened. One way you could control that is, whenever possible, never let people try to type Bitcoin addresses off payment stubs - instead, force people to get the full Bitcoin address from your website via secure SSL. But, still print ''most'' of the address on the payment stub (perhaps with four or five characters starred out), so that the customer's need for a paper trail can be satisfied, so they can prove they paid if there is ever a dispute. Merchants can also use the IP address geolocation to understand the close proximity of users. There is automated solution such as [https://www.fraudlabspro.com FraudLabs Pro] that automates the screening of Bitcoin transactions to determine risk level.

==Setting Prices==

When a business accepts bitcoins for payment, there generally is the need to convert them to the currencies used for paying suppliers, employees and shareholders. Some merchants set prices based on the current market rate at the time the price quote is presented to the customer (merchant services like [[File:Polycoin_favicon.png|20px|link=http://www.polycoin.io]] [http://www.polycoin.io Polycoin], [https://coinify.com Coinify], [[File:Favicon-32x32_.png|20px|link=https://bitcoinpay.com]] [https://bitcoinpay.com BitcoinPay], [http://www.bit-pay.com Bit-pay], [https://coinbase.com Coinbase] or [http://paysius.com Paysius] do this automatically).

[[Bitcoin Prices]] lists the exchange rate for many currencies on multiple exchanges.

When prices are determined using an automated process, the current market rate can be based on either a current price or on a weighted average basis. [[Bitcoin Charts]] provides a [http://bitcoincharts.com/about/markets-api data feed that provides weighted prices]. [[Bitcoin Average]] also offers a weighted average price index, featuring average price across all exchanges reachable in the world and in over 150 currencies. 24h sliding average price index is also available and all data is [https://bitcoinaverage.com/api.htm reachable through the API].

When bitcoin funds for purchases are received, some merchants instantly exchange those proceeds into the preferred currency used (again done automatically by [[File:Polycoin_favicon.png|20px|link=http://www.polycoin.io]] [http://www.polycoin.io Polycoin], [https://coinify.com Coinify], [http://www.bit-pay.com Bit-pay], [https://coinbase.com Coinbase] or [[File:Favicon-32x32_.png|20px|link=https://bitcoinpay.com]] [https://bitcoinpay.com BitcoinPay]. Hedging for each transaction can nearly entirely eliminate exchange rate risk that the business is exposed to when accepting bitcoins for payment.

==Contract==

A sales contract might be used to ensure that specific terms are met to lessen the chances of a misunderstanding. For instance, the party sending payment is responsible for paying any [[transaction fee]] that might be necessary. A contract might specify that a transaction fee must be paid and what amount, so as to prevent the situation where the transaction is considered a low priority transaction and thus isn't confirmed quickly.

Other items that might be addressed in a contract:

* Requirement and handling of escrow through an [[:Category:Escrow_services|escrow service]].
* Jurisdiction for disputes.
* Refund policy (particularly with the exchange rate being volatile)

==Paying taxes on Bitcoin income==
[[Tax compliance]] is a topic of concern for small businesses. We aren't accountants or lawyers, and can't give legal or accounting advice.

But in many respects, Bitcoin transactions work very much like cash. Just like Bitcoin, cash is anonymous and doesn't leave a paper trail, yet is widely used in commerce every day.

Ask yourself how you would handle a cash transaction. Do you accept cash transactions? Do you normally pay taxes on cash transactions? The answer for Bitcoin should probably be the same.

As for how to decide what a Bitcoin transaction is worth... the IRS, as far as we know, has never issued a guide mentioning how to value Bitcoin transactions. But they probably have rules and guidelines on how to value transactions made in foreign currency or "cash equivalents". We imagine the accounting would be similar.

With Bitcoins, there's likely to be some difference between the value of BTC when you received them as payment, versus when you go to exchange them for another currency like USD, should you decide to do so. This scenario, likewise, would be no different if you accepted foreign currency or gold as payment. Under some scenarios, it might make sense to book the dollar value of BTC income as it is received, and then to book any difference incurred when it is exchanged for fiat currency. Under others, it might make sense to book the whole thing at the time of exchange.

Perhaps you might talk to your accountant. You don't need to get into a discussion with your accountant about block chains and private keys or the philosophy behind a decentralized currency. By comparing the fundamentals of Bitcoins to accounting concepts already well understood by the public, you can probably get all the answers you need. What would you ask your accountant if you decided that you wanted to accept ''Berkshire Bucks'' or 1-ounce gold coins as payment?

== Merchant Services ==
* [https://apicoin.io Apicoin.io] A robust, secure api to connect to the bitcoin network.
* [http://www.btc4erp.com Bitcoin Transaction Coordinator] Full Merchant Solution for organizations using the NetSuite Global ERP and eCommerce Platform
* [[File:favicon_bp.png|20px|link=https://bitcoinpay.com/static/img/]] [https://bitcoinpay.com BitcoinPay] Payment gateway for virtual currencies with direct settlement to PLN, CZK, EUR and USD. POS + API.
* [[File:Bitfavicon.png|20px|link=http://www.bitcoinpaygate.com]] [http://www.bitcoinpaygate.com Bitcoinpaygate] Bitcoin payment processing for the web & in store payments
* [[File:BitKassa_favicon.png|20px|link=https://www.BitKassa.nl]] [https://www.BitKassa.nl BitKassa] Merchant solution for accepting Bitcoin, getting Euro or Euro/Bitcoin percentage. The Netherlands.
* [https://bitmerch.com BitMerch] Provides HTML buttons to start accepting bitcoins instantly. No server side setup required.
* [https://www.bitpagos.net BitPagos] Bitcoin and Credit Card payment processor
* [https://www.bitpay.com BitPay] Bitcoin payment processor with mobile checkout solution
* [https://bitpos.me BitPOS] Bitcoin payment processor for online and brick and mortar stores
* [http://www.bitstraat.nl BitStraat] Merchant POS solution for accepting Bitcoin
* [http://blockchain.info/api/api_receive Blockchain.info] Free APIs to process bitcoin payments. No sign up or account needed.
* [https://www.btcmerch.com BTCMerch] Payment processor for bitcoins and other cryptocurrencies. 0.5% transaction fee. Sandbox is available.
* [https://coinbase.com/docs/merchant_tools/payment_buttons Coinbase] Offers payment buttons, checkout pages, shopping cart integration, and daily cash out to USD.
* [[File:BitcoinRegister.gif|20px|link=http://coinbox.it/merchant]] [http://coinbox.it/merchant CoinBox] Bitcoin Point of Sales application for Android, with integration into various exchanges. Similar to Square.
* [[File:CoinCorner_blue_logo.png|20px|link=https://coincorner.com]] [https://www.coincorner.com/ForBusiness CoinCorner] - Integrate CoinCorner Checkout in to your eCommerce business using a simple plugin or the API for Bitcoin Payments. Point of Sale solution also available that allows physical retailers to easily accept bitcoin and automatically convert that to fiat, removing the risk of holding bitcoins.
* [https://coinify.com Coinify] Payment Service Provider (PSP) specializing in the technical aspects of accepting cryptocurrencies - such as bitcoin. Supports Bitcoin Web Payments, Mobile Checkout, In-store Bitcoin Payments and Bitcoin Invoicing with recurring billing in bitcoin.
* [[File:Coinkite.gif|20px|link=https://coinkite.com]] [https://coinkite.com/faq/terminal Coinkite] Secure wallet multisig, payment buttons, invoice pages, hardware POS terminals, and Debit-Cards.
* [https://coinpip.com/ CoinPip] Online and POS bitcoin payment processor for Asia.
* [https://coinvoice.com/ Coinvoice] Invoice in USD or BTC, Get paid in USD or BTC.
* [https://coinvoy.net Coinvoy] Free Payment Gateway with built-in exchange
* [https://cryptopay.me Cryptopay] European payment gateway with daily payouts in GBP, EUR and USD. Exchange and wallet integrated.
* [https://cubits.com Cubits] Platform with multisignature wallets and merchant system Cubits Pay.
* [[File:Paxful_how-to-buy-bitcoin.png |20px|link=https://paxful.com]] [https://paxful.com Paxful] Accept Bitcoin with no internet then sell bitcoin for profit on our peer to peer exchange.
* [http://fasterco.in Fasterco.in] Bitcoin payment processing for merchants and day-traders
* [[File:gocoin-logo.png|20px|link=https://www.gocoin.com]] [https://www.gocoin.com/docs GoCoin International payment gateway and processing platform for Merchants]
* [https://gourl.io Gourl.io] Bitcoin Payment processor with ready to use php scripts - Pay-Per-Download, Pay-Per-Product, Pay-Per-Membership, Pay-Per-Registration.
* [[File:inpay_favicon.png|link=https://inpay.pl/?lang=en]] [https://inpay.pl/?lang=en InPay.pl] InPay was created to enable entrepreneurs to accept Bitcoin in PLN, EUR and USD.
* [[File:MCS_200by200_logo-01.png|20px|link=http://www.mycoinsolution.com]][http://www.mycoinsolution.com My Coin Solution] - Bitcoin consulting services and solutions
* [https://www.okpay.com/en/services/accept-payments/index.html OKPAY] Bitcoin payment processing for merchants
* [[File:Payful.png|20px|link=http://payful.io]] [http://payful.io Payful] Accept bitcoin - point of sale, shopping cart plugins and API. Supports payment processing in US dollars, Euros and Canadian dollars.
* [[File:Polycoin_favicon.png|20px|link=http://www.polycoin.io]] [http://www.polycoin.io Polycoin] Bitcoin payment processing platform with solutions for the financial sector
* [https://pocketpos.ca/ PocketPOS] Bitcoin Point of Sale for Canadians, including merchant integration for CAD / BTC exchange.
* [http://snowcron.com Snowcron] Bitcoin Store Engine: Handles payments, sends your customers information they ordered (reg. codes, passwords...) No web programming required.
* [https://xbterminal.com/ XBTerminal] Brick-and-mortar hardware POS terminals with payment processing integrations.
* [https://www.xcoinmoney.com/ xCoinMoney] Online wallet for instant payment and subscriptions.

==See Also==

* [[Merchant Howto]]
* [[In-store Transactions]]
* [[:Category:Payment_Processors|Payment Processors]]
* [[Tax compliance]]
* [[Securing online services]]
* [[BitCoins Mobile]] provides accurate up to date pricing from multiple exchanges from your Apple iPad, iPhone, or iPod Touch.
* [[Bitcoin PayFlow]] automates the process for accepting bitcoins
* [[Lazy API]] The lazy (and possibly easiest?) way to accept bitcoin payments on your website

[[Category:ECommerce]]
[[Category:Local]]

[[de:Bitcoin_als_Geschäft_akzeptieren]]

File:Airbitz mobile logo.png

2015-10-21T05:11:49Z

Jacobbubble:

== Summary ==

== Licensing ==
{{subst:Template 2|Trademarked|PD-textlogo}}

How to accept Bitcoin, for small businesses

2015-10-21T05:09:35Z

Jacobbubble: /* Examples */

{{merge|Merchant Howto}}

This guide is intended for small business owners who wish to help promote Bitcoin by accepting it as payment for goods and services. It's written with the assumption that you operate a regular business that sells goods or services for regular national currency such as dollars, and that you wish to accept Bitcoin as another legal way to pay, and that you intend to pay taxes on your Bitcoin income just like any other income.

With Bitcoin being touted as a way to conduct anonymous transactions and as way to compete with government currency, many small business owners wonder what's the right way to accept and account Bitcoin, or if it's legal or ethical, or whether and how they should pay taxes on income received through Bitcoin.

As far as we know, Bitcoin isn't yet formally recognized by governments and authorities as a "currency". But in practice, Bitcoin is likely no different than accepting payment in other forms, such as cash, or gold, or scrip, or gift cards or foreign currency. We think that it is pretty much the same as the local businesses of Great Barrington, Massachusetts choosing to accept their locally-printed [http://www.reuters.com/article/2007/06/19/us-usa-economy-berkshares-idUSN0530157720070619 "Berkshire Bucks"] to support their local economy.

====Starting to accept Bitcoin for transactions====
Accepting Bitcoin at a small business is best started in whichever manner keeps the accounting simple for you. This will vary by the type of business you are operating.

===Start with a sign===
[[{{ns:file}}:WeAcceptBitcoin.png‎]]

If you expect that the number of people interested in using Bitcoin is small, you might simply start by posting a sign or a note: "We Accept Bitcoin", and ask people to contact you directly in order to make a payment. Even if hardly anybody uses Bitcoin as a payment method, you're helping Bitcoin in two ways: one, by increasing awareness, and two, by making your customers more willing to accept Bitcoin as payment from others in the future, because now they know somewhere they can spend it.

===Utilize a merchant solution===
If you sell things on your website (goods or services), you'll want to use a [[#Merchant Services|Bitcoin merchant solution]] to accept the Bitcoins (you can usually opt to have them converted to USD or other currencies automatically with some services).

If you sell things in a brick and mortar shop, customers can pay using hardware terminals, touch screen apps or simple wallet addresses through QR Codes.

[[File:Easybitz bitcoin pointofsale.png|400 px|alt=Accept Bitcoin without internet|EasyBitz ZeroClick System|link=https://easybitz.com/merchant]][[File:Coinktie Bitcoin Payment Buttons.png|alt=Coinkite Bitcoin Payment Buttons|link=https://coinkite.com/merchants]]

[[File:Bitcoin-pos-terminal.png|200 px|alt=Bitcoin POS Terminal|Coinkite terminal]] [[File:Mobile_Web_App_Bitcoin_Register.jpeg|100 px|alt=Bitcoin POS Terminal|CoinBox terminal]]

[[File:Mobile_Checkout_Phone.png|200 px|alt=Bitcoin Mobile Checkout|Coinify Mobile Checkout|link=https://coinify.com]]

===Smart Phone or Tablet===
You can use a wallet address with any wallet. For that it's best if you can place a QR code near your cash register to which the customers can scan with their phone and pay (use http://bitcoinqrcode.org/ to make a QR code sign). For a more convenient solution you can use a dedicated app or webapp that generates a QR code on the fly including the amount.

==== Examples ====
Solutions for smart phones and tablets:
* [https://bitcoin.co.th/merchants/ bitcoin.co.th] mobile Bitcoin Point of Sale for Thailand
* [[File:favicon_bp.png|20px|link=https://bitcoinpay.com/static/img/]] [https://bitcoinpay.com BitcoinPay], Mobile payment terminal with EUR, USD, PLN and CZK settlements.
* [[File:BitKassa_favicon.png|20px|link=https://www.BitKassa.nl]] [https://www.BitKassa.nl BitKassa] accept Bitcoin on mobile phone, tablet, computer; converts to Euro/Bitcoin (any percentage)
* [https://bitpay.com/bitcoin-for-retail BitPay] Mobile Checkout
* [https://bitpos.me/demo.html BitPOS] Merchant POS solution for Australia
* [[File:Airbitz-app-logo|thumbnail|Airbitz's app logo]] [https://airbitz.co/bitcoin-wallet/ Airbitz] Merchant Mode for Android and iOS
* [https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=info.blockchain.merchant Blockchain] Merchant for Android
* [http://www.btcxpos.com/ BTCX] POS for Sweden
* [[File:CoinCorner_blue_logo.png|20px|link=https://coincorner.com]] [https://www.coincorner.com/ForBusiness CoinCorner] - Point of Sale solution available that allows physical retailers to easily accept bitcoin and automatically convert that to fiat, removing the risk of holding bitcoins.
* [https://coinify.com Coinify] Bitcoin Point Of Sale
* [[File:Coinkite.gif|20px|link=https://coinkite.com]] [https://coinkite.com/faq/pay Coinkite] Web Pay/Buy/Donate buttons with exchange rate and timers. Customizable via API and works over Tor.
* [[File:Coin_Of_Sale_logo.png|20px|link=https://coinofsale.com]] [https://coinofsale.com Coin Of Sale] - device-independent Bitcoin POS payment system
* [https://coinbase.com/docs/merchant_tools/point_of_sale Coinbase] Point Of Sale for Android
* [[File:BitcoinRegister.gif|20px|link=http://coinbox.it/merchant]][http://coinbox.it/merchant CoinBox] Bitcoin point of sale for Android
* [http://acceptbitcoin.coinpip.com CoinPip] - Bitcoin Payment Processor for Asia / Global Payment and Payouts for Businesses
* [https://cryptopay.me/products/ Cryptopay] HTML5-based bitcoin POS
* [[File:Paxful_how-to-buy-bitcoin.png |20px|link=https://paxful.com]] [https://paxful.com Paxful] Simplest Point of Sale, No Fees and a peer to peer market to buy bitcoin instantly
* [[File:Payful.png|20px|link=http://payful.io]] [http://payful.io Payful] Accept bitcoin - point of sale, shopping cart plugins and API. Supports USA, Europe and Canada.
* [https://pocketpos.ca/ PocketPOS] Bitcoin Point of Sale for Canadians, with exchange integration
* [https://gourl.io/ GoUrl] Bitcoin Mobile Checkout

===Point-of-Sale hardware terminal===
With custom hardware you can integrate with existing registers and point-of-sales solutions (examples: [[File:Coinkite.gif|20px|link=https://coinkite.com/promo/wikibiz]] [https://coinkite.com/promo/wikibiz Coinkite], [https://xbterminal.com/ XBTerminal], [http://www.bitstraat.nl BitStraat]).

===Accounting===
When a customer makes a payment, you might simply issue a credit to their account. Ideally, you want to enter it in a way that suggests you received a payment. You could consider entering it as a "discount", but you may want to consider whether this inappropriately disguises the nature of the transaction. If on the other hand, you're giving "discounts" for Bitcoins, but then you are selling the Bitcoins for currency and then counting that as income, then chances are good that your calculation of income is making up for it. Ask your accountant.

===Businesses that offer gift cards===
If your business sells gift cards or gift certificates, you may find that the easiest way to accept Bitcoin is to accept it only for the purchase of gift cards, and then require the gift cards to be used for actual purchases of goods or services. This way, the accounting practices you already have in place for processing gift cards can be put to use. The accounting for Bitcoins would then be minimized to tracking sales of a single SKU.

This method is also ideal for retail food establishments and convenience stores, where the payment of Bitcoins through a mobile phone for a small daily food purchase might be cumbersome or disruptive, especially in front of a line of other customers. Bitcoins in this case would be best used to reload prepaid cards that can then be swiped at point-of-sale.

If you don't accept gift cards, but you already accept credit cards through a swipe terminal, consider the possibility that you could add a retail gift card system through the swipe terminal you already own. Many point-of-sale terminals, including ones from VeriFone®, are designed around the ability to support multiple applications on the same terminal. Gift cards are also highly profitable because of "breakage", or in other words, the fact that a significant percentage of them never get redeemed.

You could consider adding a private label gift card program from a provider who specializes in this, not just as a jumpstart to accepting Bitcoins, but as an extra boost to income. A private label gift card service provider necessarily have to handle your funds - they can simply provide a solution that keeps track of the balance on the cards on your behalf, including features that allow users to check their balances by phone or by web. Such a solution, of course, is also what makes the cards swipeable through the card reader.

===Businesses that mail invoices===
Does your business send out invoices to customers? Adding one line may make a huge impact for the Bitcoin economy. Perhaps you list it as a payment option just after Visa, MasterCard, and American Express, even if that means your customer must call or e-mail to make a payment.

If you have access to the programming expertise such that you can generate Bitcoin addresses programmatically, consider generating a brand new Bitcoin address for each invoice, and print it on the invoice. When a Bitcoin payment arrives, you'll automatically know where it should arrive.

Customers might wonder how much BTC they should pay in order to satisfy an invoice in full. Your invoice might suggest an amount. For example, if your invoice is for $100 and BTC's are currently worth $1.24 each, your invoice might suggest that it can be paid in full ''"with a payment of 80.65 BTC if paid by (date)"''.

You might be able to anticipate the possibility that even though a Bitcoin address can be printed on an invoice or payment stub, that they are very cumbersome for most people to type, especially being a mix of uppercase and lowercase letters. However, you should probably still do it anyway. The customer is probably going to want some paper trail for his payment. Giving him a pre-printed payment stub with a pre-printed address will satisfy that, because the customer can independently and publicly prove through [[Block Explorer]] that the payment took place.

Does your business have a website? On your invoice, consider allowing them to go to a special URL to get the address to make a Bitcoin payment just by typing in their invoice number. For example, ''ht<nowiki>tps://ww</nowiki>w.yoursite.com/paybtc'' with a form they can enter their invoice number, or just ''ht<nowiki>tps://ww</nowiki>w.yoursite.com/paybtc/60365'' for paying invoice #60365. This way, they can see the Bitcoin address, copy and paste it directly into their Bitcoin client.

Use a brand new address for each invoice whenever possible, and use it only once. This benefits the customer as it removes any ambiguity as to which customer is making which payment and for which invoice.

Known payment systems supporting invoicing, and recurring invoice setup, [https://coinify.com/checkout/invoice/cb/bb Coinify]

Online wallet supporting invoicing, subscriptions and recurrent payments, [https://www.xcoinmoney.com/info/sending-paying-invoices xCoinMoney]

===Avoiding fraud===

You should also consider the possible risk that fraudsters could send counterfeit invoices to your customers, and entice them to make a payment to a Bitcoin address they control, instead of you. While that isn't likely in general - it depends on how well a fraudster could find out who your customers are in the first place - it would certainly be an unpleasant situation if it ever happened. One way you could control that is, whenever possible, never let people try to type Bitcoin addresses off payment stubs - instead, force people to get the full Bitcoin address from your website via secure SSL. But, still print ''most'' of the address on the payment stub (perhaps with four or five characters starred out), so that the customer's need for a paper trail can be satisfied, so they can prove they paid if there is ever a dispute. Merchants can also use the IP address geolocation to understand the close proximity of users. There is automated solution such as [https://www.fraudlabspro.com FraudLabs Pro] that automates the screening of Bitcoin transactions to determine risk level.

==Setting Prices==

When a business accepts bitcoins for payment, there generally is the need to convert them to the currencies used for paying suppliers, employees and shareholders. Some merchants set prices based on the current market rate at the time the price quote is presented to the customer (merchant services like [[File:Polycoin_favicon.png|20px|link=http://www.polycoin.io]] [http://www.polycoin.io Polycoin], [https://coinify.com Coinify], [[File:Favicon-32x32_.png|20px|link=https://bitcoinpay.com]] [https://bitcoinpay.com BitcoinPay], [http://www.bit-pay.com Bit-pay], [https://coinbase.com Coinbase] or [http://paysius.com Paysius] do this automatically).

[[Bitcoin Prices]] lists the exchange rate for many currencies on multiple exchanges.

When prices are determined using an automated process, the current market rate can be based on either a current price or on a weighted average basis. [[Bitcoin Charts]] provides a [http://bitcoincharts.com/about/markets-api data feed that provides weighted prices]. [[Bitcoin Average]] also offers a weighted average price index, featuring average price across all exchanges reachable in the world and in over 150 currencies. 24h sliding average price index is also available and all data is [https://bitcoinaverage.com/api.htm reachable through the API].

When bitcoin funds for purchases are received, some merchants instantly exchange those proceeds into the preferred currency used (again done automatically by [[File:Polycoin_favicon.png|20px|link=http://www.polycoin.io]] [http://www.polycoin.io Polycoin], [https://coinify.com Coinify], [http://www.bit-pay.com Bit-pay], [https://coinbase.com Coinbase] or [[File:Favicon-32x32_.png|20px|link=https://bitcoinpay.com]] [https://bitcoinpay.com BitcoinPay]. Hedging for each transaction can nearly entirely eliminate exchange rate risk that the business is exposed to when accepting bitcoins for payment.

==Contract==

A sales contract might be used to ensure that specific terms are met to lessen the chances of a misunderstanding. For instance, the party sending payment is responsible for paying any [[transaction fee]] that might be necessary. A contract might specify that a transaction fee must be paid and what amount, so as to prevent the situation where the transaction is considered a low priority transaction and thus isn't confirmed quickly.

Other items that might be addressed in a contract:

* Requirement and handling of escrow through an [[:Category:Escrow_services|escrow service]].
* Jurisdiction for disputes.
* Refund policy (particularly with the exchange rate being volatile)

==Paying taxes on Bitcoin income==
[[Tax compliance]] is a topic of concern for small businesses. We aren't accountants or lawyers, and can't give legal or accounting advice.

But in many respects, Bitcoin transactions work very much like cash. Just like Bitcoin, cash is anonymous and doesn't leave a paper trail, yet is widely used in commerce every day.

Ask yourself how you would handle a cash transaction. Do you accept cash transactions? Do you normally pay taxes on cash transactions? The answer for Bitcoin should probably be the same.

As for how to decide what a Bitcoin transaction is worth... the IRS, as far as we know, has never issued a guide mentioning how to value Bitcoin transactions. But they probably have rules and guidelines on how to value transactions made in foreign currency or "cash equivalents". We imagine the accounting would be similar.

With Bitcoins, there's likely to be some difference between the value of BTC when you received them as payment, versus when you go to exchange them for another currency like USD, should you decide to do so. This scenario, likewise, would be no different if you accepted foreign currency or gold as payment. Under some scenarios, it might make sense to book the dollar value of BTC income as it is received, and then to book any difference incurred when it is exchanged for fiat currency. Under others, it might make sense to book the whole thing at the time of exchange.

Perhaps you might talk to your accountant. You don't need to get into a discussion with your accountant about block chains and private keys or the philosophy behind a decentralized currency. By comparing the fundamentals of Bitcoins to accounting concepts already well understood by the public, you can probably get all the answers you need. What would you ask your accountant if you decided that you wanted to accept ''Berkshire Bucks'' or 1-ounce gold coins as payment?

== Merchant Services ==
* [https://apicoin.io Apicoin.io] A robust, secure api to connect to the bitcoin network.
* [http://www.btc4erp.com Bitcoin Transaction Coordinator] Full Merchant Solution for organizations using the NetSuite Global ERP and eCommerce Platform
* [[File:favicon_bp.png|20px|link=https://bitcoinpay.com/static/img/]] [https://bitcoinpay.com BitcoinPay] Payment gateway for virtual currencies with direct settlement to PLN, CZK, EUR and USD. POS + API.
* [[File:Bitfavicon.png|20px|link=http://www.bitcoinpaygate.com]] [http://www.bitcoinpaygate.com Bitcoinpaygate] Bitcoin payment processing for the web & in store payments
* [[File:BitKassa_favicon.png|20px|link=https://www.BitKassa.nl]] [https://www.BitKassa.nl BitKassa] Merchant solution for accepting Bitcoin, getting Euro or Euro/Bitcoin percentage. The Netherlands.
* [https://bitmerch.com BitMerch] Provides HTML buttons to start accepting bitcoins instantly. No server side setup required.
* [https://www.bitpagos.net BitPagos] Bitcoin and Credit Card payment processor
* [https://www.bitpay.com BitPay] Bitcoin payment processor with mobile checkout solution
* [https://bitpos.me BitPOS] Bitcoin payment processor for online and brick and mortar stores
* [http://www.bitstraat.nl BitStraat] Merchant POS solution for accepting Bitcoin
* [http://blockchain.info/api/api_receive Blockchain.info] Free APIs to process bitcoin payments. No sign up or account needed.
* [https://www.btcmerch.com BTCMerch] Payment processor for bitcoins and other cryptocurrencies. 0.5% transaction fee. Sandbox is available.
* [https://coinbase.com/docs/merchant_tools/payment_buttons Coinbase] Offers payment buttons, checkout pages, shopping cart integration, and daily cash out to USD.
* [[File:BitcoinRegister.gif|20px|link=http://coinbox.it/merchant]] [http://coinbox.it/merchant CoinBox] Bitcoin Point of Sales application for Android, with integration into various exchanges. Similar to Square.
* [[File:CoinCorner_blue_logo.png|20px|link=https://coincorner.com]] [https://www.coincorner.com/ForBusiness CoinCorner] - Integrate CoinCorner Checkout in to your eCommerce business using a simple plugin or the API for Bitcoin Payments. Point of Sale solution also available that allows physical retailers to easily accept bitcoin and automatically convert that to fiat, removing the risk of holding bitcoins.
* [https://coinify.com Coinify] Payment Service Provider (PSP) specializing in the technical aspects of accepting cryptocurrencies - such as bitcoin. Supports Bitcoin Web Payments, Mobile Checkout, In-store Bitcoin Payments and Bitcoin Invoicing with recurring billing in bitcoin.
* [[File:Coinkite.gif|20px|link=https://coinkite.com]] [https://coinkite.com/faq/terminal Coinkite] Secure wallet multisig, payment buttons, invoice pages, hardware POS terminals, and Debit-Cards.
* [https://coinpip.com/ CoinPip] Online and POS bitcoin payment processor for Asia.
* [https://coinvoice.com/ Coinvoice] Invoice in USD or BTC, Get paid in USD or BTC.
* [https://coinvoy.net Coinvoy] Free Payment Gateway with built-in exchange
* [https://cryptopay.me Cryptopay] European payment gateway with daily payouts in GBP, EUR and USD. Exchange and wallet integrated.
* [https://cubits.com Cubits] Platform with multisignature wallets and merchant system Cubits Pay.
* [[File:Paxful_how-to-buy-bitcoin.png |20px|link=https://paxful.com]] [https://paxful.com Paxful] Accept Bitcoin with no internet then sell bitcoin for profit on our peer to peer exchange.
* [http://fasterco.in Fasterco.in] Bitcoin payment processing for merchants and day-traders
* [[File:gocoin-logo.png|20px|link=https://www.gocoin.com]] [https://www.gocoin.com/docs GoCoin International payment gateway and processing platform for Merchants]
* [https://gourl.io Gourl.io] Bitcoin Payment processor with ready to use php scripts - Pay-Per-Download, Pay-Per-Product, Pay-Per-Membership, Pay-Per-Registration.
* [[File:inpay_favicon.png|link=https://inpay.pl/?lang=en]] [https://inpay.pl/?lang=en InPay.pl] InPay was created to enable entrepreneurs to accept Bitcoin in PLN, EUR and USD.
* [[File:MCS_200by200_logo-01.png|20px|link=http://www.mycoinsolution.com]][http://www.mycoinsolution.com My Coin Solution] - Bitcoin consulting services and solutions
* [https://www.okpay.com/en/services/accept-payments/index.html OKPAY] Bitcoin payment processing for merchants
* [[File:Payful.png|20px|link=http://payful.io]] [http://payful.io Payful] Accept bitcoin - point of sale, shopping cart plugins and API. Supports payment processing in US dollars, Euros and Canadian dollars.
* [[File:Polycoin_favicon.png|20px|link=http://www.polycoin.io]] [http://www.polycoin.io Polycoin] Bitcoin payment processing platform with solutions for the financial sector
* [https://pocketpos.ca/ PocketPOS] Bitcoin Point of Sale for Canadians, including merchant integration for CAD / BTC exchange.
* [http://snowcron.com Snowcron] Bitcoin Store Engine: Handles payments, sends your customers information they ordered (reg. codes, passwords...) No web programming required.
* [https://xbterminal.com/ XBTerminal] Brick-and-mortar hardware POS terminals with payment processing integrations.
* [https://www.xcoinmoney.com/ xCoinMoney] Online wallet for instant payment and subscriptions.

==See Also==

* [[Merchant Howto]]
* [[In-store Transactions]]
* [[:Category:Payment_Processors|Payment Processors]]
* [[Tax compliance]]
* [[Securing online services]]
* [[BitCoins Mobile]] provides accurate up to date pricing from multiple exchanges from your Apple iPad, iPhone, or iPod Touch.
* [[Bitcoin PayFlow]] automates the process for accepting bitcoins
* [[Lazy API]] The lazy (and possibly easiest?) way to accept bitcoin payments on your website

[[Category:ECommerce]]
[[Category:Local]]

[[de:Bitcoin_als_Geschäft_akzeptieren]]

How to accept Bitcoin, for small businesses

2015-10-21T04:53:08Z

Jacobbubble: Old link to QR Code creator didn't work. 404 error. http://bitcoinqrcode.org/ works

{{merge|Merchant Howto}}

This guide is intended for small business owners who wish to help promote Bitcoin by accepting it as payment for goods and services. It's written with the assumption that you operate a regular business that sells goods or services for regular national currency such as dollars, and that you wish to accept Bitcoin as another legal way to pay, and that you intend to pay taxes on your Bitcoin income just like any other income.

With Bitcoin being touted as a way to conduct anonymous transactions and as way to compete with government currency, many small business owners wonder what's the right way to accept and account Bitcoin, or if it's legal or ethical, or whether and how they should pay taxes on income received through Bitcoin.

As far as we know, Bitcoin isn't yet formally recognized by governments and authorities as a "currency". But in practice, Bitcoin is likely no different than accepting payment in other forms, such as cash, or gold, or scrip, or gift cards or foreign currency. We think that it is pretty much the same as the local businesses of Great Barrington, Massachusetts choosing to accept their locally-printed [http://www.reuters.com/article/2007/06/19/us-usa-economy-berkshares-idUSN0530157720070619 "Berkshire Bucks"] to support their local economy.

====Starting to accept Bitcoin for transactions====
Accepting Bitcoin at a small business is best started in whichever manner keeps the accounting simple for you. This will vary by the type of business you are operating.

===Start with a sign===
[[{{ns:file}}:WeAcceptBitcoin.png‎]]

If you expect that the number of people interested in using Bitcoin is small, you might simply start by posting a sign or a note: "We Accept Bitcoin", and ask people to contact you directly in order to make a payment. Even if hardly anybody uses Bitcoin as a payment method, you're helping Bitcoin in two ways: one, by increasing awareness, and two, by making your customers more willing to accept Bitcoin as payment from others in the future, because now they know somewhere they can spend it.

===Utilize a merchant solution===
If you sell things on your website (goods or services), you'll want to use a [[#Merchant Services|Bitcoin merchant solution]] to accept the Bitcoins (you can usually opt to have them converted to USD or other currencies automatically with some services).

If you sell things in a brick and mortar shop, customers can pay using hardware terminals, touch screen apps or simple wallet addresses through QR Codes.

[[File:Easybitz bitcoin pointofsale.png|400 px|alt=Accept Bitcoin without internet|EasyBitz ZeroClick System|link=https://easybitz.com/merchant]][[File:Coinktie Bitcoin Payment Buttons.png|alt=Coinkite Bitcoin Payment Buttons|link=https://coinkite.com/merchants]]

[[File:Bitcoin-pos-terminal.png|200 px|alt=Bitcoin POS Terminal|Coinkite terminal]] [[File:Mobile_Web_App_Bitcoin_Register.jpeg|100 px|alt=Bitcoin POS Terminal|CoinBox terminal]]

[[File:Mobile_Checkout_Phone.png|200 px|alt=Bitcoin Mobile Checkout|Coinify Mobile Checkout|link=https://coinify.com]]

===Smart Phone or Tablet===
You can use a wallet address with any wallet. For that it's best if you can place a QR code near your cash register to which the customers can scan with their phone and pay (use http://bitcoinqrcode.org/ to make a QR code sign). For a more convenient solution you can use a dedicated app or webapp that generates a QR code on the fly including the amount.

==== Examples ====
Solutions for smart phones and tablets:
* [https://bitcoin.co.th/merchants/ bitcoin.co.th] mobile Bitcoin Point of Sale for Thailand
* [[File:favicon_bp.png|20px|link=https://bitcoinpay.com/static/img/]] [https://bitcoinpay.com BitcoinPay], Mobile payment terminal with EUR, USD, PLN and CZK settlements.
* [[File:BitKassa_favicon.png|20px|link=https://www.BitKassa.nl]] [https://www.BitKassa.nl BitKassa] accept Bitcoin on mobile phone, tablet, computer; converts to Euro/Bitcoin (any percentage)
* [https://bitpay.com/bitcoin-for-retail BitPay] Mobile Checkout
* [https://bitpos.me/demo.html BitPOS] Merchant POS solution for Australia
* [https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=info.blockchain.merchant Blockchain] Merchant for Android
* [http://www.btcxpos.com/ BTCX] POS for Sweden
* [[File:CoinCorner_blue_logo.png|20px|link=https://coincorner.com]] [https://www.coincorner.com/ForBusiness CoinCorner] - Point of Sale solution available that allows physical retailers to easily accept bitcoin and automatically convert that to fiat, removing the risk of holding bitcoins.
* [https://coinify.com Coinify] Bitcoin Point Of Sale
* [[File:Coinkite.gif|20px|link=https://coinkite.com]] [https://coinkite.com/faq/pay Coinkite] Web Pay/Buy/Donate buttons with exchange rate and timers. Customizable via API and works over Tor.
* [[File:Coin_Of_Sale_logo.png|20px|link=https://coinofsale.com]] [https://coinofsale.com Coin Of Sale] - device-independent Bitcoin POS payment system
* [https://coinbase.com/docs/merchant_tools/point_of_sale Coinbase] Point Of Sale for Android
* [[File:BitcoinRegister.gif|20px|link=http://coinbox.it/merchant]][http://coinbox.it/merchant CoinBox] Bitcoin point of sale for Android
* [http://acceptbitcoin.coinpip.com CoinPip] - Bitcoin Payment Processor for Asia / Global Payment and Payouts for Businesses
* [https://cryptopay.me/products/ Cryptopay] HTML5-based bitcoin POS
* [[File:Paxful_how-to-buy-bitcoin.png |20px|link=https://paxful.com]] [https://paxful.com Paxful] Simplest Point of Sale, No Fees and a peer to peer market to buy bitcoin instantly
* [[File:Payful.png|20px|link=http://payful.io]] [http://payful.io Payful] Accept bitcoin - point of sale, shopping cart plugins and API. Supports USA, Europe and Canada.
* [https://pocketpos.ca/ PocketPOS] Bitcoin Point of Sale for Canadians, with exchange integration
* [https://gourl.io/ GoUrl] Bitcoin Mobile Checkout

===Point-of-Sale hardware terminal===
With custom hardware you can integrate with existing registers and point-of-sales solutions (examples: [[File:Coinkite.gif|20px|link=https://coinkite.com/promo/wikibiz]] [https://coinkite.com/promo/wikibiz Coinkite], [https://xbterminal.com/ XBTerminal], [http://www.bitstraat.nl BitStraat]).

===Accounting===
When a customer makes a payment, you might simply issue a credit to their account. Ideally, you want to enter it in a way that suggests you received a payment. You could consider entering it as a "discount", but you may want to consider whether this inappropriately disguises the nature of the transaction. If on the other hand, you're giving "discounts" for Bitcoins, but then you are selling the Bitcoins for currency and then counting that as income, then chances are good that your calculation of income is making up for it. Ask your accountant.

===Businesses that offer gift cards===
If your business sells gift cards or gift certificates, you may find that the easiest way to accept Bitcoin is to accept it only for the purchase of gift cards, and then require the gift cards to be used for actual purchases of goods or services. This way, the accounting practices you already have in place for processing gift cards can be put to use. The accounting for Bitcoins would then be minimized to tracking sales of a single SKU.

This method is also ideal for retail food establishments and convenience stores, where the payment of Bitcoins through a mobile phone for a small daily food purchase might be cumbersome or disruptive, especially in front of a line of other customers. Bitcoins in this case would be best used to reload prepaid cards that can then be swiped at point-of-sale.

If you don't accept gift cards, but you already accept credit cards through a swipe terminal, consider the possibility that you could add a retail gift card system through the swipe terminal you already own. Many point-of-sale terminals, including ones from VeriFone®, are designed around the ability to support multiple applications on the same terminal. Gift cards are also highly profitable because of "breakage", or in other words, the fact that a significant percentage of them never get redeemed.

You could consider adding a private label gift card program from a provider who specializes in this, not just as a jumpstart to accepting Bitcoins, but as an extra boost to income. A private label gift card service provider necessarily have to handle your funds - they can simply provide a solution that keeps track of the balance on the cards on your behalf, including features that allow users to check their balances by phone or by web. Such a solution, of course, is also what makes the cards swipeable through the card reader.

===Businesses that mail invoices===
Does your business send out invoices to customers? Adding one line may make a huge impact for the Bitcoin economy. Perhaps you list it as a payment option just after Visa, MasterCard, and American Express, even if that means your customer must call or e-mail to make a payment.

If you have access to the programming expertise such that you can generate Bitcoin addresses programmatically, consider generating a brand new Bitcoin address for each invoice, and print it on the invoice. When a Bitcoin payment arrives, you'll automatically know where it should arrive.

Customers might wonder how much BTC they should pay in order to satisfy an invoice in full. Your invoice might suggest an amount. For example, if your invoice is for $100 and BTC's are currently worth $1.24 each, your invoice might suggest that it can be paid in full ''"with a payment of 80.65 BTC if paid by (date)"''.

You might be able to anticipate the possibility that even though a Bitcoin address can be printed on an invoice or payment stub, that they are very cumbersome for most people to type, especially being a mix of uppercase and lowercase letters. However, you should probably still do it anyway. The customer is probably going to want some paper trail for his payment. Giving him a pre-printed payment stub with a pre-printed address will satisfy that, because the customer can independently and publicly prove through [[Block Explorer]] that the payment took place.

Does your business have a website? On your invoice, consider allowing them to go to a special URL to get the address to make a Bitcoin payment just by typing in their invoice number. For example, ''ht<nowiki>tps://ww</nowiki>w.yoursite.com/paybtc'' with a form they can enter their invoice number, or just ''ht<nowiki>tps://ww</nowiki>w.yoursite.com/paybtc/60365'' for paying invoice #60365. This way, they can see the Bitcoin address, copy and paste it directly into their Bitcoin client.

Use a brand new address for each invoice whenever possible, and use it only once. This benefits the customer as it removes any ambiguity as to which customer is making which payment and for which invoice.

Known payment systems supporting invoicing, and recurring invoice setup, [https://coinify.com/checkout/invoice/cb/bb Coinify]

Online wallet supporting invoicing, subscriptions and recurrent payments, [https://www.xcoinmoney.com/info/sending-paying-invoices xCoinMoney]

===Avoiding fraud===

You should also consider the possible risk that fraudsters could send counterfeit invoices to your customers, and entice them to make a payment to a Bitcoin address they control, instead of you. While that isn't likely in general - it depends on how well a fraudster could find out who your customers are in the first place - it would certainly be an unpleasant situation if it ever happened. One way you could control that is, whenever possible, never let people try to type Bitcoin addresses off payment stubs - instead, force people to get the full Bitcoin address from your website via secure SSL. But, still print ''most'' of the address on the payment stub (perhaps with four or five characters starred out), so that the customer's need for a paper trail can be satisfied, so they can prove they paid if there is ever a dispute. Merchants can also use the IP address geolocation to understand the close proximity of users. There is automated solution such as [https://www.fraudlabspro.com FraudLabs Pro] that automates the screening of Bitcoin transactions to determine risk level.

==Setting Prices==

When a business accepts bitcoins for payment, there generally is the need to convert them to the currencies used for paying suppliers, employees and shareholders. Some merchants set prices based on the current market rate at the time the price quote is presented to the customer (merchant services like [[File:Polycoin_favicon.png|20px|link=http://www.polycoin.io]] [http://www.polycoin.io Polycoin], [https://coinify.com Coinify], [[File:Favicon-32x32_.png|20px|link=https://bitcoinpay.com]] [https://bitcoinpay.com BitcoinPay], [http://www.bit-pay.com Bit-pay], [https://coinbase.com Coinbase] or [http://paysius.com Paysius] do this automatically).

[[Bitcoin Prices]] lists the exchange rate for many currencies on multiple exchanges.

When prices are determined using an automated process, the current market rate can be based on either a current price or on a weighted average basis. [[Bitcoin Charts]] provides a [http://bitcoincharts.com/about/markets-api data feed that provides weighted prices]. [[Bitcoin Average]] also offers a weighted average price index, featuring average price across all exchanges reachable in the world and in over 150 currencies. 24h sliding average price index is also available and all data is [https://bitcoinaverage.com/api.htm reachable through the API].

When bitcoin funds for purchases are received, some merchants instantly exchange those proceeds into the preferred currency used (again done automatically by [[File:Polycoin_favicon.png|20px|link=http://www.polycoin.io]] [http://www.polycoin.io Polycoin], [https://coinify.com Coinify], [http://www.bit-pay.com Bit-pay], [https://coinbase.com Coinbase] or [[File:Favicon-32x32_.png|20px|link=https://bitcoinpay.com]] [https://bitcoinpay.com BitcoinPay]. Hedging for each transaction can nearly entirely eliminate exchange rate risk that the business is exposed to when accepting bitcoins for payment.

==Contract==

A sales contract might be used to ensure that specific terms are met to lessen the chances of a misunderstanding. For instance, the party sending payment is responsible for paying any [[transaction fee]] that might be necessary. A contract might specify that a transaction fee must be paid and what amount, so as to prevent the situation where the transaction is considered a low priority transaction and thus isn't confirmed quickly.

Other items that might be addressed in a contract:

* Requirement and handling of escrow through an [[:Category:Escrow_services|escrow service]].
* Jurisdiction for disputes.
* Refund policy (particularly with the exchange rate being volatile)

==Paying taxes on Bitcoin income==
[[Tax compliance]] is a topic of concern for small businesses. We aren't accountants or lawyers, and can't give legal or accounting advice.

But in many respects, Bitcoin transactions work very much like cash. Just like Bitcoin, cash is anonymous and doesn't leave a paper trail, yet is widely used in commerce every day.

Ask yourself how you would handle a cash transaction. Do you accept cash transactions? Do you normally pay taxes on cash transactions? The answer for Bitcoin should probably be the same.

As for how to decide what a Bitcoin transaction is worth... the IRS, as far as we know, has never issued a guide mentioning how to value Bitcoin transactions. But they probably have rules and guidelines on how to value transactions made in foreign currency or "cash equivalents". We imagine the accounting would be similar.

With Bitcoins, there's likely to be some difference between the value of BTC when you received them as payment, versus when you go to exchange them for another currency like USD, should you decide to do so. This scenario, likewise, would be no different if you accepted foreign currency or gold as payment. Under some scenarios, it might make sense to book the dollar value of BTC income as it is received, and then to book any difference incurred when it is exchanged for fiat currency. Under others, it might make sense to book the whole thing at the time of exchange.

Perhaps you might talk to your accountant. You don't need to get into a discussion with your accountant about block chains and private keys or the philosophy behind a decentralized currency. By comparing the fundamentals of Bitcoins to accounting concepts already well understood by the public, you can probably get all the answers you need. What would you ask your accountant if you decided that you wanted to accept ''Berkshire Bucks'' or 1-ounce gold coins as payment?

== Merchant Services ==
* [https://apicoin.io Apicoin.io] A robust, secure api to connect to the bitcoin network.
* [http://www.btc4erp.com Bitcoin Transaction Coordinator] Full Merchant Solution for organizations using the NetSuite Global ERP and eCommerce Platform
* [[File:favicon_bp.png|20px|link=https://bitcoinpay.com/static/img/]] [https://bitcoinpay.com BitcoinPay] Payment gateway for virtual currencies with direct settlement to PLN, CZK, EUR and USD. POS + API.
* [[File:Bitfavicon.png|20px|link=http://www.bitcoinpaygate.com]] [http://www.bitcoinpaygate.com Bitcoinpaygate] Bitcoin payment processing for the web & in store payments
* [[File:BitKassa_favicon.png|20px|link=https://www.BitKassa.nl]] [https://www.BitKassa.nl BitKassa] Merchant solution for accepting Bitcoin, getting Euro or Euro/Bitcoin percentage. The Netherlands.
* [https://bitmerch.com BitMerch] Provides HTML buttons to start accepting bitcoins instantly. No server side setup required.
* [https://www.bitpagos.net BitPagos] Bitcoin and Credit Card payment processor
* [https://www.bitpay.com BitPay] Bitcoin payment processor with mobile checkout solution
* [https://bitpos.me BitPOS] Bitcoin payment processor for online and brick and mortar stores
* [http://www.bitstraat.nl BitStraat] Merchant POS solution for accepting Bitcoin
* [http://blockchain.info/api/api_receive Blockchain.info] Free APIs to process bitcoin payments. No sign up or account needed.
* [https://www.btcmerch.com BTCMerch] Payment processor for bitcoins and other cryptocurrencies. 0.5% transaction fee. Sandbox is available.
* [https://coinbase.com/docs/merchant_tools/payment_buttons Coinbase] Offers payment buttons, checkout pages, shopping cart integration, and daily cash out to USD.
* [[File:BitcoinRegister.gif|20px|link=http://coinbox.it/merchant]] [http://coinbox.it/merchant CoinBox] Bitcoin Point of Sales application for Android, with integration into various exchanges. Similar to Square.
* [[File:CoinCorner_blue_logo.png|20px|link=https://coincorner.com]] [https://www.coincorner.com/ForBusiness CoinCorner] - Integrate CoinCorner Checkout in to your eCommerce business using a simple plugin or the API for Bitcoin Payments. Point of Sale solution also available that allows physical retailers to easily accept bitcoin and automatically convert that to fiat, removing the risk of holding bitcoins.
* [https://coinify.com Coinify] Payment Service Provider (PSP) specializing in the technical aspects of accepting cryptocurrencies - such as bitcoin. Supports Bitcoin Web Payments, Mobile Checkout, In-store Bitcoin Payments and Bitcoin Invoicing with recurring billing in bitcoin.
* [[File:Coinkite.gif|20px|link=https://coinkite.com]] [https://coinkite.com/faq/terminal Coinkite] Secure wallet multisig, payment buttons, invoice pages, hardware POS terminals, and Debit-Cards.
* [https://coinpip.com/ CoinPip] Online and POS bitcoin payment processor for Asia.
* [https://coinvoice.com/ Coinvoice] Invoice in USD or BTC, Get paid in USD or BTC.
* [https://coinvoy.net Coinvoy] Free Payment Gateway with built-in exchange
* [https://cryptopay.me Cryptopay] European payment gateway with daily payouts in GBP, EUR and USD. Exchange and wallet integrated.
* [https://cubits.com Cubits] Platform with multisignature wallets and merchant system Cubits Pay.
* [[File:Paxful_how-to-buy-bitcoin.png |20px|link=https://paxful.com]] [https://paxful.com Paxful] Accept Bitcoin with no internet then sell bitcoin for profit on our peer to peer exchange.
* [http://fasterco.in Fasterco.in] Bitcoin payment processing for merchants and day-traders
* [[File:gocoin-logo.png|20px|link=https://www.gocoin.com]] [https://www.gocoin.com/docs GoCoin International payment gateway and processing platform for Merchants]
* [https://gourl.io Gourl.io] Bitcoin Payment processor with ready to use php scripts - Pay-Per-Download, Pay-Per-Product, Pay-Per-Membership, Pay-Per-Registration.
* [[File:inpay_favicon.png|link=https://inpay.pl/?lang=en]] [https://inpay.pl/?lang=en InPay.pl] InPay was created to enable entrepreneurs to accept Bitcoin in PLN, EUR and USD.
* [[File:MCS_200by200_logo-01.png|20px|link=http://www.mycoinsolution.com]][http://www.mycoinsolution.com My Coin Solution] - Bitcoin consulting services and solutions
* [https://www.okpay.com/en/services/accept-payments/index.html OKPAY] Bitcoin payment processing for merchants
* [[File:Payful.png|20px|link=http://payful.io]] [http://payful.io Payful] Accept bitcoin - point of sale, shopping cart plugins and API. Supports payment processing in US dollars, Euros and Canadian dollars.
* [[File:Polycoin_favicon.png|20px|link=http://www.polycoin.io]] [http://www.polycoin.io Polycoin] Bitcoin payment processing platform with solutions for the financial sector
* [https://pocketpos.ca/ PocketPOS] Bitcoin Point of Sale for Canadians, including merchant integration for CAD / BTC exchange.
* [http://snowcron.com Snowcron] Bitcoin Store Engine: Handles payments, sends your customers information they ordered (reg. codes, passwords...) No web programming required.
* [https://xbterminal.com/ XBTerminal] Brick-and-mortar hardware POS terminals with payment processing integrations.
* [https://www.xcoinmoney.com/ xCoinMoney] Online wallet for instant payment and subscriptions.

==See Also==

* [[Merchant Howto]]
* [[In-store Transactions]]
* [[:Category:Payment_Processors|Payment Processors]]
* [[Tax compliance]]
* [[Securing online services]]
* [[BitCoins Mobile]] provides accurate up to date pricing from multiple exchanges from your Apple iPad, iPhone, or iPod Touch.
* [[Bitcoin PayFlow]] automates the process for accepting bitcoins
* [[Lazy API]] The lazy (and possibly easiest?) way to accept bitcoin payments on your website

[[Category:ECommerce]]
[[Category:Local]]

[[de:Bitcoin_als_Geschäft_akzeptieren]]

Bitcoin

2013-12-10T10:20:45Z

Jacobbubble: Updated BTC Market cap from 1.5 Billion USD to over 11 Billion USD

'''Bitcoin''' is a decentralized [[digital currency]] created by developer [[Satoshi Nakamoto]]. It does not rely on a central server to process transactions or store funds. There are a maximum of 2,100,000,000,000,000 Bitcoin elements (called satoshis), currently most commonly measured in units of 100,000,000 known as BTC.

{{As of|April 2013}}, it is the most widely used alternative currency,<ref name="Quantitative Analysis of the Full Bitcoin Transaction Graph">{{cite web|title=Quantitative Analysis of the Full Bitcoin Transaction Graph|url=http://eprint.iacr.org/2012/584.pdf|publisher=Cryptology ePrint Archive|accessdate=18 October 2012|author=Ron Dorit|coauthors=Adi Shamir|page=17|quote=The Bitcoin system is the best known and most widely used alternative payment scheme,...}}</ref><ref name="Mt.Gox data">{{Cite web|title=Mt.Gox data|url=http://bitcoincharts.com/markets/mtgoxUSD.html|publisher=Bitcoincharts}}</ref> now with the total market cap over 11 billion US dollars<ref>{{cite web|title=Market Capitalization|url=http://blockchain.info/charts/market-cap|publisher=Blockchain.info|accessdate=7 April 2013}}</ref>.

Bitcoin has no central issuer; instead, the peer-to-peer network regulates Bitcoins, transactions and issuance according to consensus in network software.
Bitcoins are issued to various nodes that verify transactions through computing power;
it is established that there will be a limited and scheduled release of no more than 21 million BTC worth of coins, which will be fully issued by the year 2140.

Internationally, Bitcoins can be exchanged and managed through various websites and [[software]] along with physical banknotes and coins.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Physical Bitcoins by Casascius|url=https://www.casascius.com/|publisher=Casascius Coins|accessdate=29 September 2012}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title=Bitbills|url=http://www.bitbills.com/|publisher=Bitbills|accessdate=29 September 2012}}</ref>

==History==
:Main article: [[History]]

A cryptographic system for untraceable payments was first described by David Chaum in 1982.<ref>[http://blog.koehntopp.de/uploads/Chaum.BlindSigForPayment.1982.PDF David Chaum, Blind signatures for untraceable payments], Advances in Cryptology - Crypto '82, Springer-Verlag (1983), 199–203.</ref> In 1990 Chaum extended this system to create the first cryptographic anonymous electronic cash system.,<ref>{{cite journal|journal=Lecture Notes in Computer Science|last1=Chaum|first1=David|last2=Fiat|first2=Amos|last3=Naor|first3=Moni|title=Untraceable Electronic Cash|url=http://blog.koehntopp.de/uploads/chaum_fiat_naor_ecash.pdf}}</ref> which became known as ecash.
<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/2.12/emoney.html|publisher=Wired|title=E-Money (That's What I Want)|date=1994–2012|author=Steven Levy}}</ref> In 1998 Wei Dai published a description of an anonymous, distributed electronic cash system which he called "b-money".<ref>{{cite web|title=B-Money|url=http://www.weidai.com/bmoney.txt|author=Wei Dai|year=1998}}</ref> Around the same time, Nick Szabo created ''bit gold''.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://spectrum.ieee.org/computing/software/bitcoin-the-cryptoanarchists-answer-to-cash/0|title=Bitcoin: The Cryptoanarchists’ Answer to Cash|publisher=IEEE Spectrum|quote=Around the same time, Nick Szabo, a computer scientist who now blogs about law and the history of money, was one of the first to imagine a new digital currency from the ground up. Although many consider his scheme, which he calls “bit gold,” to be a precursor to Bitcoin}}</ref><ref name="bitgold">{{cite web|title=Bit gold|url=http://unenumerated.blogspot.co.uk/2005/12/bit-gold.html|author=Nick Szabo|quote=My proposal for bit gold is based on computing a string of bits from a string of challenge bits, using functions called variously "client puzzle function," "proof of work function," or "secure benchmark function.". The resulting string of bits is the proof of work.... The last-created string of bit gold provides the challenge bits for the next-created string.}}</ref> Like Bitcoin, ''Bit gold'' was a currency system where users would compete to solve a [[proof of work]] function, with solutions being cryptographically chained together and published via a distributed property title registry. A variant of ''Bit gold'', called ''Reusable Proofs of Work'', was implemented by Hal Finney.<ref name="bitgold"/>

In 2008, Satoshi Nakamoto published a paper<ref name="whitepaper">{{cite web
|last= Nakamoto
|first= Satoshi
|title= Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System
|url= http://www.cs.kent.edu/~JAVED/class-P2P12F/papers-2012/PAPER2012-p2p-bitcoin-satoshinakamoto.pdf
|accessdate = 14 December 2010
|date= 24 May 2009
|postscript=
}}</ref><ref>{{cite web
|url= http://article.gmane.org/gmane.comp.encryption.general/12588/
|title= Bitcoin P2P e-cash paper
}}</ref> on The Cryptography Mailing list at metzdowd.com<ref>[http://www.mail-archive.com/search?l=cryptography@metzdowd.com&q=from:%22Satoshi+Nakamoto%22 Satoshi's posts to Cryptography mailing list]</ref> describing the Bitcoin protocol.

The Bitcoin network came into existence on 3 January 2009 with the release of the first Bitcoin client, [[wxBitcoin]], and the issuance of the first Bitcoins.<ref>{{cite web |title=Block 0 – Bitcoin Block Explorer |url=http://blockexplorer.com/block/000000000019d6689c085ae165831e934ff763ae46a2a6c172b3f1b60a8ce26f }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.mail-archive.com/cryptography@metzdowd.com/msg10142.html |title=Bitcoin v0.1 released}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://sourceforge.net/news/?group_id=244765 |title=SourceForge.net: Bitcoin}}</ref>
A year after, the initial exchange rates for Bitcoin were set by individuals on the bitcointalk forums.{{Citation needed|date=October 2012}} The most significant transaction involved a 10,000 BTC pizza.<ref>{{cite web|title=The Rise and Fall of Bitcoin|url=http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/11/mf_bitcoin/|publisher=Wired|accessdate=13 October 2012}}</ref>
Today, the majority of Bitcoin exchanges occur on the [[MtGox]] Bitcoin exchange.

In 2011, Wikileaks,<ref>{{cite news
|last= Greenberg
|first= Andy
|url= http://blogs.forbes.com/andygreenberg/2011/06/14/wikileaks-asks-for-anonymous-bitcoin-donations/
|title= WikiLeaks Asks For Anonymous Bitcoin Donations – Andy Greenberg – The Firewall – Forbes
|publisher= Blogs.forbes.com
|date= 2011-06-14
|accessdate = 2011-06-22
}}</ref> [[Freenet]],<ref>{{cite web
|url= https://freenetproject.org/donate.html
|title= /donate
|publisher= The Freenet Project
|date=
|accessdate = 2011-06-22
}}</ref> Singularity Institute,<ref>[http://singinst.org/donate/ SIAI donation page]</ref> Internet Archive,<ref>[http://www.archive.org/donate/index.php Internet Archive donation page]</ref> Free Software Foundation<ref>[https://my.fsf.org/donate/other/ Other ways to donate]</ref> and others, began to accept donations in Bitcoin. The Electronic Frontier Foundation did so for a while but has since stopped, citing concerns about a lack of legal precedent about new currency systems, and because they "generally don't endorse any type of product or service."<ref>{{cite web
|url= https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2011/06/eff-and-bitcoin
|title= EFF and Bitcoin | Electronic Frontier Foundation
|publisher= Eff.org
|date= 2011-06-14
|accessdate = 2011-06-22
}}</ref> Some small businesses had started to adopt Bitcoin. LaCie, a public company, accepts Bitcoin for its Wuala service.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.wuala.com/en/bitcoin |title=Secure Online Storage – Backup. Sync. Share. Access Everywhere |publisher=Wuala |date= |accessdate = 2012-01-24}}</ref>

In 2012, BitPay reports of having over 1000 merchants accepting Bitcoin under its payment processing service.<ref>{{cite web|title=BitPay Signs 1,000 Merchants to Accept Bitcoin Payments|url=http://www.americanbanker.com/issues/177_176/bitpay-signs-1000-merchants-to-accept-bitcoin-payments-1052538-1.html|publisher=American Banker|accessdate=12 October 2012}}</ref>

==Administration==
Bitcoin is administered through a decentralized peer-to-peer network.<ref name="whitepaper"/> Cryptographic technologies and the peer-to-peer network of computing power enables users to make and verify irreversible, instant online Bitcoin payments, without an obligation to trust and use centralized banking institutions and authorities. Dispute resolution services are not made directly available. Instead it is left to the users to verify and trust the parties they are sending money to through their choice of methods.

Bitcoins are issued according to rules agreed to by the majority of the computing power within the Bitcoin network. The core rules describing the predictable issuance of Bitcoins to its verifying servers, a voluntary and competitive transaction fee system and the hard limit of no more than 21 million BTC issued in total.<ref name="whitepaper"/>

Bitcoin does not require a central bank, State,<ref>{{cite web
|url= http://spectrum.ieee.org/computing/software/bitcoin-the-cryptoanarchists-answer-to-cash/3
|title= Bitcoin: The Cryptoanarchists' Answer to Cash
|publisher= IEEE.org
|date= June 2012
|accessdate = 2012-06-05
}}</ref> or incorporated backers.

==Services==
:Main article: [[Wallet]]

Bitcoins are sent and received through software and websites called wallets. They send and confirm transactions to the network through Bitcoin addresses, the identifiers for users' Bitcoin wallets within the network.<ref name="whitepaper"/>

===Bitcoin addresses===
:Main article: [[Address]]

Payments are made to Bitcoin "addresses": human-readable strings of numbers and letters around 33 characters in length, always beginning with the digit 1 or 3, as in the example of ''31uEbMgunupShBVTewXjtqbBv5MndwfXhb''.

Users obtain new Bitcoin addresses from their Bitcoin software. Creating a new address can be a completely offline process and require no communication with the Bitcoin network.

===Transaction fees===
:Main article: [[Transaction fees]]
Transaction fees may be included with any transfer of Bitcoins. {{As of|2012}} many transactions are processed in a way which makes no charge for the transaction. For transactions which consume or produce many coins (and therefore have a large data size), a small transaction fee is usually expected.

===Confirmations===
:Main article: [[Confirmation]]

The network's software confirms a transaction when it records it in a block. Further blocks of transactions confirm it even further. After six confirmations/blocks, a transaction is confirmed beyond reasonable doubt.

The network must store the whole transaction history inside the blockchain, which grows constantly as new records are added and never removed. Nakamoto conceived that as the database became larger, users would desire applications for Bitcoin that didn't store the entire database on their computer. To enable this, the blockchain uses a [[merkle tree]] to organize the transaction records in such a way that client software can locally delete portions of its own database it knows it will never need, such as earlier transaction records of Bitcoins that have changed ownership multiple times.

==Economics==

===Initial distribution===

Bitcoin has no centralized issuing authority.<ref name="ars-06-08-11">
{{Cite news
|first= Thomas
|last= Lowenthal
|title= Bitcoin: inside the encrypted, peer-to-peer digital currency
|newspaper= Ars Technica
|date= 8 June 2011
|url= http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/06/bitcoin-inside-the-encrypted-peer-to-peer-currency.ars
}}</ref><ref>{{cite news
|author= Sponsored by
|url= http://www.economist.com/blogs/babbage/2011/06/virtual-currency
|title= Virtual currency: Bits and bob
|publisher= The Economist
|date=
|accessdate = 2011-06-22
}}</ref><ref>{{cite web
|last= Geere
|first= Duncan
|url= http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2011-05/16/bitcoin-p2p-currency
|title= Peer-to-peer currency Bitcoin sidesteps financial institutions (Wired UK)
|publisher= Wired.co.uk
|date=
|accessdate = 2011-06-22
}}</ref> The network is programmed to increase the money supply as a geometric series until the total number of Bitcoins reaches 21 million BTC.<ref name="Quantitative Analysis of the Full Bitcoin Transaction Graph"/> {{As of|2012|10}} slightly over 10 million of the total 21 million BTC had been created; the current total number created is available online.<ref>{{cite web
|title= Total Number of Bitcoins in Existence
|url= http://blockexplorer.com/q/totalbc
|work= Bitcoin Block Explorer
|accessdate = 2012-10-03
}}</ref> By 2013 half of the total supply will have been generated, and by 2017, three-quarters will have been generated. To ensure sufficient granularity of the [[money supply]], clients can divide each BTC unit down to eight decimal places (a total of 2.1 × 10<sup>15</sup> or 2.1 quadrillion units).<ref name="lwn">{{Cite news
|author= Nathan Willis
|date= 2010-11-10
|title= Bitcoin: Virtual money created by CPU cycles
|publisher= LWN.net
|url= http://lwn.net/Articles/414452/
}}</ref>

The network {{As of|2012|lc=on}} required over one million times more work for confirming a block and receiving an award (25 BTC {{As of|2012|2|lc=on}}) than when the first blocks were confirmed.
The difficulty is automatically adjusted every 2016 blocks based on the time taken to find the previous 2016 blocks such that one block is created roughly every 10 minutes.

Those who chose to put computational and electrical resources toward mining early on had a greater chance at receiving awards for block generations. This served to make available enough processing power to process blocks. Indeed, without miners there are no transactions and the Bitcoin economy comes to a halt.

===Exchange rate===
Prices fluctuate relative to goods and services more than more widely accepted currencies;
the price of a Bitcoin is not static.

In August 2012, 1 BTC traded at around $10.00 USD. Taking into account the total number of Bitcoins mined, the monetary base of the Bitcoin network stands at over 110 million USD.<ref>[http://www.bitcoinwatch.com/ http://www.bitcoinwatch.com/] Bitcoin statistics</ref>

== Security ==
:Main article: [[Weaknesses]]

In the history of bitcoin, there have been a few [[incidents]], caused by problematic as well as malicious transactions. In the worst such incident, and the only one of its type, a person was able to pretend that he had a practically infinite supply of bitcoins, for almost 9 hours.

Bitcoin relies, among other things, on [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public-key_cryptography public key cryptography] and thus may be vulnerable to [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elliptic_curve_cryptography#Quantum_computing_attacks quantum computing attacks] if and when practical quantum computers can be constructed.

If multiple different software packages, whose usage becomes widespread on the Bitcoin network, disagree on the protocol and the rules for transactions, this could potentially cause a fork in the block chain, with each faction of users being able to accept only their own version of the history of transactions. This could influence the price of bitcoins.

A global, organized campaign against the currency or the software could also influence the demand for bitcoins, and thus the exchange price.

==Bitcoin mining==
:Main article: [[Mining]]

Bitcoin mining nodes are responsible for managing the Bitcoin network.

Bitcoins are awarded to Bitcoin nodes known as "miners" for the solution to a difficult [[proof-of-work]] problem which confirms transactions and prevents double-spending. This incentive, as the Nakamoto white paper describes it, encourages "nodes to support the network, and provides a way to initially distribute coins into circulation, since no central authority issues them."<ref name="whitepaper" />

Nakamoto compared the generation of new coins by expending CPU time and electricity to gold miners expending resources to add gold to circulation.<ref name="whitepaper"/>

===Node operation===

The node software for the Bitcoin network is based on peer-to-peer networking, digital signatures and cryptographic proof to make and verify transactions. Nodes broadcast transactions to the network, which records them in a public record of all transactions, called the ''blockchain'', after validating them with a [[proof-of-work|proof-of-work system]].

Satoshi Nakamoto designed the first Bitcoin node and mining software<ref name="processors">{{Cite news
|last= Davis
|first= Joshua
|title= The Crypto-Currency
|url= http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/11/mf_bitcoin/all
|accessdate = 11 November 2011
|newspaper= Wired Magazine
|date= 10 November 2011
}}</ref> and developed the majority of the first implementation, Bitcoind, from 2007 to mid-2010.<ref name="code_start">{{cite web
|url= https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=13.msg46#msg46
|title= Questions about Bitcoin
|publisher= Bitcoin forum
|date= 2009-12-10
}}</ref>

Node implementations include core software such as Bitcoind/Bitcoin-Qt, [[libbitcoin]], [[cbitcoin]]<ref>{{Cite web|title=cbitcoin|url=https://github.com/MatthewLM/cbitcoin|accessdate=3 October 2012}}</ref> and [[BitCoinJ|bitcoinj]].<ref>{{cite web
|url= http://news.slashdot.org/story/11/03/23/0210207/Google-Engineer-Releases-Open-Source-Bitcoin-Client
|title= Google Engineer Releases Open Source Bitcoin Client
|author= angry tapir, timothy
|date= 23 March 2011
|publisher= Slashdot
|accessdate = 2011-05-18
}}</ref><ref>{{cite web
|url= http://www.javaworld.com/javaworld/jw-01-2012/120110-bitcoin-for-beginners-3.html?page=1
|title= Bitcoin for beginners: The BitcoinJ API
|author= Dirk Merkel
|date= 10 January 2012
|publisher= JavaWorld
|accessdate = 2012-08-03
}}</ref>

Every node in the Bitcoin network collects all the unacknowledged transactions it knows of in a file called a ''block'', which also contains a reference to the previous valid block known to that node. It then appends a [[nonce]] value to this previous block and computes the SHA-256 cryptographic hash of the block and the appended nonce value. The node repeats this process until it adds a nonce that allows for the generation of a hash with a value lower than a specified ''target''. Because computers cannot practically reverse the hash function, finding such a nonce is hard and requires on average a predictable amount of repetitious trial and error. This is where the ''[[proof-of-work]]'' concept comes in to play. When a node finds such a solution, it announces it to the rest of the network. Peers receiving the new solved block validate it by computing the hash and checking that it really starts with the given number of zero bits (i.e., that the hash is within the target). Then they accept it and add it to the chain.

===Mining rewards===
In addition to receiving the pending transactions confirmed in the block, a generating node adds a ''generate'' transaction, which awards new Bitcoins to the operator of the node that generated the block. The system sets the payout of this generated transaction according to its defined inflation schedule. The miner that generates a block also receives the fees that users have paid as an incentive to give particular transactions priority for faster confirmation.

The network never creates more than a 50 BTC reward per block and this amount will decrease over time towards zero, such that no more than 21 million BTC will ever exist.<ref name="lwn" /> As this payout decreases, the incentive for users to run block-generating nodes is intended to change to earning [[#Transaction fees|transaction fees]].

===Mining pools===
:Main article: [[Pooled mining]]

Bitcoin users often pool computational effort to increase the stability of the collected fees and subsidy they receive.<ref name="We Use Coins Mining">{{cite web|title=About Bitcoin Mining|url=http://www.weusecoins.com/mining-guide.php|publisher=We Use Coins|accessdate=18 October 2012}}</ref>

===Mining difficulty===
:Main article: [[Difficulty]]

In order to throttle the creation of blocks, the difficulty of generating new blocks is adjusted over time. If mining output increases or decreases, the difficulty increases or decreases accordingly.

The adjustment is done by changing the threshold that a hash is required to be less than. A lower threshold means fewer possible hashes can be accepted, and thus a higher degree of difficulty. The target rate of block generation is one block every 10 minutes, or 2016 blocks every two weeks. Bitcoin changes the difficulty of finding a valid block every 2016 blocks, using the difficulty that would have been most likely to cause the prior 2016 blocks to have taken two weeks to generate, according to the timestamps on the blocks. Technically, this is done by modeling the generation of Bitcoins as Poisson process. All nodes perform and enforce the same difficulty calculation.

Difficulty is intended as an automatic stabilizer allowing mining for Bitcoins to remain profitable in the long run for the most efficient miners, independently of the fluctuations in demand of Bitcoin in relation to other currencies.

===Mining hardware===
:Main article: [[Mining Hardware Comparison]]

Bitcoins used to be mined through Intel/AMD CPUs. {{As of | 2012}}, mining has gradually moved to [[GPU]] and [[FPGA]] hardware.<ref name="bitcoinmag-butterfly" /> [[Application-specific integrated circuit|ASIC]]-based hardware for Bitcoin mining has been announced by several manufacturers who intend to ship products from late 2012 to early 2013.<ref name="bitcoinmag-butterfly">{{Cite web|title=Bitpay Breaks Daily Volume Record with Butterfly ASIC mining release|url=http://bitcoinmagazine.net/bitpay-breaks-daily-volume-record-with-butterfly-asic-mining-release/|publisher=Bitcoin Magazine}}</ref>

==Concerns==

===As an investment===
Bitcoin describes itself as an experimental digital currency. Reuben Grinberg has noted that Bitcoin's supporters have argued that Bitcoin is neither a security or an investment because it fails to meet the criteria for either category.<ref name="grinberg">{{cite web | url=http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1817857 | title=Bitcoin: An Innovative Alternative Digital Currency | publisher=SSRN | date=9 December 2011 | accessdate=4 December 2012 | author=Grinberg, Reuben}}</ref> Although it is a virtual currency, some people see it as an investment<ref name="cnbc">{{cite web | url=http://www.cnbc.com/id/45030812/The_Pros_And_Cons_Of_Biting_on_Bitcoins | title=The Pros And Cons Of Biting on Bitcoins | publisher=CNBC | date=23 November 2011 | accessdate=4 December 2012 | author=Gustke, Constance}}</ref> or accuse it of being a form of investment fraud known as a Ponzi scheme.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/06/08/bitcoin_under_attack/ |title=US senators draw a bead on Bitcoin |last1=Chirgwin |first1=Richard |date=8 June 2011 |publisher=The Register |accessdate=14 November 2012}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://uk.reuters.com/article/2012/04/01/uk-traders-bitcoin-idUKBRE8300JL20120401 |title=Bitcoin, the City traders' anarchic new toy |last1=O'Leary |first1=Naomi |date=2 April 2012 |publisher=Reuters |accessdate=14 November 2012}}</ref> A report by the European Central Bank, using the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's definition of a Ponzi scheme, found that the use of bitcoins shares some characteristics with Ponzi schemes, but also has characteristics of its own which contradict several common aspects of Ponzi schemes.<ref name="ecbreport">{{cite web | url=http://www.ecb.europa.eu/pub/pdf/other/virtualcurrencyschemes201210en.pdf | title=Virtual Currency Schemes | publisher=European Central Bank | date=October 2012 | accessdate=4 December 2012}}</ref>

===Privacy===
Because transactions are broadcast to the entire network, they are inherently public. Unlike regular banking,<ref>{{cite web
|url= http://spectrum.ieee.org/computing/software/bitcoin-the-cryptoanarchists-answer-to-cash/0
|title= Bitcoin: The Cryptoanarchists' Answer to Cash
|publisher= IEEE.org
|date= June 2012
|accessdate = 2012-06-05
}}</ref> which preserves customer privacy by keeping transaction records private, loose transactional privacy is accomplished in Bitcoin by using many unique addresses for every wallet, while at the same time publishing all transactions. As an example, if Alice sends 123.45 BTC to Bob, the network creates a public record that allows anyone to see that 123.45 has been sent from one address to another. However, unless Alice or Bob make their ownership of these addresses known, it is difficult for anyone else to connect the transaction with them. However, if someone connects an address to a user at any point they could follow back a series of transactions as each participant likely knows who paid them and may disclose that information on request or under duress.

It can be difficult to associate Bitcoin identities with real-life identities.<ref name="An Analysis of Anonymity in the Bitcoin System">Fergal Reid and Martin Harrigan (24 July 2011). [http://anonymity-in-bitcoin.blogspot.com/2011/07/bitcoin-is-not-anonymous.html An Analysis of Anonymity in the Bitcoin System]. An Analysis of Anonymity in the Bitcoin System.</ref> This property makes Bitcoin transactions attractive to sellers of illegal products.<ref name="Forbes">Andy Greenberg (20 April 2011). [http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2011/0509/technology-psilocybin-bitcoins-gavin-andresen-crypto-currency.html Crypto Currency]. Forbes Magazine.</ref><ref>{{cite web
|last= Madrigal
|first= Alexis
|title= Libertarian Dream? A Site Where You Buy Drugs With Digital Dollars
|publisher= The Atlantic Monthly
|date= 2011-06-01
|url= http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2011/06/libertarian-dream-a-site-where-you-buy-drugs-with-digital-dollars/239776/
|accessdate = 2011-06-05
}}</ref>

===Illicit use===

====Cracking====
The cracking organization "LulzSec" accepted donations in Bitcoin, having said that the group "needs Bitcoin donations to continue their hacking efforts".<ref name="CNET">{{cite web
|last= Reisinger
|first= Don
|url= http://news.cnet.com/8301-13506_3-20070268-17/senators-target-bitcoin-currency-citing-drug-sales/
|title= Senators target Bitcoin currency, citing drug sales | The Digital Home – CNET News
|publisher= News.cnet.com
|date= 2011-06-09
|accessdate = 2011-06-22
}}</ref><ref>{{cite news
|last= Olson
|first= Parmy
|url= http://blogs.forbes.com/parmyolson/2011/06/06/lulzsec-hackers-posts-sony-dev-source-code-get-7k-donation/
|title= LulzSec Hackers Post Sony Dev. Source Code, Get $7K Donation – Parmy Olson – Disruptors – Forbes
|publisher= Blogs.forbes.com
|date= 6 June 2011
|accessdate = 2011-06-22
}}</ref>

====Silk Road====
[[Silk Road]] is an anonymous black market that uses only the Bitcoin.<ref name="npr-06-12-11">
{{Cite news
|url= http://www.npr.org/2011/06/12/137138008/silk-road-not-your-fathers-amazon-com
|date= 12 June 2011
|newspaper= NPR
|title= Silk Road: Not Your Father's Amazon.com
|author= Staff
}}</ref>

In a 2011 letter to Attorney General Eric Holder and the Drug Enforcement Administration, senators Charles Schumer of New York and Joe Manchin of West Virginia called for an investigation into Silk Road and the Bitcoin.<ref name="npr-06-12-11"/>
Schumer described the use of Bitcoins at Silk Road as a form of money laundering.<ref name="ars-06-08-11"/>

====Botnet mining====
In June 2011, Symantec warned about the possibility of botnets engaging in covert "mining" of Bitcoins,<ref>{{Cite web|author=Updated: 17 June 2011 | Translations available: 日本語 |url=http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/bitcoin-botnet-mining |title=Bitcoin Botnet Mining | Symantec Connect Community |publisher=Symantec.com |date=2011-06-17 |accessdate = 2012-01-24}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.zdnet.com/blog/security/researchers-find-malware-rigged-with-bitcoin-miner/8934 |title=Researchers find malware rigged with Bitcoin miner |publisher=ZDNet |date=2011-06-29 |accessdate = 2012-01-24}}</ref> consuming computing cycles, using extra electricity and possibly increasing the temperature of the computer. Later that month, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation caught an employee using the company's servers to generate Bitcoins without permission.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://thenextweb.com/au/2011/06/23/abc-employee-caught-mining-for-bitcoins-on-company-servers/ |title=ABC employee caught mining for Bitcoins on company servers |publisher=The Next Web |date=2011-06-23 |accessdate = 2012-01-24}}</ref> Some malware also uses the parallel processing capabilities of the GPUs built into many modern-day video cards.<ref>{{Cite news |url=http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/08/16/gpu_bitcoin_brute_forcing/ |title=Malware mints virtual currency using victim's GPU |date=16 August 2011|first=Dan |last=Goodin }}</ref> In mid August 2011, Bitcoin miner botnets were found;<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/view/20211/researcher-discovers-distributed-bitcoin-cracking-trojan-malware/ |title=Infosecurity – Researcher discovers distributed bitcoin cracking trojan malware |publisher=Infosecurity-magazine.com |date=2011-08-19 |accessdate = 2012-01-24}}</ref> trojans infecting Mac OS X have also been uncovered.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.techworld.com.au/article/405849/mac_os_x_trojan_steals_processing_power_produce_bitcoins |title=Mac OS X Trojan steals processing power to produce Bitcoins – sophos, security, malware, Intego – Vulnerabilities – Security |publisher=Techworld |date=2011-11-01 |accessdate = 2012-01-24}}</ref>

===Theft and fraud===
On 19 June 2011, a security breach of the Mt.Gox (an acronym for ''M''agic: ''T''he ''G''athering ''O''nline E''x''change, its original purpose) Bitcoin Exchange caused the price of a Bitcoin to briefly drop to US$0.01 on the Mt.Gox exchange (though it remained unaffected on other exchanges) after a hacker allegedly used credentials from a Mt.Gox auditor's compromised computer to illegally transfer a large number of Bitcoins to him- or herself and sell them all, creating a massive "ask" order at any price. Within minutes the price rebounded to over $15 before Mt.Gox shut down their exchange and canceled all trades that happened during the hacking period.<ref>[https://mtgox.com/press_release_20110630.html Clarification of Mt Gox Compromised Accounts and Major Bitcoin Sell-Off]</ref><ref>[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T1X6qQt9ONg YouTube. Bitcoin Report]</ref> The exchange rate of Bitcoins quickly returned to near pre-crash values.<ref name="mick">Jason Mick, 19 June 2011, [http://www.dailytech.com/Inside+the+MegaHack+of+Bitcoin+the+Full+Story/article21942.htm Inside the Mega-Hack of Bitcoin: the Full Story], DailyTech</ref><ref>Timothy B. Lee, 19 June 2011, [http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/06/bitcoin-price-plummets-on-compromised-exchange.ars Bitcoin prices plummet on hacked exchange], Ars Technica</ref><ref>Mark Karpeles, 20 June 2011, [https://support.mtgox.com/entries/20208066-huge-bitcoin-sell-off-due-to-a-compromised-account-rollback Huge Bitcoin sell off due to a compromised account – rollback], Mt.Gox Support</ref><ref name="register1">{{Cite news
|title= Bitcoin collapses on malicious trade – Mt Gox scrambling to raise the Titanic
|url= http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/06/19/bitcoin_values_collapse_again/
|date= 2011-06-19
|author= Chirgwin, Richard
|publisher= The Register
}}</ref> Accounts with the equivalent of more than USD 8,750,000 were affected.<ref name="mick" />

In July 2011, The operator of Bitomat, the third largest Bitcoin exchange, announced that he lost access to his wallet.dat file with about 17,000 BitCoins (roughly equivalent to 220,000 USD at that time). He announced that he would sell the service for the missing amount, aiming to use funds from the sale to refund his customers.<ref>[http://siliconangle.com/blog/2011/08/01/third-largest-bitcoin-exchange-bitomat-lost-their-wallet-over-17000-bitcoins-missing/ Third Largest Bitcoin Exchange Bitomat Lost Their Wallet, Over 17,000 Bitcoins Missing]. SiliconAngle</ref>

In August 2011, MyBitcoin, one of popular Bitcoin transaction processors, declared that it was hacked, which resulted in it being shut down, with paying 49% on customer deposits, leaving more than 78,000 BitCoins (roughly equivalent to 800,000 USD at that time) unaccounted for.<ref>[http://betabeat.com/2011/08/mybitcoin-spokesman-finally-comes-forward-what-did-you-think-we-did-after-the-hack-we-got-shitfaced/ MyBitcoin Spokesman Finally Comes Forward: “What Did You Think We Did After the Hack? We Got Shitfaced”]. BetaBeat</ref><ref>[http://betabeat.com/2011/08/search-for-owners-of-mybitcoin-loses-steam/ Search for Owners of MyBitcoin Loses Steam]. BetaBeat</ref>

In early August 2012, a lawsuit was filed in San Francisco court against Bitcoinica, claiming about 460,000 USD from the company. Bitcoinica was hacked twice in 2012, which led to allegations of neglecting the safety of customers' money and cheating them out of withdrawal requests.<ref>[http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/08/bitcoinica-users-sue-for-460k-in-lost-bitcoins/ Bitcoinica users sue for $460k in lost Bitcoins]. Arstechnica</ref><ref>[http://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-talk/computing/networks/first-bitcoin-lawsuit-filed-in-san-francisco First Bitcoin Lawsuit Filed In San Francisco]. IEEE Spectrum</ref>

In late August 2012, Bitcoin Savings and Trust was shut down by the owner, allegedly leaving around $5.6 million in debts; this led to allegations of the operation being a Ponzi scheme.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Bitcoin ponzi scheme – investors lose $5 million USD in online hedge fund|url=http://rt.com/usa/news/investors-currency-digital-fund-868/|publisher=RT}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|last=Jeffries|first=Adrianne|title=Suspected multi-million dollar Bitcoin pyramid scheme shuts down, investors revolt|url=http://www.theverge.com/2012/8/27/3271637/bitcoin-savings-trust-pyramid-scheme-shuts-down|publisher=The Verge}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|last=Mick|first=Jason|title="Pirateat40" Makes Off $5.6M USD in BitCoins From Pyramid Scheme|url=http://www.dailytech.com/Pirateat40+Makes+Off+56M+USD+in+BitCoins+From+Pyramid+Scheme/article25538.htm|publisher=DailyTech}}</ref><ref>[http://pandodaily.com/2012/08/31/bitcoin-how-a-virtual-currency-became-real-with-a-5-6m-fraud/ Bitcoin: How a Virtual Currency Became Real with a $5.6M Fraud]. PandoDaily</ref> In September 2012, it was reported that U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has started an investigation on the case.<ref>[http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/technology/willardfoxton2/100007836/bitcoin-pirate-scandal-sec-steps-in-amid-allegations-that-the-whole-thing-was-a-ponzi-scheme/ Bitcoin 'Pirate' scandal: SEC steps in amid allegations that the whole thing was a Ponzi scheme ]. The Telegraph</ref>

In September 2012, Bitfloor Bitcoin exchange also reported being hacked, with 24,000 BitCoins (roughly equivalent to 250,000 USD) stolen. As a result, Bitfloor suspended operations.<ref>[http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-19486695 Bitcoin theft causes Bitfloor exchange to go offline]. BBC</ref><ref>[http://www.theverge.com/2012/9/5/3293375/bitfloor-bitcoin-exchange-suspended-theft Bitcoin exchange BitFloor suspends operations after $250,000 theft Bitcoin exchange BitFloor suspends operations after $250,000 theft]. The Verge</ref> The same month, Bitfloor resumed operations, with its founder saying that he reported the theft to FBI, and that he is planning to repay the victims, though the time frame for such repayment is unclear.<ref>[http://www.pcworld.com/article/2010586/bitcoin-exchange-back-online-after-hack.html?tk=rel_news Bitcoin exchange back online after hack]. PCWorld</ref>

===Taxation===
In September 2012, the Intra-European Organization of Tax Administrations (IOTA), in Tbilisi, Georgia, held a workshop titled "Auditing Individuals and Legal Entities in the Use of e-Money." The workshop was attended by representatives from 23 countries.<ref name="BitCoin Tax issues Oct 2012">{{cite journal | title=2012 TNT 209-4 NEWS ANALYSIS: VIRTUAL CURRENCY: A NEW WORRY FOR TAX ADMINISTRATORS?. (Release Date: OCTOBER 17, 2012) (Doc 2012-21516) | author=Stewart, David D. and Soong Johnston, Stephanie D. | journal=Tax Notes Today | year=2012 | month=October 29 | volume=2012 TNT 209-4 | issue=2012 TNT 209-4}}</ref> Jerry Taylor, IOTA's technical taxation expert, said, "There's an awful lot happening on the Internet environment which is fascinating at the moment and introducing new challenges for auditors when it comes to virtual currency."<ref name="BitCoin Tax issues Oct 2012">{{cite journal | title=2012 TNT 209-4 NEWS ANALYSIS: VIRTUAL CURRENCY: A NEW WORRY FOR TAX ADMINISTRATORS?. (Release Date: OCTOBER 17, 2012) (Doc 2012-21516) | author=Stewart, David D. and Soong Johnston, Stephanie D. | journal=Tax Notes Today | year=2012 | month=October 29 | volume=2012 TNT 209-4 | issue=2012 TNT 209-4}}</ref> Bitcoin was mentioned during the workshop.<ref name="BitCoin Tax issues Oct 2012">{{cite journal | title=2012 TNT 209-4 NEWS ANALYSIS: VIRTUAL CURRENCY: A NEW WORRY FOR TAX ADMINISTRATORS?. (Release Date: OCTOBER 17, 2012) (Doc 2012-21516) | author=Stewart, David D. and Soong Johnston, Stephanie D. | journal=Tax Notes Today | year=2012 | month=October 29 | volume=2012 TNT 209-4 | issue=2012 TNT 209-4}}</ref>

Matthew Elias, founder of the [[Cryptocurrency Legal Advocacy Group]] (CLAG) published "Staying Between the Lines: A Survey of U.S. Income Taxation and its Ramifications on Cryptocurrencies", which discusses "the taxability of cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin."<ref name="BitCoin Tax issues Oct 2012">{{cite journal | title=2012 TNT 209-4 NEWS ANALYSIS: VIRTUAL CURRENCY: A NEW WORRY FOR TAX ADMINISTRATORS?. (Release Date: OCTOBER 17, 2012) (Doc 2012-21516) | author=Stewart, David D. and Soong Johnston, Stephanie D. | journal=Tax Notes Today | year=2012 | month=October 29 | volume=2012 TNT 209-4 | issue=2012 TNT 209-4}}</ref> CLAG "stressed the importance for taxpayers to determine on their own whether taxes are due on a bitcoin-related transaction based on whether one has "experienced a realization event."<ref name="BitCoin Tax issues Oct 2012">{{cite journal | title=2012 TNT 209-4 NEWS ANALYSIS: VIRTUAL CURRENCY: A NEW WORRY FOR TAX ADMINISTRATORS?. (Release Date: OCTOBER 17, 2012) (Doc 2012-21516) | author=Stewart, David D. and Soong Johnston, Stephanie D. | journal=Tax Notes Today | year=2012 | month=October 29 | volume=2012 TNT 209-4 | issue=2012 TNT 209-4}}</ref> Such examples are "when a taxpayer has provided a service in exchange for bitcoins, a realization event has probably occurred, and any gain or loss would likely be calculated using fair market values for the service provided."<ref name="BitCoin Tax issues Oct 2012">{{cite journal | title=2012 TNT 209-4 NEWS ANALYSIS: VIRTUAL CURRENCY: A NEW WORRY FOR TAX ADMINISTRATORS?. (Release Date: OCTOBER 17, 2012) (Doc 2012-21516) | author=Stewart, David D. and Soong Johnston, Stephanie D. | journal=Tax Notes Today | year=2012 | month=October 29 | volume=2012 TNT 209-4 | issue=2012 TNT 209-4}}</ref>

[[Peter Vessenes]], [[Bitcoin Foundation|Bitcoin Foundation's]] executive director, said, since the foundation is trying to pay for everything in bitcoin, including salaries, "How do we W-2 someone for their bitcoins? Do we mark-to-market every time a transfer happens? Payroll companies cringe."<ref name="BitCoin Tax issues Oct 2012">{{cite journal | title=2012 TNT 209-4 NEWS ANALYSIS: VIRTUAL CURRENCY: A NEW WORRY FOR TAX ADMINISTRATORS?. (Release Date: OCTOBER 17, 2012) (Doc 2012-21516) | author=Stewart, David D. and Soong Johnston, Stephanie D. | journal=Tax Notes Today | year=2012 | month=October 29 | volume=2012 TNT 209-4 | issue=2012 TNT 209-4}}</ref> The Bitcoin Foundation hopes "to push for solid guidance about its legal and tax treatment." [[Patrick Murck]], legal counsel for the Bitcoin Foundation, said he would like "to help regulators understand the technology better so they can make better decisions."<ref name="BitCoin Tax issues Oct 2012">{{cite journal | title=2012 TNT 209-4 NEWS ANALYSIS: VIRTUAL CURRENCY: A NEW WORRY FOR TAX ADMINISTRATORS?. (Release Date: OCTOBER 17, 2012) (Doc 2012-21516) | author=Stewart, David D. and Soong Johnston, Stephanie D. | journal=Tax Notes Today | year=2012 | month=October 29 | volume=2012 TNT 209-4 | issue=2012 TNT 209-4}}</ref> Murck said, "Bitcoin has the potential to become much more than a niche currency, but it needs the guidance and understanding of regulators." and "The full potential of bitcoin could be realized through clearer guidelines and a better understanding by financial and tax regulators." and "Part of making that happen is to talk to regulators, the IRS, and tax professionals and helping them understand that bitcoin is not this nefarious thing, it's just software, it's a community, and there's nothing inherently nefarious about either of those things."<ref name="BitCoin Tax issues Oct 2012">{{cite journal | title=2012 TNT 209-4 NEWS ANALYSIS: VIRTUAL CURRENCY: A NEW WORRY FOR TAX ADMINISTRATORS?. (Release Date: OCTOBER 17, 2012) (Doc 2012-21516) | author=Stewart, David D. and Soong Johnston, Stephanie D. | journal=Tax Notes Today | year=2012 | month=October 29 | volume=2012 TNT 209-4 | issue=2012 TNT 209-4}}</ref>

==See Also==
* [[Introduction]]
* [[Getting started]]
* [[Using_Bitcoin|Detailed tutorial]]
* [[FAQ]]

==References==
<references />

[[Category:Digital currencies]]