Gambling with Cryptocurrencies - the Future of the Online Casino Industry

One of the important factors that gamblers take a look at when it comes to playing online casino games, is how they could make a deposit to their gaming accounts. Thankfully, online casinos offer plenty of options when it comes to payment methods and players can easily select the best option for them.

Over the last few years, there has been a growth in the use of cryptocurrencies for online transactions. The online casinos seem to embrace this warmly as there are now plenty of operators that would process payments made with cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin, and Ripple or XRP.

It doesn’t matter if you’ll be playing a table game with an online casino based in the UK or slot games in India. Transacting with cryptocurrencies has made cashing in to their gambling accounts easier for online players all over the world.

A Short Look at the History of Cryptocurrencies

Cryptocurrencies have been around since 2009. Bitcoin is the first-ever cryptocurrency that was made available to the public. It was in 2010 when the first online purchase with Bitcoin was made. Since then, Bitcoin grew and a few years later, more cryptocurrencies popped up online like Litecoin and Ethereum. Still, Bitcoin is on the top and it is also known as the father of cryptocurrencies.

Crypto-gambling mainly started around 2013 but not a lot of online casinos adapted this right away. It was really in 2017 when there was a boom in the use of cryptocurrencies. This is because it was in that year when the value of Bitcoin reached around 20,000 US dollars. It became quite the talk of the internet and many businesses started to adapt its use.

Since then, more online casinos would accept it as a payment option. There are even online casinos that are dedicated to cryptocurrency users, specifically named crypto casinos. These are the targeted casinos of crypto users that never really gambled before.

More about Bitcoin Gambling

Bitcoin casinos are known to be more generous when it comes to the promos and bonuses that they offer to their players. Such casinos are keener to offer better bonuses because it is generally cheaper to run an online casino that only accepts Bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies.

For players, the use of cryptocurrencies on gambling transactions relieves them from payment headaches. Since cryptos are decentralized, it’s typically faster to transact with this online. Many banks are very strict when it comes to gambling transactions especially if the casino is based outside the country.

For that, a transaction could take a few business days to clear and not all players have the patience for it. They turn to cryptocurrencies to avoid such problems. Overall, it’s also a safer option because they no longer need to disclose their banking info to casinos if they will use cryptocurrencies.

Bitcoin Legality

Now, you may wonder if crypto-gambling is legal. The answer to that really depends on where you are, but generally, it is in the grey area. In the United States, there are no laws that prohibit or allow its use. So basically, you can’t get in trouble with crypto-gambling transactions, especially if these are made with off-shore based online casinos.

Japan is known to regulate the cryptocurrencies. The country has strict rules, however, it is less restrictive when it comes to gambling, and this includes gambling with cryptos. Despite the fact that the country is regulating the local use of cryptocurrencies, crypto-gambling is still not as popular in the country.

It may sound odd that this is the case for Japan but it is possibly because of what happened to Mt. Gox a few years ago. In 2014, this Japanese-based crypto exchange platform went bankrupt and experienced the first-ever and biggest hacking problem in the crypto world.

Currently, crypto-gambling is getting more attention as more people start to use crypto-wallets. There are over 36 million crypto wallets that are created as of Q1 of last year and while there is still no estimate as to how many there are of those right now, it is likely that this already grew.

Bitcoin is Still Alive

The growth of crypto-users continues despite the fact that it’s been a while since a Bitcoin is valued at anywhere over 10,000 US dollars. Currently, a Bitcoin is valued at around 6,600 US dollars and it’s still not bad. Bitcoin is also seen as a digital asset that is unstable, but people are still using it.

Experts still see that cryptos are doing well even after it has peaked in 2017. It is still possible that it would peak once again in the next few months or even weeks. It’s really hard to predict but people are still keen to invest in it.