Over the past six or seven years, cryptocurrency and blockchain technology, in general, has been taking off. Especially during the pandemic when people were stuck at home with a lot of disposable income they could barely use, interest in the crypto space overall grew rapidly.
We have seen many exchanges pop up making it easy to purchase your first cryptocurrency at the click of a button. Accessibility has expanded and although this is still a very new industry, interest in it is only going to grow. But this begs the question, how much use do we have for cryptocurrencies in our day-to-day lives? They have not become widespread enough to replace fiat currencies so what actual use do they have? Below we take a look at some of its day-to-day uses.
1) Retail purchases
There are many retailers (mainly online, however) that are now accepting payment in a variety of cryptocurrencies. Now, it does involve converting it using an exchange rate with a fiat currency, but the fact that you can purchase a product using Bitcoin, Ethereum or one of the many other currencies is a huge step towards its implementation into our daily lives.
Walking into a supermarket even with an empty pocket or bank accounts and still being able to purchase items, or going to a hotel and transferring them Bitcoin as payment using their room booking system is no longer a fantasy, but is the reality.
2) Investing
The beauty about the crypto space at the moment is that since we are still in the very early stages, huge growth comes quickly. A relatively small investment in an obscure coin that suddenly becomes hyped overnight has created many millionaires in the blink of an eye. Although risky, many people are drawn to cryptocurrencies thanks to the returns, especially when you look at the bank’s current interest rates at below 1%.
Some of the biggest exchanges like Binance, Coinbase and FTX offer safe products for the average consumer, reducing (but not eliminating) the risk associated with investing in crypto, but with the potential for fast rewards that would take a business listed in a stock exchange years to match.
3) Gaming
There is an abundance of play-to-earn games on the market now and all of them require you to own some of their native tokens to play the game. Take for example Axie Infinity, you need to purchase the Axie (Pokémon style characters) using Ethereum, breed characters using their native AXS coin, and earn the prize money, SLP, all of which can be converted back to fiat currencies. In developing countries such as the Philippines and Venezuela, such games are providing an income to people who are unemployed or unable to work.
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