The number of vendors and businesses accepting payments through Bitcoin spiked by a whopping 174 percent last year. The most expensive cryptocurrency in existence, Bitcoin went through a notable slump in 2023 after several market shaking incidents like the collapse of FTX and Terra left investors high and dry. For most of the year, Bitcoin was trading around the mark of $30,000 (roughly Rs. 24.9 lakh) before finally shooting up over $40,000 (roughly Rs. 33.2 lakh) at the end of 2023.
Bitcoin-accepting restaurants, bars, shops, and services reached the figure of 6,126 by the end of last year, showed data from tracker BTC Map. To put the spike in perspective, BTC Map also showed that the number of businesses that were accepting payments via BTC at the start of 2023 stood at just 2,207 merchants.
BTC Map identifies regions where BTC is being used for daily transaction purposes through OpenStreetMap where people and merchants can tag these pro-crypto vendors and merchants. BTC Maps showing a rise in the number of pro-BTC merchants also indicates that more people are actively tagging spots where crypto payments are being accepted.
The regions of Central and South America alongside those in the US and Europe showed larger clusters of BTC-accepting businesses. Over 1,000 BTC-accepting businesses were tagged in Italy and 380 were marked in South Africa.
In India, data by the BTC Maps managed to identify BTC-accepting vendors in Surat, Mumbai, Gaya, Delhi, and Chennai. There were no tags identified in China and Russia.
With regulatory challenges starting to sort out gradually around the world, more brands could also open crypto payments in the times to come.
One of the biggest brands that started accepting payments in BTC was Italian luxury carmaker Ferrari. In October 2023, Ferrari decided to accept payments in the form of Bitcoin, Ether, and USD Coin in the US.
Fashion label Ralph Lauren, McDonald’s, and Gucci are among other brands that have opened crypto payments in select regions.
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