BitPay Inc, the world's leading payment processor for bitcoin, announces that it has processed over $2 million during the first 25 days in March.
The pace of transactions is accelerating with over 3,600 completed transactions this month. This transaction processing volume through BitPay represents bitcoins being used for the purchase of goods and services around the world.
As a result of BitPay reaching this milestone, the company also announces that it has lowered its processing fees for all merchants to 0.99%, including settlement in any local currency that BitPay supports. This means that a merchant can accept payment over the bitcoin peer-to-peer payment network, and either keep the bitcoins or receive their local currency such as dollars or euros. Settlements to local currencies are made with a guaranteed exchange rate locked at the point of sale for no additional fee.
"We chose to celebrate this milestone by rewarding all merchants, large and small, with an across-the-board fee reduction, instead of offering tiered pricing which rewards only the largest merchants," says Tony Gallippi, co-founder and CEO of BitPay. "We want our merchants to use this fee reduction to offer discounts and incentives to their customers for paying with bitcoin."
A great example of this incentive is BitcoinStore.com which sells over 500,000 consumer electronic devices online. BitcoinStore.com is able to sell items for 1%-5% below its competitors because of the savings they realize by accepting bitcoin instead of accepting credit cards.
BitPay currently has over 4,000 merchants using its platform to accept payments over the peer-to-peer payment network, and BitPay is acquiring new merchants at a rate of 1,000 new merchants per month. Businesses everywhere are starting to understand the value proposition that bitcoin and BitPay can bring to their business.
BitPay also recently announced that they have integrated their payment platform with Amazon's fulfillment services, enabling merchants to combine frictionless international payments with frictionless international shipping in a fully-automated system.
BitPay has completed its move to Atlanta and has opened their headquarters in Atlanta Tech Village, a new startup space in Buckhead, Atlanta's Financial District.