Sweden, the Scandinavian country famous for ABBA, Bjorn Borg, and Volvo, is leading the way in becoming the world's first cashless country, and the technology behind Bitcoin and the cryptocurrency it spawned will help that process. We are promoting.
Two years ago, in October 2015, Niklas Arvidsson, a researcher in industrial economics and management at KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, helped write a study predicting that the country would become the first to adopt a cashless society. I did. “Cash remains an important means of payment in many national markets, but this is no longer the case here in Sweden,” he said.
Progressive Swedes are moving towards achieving their noble goals, and other Scandinavian countries are following suit. Consider that 56.3 percent of the country's 1,600 bank branches (900 out of 1,600 branches) reportedly no longer hold cash or accept cash deposits. Furthermore, the circulation of the country's traditional currency, the Swedish krona, has been declining for some time. In 2009 it was SEK 106 billion, but last year it was only SEK 60 billion. Why is this happening?
According to data obtained from Visa, Swedes use bank cards three times more often than the average European. Additionally, according to a Riksbank report published in December 2016, 85 percent of the population has access to cash, compared to 97 percent who have access to cards.
Living in a society where you don't have to use cash has many benefits, especially when it comes to personal safety. People are less likely to be robbed, and thieves are less able to sell stolen goods as easily.
Another important factor is the growing popularity of Swish, an app owned by six Swedish banks: Danske Bank, Handelsbanken, Länsförsäkringar, Nordea, SEB and Swedbank. This allows anyone with a smartphone to transfer money from one bank account to another in real time. All you need is the sender's and recipient's phone numbers.
Swish was launched in 2012 and had 3.6 million users by the end of 2015. This is more than a third of Sweden's population of 9.9 million people. Approximately $515 million was also transferred using the app that year. Since then, those eye-popping numbers have increased significantly, and now even churches have begun publishing their phone numbers at the end of each service to make it easier for parishioners to top up their coffers.
The trend has forced Sweden's central bank to consider introducing a digital form of state-backed currency, with the technology behind Bitcoin, the pioneering cryptocurrency launched eight years ago, a likely option. It is being promoted as
The main concern about going cashless in Sweden is that it could exclude the “unbanked” – people who don't have a bank account or don't own a smartphone. However, Bitcoin has the ability to solve these problems through technology. Users do not need a bank account and can spend money virtually anonymously.
You can buy Bitcoin and other major cryptocurrencies (Ethereum, Ripple, Dash, Litecoin, Ethereum Classic) in an easy way, for example directly from the investment platform eToro. With 6 million members in 140 countries, the company's motto is “Cryptocurrency doesn't have to be crypto.” Trading with eToro is attractive because of its fast online verification process, worldwide offices (including the UK), and the ability for members to match the strategies of top-performing traders using the CopyTrader tool.
Many in the FinTech space believe that blockchain, the distributed ledger that is the backbone of cryptocurrencies, is a truly transformative innovation. Sweden and other countries are already considering how it could be used in public services. And sooner or later, it could support the world's first cashless society.
