On Transmission #41, Theo Goodman hosted Dominik Weil, the co-founder of Bitcoin Vietnam and the Bitcoin Frankfurt Meetup. According to Dominik, interest in bitcoin and users of Bitcoin Vietnam have been increasing since they started operations in March 2014.
Recently, they launched a new remittance service called Cash2VN which allows users to send money to Vietnam using bitcoin. Cash2VN charges a flat fee of US$2 plus a 1% trade fee.
Dominik mentioned that people often misunderstood the subject of sending money overseas.
At Bitcoin conferences you have people going around saying that Western Union charges 10%. In reality most people pay around 3% and find ways to reduce the fees.
Merchants are slowly seeing the benefits of accepting bitcoin. Vietnam has some of the highest levels of credit card fraud worldwide and merchants like the idea of accepting payment without chargebacks.
The current state of Bitcoin regulations in Vietnam makes it easy for Bitcoin companies to start and operate there.
None of the government agencies see how it fits into their jurisdiction. The state bank says that bitcoin is not a currency so it’s not regulated, the Ministry of Trade says that it’s not a good nor a service, so they simply don’t regulate it.
To learn more on how to buy bitcoin in Vietnam, read our buy bitcoin in Vietnam guide here.
Bobby Ong
Bobby is the co-founder of CoinGecko, a cryptocurrency ranking website that gives a 360 degree overview of cryptocurrencies. Follow the author on Twitter @bobbyong
