WageCan – This international company offer an interesting combination of a Bitcoin savings account, which offers daily interest on your balance, and a debit card accepted in more than 210 countries and at more than 30 million ATM machines around the world. You pay a $20 fee to order your card, but then there are no inactivity fees and no fees for purchases, although you do pay $2.50 for ATM withdrawals. It carries a 1% fee for ATM withdrawals, 1.5% on currency conversions when you top-up, and if you don’t use your card enough there is a small monthly inactivity fee of $2. BIT-X – Although the Bit-X offering is technically a pre-paid card like any of the others listed above, it doesn’t feel like one to use. The number of retailers accepting BTC directly is growing every day, and there are now literally thousands of places offering some great deals to Bitcoin buyers. E-Coin – One of the most interesting aspects of E-Coin’s offering is that you can choose between a physical or virtual card. Initially the USD denominated card will only draw coins from your BTC balance, but the option to use a range of altcoins including NuBits, BitUSD, NXT and LTC is in the planning.
The virtual option allows you to make orders anywhere over the internet that accepts debit cards, but you don’t get a physical card to use in stores or to withdraw cash from an ATM as you do if you go for the ‘physical’ option. There are fees for ATM withdrawals and payments, as well as for card activation and delivery. There is no charge for topping up your card, or for making purchases online or offline, but there is a fee for ATM withdrawals and other fees may apply depending on your location and how you use it. CCEDK’s order books make use of the Bitshares decentralized exchange platform, to conduct exchanges in a transparent and secure manner. Using the ANXBTC exchange platform you can buy and sell coins instantly for a range of major international currencies including USD, EUR, HKD, AUD, CAD, JPY, SGD, GBP and NZD. You can choose between three currencies: USD, GBP or EUR.
It is denominated in USD, and is topped up from the popular OKPay e-wallet, which can be used to store a wide range of digital and fiat currencies, including Dogecoin and Litecoin as well as BTC. You can get cards denominated in EUR or USD, and these cards can be shipped worldwide. This is possible thanks to a unique level of co-operation between the Bit-X exchange and their banking partner, and it means that you can leave your balance in Bitcoin whilst still being able to spend your coins anywhere that credit cards are accepted. Coinomat – Popular instant exchange service Coinomat now has its own card. CCEDK – This European exchange provider has joined forces with Bit-X to offer their own ‘Nanocard’. It describes itself as “the first true crypto debit card”, and for good reason: whereas all of the other options require you to convert a portion of your balance from digital currency to fiat in advance, in order to top up your card ready for use, Bit-X will automatically sell the exact amount of Bitcoin required for each purchase at the current market rate when you are actually making the purchase.
Fees are comparable to Bit-X. There is a fee to buy the card, which is higher if you want an actual piece of plastic, but after that the fees are very reasonable – a minimal monthly maintenance fee and no fee on purchases. There is a small fee for point of sale purchases and cash withdrawals, as well as a fee to have a new card issued. If you walk down the high street and step into your favourites stores you will find that very few of them are equipped to take digital currency payments, and it is often difficult to buy your groceries or other make other common purchases using Bitcoin. You can even start using the card without verifying your identity, although dong so will allow you to take advantage of higher spending limits. You get a public BTC address for each card too, so you can even give out this address and receive digital currency payments directly to your card balance. There is now a wide range of different services available which help you to spend Bitcoin pretty much anywhere, even places who’ve never heard of cryptocurrency. After a long wait, their card is now available to order.
