For some, it still seems impossible, but cryptocurrency is already spendable even in Italy. For a few years in Italy already, there have been some changes to the tourism reality that have looked to the future, expanding the payment methods accepted, intriguing visitors by the potential of virtual currencies. Today, paying your hotel bill with cryptocurrency is also possible in Sardinia, right here at B&B Sa Pardina in Orroli, in the province of Cagliari.
WHAT CRYPTOCURRENCIES ARE AND HOW THEY WORK
It’s been more than 10 years since the first virtual currency, Bitcoin, hit the world market. It showed that there can be a new way to buy goods and get involved in the market.
Cryptocurrencies are independent virtual currencies, meaning that they are free from government and state control. Totally decentralized, they are based on the principle of cryptography. To explain it simply, it is a series of crypto codes that have an economic value. This is precisely why today you can, for example, pay a hotel bill in Bitcoin even in Italy!
The cryptocurrency moves between virtual wallets within a market between peers (peer to peer).
Currently, these are the three most famous and important cryptocurrencies in the world:
- Bitcoin. As we have said, it is the first cryptocurrency, and it still today covers the collective imagination of the idea of cryptocurrency par excellence;
- Ethereum. Bitcoin’s main rival;
- Ripple. A new cryptocurrency in the market that is gaining more and more importance.
CRYPTOCURRENCY AND TOURISM: IN WHICH DIRECTION IS THE MARKET GOING?
The tourism sector was not the first to realize the potential of cryptocurrency. However, the market is quickly changing. In addition to the big chains and the world’s leading luxury hotels, independent, traditional (but always forward-looking and innovative) establishment such as the B&B Sa Pardina in Orroli have also opened up to this world
Crypto-tourism is mainly linked to the Blockchain, and it involves various aspects related to important issues such as security, controlled and protected passage of information, especially in relation to the User Experience and online booking.
But it is not only this. Today, cryptocurrency is also used to book hotels or airline flights. Among the main platforms on the market that accept Bitcoin are:
- Destinia: leading website for booking flights online;
- Travala.com and travelbyBit: : both platforms allow the user to book a vacation in hotels that accept cryptocurrencies and bitcoins.