The chief executive of online retailer Overstock.com Inc has claimed that the company’s Bitcoin sales are expected to add 4 cents per share to its earnings for the year.
Having begun accepting Bitcoin payments on its website in January this year, sales using the virtual currency has exceed $2 million, or around one-quarter of 1 per cent of total sales so far.
Chief executive Patrick Byrne says he expects that Bitcoin sales will hit $6-$8 million by the end of 2014, most coming from new customers.
So far, total Bitcoin sales have totalled $15,000 per day, or $300,0000 per month. By the end of the year, Byrne expects Overstock to make $1 million of Bitcoin sales per month.
Overstock uses Coinbase as a payment processor and has been a forerunner in the Bitcoin revolution, being the first company with at least $1 billion in sales to accept Bitcoin payments. The company expects $1.5 billion in sales this year.
More than 60,000 merchants worldwide accept Bitcoin, according to data from CoinDesk, a provider of Bitcoin data.
Byrne commented: “I think the world expects us to make 75-80 cents per share this year. And 4 cents of that would be attributable to Bitcoin.”
He continued: “When technology comes along like crypto-currency, which can replace at a far lower cost … I am all for supporting it. We’re in Bitcoin for the long haul, I intend to make it permanent. Cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin are going to be around for as long as the law of mathematics works.”
Overstock plans to start accepting Bitcoin payments from international customers by mid-September this year. At the same time, it will also allocate 4 per cent of Bitcoin sales to promote the currency.
Whitepapers
Related reading
5 ways blockchain can change the cross-border payments landscape
Cross-border payments is a changing sector of the industry, driven by customers demanding little to no friction and encountering multiple steps, intermediaries ... read more
The SME technology revolution | video
The UK is home to 5.4m micro SMEs that have fewer than nine employees, according to the House of Commons library. They ... read more
JP Morgan blockchain network showcases banks’ DLT progress
JP Morgan’s expansion of its blockchain-based interbank payments project signals that major banks are stealing a march on disruptors and startups by ... read more
Security a priority for EU’s INATBA blockchain taskforce
The European Commission’s new blockchain initiative, the International Association for Trusted Blockchain Applications (INATBA), should focus on quashing extant security concerns around ... read more
