The price of Bitcoin is largely dictated by current events in the media related to it, and that’s one of the peculiar things about the currency which has been driving people to it so strongly. And yet, while recently there have been some rather negative portrayals of Bitcoin in the news, leading to small price decreases, a recent announcement by Microsoft has more than made up for that. The company has revealed that they are now accepting Bitcoin in their online stores, and as a result, the price of the cryptocurrency has jumped by $20.
Bitcoin owners will now have the opportunity to get various products by Microsoft with their hard-earned virtual coins, and this includes Windows, apps from the Windows Phone Store, as well as Xbox digital content. This follows as a result of Microsoft’s integration of BitPay into their services, who have previously worked with PayPal, enabling various digital merchants to work with BitCoin for their services and products.
According to Microsoft, payments made with Bitcoin should be processed immediately, although there could be a delay of a couple of hours in some cases. Additionally, the company stated that the use of Bitcoin in their stores is still limited, but they are apparently looking into ways to integrate the cryptocurrency more strongly.
As a result of the announcement, the price of Bitcoin has expectedly went up. Bitcoin wasn’t actually the only cryptocurrency to benefit from this, although it was the one to see the strongest jump – an extra $20 was added to the current value of Bitcoin, while Litecoin, dogecoin, namecoin and darkcoin managed to rise by about 2-3% each.
It’s not that surprising to see Microsoft adopting Bitcoin, as the company’s founder has recently revealed that he’s actually strongly in support of the cryptocurrency. According to Bill Gates, the concept has a huge potential and should be utilized fully. He acknowledged the convenience of Bitcoin, adding that it can make things significantly simpler for larger transactions.
With Microsoft setting an example, it’s expected that other large companies will sooner or later become more relaxed about accepting Bitcoin as well. There has been speculation about certain companies in the tech industry, particularly in the games field, although nothing has been confirmed by any of them yet. It would not only be interesting to see this happening, but it would also be peculiar to see how it will affect the price of Bitcoin in the long run. The current jump is expected to even out sooner or later, but if more companies start to accept the currency, it could lead to major changes in the market, as well as in public perception about cryptocurrency.