A city in North Dakota installed a state-hosted crypto ATM in the hope of boosting payment volumes in cryptocurrencies.
The City of Williston goes crypto
A good way to tell how cryptocurrency adoption is going has been the prevalence of cryptocurrency ATMs, as they provide the most easily understandable way for retail customers to interact with crypto. Crypto ATM adoption hit 10,000 this year, and the City of Williston in North Dakota recently added another one after announcing a “government-hosted cryptocurrency kiosk” at its Williston Basin International Airport. Passenger and non-travelers can now buy and sell up to 40 different cryptocurrencies, including BTC, ETH, Dogecoin, and Shiba Inu.
The City of Williston partnered with Coin Cloud, a crypto service that provided digital currency machines to the city. Coin Cloud prides itself on the fact that its digital currency machines feature up to 40 different assets while regular Bitcoin ATMs are just limited to one.
Hercules Cummings, finance director for the City of Williston, expects the city’s crypto payment volumes to surge due to the campaign. With the government accepting crypto for utility payments and simultaneously providing the infrastructure to interact with cryptocurrencies, Cummings expects his city to become a key player in accelerating crypto adoption. He anticipates the next step to be a crypto ATM in the City Hall if higher demand at the airport works out as planned. The city’s roadmap also features crossing over these payment corridors to licences, permits, and other city-related fees.
Cummings affirmed that the administration did not act as the custodian for crypto funds or manage the crypto transactions, as the ATM operator Coin Cloud would handle that. The city’s goal was rather to “bridge public curiosity to acceptance and portfolio adoption of a growing asset class,” and Cummings stressed that the government should position itself as a key player in this technology initiative.
Crypto adoption becoming more mainstream
This initiative follows the wider trend of cryptocurrencies becoming more widespread in the day-to-day lives of Americans. Just recently, two US mayors announced they would be the first major US politician to accept their salary in Bitcoin.
Crypto adoption is not only limited to the States, though. The Simón Bolívar International Airport in Caracas, Venezuela, is also working on hoisting up a cryptocurrency ATM, just like its North Dakotan counterpart did. The ATM would accept several digital currencies, which would also include its own, oil-pegged Petro. Venezuela, which has been hit by hyperinflation and food shortages, is often seen as the next possible country that would adopt Bitcoin or another cryptocurrency as legal tender, according to the example of El Salvador.
That goes to show that crypto is becoming more widespread by the day and that crypto adoption is not only limited to virtual wallets of blockchain gaming. As more cities start testing the waters with crypto ATMs, local governments may eventually find that the benefits of crypto outweigh the risks and could become a champion for adoption at the local level.