I’ve you’ve had visions of paying for that PSL or unicorn frappuccino using bitcoin instead of your Starbucks card or cash, better put down your cuppa.
Starbucks Chairman Howard Schultz thinks buyers will likely buy into digital currencies years from now, but he doesn’t think bitcoin is the one to take it to the finish line.
In fact, the ‘Bucks boss went so far as to denigrate bitcoin as a legitimate currency.
“And the reason I mentioned this is not because I’m talking about bitcoin because I don’t believe that bitcoin is going to be a currency today or in the future,” he said in an earnings call this week, which was reported on by outlets across the Internet. “I’m talking about the new technology of blockchain and the possibility of what could happen not in the near terms, but in a few years from now.”
Bitcoin is the most notable digital cryptocurrency on the planet. Its meteoric spike in value to almost $19,000 per unit in January is testament to the growing power of digital money in our society. Although bitcoin is the best-known of its ilk, others like litecoin and ethereum challenge bitcoin on which — if any — will succeed in becoming the future of money, a future that grows increasingly dependent on advanced computer software, called the blockchain.
Schultz told Bloomberg that Starbucks is open to digital currency, stressing trust as a major factor when it does sign one on down the line.
“As we think about the future of our company and the future of consumer behavior,” Shultz said in the call, “I personally believe that there is going to be one or a few legitimate, trusted digital currencies off of the blockchain technology.”
A trusted brand like Starbucks accepting cryptocurrency as payment will signal that this brand of digital money is legitimate enough for the mainstream.
Via Bloomberg, Business Insider
Read: Bitcoin, Ethereum or Litecoin: Which is best for you?
Read: Buying and selling bitcoin.
