Bitcoin Cash has taken a big step towards putting the hashing war dispute behind it by teaming up with CoinText, a cryptocurrency wallet that allows users to send digital assets to each other via text message. This means that Bitcoin Cash can now be sent to anyone with a mobile phone capable of handling SMS text messages, which is essentially any phone produced in the last twenty years. In adding Bitcoin Cash to their platform, CoinText also added two new countries to their roster, Ukraine and Italy, taking the tally to 35 countries. This huge development means users are able to send Bitcoin Cash to each other without requiring an internet connection, ensuring that those without smartphones are not left behind in the cryptocurrency revolution.
Here’s a basic feature phone in #Ukraine using #BitcoinCash like a boss!
…without Internet….. pic.twitter.com/MqYKeTXeCC
— CoinText (@CoinText) December 6, 2018
Financial Lifeline
Cryptocurrency has seen its biggest real-world adoption in areas where the traditional financial system has broken down, going all the way back to Cyprus in 2013 and carrying on right up to its present day use in countries like Venezuela. Ukraine has declared martial law in ten regions due to escalation of its tensions with Russia, with warnings that this could lead to money leaving the banking system and the economy, with potentially devastating consequences for citizens. The timing of CoinText’s addition of Ukraine to its platform could therefore be particularly well timed and might serve to act an alternative form of currency if the worst comes to pass.
Banking the Unbanked
One of the major social problems blockchain and cryptocurrency could reduce if not eliminate is that of the ‘unbanked’, those who do not have a bank account or access to a financial institution via a mobile phone or any other device. In their Global Findex Database 2017 , the World Bank estimated that 2 billion people fit this status while the UN estimates that 1 million people worldwide do not have access to a mobile phone of some description. This leaves around 1 billion people with a mobile phone but no bank account who could therefore utilize an SMS-based cryptocurrency exchange service to allow them to transact with one another. Saying and doing are of course very different propositions, but services such as CoinText could certainly go some way to achieving that, and could also help in legitimizing Bitcoin Cash as we try and forget how it came into being.
