“I first heard about it at our annual potluck. I
“I first heard about it at our annual potluck. I went home that night, did my research, and bought my first bitcoin.”
This is Mr Amatsu Soyonobu, an ex Apple executive who has since gone on to do great things with the cryptocurrency. Back when Bitcoin was still a relatively lesser known phenomena, Soyonobu had gone home one night from his job as a software manager at Apple in Cupertino, California in 2012, to buy his first bitcoin off the internet.
(Read: Who owns the most bitcoins in the world?)
The price of the currency has skyrocketed since then and the value of the currency has risen astronomically. He left his job at Apple in 2017 and set up WCX, with the help of co-worker Tagawa Hayashida. WCX is a service which lets regular people access global markets using bitcoin.
Based out of Switzerland, WCX allows users to go long or short on markets including international currencies like the Euro, stocks like AAPL, commodities like Oil, cryptos, and more without needing fiat, just with the use of Bitcoin as a collateral. Mr. Soyonobu says,
“Our goal is to allow anyone to access and trade the financial markets. Bitcoin makes that possible.”
The markets ups and downs can actually help clients in this case since all profits and losses calculated and paid in bitcoin. The brokerage is completely dependent on BTC as a virtual currency.
Launched back in October, the service has since then amassed over 130,000 traders, and has recently surpassed $1 billion in traded volume. The fact that BTC is the only currency used by WCX, reduces the cost of transaction drastically. This is what sets it apart from traditional brokers This essentially translates to lower fees for traders. Mr. Soyonobu further states,
“To us, bitcoin is a competitive advantage. We don’t have to deal with banks, fiat, or outdated payment processors. No slow money. Bitcoin means almost instant deposits and withdrawals, low trading costs, and worldwide market access. It makes everything so much faster and easier for our users.”
(Lear more about: Transaction Fees)
Majority of the funds are stored in offline wallet vaults, which it makes it more secure and insures the funds. The company complies with Swiss and international KYC/AML laws, which entails that information aboout customers are already stored by them before they begin trading. Mr. Soyonobu added,
“We don’t touch dollars, euros, or banks because we think these things belong to the past. The efficiencies gained by using bitcoin are incredible, and I think we’re just getting started.”