Bitcoin is growing in popularity among hobbyists and IT geeks who trade the currency in SA‚ with one local expert estimating 100‚000 people trade the crypto currency. The internet currency is traded on two exchanges in SA: Luno and Ice3X. Bitcoin’s value has increased a thousand fold since 2011‚ so that a person who bought $1‚000 of bitcoin then, would now be a dollar millionaire. Ice3X bitcoin exchange founder Gareth Grobler says the bitcoin market in SA is still "tiny" compared with Asia but guesses about 100‚000 people could be trading it. Tech analyst Simon Dingle says: "Luno and other local exchanges are seeing an influx of new users given the recent rise in the price of bitcoin. It is certainly becoming more popular all over the world and SA is no exception." Luno marketing officer Werner van Rooyen says bitcoin is becoming more mainstream in SA. "We see it in many ways‚ not just from our internal metrics — including new customers‚ active users‚ application downloads‚ trading ...
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