Billions in remittances are annually sent from folks in the USSA to their friends and families elsewhere. For decades, firms like Western Union and MoneyGram took a hefty fee for this service. But today, with the emergence of peer-to-peer digital currencies like Dash, money transfers can be done more speedily and with a much lower fee. This latter route can now be pursued by residents of San Antonio, Texas thanks to the existence of a Dash-enabled General Bytes Machine at LOL Liquors.
This video features Danny Sessom of http://DashCares.com and Paras Arora of LOL Liquors.
LOL Liquors has two locations in greater San Antonio and offers one hour delivery within Bexar County (210-714-0036).
- 12107 Toepperwein Rd., Ste. 6, Live Oak, Texas 78233
- 7432 W Military Dr, San Antonio, TX 78227
LINKS
- Bitso exchange in Mexico https://bitso.com/?l=en
- Wirex pre-paid debit card https://wirexapp.com
- What Is Dash? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0oNO3mbBE8
- General Bytes is the World’s Largest Dash-Supporting ATM Network https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pFAT1f3krYc
- Remittance Flows Worldwide in 2015 http://www.pewglobal.org/interactives/remittance-map/
- Trump threatens remittance blackmail to fund border wall with Mexico https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/us-elections-2016/Trump-threatens-remittance-blackmail-to-fund-border-wall-with-Mexico/articleshow/53964815.cms
TRANSCRIPT
[DANNY SESSOM] What I feel is kind of important about what we’re doing is trying to reach the immigrant community who are, of course, the unbanked and that’s kind of what cryptocurrency’s all about. And we want to teach them how to use cryptocurrency to cheaply send money home to Mexico or South America, Central America, wherever.
[REMITTANCE FLOWS WORLDWIDE ONLINE ARTICLE] $134 billion in remittances was sent from the U.S. to other countries in 2015. About 1/6 of that was sent to people in Mexico.
[DANNY SESSOM] You know, one of the things that Trump was talking about as far as building the wall is this is the way that we’re going to pay for it, this is how we’re going to force Mexico to pay for it is, you know, raising the fees on remittance services and tariffs and stuff going across the border. Well hey, why would anybody want to contribute to something that’s such an insult to them? So we’re delivering the Dash ATM to LOL Liquors.
[WHAT IS DASH? VIDEO EXCERPT] Dash is digital cash. Money exchanged on a highly secure, open source, peer to peer network.
[PARAS ARORA] It’s such an honor to have it here at the store. I have a ATM at my second location but that’s not a Dash ATM it’s just a Bitcoin ATM so this is an upgrade to me. Number one it increases foot traffic. Bitcoin ATMs are not —Bitcoin and Dash ATMs I should say, are not as common still, so it’s a destination shop. You know, people are going to drive from all over the place and this machine should pull traffic from as far as 100 miles, even 150 miles. The San Antonio community is very interesting, very diverse number one, I should say. Predominantly it’s a hispanic community and we really got affected you know — people had friends and family you know — of course the natural disaster that happened in Mexico. So of course they all want to help and, let’s say it’s their hard-earned money and San Antonio is really also very much of a blue collar community so let’s say you only have $60 that you want to send your family and you’re paying $18, $20 out of that $60 to Western Union or MoneyGram — that really eats 20-30% off that cost, which is, you know, completely not right. You know, these people are trying to help their families and friends and they really can’t do it.
[WHAT IS DASH? VIDEO EXCERPT] With Dash, fees are extremely low or completely nonexistent.
[DANNY SESSOM] I’ve been a contractor for roofing for 30 years now. Well, the guys that worked for me and everything I would take them down to send their money through Western Union and they were always getting raked over the coals so when I did get into Bitcoin I realized that hey, this is something that I need to be teaching these guys about. There is going to be a 5% fee if they’re using the ATMs, which would be lower than the normal ATM fees. I think people are paying 10%, 15% or more to use the crypto ATMs with Bitcoin or whatever. So, we’ll have a coupon code for these people to use it and get away with 5%.What we’re hoping for is, you know, Bitso is going to be accepting Dash so they’ll have an exchange that they can work with on that side but I think what would be more effective for them is actually the Wirex card because the fees will be lower. Basically you would just send your cryptocurrency and since they added Dash recently, you’d be able to send your Dash there as well and it would just load onto your pre-paid debit card and you’d spend it as dollars wherever you go. It was available in Mexico and I spoke with some of the guys from Wirex recently and they’ve been in Mexico working on that, so they’re working right now on bringing it back online in Mexico.
[PARAS ARORA] You want to change the world — you don’t change the world by selecting the right politician, you don’t change the world by voting for X person or Y person, you change the world with modern technology. You change the world by coding. That’s crypto for you. This is how we can change the world.
[WHAT IS DASH? VIDEO EXCERPT] Dash.org
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