Australian newsagents may soon be without two of their major money-spinners – the daily print editions of Fairfax newspapers including the Melbourne Age and the Sydney Morning Herald, which are being discontinued – but they may have a possibly more lucrative new line of business: selling bitcoins.Sydney fintech systems business Blueshyft and bitcoin
exchange Bitcoin.com.au have launched a plan that they hope will see newsagents
flogging bitcoins to their customers.
If the scheme takes off, it would be the first time Australians have been able
to buy the digital currency over the counter for cash.
Blueshyft is said to be owned by a nephew of Rupert Murdoch, Matt
Handbury. Bitcoin.com.au is part of Global Internet Ventures, a company
organised by Internet entrepreneur Domenic Carosa, onetime promoter of the Destra
Web entertainment and hosting site.
The partners say they expect about 15 million transactions in the first
year with the average transaction size of about $150 to $200, which is a tad
more than the cost of an SMH or Age, or even an Oz Lotto flutter.
Newsagents who sign up for the venture will be issued with an iPad and an app
that connects to bitcoin services, they say. And presumably be paid in bitcoins.
