So you may be wondering, how is it that Japan makes up of more than 50% of volume for BTC, but is rarely in the news?
Cryptocompare as of 11/15/2017
By what I've seen on reddit or steemit, these may be familiar.
- Japan becomes leader in trade volume in September when China left the market. Business Insider
- Japan's big retailers are accepting bitcoin. Bitcoin.com
- GMO coming out with new 7nm asic chips sometime next year. GMO
But what else have you heard? To me, nothing. I currently live in Japan and there is a serious lack of excitement in my life. I'm working from 8am to 9:30pm and with every slaving minute, it is crushing my motivation to get out of bed every morning. Bitcoin and the cryptocurrency space gives me that spark! Jumping onto reddit, steemit, and youtube to read and watch the crypto news brings me so much joy. So THANK YOU.
Back to my point,
There is a large disconnect in what is actually going on in Japan verses what is portrayed in the news. Sure, it is a legal currency under Japan's new laws, but I can vouch that it is rarely used in everyday life. None of my coworkers know much about it. Whenever I ask anyone what they know about bitcoin, they usually respond either,
How bitcoin was blasted all over the news with the Mt. Gox crisis
or
The murder that occurred over bitcoin recently. Here
Saddening news that many Japanese people were talking about...
The Japanese people are definitely scared and once you scare a Japanese, you've lost a potential user.
After a little bit of investigation, (questioning the Japanese people and scouring many Japanese blogs)
I've came up with a couple things that you may not have heard.
Retailers
I did a little searching and went to the biggest retailer currently accepting bitcoin, BIC Camera. This is one of the biggest retailers in Japan with over 40 stores all across Japan. Based on the news that bitcoin is going to be used in various places I wanted to see how many people have actually used bitcoin as payment.
I went last month and I asked at least 6 different cashiers. All with the answer zero. Interesting.. not much traffic. They even said none of their coworkers has accepted a payment yet. Not quite, "widespread in Japan" yet.
Cloud Mining
It's going to be huge in Japan. Billions of yen is pouring into research for even smaller chips, 5nm, 3.5nm for development in the future. Many Japanese bloggers have been writing about the excitement of the Japanese crypto space to have finally squeezed into the mining competition. I can almost guarantee that the Japanese will fully trust their companies that reside in Japan, and will happily pour their money into them. If you did not know, Japan is huge on renewable energy, and they plan on utilizing and incorporating it into their business model. Here's a quote from GMO,
"In terms of electricity supply, we set up a "next generation mining center" in Scandinavian countries with plentiful renewable energy and procure clean and inexpensive electric power, which makes it possible to operate facilities with reduced costs." (In English)
Another Japanese company DMM, announced that they have launched a "Cryptocurrency Division", stating that,
"DMM will operate one of the 10 largest mining farms in the world before the end of 2018."
That is a huge statement coming from the tech giant.
Really exciting stuff! These companies are huge in Japan and it's great to see all the money being invested into crypto.
Overall, I want to keep looking into the various websites and blogs where the Japanese people gather. I am a Japanese American and can read and write fluently in Japanese. I've always wanted to express my opinions and possibly bridge the language gap between Japan and the rest of the world. I've always wanted to contribute somehow and hopefully I can be of help.
This is my first article ever so please forgive the mistakes or lack of structure. I also want to get better at writing these types of things so if you could also send some feedback or criticism that would be wonderful. Also please ask any questions as well!