A Taste Of The Future of Currency In Meredith?

PHOTO: Dan Estes of Estes Collectible Investment next to his new Cybercurrency ATM, one of only a few in New Hampshire. Brendan Smith Photo

by Brendan Smith
Weirs Times Editor

Back in 2008, after the housing market crash, an electronic version of money, known as cryptocurrency, came to life.
It was called Bitcoin.
No one knows who created Bitcoin, though theories abound, but it was without a doubt a new phenomena, powered by a massive amount of computing power, that not many outside of those having remarkable computer prowess could grasp.
“Bitcoin was created to move money without people being able to identify you,” said Dan Estes of Estes Collectible Investment in Meredith where the store is only one of a few in New Hampshire to now have a Cryptocurrency ATM.
It has been twelve years since the start of Bitcoin, and what was once considered a fad that would come and go, has now slowly been seeping into the mainstream of the financial world and most likely is here to stay.
“Companies like J.P. Morgan were against it in the beginning, but are now on board,” said Estes.
Despite it not being officially considered legal tender, today there are hundreds of other virtual forms of currency called Altcoins.

If you are like this reporter and a majority of other people in the world, It is hard to really grasp the concept of electronic currency. How does it work? Will it survive? Will it be all we use in the future or will it go the way of the leisure suit?
Dan Estes is on the side that electronic currency will not only survive, but it will thrive.
“I truly believe that it will be the wave of the future, whether it is in our lifetime or not,” says Estes.
Even though Estes himself is not yet taking cryptocurrency at his own store, where he deals with buying and selling gold, silver and jewelry and even antiques, it will most likely only be a matter of time until he does.
“More and more companies are accepting it,” said Estes. “You can buy land, homes, cars, jewelry and more with some companies. So as all that grows, I am strongly considering it.”
An interesting fact about Bitcoins is that, unlike dollars which can be printed at the whim of the government, only 21 million bitcoins will ever be created as they are electronically mined with computers. To date, 18.4 million have been mined.
With all that being said, the Cryptocurrency ATM at Estes’s shop has not gone unused. In fact, there has been a very brisk influx of customers for the machine.

“With this ATM, you can only buy bitcoins, you can’t sell them,” said Estes.
Those who want to buy bitcoins need to set themselves up with an electronic wallet. (Estes recommends using either Coin Base or The Edge for the best security.)
Once you have the wallet then you can go ahead and buy bitcoins and even send them to others.
“Say your wife is overseas and she has an electronic wallet and so do you and you need to send her some currency,” explained Estes. “She would send you the app for her wallet, you show the app to the camera on the ATM, put the cash in the machine and the cryptocurrency equivalent will go immediately into your wife’s wallet.”
If you have been paying attention to cryptocurrency at all, you see that the price of one bitcoin can be pretty hefty. (Different altcoins have different values). As this article is written the cost of one bitcoin was 16,111 dollars, but it has, at times fluctuated wildly up and down.
At first, that might put off the novice bitcoin purchaser who might not want to part with that much cash right away.

“You don’t have to buy an entire bitcoin, you can buy percentages of one,” said Estes. “You can put anywhere from five to a hundred dollars in the machine and buy as much or as little as you want.”
The price of a buying a bitcoin through the Coinbase ATM does include a fee, but it is considered one of the safest systems to date.
If you are interested in getting in on bitcoins, Dan Estes will be more than happy to give you advice on how to get started. Even though the process of how bitcoins and other cryptocurrencies work can be a bit overwhelming, being able to buy them is extremely simple.
Of course, if you’d rather go searching and mining for your own fortune that isn’t a bitcoin, Estes Collectible Investment is also one of the largest brick and mortar stores in Northern New England for metal detectors.
But that’s a story for another day.
Estes Collectible Investment is located at 31B Main Street, Meredith, NH.
The phone number is 603-279-0100. You can also find them on Facebook.