Steam no longer allows payment with bitcoin

Valve has announced that its video game platform Steam no longer accepts Bitcoin as a payment method. The company attributes its decision to the "high fees and high volatility" of the cryptocurrency in question.

Steam eliminates Bitcoin as a payment option

It has been in a blog post where Valve has explained that bitcoin transaction fees have risen to nearly $ 20 per transaction last week, a sharp rise that contrasts with the $ 0.20 being paid when Bicoin payment was enabled. ” These increases in fees should be borne by players making purchases on Steam, so the total cost to consumers could be even higher if the value of transaction fees continues to rise.

Even in the event that the value of bitcoin goes up while the user completes the transaction and Steam has to refund the difference to the user, the transaction fee must be paid again by the user for the refund, which irreparably translates into an increase in the cost of the purchase for the user. To all this can be added the fact that the value of Bitcoin changes again so that it would enter again in a process of refunding the difference and paying the transaction fee again.

Steam says it might reconsider this decision to remove Bitcoin as a payment option in the future if the currency finds more stability, but for now it's only working with customers who are still dealing with underpayments or transaction fees. Last week bitcoin's value soared above $ 11, 000, representing a 933 percent increase from January this year.

Other governments in China, South Korea, Russia, and in other parts of the world have observed the cryptocurrency more severely and have implemented regulations or outright bans.

Theverge font