Brisbane Airport (BNE) has partnered with TravelbyBit and many of the retailers located within its terminals to transform the airport into one of the world’s most crypto-friendly spaces, according to a report on the BNE website.
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TravelbyBit is a crypto startup that “design[s] tourist routes and provide[s] selected providers with [its] very own digital currency payment platform.” Travelers using the TravelbyBit service can choose to pay in Bitcoin, Ethereum, Dash, or Steem; travelers must set up and use their own digital wallets.
Certain luxury hotels, restaurants, and entertainment venues across Brisbane have also been adopted into TravelbyBit’s crypto payment network. Caleb Yeoh, CEO of TravelbyBit, said: “Whenever you travel overseas you have to deal with multiple currencies and you never know what exchange rates the banks are charging you.” He went on to say that using crypto in travel is “simple, safe, and there’s no bank fees,”
BNE Official: the Travel Industry has Potential for Crypto Adoption
Although Cryptocurrencies still have a long ways to go before they can be truly integrated into the world’s existing payment systems, it does make quite a bit of sense to make an airport--a place where dozens of different kinds of fiat currencies intersect--into a crypto-compatible space.
Roel Hellemons, General Manager of Strategic Planning and Development for the Brisbane Airport Corporation, explained: “Many people around the world have made money investing in cryptocurrencies and a lot of these people travel internationally, so it makes sense to offer a digital currency experience within our terminals.”
Hellemons went on to explain that this partnership is only the first in an effort to “expand the digital currency option” across the airport space.
Australia is Rather Bullish on Crypto
BNE’s integration of cryptocurrency is another indication of the Australian government’s rather crypto-friendly attitude relative to some of the world’s other industrialized nations.
In late October of 2017, Reserve Bank of Australia’s Payments Policy Department officials Tony Richards and David Emery told the Australian House of Representatives Standing Committee on Tax and Revenue: “The distributed and cross-border nature of digital currencies like Bitcoin means that regulation of the core protocols of these systems is unlikely to be effective.”
The pair went on to say that “digital currencies do not currently appear to raise any pressing regulatory issues.”
