BTC Casinos Canada – How to Buy, Trade and Play Casino Games with Bitcoin
Unless you’ve been backpacking through the Yukon for the last decade, you’ve surely heard of Bitcoin [BTC]. Introduced back in 2009, Bitcoin is the oldest and most valuable of all “crypto” currencies. It is the second most expensive publicly traded commodity on any market, surpassed only by Berkshire Hathaway [BRK.A], which has been trading at over US$400k since mid-April 2021. BTC has been trading above $30k in the same time period, peaking at more than US$64k on April 13.
Like its ever-fluctuating rise in value, Canada’s interest in Bitcoin continues to grow. In the last decade, its mysterious shroud has been lifted. It’s no longer some metaphysical enigma, but a digitization of established wealth. Anyone in Canada can buy it, sell it, trade it, barter with it, and yes, even gamble online with Bitcoin.
In the following text, you’ll learn everything you need to know about Bitcoin. We’ll start with a brief history to better explain what it is, and how it was established. Then we’ll delve into the many ways you can use Bitcoin in today’s evolving markets.
History of Bitcoin: The Making of the First Crypto Currency
It all started back in 2008 with the registration of the domain name, bitcoin.org, on August 18. Then, on October 31, a curious link was posted on a cryptography mailing list. That link led to a white paper titled, Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System, authored by Satoshi Nakamoto. The abstract of that paper explains:
“A purely peer-to-peer version of electronic cash would allow online payments to be sent directly from one party to another without going through a financial institution.”
The paper went on to describe the benefits of electronic cash, development, ease of maintenance, and methods of use. It was described as a system for electronic transactions that would not have to rely on trust, but rather a time-stamped, proof-of-work protocol, in which every action was inherently recorded on a digital chain. Work on the chain would be awarded with blocks of Bitcoin (a.k.a. Bitcoin mining), which is where the term Blockchain comes from.
Blockchain:
a system in which a record of transactions made in bitcoin or another cryptocurrency are maintained across several computers that are linked in a peer-to-peer network.
What makes the blockchain so revolutionary is that anyone can look at the chain and see clear evidence of what’s going on. Every block mined, every Bitcoin transfer, every single action is visible and verifiable as proof-of-work. Thus, Nakamoto achieves the goal of creating “a system of electronic transactions without relying on trust”.
It’s important to note that Satoshi Nakamoto is presumably not a single person, or any real person by that name, but rather a pseudonym for the author or authors of that original white paper, who went on to launch the Bitcoin network the following year.
On January 3, 2009, the Bitcoin network officially came into existence when Satoshi Nakamoto mined ‘block 0’. It became known as the ‘genesis block’, awarding Nakamoto with 50 Bitcoins. Embedded in the blockchain’s coinbase of this block was the following time-stamp of text:
The Times Jan/03/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks.
2009-2021: A Roller Coaster Ride of Riches
When Bitcoin was initially introduced, it was traded freely between early adopters. It had no monetary value at that time. The first time any real value was established was May 22, 2010, when Laszlo Hanyecz successfully bartered with Papa Johns Pizzeria of Jacksonville, Florida. He traded 10,000 BTC for two pizzas, said to be worth $41 at the time. That being the first real-world purchase made with Bitcoin, one could estimate its original cash value at about US$0.0041 per BTC; (although the actual opening value has been estimated anywhere between $0.0008 and $0.08).
The following year, Bitcoins gained notable value when they took parity with the US Dollar. That value lasted from February to April, 2011. As interest began to grow, more people began mining and trading BTC. From October to November 2013, its price rose from $150 to $200, soaring to $1,242 on November 29. Thus marked the first prolific rise in BTC value.
BTC hovered between $200-$800 for years after that. It wasn’t until 2017 that the next enormous spike occurred. On September 1, it breached $5k for the first time, and continued climbing all the way to $19,783.06 on December 17. Five days later, it dipped back to under $14k, and in the first week of February 2018, BTC had fallen back to around $6k. By December, it was worth just $3,300.
Hope Springs Virtually Eternal
Those who didn’t lose hope in 2019, holding onto their coins over the next year, saw their value soaring once more in 2020. By November, they revisited the $19k mark, and things only continued rising from there. It reached $41k in January 2021; $50k in February; $60k in April. Then, the inevitable fall took BTC back to $39k, before rising again to over $50k on September 2, 2021.
The intense volatility of Bitcoin has been its greatest downfall, but also its most intriguing quality. It is by far the least graceful of any cryptographic commodity in history. For this reason, BTC is often considered a great crypto for trading on exchange markets, but perhaps too risky for bartering; even too risky for some online gamblers to play casino games with.
If Bitcoin doesn’t sound right for you…
If you have an interest in gambling with crypto, but feel that Bitcoin is simply too volatile, there are plenty of less erratic crypto currencies you can gamble online with. One is Bitcoin Cash [BCH], which is a direct descendant of BTC; a “hard fork” of the original crypto developed by Bitcoin miners to be more stable and scalable.
The following is a list of other crypto currencies you can play blackjack and other casino games with online. Click any one to lean more about it, or continue scrolling to learn more about buying, trading and gambling with Bitcoin.
- Bitcoin Cash [BCH]
- Litecoin [LTC]
- Tether [USDT]
- Ethereum [ETH]
- Dogecoin [DOGE]
- Binance [BNB]
- CasinoCoin [CSC]
- Chainlink [LINK]
- Ripple [XRP]
- Tron [TRX]
- Monero [XMR]
- Verge [XVG]
How to Buy and Trade Bitcoins
There are a lot of different ways to get your virtual hands on Bitcoin. You can mine it, earn it, buy it, or trade for it. In this section, we’ll give you some advice on different ways to go about it, and links to further details about each. On a side note, however you get it, you’ll probably need a Bitcoin Wallet to store it.
Mining for Bitcoin – Then and Now
The original way to get BTC was to mine it yourself. In the early days, mining was easy. Any computer with a moderate CPU was capable. The hashrates were low, meaning there weren’t too many people doing it, which made it very easy. Today, it requires a very fast, top-of-the-line GPU; one strong enough to beat out the hundreds of thousands of people competing to solve the cryptographic puzzle necessary to mine a block on the network.
It only takes 10 minutes to mine 1 block, with each block being worth a current hashrate of 6.25 BTC. That makes it sound easy, and well worth the investment to purchase an adequate mining system. However, you have to realize that thousands of miners are competing for each and every block. It is beyond difficult to earn BTC this way; virtually impossible without buying a stellar ASIC mining setup, and then joining an elite mining pool.
- Learn More: How to Mine Your Own Bitcoins in Canada
Buying Bitcoin with CAD
There are more ways to buy BTC with cash than ever before. You can buy it in person at select retail shops, or buy it online through various exchange services. You can even use your debit card to buy BTC from special Bitcoin ATMs all across Canada.
Buy In Person
To buy Bitcoin in person with cash or a debit card, simply visit the nearest Canada Post. They don’t sell BTC directly, but they do accept cash and card payments for Canada’s most reputable online crypto service, myBTC.ca. To get started, visit myBTC.ca on your computer or mobile device and follow the instructions provided. Then head to Canada Post to complete your purchase in person.
Trade on Exchange
The most common way to acquire BTC today is to purchase it through an exchange service. There are countless crypto exchange apps available, all claiming to be the best around. The bet at what? That’s the real question. One might be faster, but more expensive. One may be cheaper, but offer fewer crypto options. One might provide exchange services for every crypto in existence, but lack your favorite payment methods.
The best way to find the right crypto exchange for you is to take your time, do your research, and find out what suits you best. Then look for a crypto exchange that corresponds with those needs.
Bitcoin ATMs
It may surprise you to learn that Bitcoin ATM machines are popping up all over Canada; more than 2,000 to date. All you need is a debit card and a Bitcoin Wallet to store your coins. Bitcoin ATMs deal in more than just BTC, allowing you to buy and sell all major cryptos. You can use this link to find the nearest Bitcoin ATM.
- Learn More: Buying Bitcoin in Canada, Online & In Person
Gambling Online with Bitcoin in Canada
Whether you’re a slots lover, blackjack aficionado, or sports fanatic, you’ll find plenty of websites that allow you to wager in crypto. Bitcoin casinos started popping up the moment Bitcoin gained universal recognition as a valuable asset (circa 2013). Back then, the major perk was the ability to gamble online anonymously, from anywhere, beneath the scrutinizing radar of any central government. Now, it’s about turning something of moderate value, into something that could be worth so much more in time to come.
Hear me out…
Dealing in Bitcoin is a risk, no matter how you look at it. A few months ago, it was worth over CA$75,000. As I write this, it’s worth about CA$52,000. So if you were to invest CA$1,000 in Bitcoin, you’d get around 0.019 BTC out of it. If you deposit that at a crypto casino, they’ll probably turn it into uBTC, which are tiny little incremental units of bitcoins, perfect for splitting a single BTC into smaller amounts to wager with.
Now, if you play blackjack with crypto, with a little luck (and perfect strategy), your BTC has the potentiall to climb; perhaps even doubling from 0.19 BTC to 0.38 BTC. And by that time, the value of 1 BTC could climb as well, back to CA$75k or more. So by the time you cash out those winnings, they could be far more valuable than your original $1,000 investment.
What if the value of BTC drops, instead of rising? That’s a distinct possibility. All I can recommend is that you wait it out. If there’s one thing we’re consistently learning about Bitcoin, it’s that its volatility swings on an unpredictable pendulum. We don’t know when it will hit a spike, or how high that spike might reach, but it always happens eventually. As the myriad investors on Reddit might say…
Buy the Dip 💰 Bet the ₿it 🎲 Cash Out the Rocket 🚀
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