Yes, we now accept fees paid in cryptocurrencies. Just put “lalegal.eth” as the destination address in your wallet, and that’s it.
Cryptocurrencies are a reality that is increasingly spreading. It is therefore reasonable to see them for what they are: a new way of exchanging values.
When we say cryptocurrencies, the first word that comes to mind is volatility. And yes, cryptocurrencies can be a roller coaster ride. But to see them in their right dimension, we invite you to analyze the following comparison with the price of a Big Mac in the United States.
In the column of price in dollars, I show how much the price of a Big Mac in the United States has varied over 5 years (The Big Mac Index, 2022). In the other two columns, I place how much the Big Mac would have cost if it had been paid for with bitcoin or ether cryptocurrencies.
And so I came to the conclusion that in 5 years:
- The North American dollar devalued 14.44%.
- The bitcoin revalued 90.21%.
- The ether revalued 85.73%.
Clearly with this exercise I do not intend to invite you to become crypto-investors. It is undeniable that they are volatile instruments (just like the stock market shares). In the 5-year comparison we can comfortably see that bitcoin has almost doubled in value, but its growth rate has not been constant (unlike the dollar, which is constant, downward, but constant). Today bitcoin is worth a quarter of what it was worth in November 2021. During 2022 bitcoin lost almost as much value as Tesla or Spotify shares.
What I intend with this exercise is to place cryptocurrencies in their right perspective: as one more element to exchange value that is gradually spreading. 3 recent examples:
- In October 2022 Mastercard announced that it would help banks to offer the service of buying / selling cryptocurrencies (CNBC Television, 2022).
- In May 2022 Gucci announced it will accept cryptocurrency payments in stores in New York, Los Angeles, Miami, Atlanta and Las Vegas (“Gucci to Start Accepting Crypto Payments in Some U.S. Stores,” 2022).
- In October 2022 “Mercado Libre” announced that it would launch its own cryptocurrency, starting in Brazil (Inside Latin America’s booming crypto testing ground | Fortune, 2022).
In view of the volatility of cryptocurrencies, I consider relevant to highlight one aspect: if they have gone up and down in price, it is due to the effect of their supply and demand; not because the emission of these virtual assets has skyrocketed (I make this remark with respect to bitcoin and ether, which I consider the two main ones).
The amount of paper cash can be infinite, and can increase or not at the will of the government in office (and this of course affects its value). Cryptocurrencies do not, their consensual algorithm sets the rules of issuance:
- There can only be a total of 21 million bitcoins. And they are released at a decreasing rate, as transactions occur. The economist Saifedean Ammous calculated that the total number of bitcoins would be issued in the year 2140. And that in the next 20 years the amount of bitcoins will increase by 27%, while the amount of gold will increase by 52% (Ammous, 2018).
- In the case of ether there is no maximum amount, but its consensus algorithm prevents this cryptocurrency from being issued indiscriminately. In September 2022 the way of issuing ether changed (to spend less energy). Before this date ether increased at a rate of 4.61% per year; now its rate goes to 0.52% per year (How The Merge Impacted ETH Supply, 2022).
Cryptocurrencies are a way of exchanging assets without being subject to the costs and restrictions that financial intermediaries may impose. This is why they are being used to send remittances from the United States to Mexico (“Remittances drive the use of cryptocurrencies in Mexico,” 2022). Using these virtual assets is not getting married to speculation, at any time they can be converted back to traditional currency.
So now you know: if it is past 5:30 pm or it is the weekend and you wish to pay fees to L-A Legal, or if you are abroad and do not want almost a full day to pass for us to receive the fee (so that it reaches us in minutes), you can send us your payment in bitcoin or ether.
And the issue of the invoice? That will require another 800 words….
Sources consulted:
How The Merge impacted ETH supply. (2022, diciembre 22). Ethereum.Org. https://ethereum.org
The Big Mac index. (2022, julio). The Economist. https://www.economist.com/big-mac-index
