Cuba now has its own Bitcoin exchange, despite restrictions

[El Presidente]

Cuba now has its own Bitcoin exchange, despite restrictions

An Italian-Cuban crypto entrepreneur has launched the Qbita Exchange, a peer-to-peer Bitcoin trading platform built in Cuba for Cuba.

By Jose Antonio Lanz

 

In brief

• The man behind the Qbita Bitcoin wallet has developed a peer-to-peer exchange custom built for Cuba.
• The exchange comes built in with the ultra-lightweight wallet, which requires relatively little data space and bandwidth to use.
• Developer Mario Mazzola is already looking ahead, with plans to integrate business solutions next.

Full Story 

https://decrypt.co/26405/cuba-bitcoin-exchange-despite-restrictions

[MPS]

Now we just need you to accept BTC! 

[ThomasHoward]

Hope that it's a good exchange. I didn't hear about any restrictions in Cuba to open a bitcoin exchange and generally about any bitcoin restrictions. Mario Mazzola was already the creator of the ultra-lightweight Bitcoin walletQbita. Now he just made a bitcoin exchange because his bitcoin wallet became very popular. I have been at some of his lessons and there he never mentioned that he had any law problems because of bitcoin. Where did you get that information?

[VeguerosMAN]

I hope this is a legit exchange, for I know a few who lost a lot in 2022 in Cuba with scam exchanges.

[ATGroom]

I've used Qbita to get money into Cuba.

It isn't like the west where the exchange buys and sells. It's a literal marketplace.

The person in Cuba posts an ad for the amount of BTC they want to buy or sell, and then waits for someone to contact them. When they do, they talk on the phone or meet in person and make the arrangements to handover cash, make a bank transfer etc, then transfer the crypto directly.

If you can find a buyer, the transaction can be done in minutes. In my experience in generally takes about a day. There have been times it has taken a week or more. The clip is a small fee (around 1%) for Qbita. Compare that to sending it via the official channels where you are looking at 10%-15% clip to the government and 5-7 days in transit, it is better in all respects.

So, it's not a scam. Like every exchange they do have wallets and you could choose to leave your bag with them, and then they could disappear one day. Pretty easy solution to that is not to leave your money with them.

All that said, I haven't used it in a while and I heard that it may have disappeared as of a few months ago. 

[MrFolgers]

43 minutes ago, ATGroom said:

I've used Qbita to get money into Cuba.

It isn't like the west where the exchange buys and sells. It's a literal marketplace.

The person in Cuba posts an ad for the amount of BTC they want to buy or sell, and then waits for someone to contact them. When they do, they talk on the phone or meet in person and make the arrangements to handover cash, make a bank transfer etc, then transfer the crypto directly.

If you can find a buyer, the transaction can be done in minutes. In my experience in generally takes about a day. There have been times it has taken a week or more. The clip is a small fee (around 1%) for Qbita. Compare that to sending it via the official channels where you are looking at 10%-15% clip to the government and 5-7 days in transit, it is better in all respects.

So, it's not a scam. Like every exchange they do have wallets and you could choose to leave your bag with them, and then they could disappear one day. Pretty easy solution to that is not to leave your money with them.

All that said, I haven't used it in a while and I heard that it may have disappeared as of a few months ago. 

This must be what it sounds like to an outsider how 24:24 works 😬