The world's first Bitcoin ATM will be ready for its inaugural transaction starting this coming week at a coffee shop in downtown Vancouver. Manufactured by Nevada-based Robocoin with service from local operator and broker Bitcoiniacs, the $18,500 machine will be the first of five Bitcoin ATMs headed to Canada.
The machine will allow locals to exchange Canadian dollars for Bitcoins and vice versa. When depositing Canadian money, the Bitcoin credits will be added to the user's online Bitcoin wallet. Alternately, Bitcoin credits can be used to 'purchase' Canadian funds which can be retrieved from the machine at the time of the transaction.
The machines will use palm scanners to identify and keep track of users which should also help prevent money laundering schemes. We are told there will be a CAD $3,000 ($2,870) limit per user, per day. At that rate, it would have taken alleged Silk Road mastermind Ross Ulbricht a lifetime to cash out his $80 million haul in the digital currency, but I digress.
Bitcoiniacs co-founder Mitchell Demeter said the machines will make it easier for people to buy and sell Bitcoins and hopefully drive the adoption of the virtual currency and make it more accessible.
The remaining four machines are scheduled for deployment this December in Calgary, Montreal, Ottawa and Toronto. It's unlikely we will see similar ATMs pop in the US, however, as government regulations have thus far been a barrier in making that happen.