The big picture: AMC Entertainment CEO Adam Aron announced last month that his company would have the technology in place to start accepting Bitcoin for online ticket and concession payments at its US theaters by the end of 2021. But what about other popular cryptocurrencies?
In a recent post on Twitter, Aron confirmed that he also expects AMC will accept Ethereum, Litecoin and Bitcoin Cash alongside Bitcoin later this year. These cryptocurrencies, along with Bitcoin, are arguably the four leading virtual currencies in circulation today. They're the same four that have been adopted by PayPal and its mobile payments subsidiary Venmo in recent months.
While no doubt good news for the crypto community as a whole, it's unlikely to have the same sort of impact that we saw earlier this week when a bogus Walmart press release pushed Litecoin prices up nearly 35 percent in just 15 minutes.
Indeed, a quick check of Litecoin as of this writing reveals that it's trading up 2.78 percent. Ethereum is also up 3.43 on the news, but Bitcoin Cash is down 1.61 percent. Bitcoin is also down by 0.29 percent, but is still at a healthy $47,610 value per.
Still, questions remain about crypto's viability as a payment method rather than simply a store of wealth or an investment vehicle. Volatility aside, there's also concern around processing times and transaction fees, the latter of which can be prohibitively high at times.
Do you have any interest in buying movie tickets or concessions with crypto, or would you prefer to use a more common payment method like cash or debit card?
Image credit Art Rachen