Do you want to collect your salary in Bitcoin? Find out the advantages and disadvantages

As the adoption of cryptocurrencies increases, some companies are more likely to offer their employees the option of receiving their salary or part of it in bitcoin (BTC), or another digital asset such as ether (ETH).  

Employees may also be interested in getting paid in bitcoins, especially if they are freelancers familiar with cryptocurrencies. This method of incorporating bitcoin into payroll has both benefits and risks, a number of features that we will explore in this article. 

3 main attractions of bitcoin payments 

The first benefit of payroll payments with cryptocurrencies lies in the speed at which they can be processed. Transfers from the company to employee digital wallets happen in minutes, even if they are in different countries, except in exceptional times of network congestion.  

Another advantage, which often applies in the case of freelance workers, is that payment can possibly be made outside working hours. For example, on a weekend or on a public holiday, while maintaining the immediacy mentioned above. Furthermore, the payments are not affected by the geographic location of the recipients, as they have access to their wallet anywhere with Internet access. You can live in Colombia or Argentina and work for a company in Europe, with minimal relocation costs. 

Payments in bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are, on the other hand, decentralized, which eliminates the middlemen. That is, they are done directly between the company and the employee, and the transactions are resistant to censorship because they are not handled by a centralized entity. The handling of the money received is the sole responsibility of the beneficiary. This means that there is less risk of a third party blocking your money, you will always be able to access your savings if you have full custody of the wallet where it was deposited. 

For now we cannot do without fiat money

Of course, daily expenses involve a conversion into fiat money, which is also done in a decentralized way, on peer-to-peer (P2P) or peer-to-peer platforms. On the other hand, it may be easier to access fiat currency with bitcoin than with the dollar. This is seen on a daily basis in Venezuela, where it is easier to obtain bolivars with bitcoin than with the US currency, as we report here. 

For the savings plans that the employee wants to carry out, it is only necessary to keep the cryptocurrencies in the receiving wallet, or transfer them to a wallet intended for savings. This produces more benefits, in the case of conventional payroll, than leaving fiat money in a low-yielding bank account. Inflation would increasingly threaten fiat currency savings funds, which is not so often the case with bitcoin. 

A strategy based on holding bitcoin, or holdear, according to bitcoin jargon, can produce good returns for theinvestor in the medium and long term.