Betting with actual money is now a thing of the past. With the advent of cryptography, pseudoanonymity and crypto-currencies, it is now more convenient and safer to play online Poker and other online gambling games regardless of your whereabouts. Why risk the chances of getting spied on when you can use of virtual currency like Bitcoin to enjoy and make money with online gambling.
It you haven’t got a clue what a Bitcoin is, read along and get ready to be mind-blown by how beneficial it is to use Bitcoin in online gambling.
Bitcoin is a payment system in the form of digital money. Bitcoin is open-source, which means nobody owns it. The digital currency was invented by Satoshi Nakamoto and the real identity of the Bitcoin founder remains unknown up to this very day.
Since the introduction of Bitcoin, people haven’t really understood what it actually is. Some believe Bitcoin to be a real currency, others think it’s merely a commodity, a payment platform, a speculation bubble and many more. But no matter what you call it, Bitcoin is the future of paying for everything! Although it has to be admitted that today the biggest use case is actually speculation and trading. Novices can even study how crypto trading works.
Since anything in this world has value, it can be a bit more complicated to understand and even explain why Bitcoins have ‘intrinsic’ value. Bitcoins don’t have physical denominations but they are considered as money that can be used to purchase anything as long as the merchant accepts such payment, of course.
Bitcoinpenguin.com was established in 2014; as per the internet has graciously provided us. One thing that we also like to point out is that their website does not talk about their regulations and whatnot.
Today, only a few merchants actually accept Bitcoin as a form of payment. But as more people and merchants realize the benefits and worth of Bitcoins, then the crypto-currency would become more acceptable to exchange and use like how the Dollar or Euro or even gold is today.
Bitcoins are created by a process called mining. But unlike traditional mining, Bitcoin mining is a network of thousands of computers, solving a mathematical problem.
Technically, you can’t store Bitcoins anywhere. But just like with actual cash that you keep in your physical wallet, Bitcoins can also be stored in various “bitcoin wallets“. To be precise, you are not really storing the actual bitcoin ‘coins’ or ‘bills’, but only the digital keys used to access the public Bitcoin addresses.
There are several web-based wallets, USB wallets and hardware wallets that let you store your private bitcoin keys. You can also make use of paper wallets (they offer actual coin-like Bitcoin) which are the cheapest ways of keeping and storing your bitcoins. The best thing about paper wallet is that no digital keys are stored anywhere, therefore there would be no way to get your Bitcoin keys compromised via cyber-attacks or hardware failure.
To get some (or more) Bitcoins, you can buy them either by directly transacting with people who have them, or thru exchange trades. There are also a lot of Bitcoin markets selling Bitcoins and they are offering various ways as payment method as well (credit card, wire transfer, Paypal, etc). Just like when buying Bitcoins, you can also sell them by peer-to-peer transactions and exchanges.
An easy way to start is to pay by credit card – youll find some trustworthy Exchanges to buy Bitcoins with Credit Card on this website.
There are downsides but Bitcoin is not the problem. The adoption of online poker websites is. For example, the government might try to interfere and target certain poker sites for violation of applicable federal laws. Major poker sites also haven’t embraced the payment solution yet because of the extra precautionary measures required (which costs them money) to send out Bitcoin payments.
In reality though, Bitcoins are the best payment solutions for online gambling sites primary because Bitcoins are funds or money that are deposited legitimately on web-based wallets or personal wallets.
Check with the poker platform if it’s accepting Bitcoins as funds to play online poker. If it offers Bitcoin depositing options, then you can send the fund from your digital wallet to the poker site’s Bitcoin wallet.
Provably fair system is a way of making sure that the gambling operator is not cheating anyone and that you get a fair deal on every hand you play. Provably fair is a documentation of the technique the online casino use to shuffle a deck in a provably fair manner.
To identify whether the online casino is provably fair or not is very easy. You will know if you are playing at a provably fair Bitcoin casino if you can check how the results are being calculated to ensure that deck results are not being manipulated whatsoever. There should also be a “Provably Fair” button that you can click during gameplay to instantaneously verify the authenticity of a shuffle.
They can cheat players but they would be exposed if they do so since players can immediately verify the authenticity of the shuffles.
It depends on the poker room you are playing on. But it is not mandatory to share your personal or financial details with most poker room. So, in case the poker room gets hacked, data sniffers won’t be able to access your Bitcoin wallet since you didn’t share it in the first place.
You can check the poker sites that accept Bitcoins here. If you want to play with anonymous currencies like Zcash, check out this website.
If the poker platform offers a downloadable Bitcoin poker app. Otherwise, you can only play Bitcoin poker on your desktop.
Bitcoin poker sites offer a variety of ways for players to withdraw their poker earnings or balances. In most cases, Bitcoin cash-outs are done anonymously. In order to process your payout, you will need to provide your Bitcoin address.
The amount that you can cash out will also vary depending on the minimum / maximum payout amounts set by the poker platform. Withdrawal requests / transfers can take up to 1-5 days.
The legality of the poker site is dependent on where it is operating or based in. For instance, depositing and withdrawing Bitcoins in European-based poker sites is entirely legal.
On the other hand, Bitcoin poker sites are usually illegal in the United States, thus US players often can’t play in Bitcoin poker sites. Some countries or states regulate Bitcoin poker sites, and some don’t. As bitcoin is not seen as official money yet, it is handled like playing for play-money in many countries – which makes it perfetly legal.
Gameplay is basically similar. One difference between a normal poker to a Bitcoin poker is that the latter is the safer platform. Of course, there’s also the difference in ways of transferring money to and from player’s account. With Bitcoin poker, everything is done anonymously while regular poker requires that players provide financial and personal details.
Rakeback is the amount you get from the fees charged by the poker site from each game it hosts.
Bitcoin poker sites usually give away free Bitcoins to players that win tournaments. Other than that, there is no other way of getting free Bitcoins from Bitcoin poker sites. But you can get a Bonus for your first payment to the Bitcoin Poker Site – in some cases they double your deposit – or more.
The only time you will need a credit card or bank account is when you buy Bitcoins. But if you have Bitcoins already, then you can instantaneously gamble on Bitcoin poker sites.