FROM cash, to card to crypto currency.

That’s the journey of a Mackay restaurant and bar which believes it’s one of the first businesses in the region to accept digital currency — one of which is bitcoin, The Daily Mercury reports.

The Paddock & Brew Company on Wood St last night officially made the radical move, something owner David Pollard believes will soon become the norm.

“Bitcoin; it’s here to stay. And it’s not just bitcoin, it is all of the crypto- currencies,” he said.

“We are going to have to get our heads around it, we are going to have to learn it because it’s going to become a way of our life.”

In order to accept bitcoin as a currency, the business had to go through the rigorous process in setting up a ‘wallet’.

media_camera With companies like Amazon and eBay now accepting crypto-currency, Mr Pollard said it was a smart business move.

Mr Pollard explained that a person making a transaction, doesn’t buy a whole bitcoin but rather a portion of it.

“If you have $50, you buy a portion of a bitcoin to the value of $50. “We actually have a payment gateway system. When we put in the dollar amount of the purchase it converts that to the amount of bitcoins at the current trading value.”

The restaurant also accepts 109 other crypto-currencies.

With companies like Amazon and eBay now accepting crypto-currency, Mr Pollard said it was a smart business move.

“Business now has to adapt and we have to keep up with what’s going on.”

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What is bitcoin?

BITCOIN is essentially a digital currency that skyrocketed in value in 2017. It is what is known as a ‘crypto-currency’.

Bitcoin, was actually created way back in 2009, by a software developer called Satoshi Nakamoto, whose real identity is unknown. According to technology website, CoinDesk, “The idea was to produce a currency independent of any central authority, transferable electronically, more or less instantly, with very low transaction fees.”

The current value of one bitcoin $A17,304.72. In December 2017, the digital currency rose to a record of more than $A25,000.

Want to get into bitcoin?

“The most popular way is to find an online exchange, where you would then need to register, create an account and upload 100 points of ID,” Martin Davidson, co-founder of the Melbourne-based not-for-profit Blockchain Centre told News.com.au last month.

“You then transfer Australian dollars to your exchange account, and you’ll be able to buy bitcoin or any of the crypto-currencies on that exchange.”