????上周五，在雅典的大街上，杰奎因·菲諾伊為緩解希臘的貨幣限制做著自己的努力。他并沒有給路人派發現金，而是安裝了一臺每日取款額度為1000歐元的ATM機，比希臘政府的規定高出940歐元。當時正值債權人決定希望金融命運的關鍵時刻，為了防止銀行出現擠兌浪潮，希臘政府規定，ATM機的取款額度為每日60歐元。

????只有一個條件：你需要有虛擬貨幣比特幣才能使用它。

????菲諾伊今年36歲，是Bitchain的首席技術官。這家初創公司成立于4個月前，位于巴塞羅那SantCugatdelVallés社區。他和另兩位共同創始人，39歲的喬迪·阿拉爾卡斯、44歲的米格爾·阿拉爾卡斯，在今年3月成立了這家公司。他們打算建立基于比特幣的國際ATM機網絡，這些ATM機由位于巴塞羅那和硅谷的公司BTCPoint生產（該公司也是菲諾伊的前任雇主）。

????比特幣已誕生6年之久。這種ATM機是一種迅速發展的衍生物。2013年10月，第一臺比特幣ATM機出現在溫哥華一家咖啡店內，而如今這類機器在全球已經有429臺。要在ATM上購買比特幣，用戶需要投入現金，隨后對應的比特幣就會打入其虛擬賬戶。想要把比特幣轉化為現金并取出（在現金緊缺的希臘更有可能出現這種情況），用戶需要把比特幣發送到ATM機提供的虛擬地址，然后獲得一個二維碼，掃描這個二維碼就能得到現金。

????比特幣脫離于政府的金融體系之外。對于那些想要避免因貨幣和銀行體系不穩而導致財務損失的人們來說，這種虛擬貨幣極具吸引力。近來，對比特幣的需求重新高漲起來，尤其是在歐洲（在過去四周，比特幣在希臘的使用量提高了500%），這意味著希臘的遭遇甚至會鼓勵其他南歐國家的人民把錢換成比特幣，以免自己的國家陷入類似困境。

????麻省理工學院媒體實驗室數字貨幣倡議高級顧問，《加密貨幣時代：比特幣和數字貨幣如何挑戰全球經濟力量》一書的作者之一邁克爾·凱西表示：“西班牙、葡萄牙、意大利和其他一些國家的國民都擔心自己的國家重蹈希臘覆轍，他們可能會出于投機考慮購買比特幣。”

????他補充道；“你購買比特幣，因為你覺得在未來的某個時候，你的銀行會關閉，你手中的貨幣會被新貨幣取代。黃金是應對這種問題的最古老的止損措施。而比特幣則是一種新的手段。”不過，凱西指出，比特幣的使用率仍然很低，盡管其增長速度很快，仍然需要謹慎看待。

????菲諾伊把構建比特幣的國際ATM網絡，看作一種幫助人們更輕松地在全球各地轉移金錢的方式，如此一來就不用為傳統的轉賬服務支付高昂的費用。

????他表示：“對第三世界國家的人民來說，這是一個好消息，他們目前要依靠西聯匯款之類的服務。例如，一個人可以在世界某處存錢，而他的家人可以在非洲把它取出來。這就是我們這個網絡希望達成的目標之一：匯款。”

????在希臘的案例中，身處倫敦且感到擔心的親人可以購買比特幣，并將其轉至雅典的家人賬下，家人隨后就能以歐元的形式從Bitchain的ATM機中取出這些比特幣。類似的，游客也可以用美元在紐約購買比特幣，然后在巴塞羅那的比特幣ATM機中取出相應的歐元。

????行業網站Coin ATM Radar的數據顯示，Bitchain的ATM機會在交易中收取4%的手續費，略低于全球5.61%的平均水平，而雅典的ATM機將會在運作初期免手續費。菲諾伊表示，對那些兌換貨幣的人而言，比起實體貨幣兌換商，4%的手續費意味著節省了80%至85%的錢。

????用傳統方式匯款顯然要昂貴得多：要把錢從美國匯到希臘，西聯匯款從中要收取大量費用（匯款1000歐元需要1180美元，而目前的匯率是1000歐元兌換1120美元），若要把這筆錢打入信用卡并使其立刻到賬，還需要額外收取81美元。

????菲諾伊和他的伙伴們很快就會了解有多少希臘人（以及去希臘的游客）使用了比特幣。他們的ATM機設立在雅典市中心的The Cube辦公區，計劃于周六正式開始運作。他表示，幾周前Bitchain安裝在巴塞羅那的兩臺ATM每天都能完成約20次交易，其中60%是購買比特幣，40%是取現。

????該公司計劃于今年年底之前在全球安裝40臺ATM機，包括那些存在貨幣問題或轉賬流程十分繁雜的國家，如阿根廷和委內瑞拉，這些國家擁有使用比特幣的環境。

????每臺ATM機的成本大約為8500歐元，據費諾伊介紹，每臺機器收取6至9個月的手續費后就能收回成本。到目前為止，他和搭檔已經投入了約10萬歐元來做前期工作。

????菲諾伊表示：“希臘的局勢比我根據媒體報道推測的要平靜得多。在ATM機前排隊的只有一兩個人。旅游業依舊正常。人們的情緒比我想象的好。”

????如果希臘退出歐元區，毫無疑問這一切都將改變，并讓Bitchain的ATM機更加火爆。畢竟，與希臘目前嘗試的其他選擇相比，比特幣并沒有古怪到讓人難以接受的程度。比如，有些商店開始接受鄰國保加利亞的貨幣列弗，而希臘小島阿基斯提正在嘗試一種名為“鸚鵡螺幣”，以黃金支撐的數字貨幣。（財富中文網）

????譯者：嚴匡正

????審校：任文科

????Joaquin Fenoy was wandering the streets of Athens Friday, doing his bit to ease Greece’s currency restrictions. He wasn’t handing out cash, but rather installing an ATM with a withdrawal limit of €1,000 (about $1,100). That’s €940 above the €60 daily ATM withdrawal limit the Greek government put in place to stop a bank run as its creditors decide the country’s financial fate.

????There is one catch, though: You need to have the virtual currency bitcoin to use it.

????Fenoy, 36, is the CTO of Bitchain, a four-month-old startup based in the Barcelona suburb of Sant Cugat del Vallés. He and his co-founders—Jordi Alcaraz, 39, and Miguel Alcaraz, 44—launched the company in March to build an international network of bitcoin-based ATMs manufactured by BTCPoint, a Barcelona/Silicon Valley company (and Fenoy’s former employer).

????Bitcoin ATMs are a fast-growing offshoot of the six-year old bitcoin currency. The first one was opened in a Vancouver coffee shop in October 2013, and there are now 429 worldwide. To buy bitcoins at an ATM, a user inserts money, and the equivalent in bitcoins are put into his virtual wallet. To turn bitcoins into cash and withdraw it (which is more likely in cash-strapped Greece), users send bitcoins to a virtual address supplied by the ATM; they are then given a QR code that they scan to receive cash.

????Free of ties to government financial systems, bitcoin appeals to people looking to hedge against unstable currencies and banking systems. Demand for bitcoin has picked up in recent days, especially in Europe (Greece’s bitcoin use has risen 500% in the last four weeks), suggesting that Greece’s travails may even be inspiring people in other southern European nations to shift into bitcoin in case their countries ever have similar problems.

????“The suspicion is Spanish, Portuguese, Italians, and others worried about going down this route are buying in speculation,” says Michael Casey, senior advisor of MIT Media Lab’s Digital Currency Initiative and co-author of The Age of Cryptocurrency: How Bitcoin and Digital Money Are Challenging the Global Economic Order.

????“You buy a bitcoin now because you think sometime in the future you’ll have your banks shut and your currency reintroduced,” he adds. “Gold was the old hedge against this sort of thing. Bitcoin is the new one.” Usage is still low, Casey notes, so big growth numbers have to be taken with a grain of salt.

????Fenoy frames building an international bitcoin ATM network as a way to help people easily move money around the globe without paying the high fees of traditional money transferring services.

????“It’s very good for people in the Third World, who are now dependent on Western Union and services like that,” he says. “Someone in one part of the world could put in money, and a family member could take it out in Africa, for example. That is one of the objectives: remittances.”

????In Greece’s case, worried relatives in London could buy bitcoins and transfer them to the digital wallet of a family member in Athens, who could then withdraw the bitcoins as euros from Bitchain’s ATM. Similarly, tourists could also buy bitcoins with dollars in New York and then take them out of a Barcelona bitcoin ATM in euros.

????Bitchain ATMs charge a 4% commission on transactions, a bit below the worldwide average of 5.61%, according to industry site Coin ATM Radar; the ATM in Athens will offer a zero commission rate to start. Fenoy says that for someone exchanging currencies, that 4% commission represents an 80 to 85% savings when compared with a physical moneychanger.

????Sending money the old-fashioned way is certainly more expensive: On a transfer from the U.S. to Greece, Western Union takes a cut on the conversion (€1,000 would cost $1,180 from Western Union, compared with $1,120 at the current exchange rate) and charges $81 on top of that to put the transfer on a credit card and deliver it immediately.

????Fenoy and his partners will soon find out how many Greeks (and visitors to Greece) have access to bitcoins. Their ATM, based at a downtown Athens co-working space called The Cube, is slated to open Saturday. The two ATMs Bitchain installed in Barcelona a few weeks ago see about 20 transactions a day each, he says, split 60/40 between buying bitcoins and withdrawing cash.

????The company plans to have 40 ATMs installed worldwide by the end of the year, including in other countries with the kind of currency problems and byzantine money transfer regulations that make them prime for bitcoin usage, like Argentina and Venezuela.

????Each machine costs about €8,500 and according to Fenoy, between six and nine months worth of commissions are needed to pay off each one. So far, he and his partners have put in about €100,000 to bootstrap the company.

????“The situation [in Greece] is a lot calmer than I’d envisioned from what I’d seen in the media. The lines at ATMs are just one or two people,” Fenoy says, talking from Athens on his cell phone. “Tourism is normal. People are in a better mood than I expected.”

????A Greek exit from the euro would no doubt change that—and make Bitchain’s ATM much more popular. After all, bitcoins are not any weirder than other alternatives being tried out in Greece right now: Some stores are taking neighboring Bulgaria’s currency, the lev, while a small Greek island, Agistri, is trying out a gold-backed digital currency, the Nautiluscoin.