Bitcoin has achieved significant milestones over the past six months. Legal tender in a nation, hitting a new all-time high, and witnessing a robust network hash rate than ever, BTC has continued its exponential growth. However, besides the positive, we have observed that for the first time in the history, the global BTC ATM installation has slowed down when compared with the preceding year. Indeed, it is the first time that the Coin ATM Radar, that tracks overall ATM installations, is steadily declining.
Bitcoin ATM installation trend breaks this year
Historically we have observed that the trend of Bitcoin ATMs installation has surged in the first two months of every year. Notably, the trend used to surge continuously every year. However, this year, for the first time the soaring trend is declining.
We have noted that considering only the first couple of months of this year, a total of 1,817 ATMs have been established. In contrast, over the same period in the last year, 2,435 ATMs were installed, which is 618 ATMs more when compared to this year.
Moreover, it is also worth noting that in 2020, only 760 ATMs were established. Still, the count was able to overshadow the 250 ATMs installation in 2019.
Why is BTC ATM installation declining?
According to experts in the cryptosphere, one of the leading reasons that caused a decline in Bitcoin ATM installation is lack of involvement from newer jurisdictions. We should note that the US alone contributed to 93% of the total global cryptocurrency machines installations in 2022 with 1,689 new machines.
On the other hand, these ATMs in Europe were also reduced by an ATM in January and February 2022, bringing the total count to 1,397 ATMs. Meanwhile, North AMerica is representing more than 95% of the total digital assets installations with more than 34k ATMs.
Currently there are a total of 36,067 ATMs installed. Although the installations took a steady start, we can expect a spike again as jurisdictions like El Salvador aim to deploy 1500 ATMs. However, unless more governments amo up their efforts to crypto adoption, the installations would continue to find difficulties to maintain an upward trajectory.
Source: https://www.thecoinrepublic.com/2022/03/01/for-the-first-time-bitcoin-atms-installations-have-lost-pace/