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E-Coin Bitcoin Visa Card Now Secured By BitGo

Bitcoin debit card E-Coin recently teamed up with BitGo to provide a suite of bank-like services for bitcoin users, including access to most ATMs and deposit insurance.

E-Coin is a recent addition to the Bitcoin Industry, having been started in late 2014. The London based company provides a debit card linked to a cloud wallet, which gives users access to Fiat and Digital currencies across the Visa network. ”The beauty of this solution compared to the one offered by bitcoin merchants is that instead of convincing businesses to accept bitcoins, we provide bitcoin lovers with the opportunity to spend bitcoins within traditional finance infrastructure,” states the E-Coin website.

E-Coin recently finalized a BitGo wallet integration. BitGo was the first company to launch a multi-signature Bitcoin wallet. Based in Palo Alto, the company operates a security-as-a-service platform.

Users now benefit from having funds secured by Bitgo, an established company. Using a well-known third party, multi-signature wallet to hold customer funds may alleviate any security concerns that potential customers have in dealing with a relatively new company, like E-Coin. According to the E-Coin press release, deposits and transfers also take less time than they did with the previous system.

"We have partnered with BitGo to further increase the safety and reliability of the service for our Customers. BitGo is the industry trend-setter for security of bitcoin transactions."
— – Georgy Sokolov, co-founder of E-Coin

BitGo also insures funds, up to $250,000, against theft. This provides E-Coin card holders with FDIC-like insurance. The insurance is provided by an A-rated global insurance and reinsurance company, XL Group. BitGo customers have the option of increasing the amount of protection for a 1 percent annual fee. “BitGo customers who opt-in to the program are protected from acts, errors, or omissions of BitGo technology, processes, and employees, including external hacking incidents and employee theft. Both hot wallets and cold storage are eligible for coverage in the policy.” states the Bitgo website

Bitgo is the first bitcoin company to have secured comprehensive cover issued by a global, A-rated underwriter. John Coletti, Chief Underwriting Officer of Cyber and Technology Insurance for XL Group stated that, “In collaborating with BitGo and Innovation Insurance Group, we tailored a first-of-its-kind insurance product to help protect the rapidly growing bitcoin industry.”

“We have seen early attempts at insurance in the bitcoin market, such as those based on a captive model funded with cash reserves or ‘crime’ policies that solely cover employee theft of cold storage keys.”
— – Ty Sagalow, President of Innovation Insurance Group and CEO of Bitcoin Financial Group

BitGo was the first web wallet service to implement multi-signature addresses, and many prominent exchanges and other bitcoin-using companies have secured their funds with the company. BitStamp now uses BitGo, following their infamous hot wallet hack in January.

The main selling point of the E-Coin card is that you can carry a balance in bitcoins, but spend fiat currencies. The service converts bitcoin on the fly, at any ATM or merchant in the Visa network. Currently this network spans over 30 Million ATM locations and 25 Million merchants worldwide.

Getting an E-Coin card currently costs $17, which includes a standard delivery option. This is slightly more expensive than the advertised cost of the E-Coins main competitor, Xapo. The more established card provider would normally charge $15, but is presently still in beta phase. However, unlike the Xapo card, which can take “up to several months to receive,” according to the Xapo website, E-Coin cards are shipping now.

“users can typically get them within 2-3 days in Europe and within 1-2 weeks in most other countries.”
— – E-Coin press release

Unfortunately regulations in the United States won’t allow E-Coin, Xapo, nor any of their competitors to ship bitcoin debit cards directly to a US address at this time. These cards work just fine in the US, but getting them shipped can be tricky.

Once you have the card in your hand, however, activation is quick and loading bitcoins onto the card is a simple process you can do from your smartphone.

“You can literally load your card while queueing at an ATM and withdraw cash straight away!”
— – Georgy Sokolov

Just like the competition from Xapo, and much like you’d expect with a bank-issued ATM card, there are fees for using the E-Coin card. On top of a $2.50 ATM transaction fee, there is a $1 monthly maintenance fee, 3% foreign transaction fees and a bitcoin withdrawal fee of 2%.

The daily ATM withdrawal limit is set at $400 per 24-hour period, which can be raised to $2000 if users verify their identity. Prior to this verification process card holders are also limited to loading the card with no more that $2,500, and cannot withdraw more than $1,000 from ATMs – for the lifetime of the card. The limits disappear entirely for verified accounts. People hoping to use this as a fully anonymous Visa card will currently find it impractical for large amounts or long-term use.

Although identity verification can remove several limits imposed by the card issuer, it does not address all of the issues users may encounter. When making a purchase you can either manually pull a specific amount of bitcoins kept at Bitgo in advance, or the amount can be pulled instantly as you make the purchase. This feature is called the “instant card loading” feature, and can only be used five times per day for verified card holders.

With this new union between E-Coin and Bitgo, users have a fast way to get a Visa debit card that you can use anywhere. Funds can be debited debits from a multi-signature wallet with some of the highest security in the industry, all while keeping your balance insured. For so much convenience, security, and accessibility to be in one offering is an enticing proposition.


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