Infinitum Announce their Physical Bitcoin

Alec Johns, Marketing Manager at Infinitum, took a shine to Bitcoin when he was importing products from China and India for local distribution. Johns recognised that the International payment processing fees made a substantial dent in his profits. “Then Bitcoin came into the spotlight and I was able to make payments and not worry about bank transfer fees,” said Johns.

“The solution that Bitcoin gave me as a small business was efficient and simple, I was hooked.”
— – Alec Johns, Marketing Manager at Infinitum

The inspiration behind the Ingenium Coin came from the Bitcoin community forums over Christmas and New Year. “For about a year we have wanted to do something, anything to promote and increase awareness of Bitcoin in a positive way,” said Johns. “Bringing another physical Bitcoin to the market appeared to be what the public were after.”

Johns believes consumer confidence in Bitcoin has suffered due to incidents in the past such as the MtGox collapse. “We want to help lift and restore the brand of Bitcoin by promoting products showing a positive side of Bitcoin,” he explains.

The decision to use pre-registration, as opposed to pre-orders, is an attempt to restore customer confidence in Bitcoin related businesses. Companies in the past have taken pre-orders to fund production rounds, and in some cases products were either very late or never received. “We decided that we will not take anyone’s money until we have the stock minted, ready to ship. If that took a few weeks longer then so be it”

“We want the community to trust us then we must first show some confidence in ourselves.”
— – Johns

The Da Vinci Ingenium coin is five centimetre wide and three centimetres thick. The obverse features a carving of Leonardo Da Vinci, which looks almost like a sculpture. “This was a difficult task we tried with our graphics designer but the designs we not detailed,” said Johns. “In the end we outsourced to a design company which specialised in making sculptures. We simply did not have the skills in house for the detailed design work.” The reverse side of the coin will feature a 3D hologram, which can cover a bitcoin address private key and the Latin saying "Actus Genio Sunt, Illi in Nulla re Tempus" meaning "Acts of Genius are Never Lost in Time".

While the coins can be linked to bitcoin holdings they will be sold as silver bullion, there are two reasons for this distinction. The first reason is that FinCen views pre-loaded physical coins as a form of money transmittance. Mike Caldwell, the original producer of physical Casascius Bitcoins, ran into this issue in 2013 and immediately stopped the sale of his pre-loaded coins. Today Casascius coins are viewed as collectors items and can fetch as much as USD $2,500 on eBay.

Johns believes people will also eventually trade the Ingenium coins on secondary markets,  “eBay officially do not allow funded coins to be sold on their auction sites,” Johns explains. “They also class that as money transfer and makes them fall under FinCen rules.” Those who do attempt to sell pre-loaded physical coins on eBay will be red-flagged and removed.

However, after the minting process on the 25th May, the Da Vinci Ingenium Coin will be available for purchase with three bitcoin securing options, which are referred to as ‘modes’. This is in an effort to accommodate all types of consumers wanting to link bitcoin assets to the physical coins.

Mode One from Infinitum will include a wallet included for the customer, “Infinitum will then print the keys, place them and apply the hologram to the reverse of the Ingenium bitcoin concealing the private key inside and leaving the public address barcode visible through the transparent window,” advises the Infinitum website.

“The computer used for generating keys is accessible via two factor authentication. Two people must be present and must have an Ingenium physical coin and hologram sticker in hand ready to implement after printing. The keys are produced using an offline wallet generator, printed, cut and folded into 13mm x 13mm size and placed into the waiting Ingenium physical coin, the hologram sticker is fixed in place immediately. No digital copy of the keys remain, any surplus paper is shredded. This method ensures that no one knows the private key that inside the coin.”
— – Infinitum

Mode Two is a self implementation of a bitcoin wallet, which allows for the purchaser to generate their own public address and private key. A hologram sticker is provided to keep the private key hidden on the reverse of the coin.

Mode Three implements a password for private key encryption. This particular method is aimed towards customers with advanced knowledge of Bitcoin. “We recommend two factor authentications using BIP38” states Infinitum.

Should the coin be misplaced or stolen, the private key is hidden behind a sticker, nothing else. The owner will no longer be able to access their funds unless they have a copy of the information hidden elsewhere, and the bitcoin assets will only be as secure as the physical coin. “The advantage BIP38 or two factor encryption is that we Infinitum can never know the actual public key address as we do not have the password to decrypt it. It provides a high level of security.” states Infinitum. However, should the owner of the coin forget the password, the coins stored on that wallet will be inaccessible.

“the price of the coin is the same no matter which mode the customer chooses,”
— – Infinitum

It has been no small feat for Infinitum to pull together their project in the last year.  The coin is  a sum of parts that have been manufactured and sourced around the world. The security holograms come from the USA, the laser cut coin dies from Switzerland, coin box from local suppliers, Certificate paper from Germany.  “The actual silver coin minting is done in Dubai, so from all over the world we have tried, tested and sourced the very best materials and also the looked for the very best skills to help us produce a quality coin,” said Johns.