Gold Coast Mayor Tom Tate has recommended that charges may very well be paid with cryptocurrency in future years, regardless of the market crashing by $2 trillion — greater than half of its whole worth — over the previous six months.
Key factors:
- A charges enhance of about 4 per cent is anticipated for Gold Coast residents this yr
- It’s highest in a decade however beneath CPI of 5.1 per cent
- The mayor says utilizing cryptocurrency would ship an revolutionary “sign” to youthful ratepayers, however an instructional says extra analysis is required
Because the council prepares at hand down its annual price range on June 14, Gold Coast residents can anticipate to see a rates rise of at least 4 per cent — the best enhance in 10 years.
However Mr Tate has additionally introduced that council will search to rent a chief funding officer from the personal sector to encourage “innovation” and examine “joint ventures” on council-owned land.
“Why cannot we pay charges on cryptocurrency if the danger is just not excessive?” he stated.
“It sends a sign that we’re revolutionary and convey within the youthful era … [but] I am not saying we’re doing it, I am simply saying we’re all the time wanting on the subsequent stage.”
Whereas a nationwide blockchain business group has welcomed the prospect, a cryptocurrency researcher has urged extra warning.
Council wants ‘threat urge for food’
The underlying concept of cryptocurrency is that it creates a method of payment that cuts out the middleman, like a financial institution.
Whereas many discover the expertise complicated, chair of business physique Blockchain Australia Adam Poulton stated cryptocurrency was “simply one other type of cash” with an trade price linked to the Australian greenback.
“They will select to obtain that Bitcoin and maintain it themselves, or they’ll truly trade that Bitcoin into Australian {dollars}, referencing that trade price, and have these Australian {dollars} flip up of their checking account.”
However contemplating the value fluctuations cryptocurrencies experience, together with the existence of scams and the latest market crash, Mr Poulton stated “the council would wish to take a look at [its] threat urge for food”.
“The very last thing they’d need to do is settle for $2,000 price of charges, maintain it in Bitcoin and for the Bitcoin worth to halve,” he stated.
“The opposite threat is the Bitcoin might go up in worth and so they’ll even have three or 4 thousand {dollars}.”
He stated council might as an alternative settle for 95 per cent of a charges invoice in Australian {dollars} and the remaining 5 per cent in cryptocurrency.
“We’re joyful to threat that different 5 per cent and really maintain that and see what future use circumstances may very well be used with it,” he stated.
“However there’s a whole lot of stuff it’s important to grow to be accustomed to to make use of and work together with cryptocurrency in a protected technique to defend your monetary wealth.”
Extra time wanted for training
Affiliate Professor Vallipuram Muthukkumarasamy from Griffith College’s Faculty of Info and Communication Expertise stated the mainstreaming of cryptocurrency had been spoken about for years however it nonetheless remained a “speculative funding”.
“In 2015, in that period, plenty of hype was there considering ‘it is going to take over in a yr or two’,” he stated.
He stated whereas the underlying expertise had “a whole lot of alternative”, implementing it was the problem when it got here to massive bureaucratic organisations like native authorities.
“It is a paradigm shift, it is a new expertise,” he stated.
“Council charges, it is open for that, it is definitively a chance however then acceptance, verifying the expertise and implementing that, are points.
“A variety of studying must occur and the arrogance constructing must occur with that.”
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