The price of bitcoin in Zimbabwe is significantly higher than it is in other places around the world, so if you want to buy something outside Zimbabwe that has a similar price in Zimbabwe, then you can take advantage of the difference in the price of bitcoin between the two countries, to get a discount that is proportional to the difference in the price of bitcoin. This is what we call in the industry: “taking advantage of arbitrage”.
This is what we call in the industry: “taking advantage of arbitrage”.
I decided to ‘take advantage of arbitrage’ to get a discount on an airline ticket recently.
My colleagues will be attending the Texas Bitcoin Conference at the end of this month so I decided to see how much money I can save if I ordered the ticket for one of them in a different country and then make the payment in Zimbabwe while using bitcoin as the rails to move the money. Because of the difference in the price of bitcoin between the US and Zimbabwe, I saved 41%.
At the time when I made the payment, the price of bitcoin on Golix (Zimbabwe’s crptocurrency exchange) was $8199.99 and on Coinbase it was $4840.
Here’s how I did it
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- I called the South African Airways office in South Africa (+27 11 978 1111) and made my booking over the phone. I told them that I just wanted to book now and pay later. When you do this, they will email you a booking confirmation and then they give you 24 hours to make the payment as well as the whole amount you should pay.
- I then called the South African Airways office in Zimbabwe (+263 8677 702 702), and told them that I have a booking that I want to pay for using bank transfer. They emailed me their banking information.
- I then bought 0.2494 BTC Coinbase at a price of $4,840. The total cost of buying that bitcoin was
$1207.09 - I then sold the bitcoin on Golix at a price of $8,199 price to get $2,045
- After selling the bitcoin, I had $2,045 in my USD wallet so I had that money sent straight from my Golix wallet to the bank account that the Zimbabwe South African Airways office sent me.
- I did all this within an hour and without having to leave the office.
However, before trying it out you should keep in mind that:
- This may not work with any airline. I only tried this with South African Airways. If you have done this with a different airline, or if you have an airline you want me to try for a second colleague who is making a similar trip, please let me know in the comments section below.
- A booking is only reserved for 24 hours. If you make your payment via Golix, Golix will send the payment as a bank transfer which also takes a day to go through in Zimbabwe. I got around that by sending the South African Airways Zimbabwe office a proof of payment and then asking them to hold on to my booking until the transfer went through. If you plan to do this too you may want to first inform the Golix team using a subject like: “Proof of payment for SAA ticket”. A proof of payment was easy and quick for me to get because I work for Golix.
- The price of bitcoin is volatile and there is no guarantee that you will always save 41% (your mileage may vary).
If you have ‘taken advantage of the arbitrage’ to get a discount on any other product or service, please let me know in the comments section below..
This guest article was authored by Panashe Tapera, a financial tech enthusiast and is entrenched in the cryptocurrency community.
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21 comments
interesting article. How do you get started if you want to be part of this whole bitcoin game and are there ready buyers and sellers on the bitcoin market across the US and Zimbabwe.
Quite easy, you can sign up here on golix.io and you’re able to buy/sell Cryptos.
Not worth gambling, bitcoin has lost 15% in the last 5 days. Why not just burn the US dollars?
I’m really interested in investing money in bitcoin but how do I go about it. Please shed more information.
where are you? do you want buy btc? i have many more btc from china
Hot To Get A 41% Discount On Airline Tickets In Zimbabwe… Maybe u wanna check your grammar in your heading. Don’t u have proofreaders lol
They always have these annoying silly grammatical and spelling mistakes! nxa
Bt did you manage to understand the point s/he was trying to put across, as far as l can tell s/he is not a trained journalist
still, it shows lack of concentration and awareness, we are accepting more and more mediocrity with each passing day here!
I would take this article with a pinch of salt. That or assume the writer theorized this transaction than having actually carried it out.
Firstly Coinbase is only open to American users. It will not work for Zimbabweans.
In the event you find a registered user willing to help, funding their Coinbase account is a challenge as Zim banks are not processing TT’s freely – there is a priority list and this would hardly be entertained by any bank valuing their license! In the case you use a debit card, you would need to prefund it and that means buying USD from the black market at a premium of more than 50% currently. So no savings after the whole transation.
Once you manage to get around all those headaches and try sell on Golix you will be faced with liquidity challenges. It’s hard to sell bitcoin worth more than $1,000 at one go at one price. So to sell BTC 0.2494 at your required price you will have to be very patient (a day or so) or choose to drop 10-15% selling into the order book. Then you will drop another 2% because you are not a market maker but taker..
All these steps could take you at least 3 days to go through and who knows that by by then the price of bitcoin would not have dropped or risen (it’s extremely volatile). That or your booking would have been cancelled and you would need to rebook at a higher fee.
The writer should not mislead people. This transaction if not worth your time or effort after the time delays, hidden fees and anxiety of bitcoin price.
yes, i was about to ask about this too. how did he buy from coinbase when the current bank international card/transfer limits are so restricted. this article is just bait for you to get on touch with Golix.
So the writer clearly states that he is not in Zimbabwe here, “My colleagues will be attending the Texas Bitcoin Conference at the end of this month so I decided to see how much money I can save if I ordered the ticket for one of them in a different country and then make the payment in Zimbabwe while using bitcoin as the rails to move the money”
The writer is not in Zimbabwe, but was however able to make a payment for an airline ticket for someone in Zimbabwe who will be attending a conference. For most Zimbos they would not be able to purchase BTC on Coinbase however they might have someone who can do it on their behalf and able to take advantage of the discount.
“For most Zimbos they would not be able to purchase BTC on Coinbase however they might have someone who can do it on their behalf and able to take advantage of the discount” Correction, there is no discount as the Coinbase price is the approx going global price.
Golix price however is at a premium so is the USD on the parallel market – ie same as selling USD on parallel market and buying ticket.
As Kilotango rightfully said “his article is just bait for you to get on touch with Golix”.
A fintech enthusiast should know “screenshot or it didn’t happen”.
There is a 41% premium on bitcoin in Zimbabwe for a reason. USD is selling for a premium on the parallel market and hence this is actually reflecting on bitcoin. “Markets can be both irrational and efficient at the same time”. No arbitrage here,
Thats one way to look at it,
Arbitrage defined is “the simultaneous buying and selling of securities, currency, or commodities in different markets or in derivative forms in order to take advantage of differing prices for the same asset” .The underlying cause of the differences in the price of the asset is not an issue, just taking advantage of price differences is arbitrage irrespective of what caused the difference in pricing.
uyo anonzi sally rinenge benzi iro,spelling ine basa rei ipapo pane kuti unzwe logic uriku tsvaga zvemaspellings.
Techzim please screen your articles.I like the site but this article puts your standards down….he should have sent the usd directly and you can get a 60% premium….it’s a false pretense that his is actually saving when he just converting his dollars to bond
How did you buy Bitcoins from Coin base, When Zimbabwe is not a supported country to buy bitcoins from Coin Base
I clearly said i was not in Zimbabwe when i did this transaction.
Whats your connection to/with Golix?
Here we go, from linkedin, got free advertising for the article above, well done:
Panashe Tapera
Growth Hacker & Accountant at Golix (A Local Bitcoin Exchange.)
BitFinance University of Zimbabwe