Scott Buchanan discusses the functioning of Crypto ATM. He predicts the use of digital currency in the current market space focusing on traditional finances.
1. Tell us about your role in Bitcoin Depot.
As the CFO of Bitcoin Depot, I am responsible for all financial aspects of our business, including strategic finance, mergers and acquisitions, capital acquisition, financial planning and analysis, accounting, and long-term modeling. I also oversee our legal and HR departments.
2. Can you tell us about your journey into the Fintech space?
Earlier in my career, I worked at KPMG where I had several Fintech clients, which exposed me to the industry. I have always found Fintech very interesting, but it wasn’t until I joined Bitcoin Depot just over two years ago that I got the opportunity to truly immerse myself in this space.
3. How do you think technology is developing the finance sector?
Technology has been rapidly disrupting the finance sector for several years now, and I believe cryptocurrency and blockchain technology is only accelerating that disruption.
Cryptocurrency is going to continue to weave its way into the traditional finance world as adoption increases.
4. How has a data-driven approach enhanced the financial industry?
Data analytics is core to our business decision making, and the same can probably be said for most companies in the financial sector. Data has allowed many Fintech companies to provide a higher level of value to customers over the past few years.
5. Can you explain how exactly your crypto ATM works?
Our crypto ATMs allow customers to purchase cryptocurrency with cash in more than 5,000 retail locations across the country, providing fast and convenient physical access points for converting cash to cryptocurrency. Using our kiosks is fairly simple – the customer just needs to follow the instructions on the touchscreen to start the transaction. They’ll need to create an account using their phone number and once that’s completed, they can select which cryptocurrency they want to purchase, then scan their crypto wallet to show where to send their purchased crypto.
6. We recently covered your growth news, according to you what are the factors that contributed to this phenomenal growth?
Cryptocurrency has continued to become more mainstream over the past few years and that has driven demand for our service as well. Bitcoin Depot’s growth has been propelled by the strategic direction of our industry-leading team, which has decades of experience in the traditional ATM space as well as Fintech. This invaluable experience within the industry has allowed us to rapidly scale to meet the growing demand for crypto ATMs.
7. What are your predictions about the future of digital currencies and/or the industry?
Digital currency will continue to proliferate across the entire finance industry. Bitcoin has shown tremendous value during this period of rapid inflation and that protection against inflation will be just one of several reasons why cryptocurrency will become more and more prevalent in traditional finance over time.
8. What advice would you give to other aspiring start-ups?
One of the most important aspects when scaling a start-up is to find a strong addressable market and to acutely focus on meeting the needs of that market. Once you have a strong fit there, building a high-performance team is critical to a founder’s ability to scale a successful business.
9. What start-up technology or business idea has grabbed your attention recently?
One technology that has made a lot of waves recently is Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs). NFTs have had a huge year in 2021 and the concept has been very intriguing to me. It will be interesting to see if this momentum carries into 2022, or if it was more of a short-term trend. I personally think they will continue to grow in popularity, but that they will likely evolve into more of a focused market.
10. Any new or upcoming developments at Bitcoin Depot we should be aware of?
We recently deployed our 5,000th kiosk! That was a huge milestone for us as a company and we are continuing to expand rapidly to meet market demand. Outside of that we are also planning to enter several new international markets as we head into 2022. We believe there is strong demand for our kiosks outside of solely operating in North America as we are today.
11. What books are you reading these days?
As a company we recently read Radical Candor by Kim Scott. We discussed this book with all the managers across Bitcoin Depot and challenged each other to be more candid with one another to make sure we always motivate each other to be the best possible version of ourselves.
11. We’ve heard that you have a fun and cool work culture. Tell us more about that or share some photos.
We make a concerted effort to ensure Bitcoin Depot is always a positive and fun work environment that our employees enjoy. The pandemic has certainly made it more difficult to do in-person events but, even with that challenge, we have continued our team-building activities over Zoom. This has allowed us to stay connected as a team, which is extremely important since we are adding so many employees each month.
12. Can you tell us about or give us a glimpse into some of the apps on your phone currently?
Bitcoin Depot recently launched our own mobile wallet app, so I would say that is the most interesting app on my phone currently. We created our mobile app to provide our customers with another level of service they can use in addition to our core kiosk offering.
