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Burger King Now Has Its Own Cryptocurrency - the 'Whoppercoin' - in Russia (fortune.com)

Posted by EditorDavid on from the dollar-menus dept.

An anonymous reader quotes Fortune:According to New York Magazine (via local Russian news reports), the Russian subdivision of Burger King has launched its own cryptocurrency, aptly called "Whoppercoin"... For each Whopper burger customers purchase, they'll receive one Whoppercoin in a special cryptocurrency wallet. While the coins' wider use is unclear, some reports suggest that the Whoppercoin will be accepted as payment at Burger Kings across Russia... Burger King has reportedly issued one billion Whoppercoin tokens to date on Waves Platform, though it is possible that there will be more to come.
Burger King Russia is now also reportedly accepting bitcoin as a form of payment.

63 comments

  1. What is a currency? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    If this is only good for buying from Burger King, is it really a currency? Isn't it more of an electronic coupon? Unless there's a wider usage for this, it seems to be a publicity stunt (like the OK, Google ads) and an incorrect use of the word 'currency.'

    1. Re: What is a currency? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      More of a currency than Bitcoin.

      I bet Burger King can tell you what prices are in whoppercoins, and people hoping to buy things might hold them instead of speculators hoping they go up.

    2. Re:What is a currency? by WheezyJoe · · Score: 1

      Article doesn't say. At best it suggests maybe this "currency" will be redeemable at other Russian Burger Czars... Kings.
      Suspiciously short article, suspiciously short on facts or even news. Hints maybe that Burger Putins might also accept bitcoin, but again, nothing said for sure. Stupid article.

      --
      Take it easy, Charlie, I've got an Angle...
    3. Re: What is a currency? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well, this is a known problem with having a limited money supply. It's going to suffer deflation, leading everyone to hold it hoping the value will go up rather than spending it. With inflation, the economy gets stimulated because everything is on sale today compared to more expensive tomorrow. With bitcoin the opposite is true, so there is a good incentive to never actually buy anything since it will be cheaper tomorrow. Eventually the economy slows down and goes into recession. All those fiat currency nuts worried about hyperinflation are about to find out why deflation is deadly for an economy.

    4. Re:What is a currency? by dunkelfalke · · Score: 0

      A czar is an emperor, not a king.

      --
      "It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
    5. Re:What is a currency? by WheezyJoe · · Score: 1

      A czar is an emperor, not a king.

      I stand corrected, thank you. Burger Emperor. I want in, I think there's potential there.

      --
      Take it easy, Charlie, I've got an Angle...
    6. Re: What is a currency? by alvinrod · · Score: 1

      Sure it's a currency. It's value is tied to the Whopper (or some other goods at their stores) and as long as Burger King will honor in trade for a Whopper them they hold value.

      Otherwise they hold no more or less value than paper dollars outside of most people being willing to accept dollars. The ultimate value of a dollar is that governments require payment of taxes using them so everyone eventually needs some. Otherwise I am no more obligated to accept dollars for something in trade than I am to accept Burger King's currency. But if I were selling a car, I could choose to accept payment in the form of some number of these crypto coins just as easily. If I then trade them with someone else for a TV, they are functionally no different than currency other than these coins may be pegged to the Whopper, so these are more like a gold (or other commodity-backed) currency than most government fiat currencies that exist.

      There also probably isn't a whole lot of trust in this currency at this point so I don't think it will be used for large transactions and holders may have to trade them to others unfavorably compared to other currencies due to their more limited utility.

    7. Re:What is a currency? by sittingnut · · Score: 1

      if this is "currency", then so are loyalty points, frequent-flyer miles, etc, etc, and such.

    8. Re: What is a currency? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Is a coupon a currency? If I run a business and produce coupons for my product, am I therefore printing currency? Those coupons can be exchanged for goods and/or services. In many cases, coupons also something that resembles an exchange rate to currencies. Ever read the fine print on a coupon? Many of them say they have a value of 1/20th of a cent, so it is actually possible to collect 20 of those coupons and exchange them for a cent. The business controls the supply of coupons and obviously won't make the opposite exchange. However, it does fix a value to the coupons relative to currencies, which is essentially an exchange rate. So, are those coupons currencies?

      I'd say the answer is no because those coupons are highly unlikely to be accepted for any monetary value anywhere other than my business, despite the pledge to pay out one cent per 20 coupons. The inability to use the coupons elsewhere would defeat the purpose of a currency.

    9. Re:What is a currency? by unixisc · · Score: 1

      True. OTOH, if one can live only on Burger King's meals, it's real enough for a big portion of their expenses.

    10. Re: What is a currency? by GrumpySteen · · Score: 1

      these are more like a gold (or other commodity-backed) currency than most government fiat currencies that exist.

      Except these seem to be backed by saturated fat and sodium, which makes it odd that they were launched in Russia instead of the USA.

    11. Re: What is a currency? by alvinrod · · Score: 1
      Most coupons expire and are destroyed upon use, so it's quite clear that they don't like like other traditional currencies in a lot of ways. A person could still trade a $10-off coupon for something else, so there are some similarities, but I don't think you took the time to think about why coupons might not be currency, whereas something like Burger King's crypto coin might meet that definition more easily.

      If you want to know why most coupons have that small print of being worth some tiny fraction of a cent, you may want to look into the history of trading stamps. The quick answer is because of various state laws, so nation-wide chains will add that to coupons in order to comply with century old laws that exist in certain states. Some of these laws were also later applied to coupons as well once they became more popular and widely used, hence the same tiny fraction of cash value.

      The inability to use the coupons elsewhere would defeat the purpose of a currency.

      While the ease of use of a currency is why people use it in place of something else, you wouldn't get very far in the United States trying to pay with Euros, yet they are still no doubt currency. The same applies with U.S. dollars in many other parts of the world, but you won't argue that U.S. dollars aren't a currency for that reason. The issue is that these crypto coins are just accepted in far fewer places, so they lack the same utility as most currencies. The only advantage they possibly hold though is the guarantee of being redeemable for a Whopper (or whatever other products they may be good for) and if Burger King were to refuse to do that their value would collapse quickly. However, if other businesses also start accepting them as a form of payment, then they become much more like the Euro, the U.S. dollar, or other various government issued currencies in terms of utility.

    12. Re:What is a currency? by ClickOnThis · · Score: 1

      Exactly. The companies that run loyalty programs typically have rules against selling or exchanging such points with third parties, unless they allow it explicitly. If these points were a true currency, the issuer would not restrict their use.

      --
      If it weren't for deadlines, nothing would be late.
    13. Re:What is a currency? by PolygamousRanchKid+ · · Score: 1

      OTOH, if one can live only on Burger King's meals, it's real enough for a big portion of their expenses.

      Anyone can live only on Burger King's meals . . . it's just a question of how long you'll live.

      --
      Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
    14. Re:What is a currency? by unixisc · · Score: 1

      That's irrelevant. Point is not having to starve to death. And avoid the fries, if one wants to avoid the fats.

    15. Re:What is a currency? by ChromeAeonium · · Score: 1

      I wonder what the exchange rate for Woppercoin to Chuck E. Cheese tickets is?

    16. Re: What is a currency? by king+neckbeard · · Score: 1

      This is an interesting case, because presumably, Burger King can manipulate the supply. Also, if the currency is tied to the menu prices, then you've basically got a food backed currency.

      --
      This is my signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
    17. Re: What is a currency? by hackwrench · · Score: 1

      A czar an Emperor and a king are three different things.

    18. Re: What is a currency? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Specifically, a czar is a title of a specific emperor - Caesar. The Slavic languages dont use that dipthing though so they simple made it seezar. Czar.

      #truthiness

    19. Re:What is a currency? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Burger Oligarch? Burger Kleptocrat? Burger Big Brother? Burger President-For-Life? Burger Supreme Leader? ok ill stop

    20. Re: What is a currency? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I think of 2 different currencies: a dollar bill circa 1888, and one Japanese ryo circa 1660.

      The dollar bill could be exchanged for a quantity of gold. Does that not make it a coupon? The Japanese Ryo could be traded for 1 years rice for one person. At the time that amounted to about 270 L of rice. Being able to trade a currency for food is therefore not unprecedented.

    21. Re:What is a currency? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No this is absolutely not a form of currency. They are redeemable coupons that are used to internally track the voucher or liability they have to a customer (known or unknown). You'd find expiry dates on the coins / numbers / vouchers and terms and conditions for redemption somewhere in the mix. This is just an overdone form of Gift Cards and really quite a waste of said technology which is just going to cause more headaches than it saves.

      Good one Whopper! Sounds great you clickbaited people to guy eat your crap food.

  2. Bitcoin as payment? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Have fun waiting anywhere from 30 minutes to four hours for your payments to clear. Hope you're not too hungry.

    1. Re:Bitcoin as payment? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Whoppercoins must have less hash for quicker customer satisfaction. Maybe there will be some free coke for the customers adopting it. A slow-food restaurant wouldn't have to weed out such currencies, as the customers come out of their carbon-hydrate benders.

    2. Re: Bitcoin as payment? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      As of today, if you want it to clear in 30 minutes, the transaction fee will be around $8.

  3. Congrats, Burger King Russia! by Opportunist · · Score: 4, Insightful

    You just reinvented the coupon.

    But I guess calling it a cryptocurrency is better for PR.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
    1. Re:Congrats, Burger King Russia! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I see it more like rewards points various business and credit cards offer.

    2. Re:Congrats, Burger King Russia! by Kjella · · Score: 1

      You just reinvented the coupon. But I guess calling it a cryptocurrency is better for PR.

      If it's one non-transferable whoppercoin discount per purchase, then yes. If you can buy/sell/transfer whoppercoins to other wallets and pay entirely in whoppercoins without restrictions, it's a quasi-currency.

      --
      Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
    3. Re:Congrats, Burger King Russia! by SCVonSteroids · · Score: 1

      Kind of like Canadian Tire money, I believe?

      --
      I tend to rant.
    4. Re:Congrats, Burger King Russia! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well, we will see. I remember listening to the smart-alecs on Slashdot telling me that Bitcoins were ridiculous, and only a fool would bother mining them.

      https://news.slashdot.org/story/10/07/11/1747245/bitcoin-releases-version-03

    5. Re:Congrats, Burger King Russia! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      These can be traded and eventually end up as fiat. Unlike actual coupons where that would be illegal.

    6. Re:Congrats, Burger King Russia! by Opportunist · · Score: 1

      How are coupons non-transferable. Here, take my coupon book. Presto, transfer complete!

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
    7. Re: Congrats, Burger King Russia! by louden+obscure · · Score: 1

      Or maybe Ricky's hash coins.

      --
      Serenity now, insanity later.
    8. Re:Congrats, Burger King Russia! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well no because Fiat is a term used for Govt. Crypto currencies are not Fiat, that's what makes them good so-to-speak.

    9. Re:Congrats, Burger King Russia! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's better than a coupon!
      It's a coupon that burger king can track... they know they gave it to you, but they can see you gave it to some one, and they gave it to some one else, and then that person used it to buy a whopper...
      Burger King just started tracking it's coupons, and the relationships it's customers have with each other, and we called it cryptocurrency.

      Oh and don't worry about your wallet being private, if you want to get a whopper you have to go to a store at some point and there are cameras in all of those already!

  4. since BK calls what they serve "food" by turkeydance · · Score: 3

    they can call their coupon "Whoppercoin"

  5. Accepting bitcoin by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It might actually make sense for Burger King to prefer Bitcoin than some other currencies. That certainly isn't true for currencies like the US dollar, Canadian dollar, pound sterling, and Euro. However, the ruble has been devalued a number of times. If a nation's currency has a high enough inflation rate, bitcoin might actually be a preferable form of payment. The main issues with bitcoin are the volatility and quite possibly that the current value is due to a pretty large bubble. However, it might be preferable over some government-backed currencies if those currencies are unstable enough -- and the ruble isn't exactly a stable currency.

  6. How does the proof-of-work aspect work? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    So with Bitcoin there's the proof-of-work aspect that's done by wasting a huge amount of energy generating hashes. But what's the equivalent with this proprietary, custom blockchain? Does Burger King have computers spinning their wheels generating hashes?

    1. Re: How does the proof-of-work aspect work? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Unlikely. They're the central authority to create Whoppercoins, so the only thing they need to do is cryptographically sign them. Like signing your email with your private key, this is really computationally cheap to do and expensive to crack.

    2. Re:How does the proof-of-work aspect work? by mikael · · Score: 1

      Well, if you use solar panels to power your mining rig, then you can earn SolarCoins at the same time.

      --
      Vintage computer adverts: http://www.vintageadbrowser.com/computers-and-software-ads
  7. Commodity fetishism to the next level by fubarrr · · Score: 1

    Uncle Lenin will be proud

    1. Re: Commodity fetishism to the next level by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That's grandpa Lenin, you insensitive clod.

  8. white paper by religionofpeas · · Score: 2

    So, where's the white paper where we can read the technical details of this coin ? Or is just some nonsensical fluff piece with no other purpose than to promote Burger King ?

  9. Why is a business promoting cyptocurrency? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Why would a legitimate business do so much to promote a cryptocurrency? Is it really big in Russia? Is it really a marketing stunt?
    Or are they laundering illegitimate coin?
    I would really look at that last one.

  10. What about Italy? by Hognoxious · · Score: 0

    In Italy they use woppocoins.

    --
    Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
  11. My computer is ready by Presence+Eternal · · Score: 1

    Hey, pay me five bucks a day and I'll hash whatever the hell you want.

  12. The important question is by nospam007 · · Score: 1

    Can we mine our whoppers at home?

  13. excellent by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    fiat is dead, bitcoin is dead, all other standards have collapsed ... except whoppercoin

    The Year of the Whopper

  14. How about the Tasteslikepoopcoin? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Trust me. I would know.

  15. In Soviet Russia... by Squiff · · Score: 2

    Burger king pays you in bitcoin

  16. economist by bugs2squash · · Score: 1

    what's it' worth on the big mac index ?

    --
    Nullius in verba
    1. Re:economist by infolation · · Score: 1

      and what's the current MACD of the whoppercoin?

  17. This is why this won't work by slashmydots · · Score: 1

    A brand new crypto with its own blockchain, yay. What's the golden rule of cryptocurrencies? You can't fake a transaction or steal bitcoins with a false transaction unless you can outprocess the entire rest of the network consistently to mine and verify your own block all by yourself. I know of a couple thousand people or so that could individually outprocess what is likely their pathetic little room full of a couple GPUs. In fact, my rig probably could. JUST USE BITCOINS, YOU IDIOTS.

    1. Re:This is why this won't work by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Seriously? Did you even read the article? Buy a whopper, get a free whoppercoin. Maybe you can use those coins for something in the future, like another whopper. Maybe not. JUST USE BITCOINS for what? Who's going to give me a free BitCoin for buying a whopper? That use is significantly worse for BitCoin than whoppercoin. This is like saying "don't use a coupon, use BitCoin."

      If this article were advocating setting up whoppercoin exchanges (MtGox?) paying for other things in whoppercoin, investing / speculating in whoppercoin, I'd agree with you. As the article advocates none of those things, I conclude that you wrote a comment for an article you failed to read. Is this true? Did you even read the article?

    2. Re:This is why this won't work by sheramil · · Score: 1

      A brand new crypto with its own blockchain, yay. What's the golden rule of cryptocurrencies?

      The value will rise and fall at random, albeit with rumors that Russian gangsters / George Soros / 4chan / The illuminati are manipulating it, there will be three or four incidences of someone stealing - reportedly - billions of dollars worth of them, destabilizing the whole system, and ultimately people will forget about them until years later a story surfaces (on slashdot, naturally) where someone has five hundred million Whoppercoins and they try to redeem them all at the same time, and people have a hearty chuckle before forgetting it all again.

    3. Re: This is why this won't work by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Pay in bitcoin for a burger worth maybe $5, and potentially pay a bitcoin transaction fee of $5 or more? Why would you do that?

  18. stop inventing new names for practically unchnged by mapkinase · · Score: 1

    Stop inventing new names for practically unchanged old concepts. I am tired of this shit.

    --
    I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
  19. Cat got your tongue? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    That is *not* cyrptocurrency, if I am not wrong when I get a Bitcoin I can buy *anything* with it, everywhere.

    But the cards with "happy points" for use only in the "happy shop" are around since 1980s. Heck, I have like 2 two of these in my wallet now from a supermarket and a drugstore. Really this site has less tech news and more clickbait news, really a shame.

    1. Re:Cat got your tongue? by sheramil · · Score: 1

      That is *not* cyrptocurrency, if I am not wrong when I get a Bitcoin I can buy *anything* with it, everywhere.

      You are wrong. You can't buy anything with it, everywhere. You can't even buy a Whopper with it.

  20. "Whoppercoin" ? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Isn't that a generic nickname for any cryptocurrency?

  21. Central banck by manu0601 · · Score: 1

    At lease, here is a cryptocurrency backed by real economy assets: burgers. It is weird to think of a fast food chain as the central bank, though.