Blowfish restaurant, six other businesses accept ethereum from Olympic guests

SKI ZONE, a skis and snowboards rental shop in PyeongChang, Gangwon Province, is one of seven businesses that started accepting ethereum as a payment method to attract visitors to the PyeongChang Winter Olympic Games. / Courtesy of Yongpyong Ski Zone webs

By Ko Dong-hwan

Holders of digital currency visiting the PyeongChang Winter Olympics can avoid the inconvenience of exchanging it for South Korean won as seven locations in the host and venue cities have started accepting ethereum.

Six locations in PyeongChang and one in Gangneung are welcoming customers who want to pay with ethereum as well as with conventional credit cards and cash.

The digital currency can be used with “Coinduck,” a South Korean app designed by blockchain builder Chain Partners. The tech firm says the app, for the first time in the world, uses ethereum for payment, charging a two percent service fee.

The locations in PyeongChang are a coffee shop, a hotel, a souvenir shop renting skis and snowboards, three lodging facilities, and in Gangeung a restaurant specializing in serving blowfish.

However, there haven’t been a considerable number of transactions using ethereum so far, as only a few trades have been reported.

At the ski rental shop, its first ethereum transaction took place Feb. 18 when a foreign tourist made a payment worth 100,000 won ($93). At one of the lodging facilities that launched the ethereum-payment system to attract tourists visiting for the Olympics, one customer paid 150,000 won with the digital currency.

No ethereum transactions have been reported at the blowfish restaurant as of Feb. 20. A restaurant employee said some foreigners showed interest in the digital currency’s availability and took photos of the shop. The shop tested the digital currency in a dry-run, finding it took less than five seconds to make a transaction.

Business operators wishing to use ethereum as a payment option on Coinduck can register as a partner shop on the app’s website.

Other digital currencies such as bitcoin are not yet accepted for use in PyeongChang and Gangneung. A Coinduck official said the app will soon enable other currencies to be used by users.