(Replying to PARENT post)
Smartphones are essential in daily life to many people, even if they happen to be homeless.
Hopefully in most countries it is possible to have an internet connection even if you don’t have a home address. I.e that even if no one lets you buy a mobile subscription it will still be possible to have prepaid SIM cards in your country. And that some of those prepaid providers do not require that you have a home address.
(Replying to PARENT post)
The homeless used it because the banks refused to service them and sleeping on the street with cash in your socks is dangerous. That made the volatility and fees involved in cycling dollars in and out of a Bitcoin ATM look like great deal relative to their lack of options before.
(Replying to PARENT post)
(Replying to PARENT post)
In the U.S., many (most?) who are homeless still manage to have cellphones.
(Replying to PARENT post)
An internet connection is not required to hold a private key. A hardware wallet would probably make the most sense.
(Replying to PARENT post)
> Too bad grocery stores, and most other businesses, don’t accept Bitcoin as payment.
This means that Bitcoin cannot bank the unbanked (and it never could).
I also wonder how you would "bank the unbanked" by requiring them to have an internet-connected smartphone to even be able to be banked by Bitcoin.
Edit Smartphone or other internet connected device