RE: DO YOU LIVE ON BITCOIN? - How Do You Live, on Bitcoin? - Is this possible today?
I am a US resident. The BitPay card was easy to get in Minnesota, but may not be available in all states.
Just 1.) order the card with a small BTC payment, and 2.) activate the card once it arrives in the mail. This is just a standard pre-paid Visa that can be funded with BTC. Loading the card with dollars basically involves selling your BTC to BitPay in a timed transaction. The card has decent limits (something like a $25,000 max balance, $3000/day spending limit, $600/day cash withdraw limit, etc) and the fees for withdrawing cash from any ATM can be kept under 2% by only withdrawing the max amount. Note: loading this card with STEEM/SBD via blocktrades conversion to BTC is possible, but be sure to over-estimate the transaction amount, and have a BTC wallet address handy for any excess funds to be refunded to if you want everything to go smoothly.
Caution: using this card for many small transactions can result in excessive fees, and using this card for physical purchases is inherently risky because it has no security chip.
In some US states (but not mine) the Coinbase "Shift" card is also available. This can be used to fund point-of-sale purchases directly with your Coinbase BTC balance.
Very nice, I hope the rules have not changed (yet)... thx