$55,800: Swiss Luxury Watchmaker Prices ‘Encrypto’ Bitcoin Watches
Add some bitcoin to your bling. | Source: Franck Muller
By CCN.com: The Encrypto watches by Franck Muller, which will cost you anywhere between $9,800-$55,880 to acquire, has a built-in cold storage system. The public address is accessible on the outside of the watch, while to get the private key, you need to get inside the watch.
Not Ideal: Company Provides You A Private Key
You can check the balance using the dial, or scan the public address and put it into a blockchain explorer.
One question arises: if the public address has to be etched into the watch, that means that watch’s manufacturer at some point has access to the private key. This means a security breach could easily allow someone to swipe whatever funds people decided to store on the devices.
A second complication arises. Unlike a regular Rolex or another piece of fancy jewelry, you can’t ever really sell this watch. At least not with the value-added cold storage system intact. The buyer could never be sure you hadn’t copied the private key and held onto it.
Further, it wouldn’t be advisable to buy one of these watches except directly from the manufacturer, which assumes you trust them in the first place.
Yours For Life
It probably would have been more ideal to use a digital display for the public address so that the user could generate it him or herself. A company called Regal Assets were responsible for the creation of this part of the watch. On this subject, the press release about the Muller watch reads:
“The watch’s cold storage wallet uses offline generated, non-deterministic TRNGs (True Random Numbers Generated) that cannot be hacked. The method for storing Bitcoin is quite popular among hodlers and early adopters due to its increased security and peace of mind. Rather than rely on slips of paper, users can scan the QR code on their watch to check their balance and deposit BTC in their personal safe, or their fully insured deep cold storage vault if they are buying BTC from Regal Assets.”
Designed with wealthier Bitcoiners in mind, the elegant watches range from just under $10,000 to over $38,000 per unit. Muller has several designs for men and women, including a limited run of 50 watches each over $25,000.
The famous Swiss watchmaker does allow you to pay with Bitcoin, however, offering the payment method alongside traditional bank wire. Credit and debit cards are currently not accepted, though the press release says they are.
The unique nature of the luxury product makes such details trivial.
Bitcoiners have a variety of options for cold storage. The cold storage system in this watch is less than optimal, but the fashion statement of having a diamond-encrusted Bitcoin symbol on one’s wrist is an undeniably hard flex. As such, we can probably expect these watches to start popping up at conventions and the like.