đź“– Unfamiliar terms? See the glossary for definitions.
The core innovation. No company, no servers, no permission needed.
✅ Updated (2026-09-21) — Phase-0 discovery is Nostr. The “query all listings on-chain” step assumed below is not supported by our Electrum/Fulcrum server (no category enumeration). So Phase 0 finds listings via Nostr (NIP-99 — signed events, cached locally). The on-chain anchor is planned (Phase 0+): it makes listings censorship-resistant and enumerable on-chain, but is not required to discover them today.
The Asgaya Bulletin Board is open discovery data. Not a website. Not a database. In Phase 0 it is signed Nostr listings — anyone can post, anyone can read, no one needs permission. (A censorship-resistant on-chain copy — the anchor — is planned for Phase 0+.)
Anyone can post. Anyone can read. No one can censor it.
Every participant is either a BCH Seller (has BCH, wants fiat) or a BCH Buyer (has an asset, wants BCH). Everything else — the asset, the payment rail — is a field.
These two “types” are an internal label, not two classes. On the board every poster is a seller — of BCH, or of some other asset — and only the asset changes; the label is derived, never chosen.
The board is asset-agnostic: the asset is a free field. Anyone can list any asset — a fiat (EUR, VES), a token (H€, HAu, PUSD), or even a non-monetary good (e.g. rice). Asgaya does not curate which assets are listed; that neutrality is the point, and the legal posture: no intermediary, nothing for us to control.
A seller posts a listing with their accepted payment methods (Bizum, SEPA, cash or card in person), a fee (a Phase-0 bootstrap default of 0.5%), and the volatility buffer (7%). When a sender selects them and pays €100 via Bizum, the seller’s bot detects the payment and locks €107 worth of BCH into the covenant. The seller earns its fee (€0.50 at the default) plus any unused buffer if BCH appreciates during the window.
Guarantee: The seller never locks BCH until their bank confirms the fiat payment. No capital risk.
A buyer posts a listing with their payment method. For a merchant, that method is “cash at my shop” (or card in person) plus a location. For an online buyer, it’s “bank transfer” or “PagoMóvil.”
Merchants are BCH buyers. Nothing more. A merchant is just a buyer whose payment method is cash and who has a physical address. The system doesn’t need a separate “merchant” category.
When a recipient visits the merchant, they hand over the claim, receive cash, and both sign. The merchant earns its fee in BCH. The recipient is now in the shop—likely to buy groceries. The remittance fee is the door opener.
| Feature | LocalBitcoins / Binance P2P | Asgaya Bulletin Board |
|---|---|---|
| Storage | Central database (company servers) | Signed Nostr listings — no server; on-chain anchor (Phase 0+) |
| Discovery | Website API (single point of failure) | Any client reads the same open listings (any relay/index) |
| Censorship | Platform can ban you | Permissionless |
| Trust | Platform escrow (custody risk) | Covenants (non-custodial) |
| Regulation | Platform liable (KYC required) | No intermediary (MiCA compliant) |
| Uptime | Depends on company | Depends on BCH network (99.99%) |
There’s no company to shut down. LocalBitcoins was ordered to close. The bulletin board is just open data — no one can turn it off.
The app publishes a signed Nostr event (NIP-99, kind:30402) — an addressable listing carrying the offer (ad type, asset, payment methods, fee, buffer, limits, location) and the poster’s BCH pubkey + npub. It is replaceable: republishing with the same id updates it.
No transaction, no fee — live in seconds.
Each device keeps a local cache of the listings it sees on its relays (one subscription, filtered by the asgaya-board tag), then filters and ranks client-side. No API, no website — any client can read the same open events.
Republish the same listing id with new details → relays replace the old version. Set the listing’s status to paused to hide it; delete to remove it.
On-chain anchor (planned, Phase 0+): the discovery-critical fields (identity, asset, payment method) will also live in a per-seller BCH NFT, so a listing survives relay censorship and can one day be enumerated directly on-chain. Until then, Nostr is the Phase-0 discovery layer.
Phase 0 (Nostr): listings are free to publish, so spam is handled client-side (validity checks + pruning) and by relay policy. The on-chain 0.001 BCH deposit (~€0.50) returns with the Phase-0+ anchor, where faking a listing at scale gets expensive.
This is an unknown. We don’t yet know whether the deposit (or relay policy / listing limits) is enough. Phase 0/0+ will test it.
See: Bulletin Board Anti-Spam Strategies for full analysis of alternatives and testing plan.
Because listings are just signed events, you can post as many as you want.
You have bank accounts in Spain and Venezuela. Post as a BCH Seller (accepting Bizum) and as a BCH Buyer (paying via PagoMóvil). Receive €100 from a sender, lock BCH into a covenant. The merchant in Venezuela receives the BCH. Buy that same BCH back from the merchant via PagoMóvil. Your BCH returns to your wallet. Net: seller fee + buyer spread on the same capital.
You’re a merchant in Venezuela with family in Spain. Post as a BCH Buyer (cash at shop) and as a BCH Seller (via family’s Bizum). A sender pays your family €100. You receive the BCH at your shop, hand cash to the recipient, and they buy €20 of groceries. Recycle the BCH through your family’s seller listing. Net: merchant fee + seller fee + grocery margin. The remittance is the door opener.
You receive income in multiple currencies. Post as a BCH Buyer accepting all your incoming payment rails (Bizum, MB Way, SEPA, PayPal). Post as a BCH Seller paying out in your target currencies (WeChat, Alipay). Earn a small spread on each conversion.
Bulletin board = discovery. Covenants = execution.
Seller flow: Sender finds a seller on the bulletin board → creates a covenant → pays the seller via Bizum → seller’s bot detects payment and locks BCH → covenant releases BCH to the recipient.
Buyer flow: Recipient finds a buyer (merchant) on the bulletin board → creates a covenant → visits the merchant and receives cash → both sign → covenant releases BCH to the merchant.
Key: The sender (or recipient) creates the covenant, not the seller or merchant. The counterparty co-signs after confirming payment or handing over cash.
Published (Phase 0, on Nostr): listing type, asset, payment methods, fee, and the poster’s BCH pubkey + npub.
Not published: real identity (unless you put it in the listing), transaction volume, customer details.
Pseudonymous by default. Merchants reveal location because cash pickup requires it. Online traders need only a nickname.
Reputation is derived from the identity’s settlement history on-chain — the settled covenants that touch the identity address: number of trades, completion, average value, recency. It is a continuity signal (not self-reported truth). Phase 0 runs on trusted participants (weak signal); the full model and local ranking arrive with the anchor (Phase 0+). Physical merchants get priority because their location is reputation at stake—they can’t disappear overnight.
The bulletin board isn’t a product. It’s infrastructure. When regulators shut down LocalBitcoins, users lost their marketplace. When they come for Asgaya, there’s nothing to shut down. The listings are already published (Nostr today; a censorship-resistant on-chain anchor is planned).
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