{"id":12643,"date":"2018-02-19T13:15:57","date_gmt":"2018-02-19T17:15:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/antiguanewsroom.com\/?p=12643"},"modified":"2018-02-19T13:20:48","modified_gmt":"2018-02-19T17:20:48","slug":"aryes-antigua-hotel-will-be-funded-by-bitcoin-profits-reports","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/antiguanewsroom.com\/aryes-antigua-hotel-will-be-funded-by-bitcoin-profits-reports\/","title":{"rendered":"Ayre’s Antigua hotel will be funded by bitcoin profits-reports"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Calvin Ayre, a gambling and bitcoin multi-millionaire who was once on the run from the US authorities, is building a $100m five-star resort on Antigua funded by profits from digital currencies.<\/p>

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Canadian-born Ayre, who has been appointed Antigua and Barbuda\u2019s special economic envoy, said he had begun work on the upmarket tourist resort on Antigua\u2019s Valley Church beach.<\/p>\n

Ayre, who\u00a0pleaded guilty to a single federal misdemeanour last year after a decade on the run from the US investigators<\/a>, said the Ayre Resort would be entirely funded by profits made from the rise in value of bitcoin in which he was an early investor.<\/p>

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Gaston Browne, the prime minister of Antigua and Barbuda, said: \u201cWe expect the resort\u2019s novel and exciting concept to broaden Antigua and Barbuda\u2019s tourism product and bring a new category of tourists to our islands. We look forward to working with Mr Ayre on this resort and the many other investments he has made in Antigua.\u201d<\/p>

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Ayre, 56, to whom Antigua and Barbuda has given the official title of \u201chis excellency\u201d, said: \u201cThis resort will attract a totally new market segment of tourism on the island \u2014 successful wellness-seekers who also want to have fun. The property will not be an all-inclusive destination. Instead, its amenities will be available to residents of Antigua and Barbuda and visitors alike.\u201d<\/p>\n

The resort will accept bitcoin cash, which forked from bitcoin last year, at point of sale terminals on the property and through its online booking engine.<\/p>

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Ayre, whose pig-farmer father was convicted of smuggling marijuana, was barred from acting as a director of a public company in British Columbia following a share-trading scandal in the 1990s.\u00a0He recovered from that setback to create Bodog, one of the largest online gambling brands in the world<\/a>, and the business\u2019s growth led to him judging televised lingerie contests during the Super Bowl and being the subject of a six-page profile in Playboy magazine\u2014 Ayre bought 3,000 copies of the issue for himself.<\/p>\n