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this post was submitted on 18 Aug 2023
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Fundamental difference between a currency accruing value due to superior characteristics over its competitors, and a Ponzi scheme where a truly worthless good that only has transitory value because it's "the next big thing" is passed along from original entrants to new entrants. USD has no "inherent" value (not even the "full faith and credit of the government") either, and critical issues where the broader institution responsible for its issuance is a corrupt war-mongering police state. If we're being honest here.
If a currency were a superior currency it would not necessarily increase in value, it would increase in acceptance and (generally) velocity.
Stop using Economics terms. They're definitely made up and not at all a description of how people actually act. Seriously though. It's obvious that Bitcoin is just a Ponzi scheme. Otherwise, people would actually use it as currency instead of a speculative asset.
Notice how people who buy bitcoin get really happy when the price in USD goes up. That's because they don't value Bitcoin except as a way to get more USD. Do you get all excited when the dollar is worth more in foreign currency? Or if you're European, the Euro? Not really because you are not holding onto USD or EUR as a speculative asset.
Nothing is priced in Bitcoin just like nothing is priced in baseball cards or beanie babies. No one uses it as a currency because transactions take forever and there's nothing backing it. With USD or EUR you are guaranteed to be able to pay your taxes in it. Bitcoin is complicated Venmo and its backers want to hide that fact.
Its not even complicated Venmo because transactions are barely done in it. People just buy it hoping it will go up in value.
Well no, I've bought "a lot" with bitcoin. Through bitpay I could buy confuser parts, VPN. And I've bought a lot of games for btc too
Paid maybe 30-50 cents per transaction, which is nothing compared to traditional banking. If more had support for either btc or bitpay-like-services, it'd be easier to use.
You are an anecdote, but most people aren't you and most businesses that allow bitcoin transactions immediately sell it for a government backed currency. It is not stable enough for them to keep the wages of hundreds of families in it.
People outside of spaces where cryptocurrency is accepted have a really hard time understanding just how much cryptocurrency is used. Every year it becomes more pervasive and integrated but people keep spouting the same criticisms they have for years.
Most of the opinions here are pretty america-contric.
Btw the article does not reflect the headline and ya'll should really read it before posting about how NFTs are broken. I wonder if folks would have read the article if they disagreed with the headline.
So, what you're saying is countries with volatile, unstable currencies that typically try to get their hands on as much USD as possible are more willing to use a currency other than their own? Man, that's such a shocker. I cannot believe that someone would rather store their wealth in almost anything other than money printed by unstable governments that's worth as much as a square of toilet paper.
Integration isn't the same as substitution, it means I can pay a dev living in Indonesia in eth and they can deposit it to their bank without having to go through a third party, because it's a hell of a lot faster, safer and easier than trying to set up an international wire transfer between banks who don't speak the same language.
Furthermore, if cryptocurrency helps a population regain control of their finances in a failing economy, how is that a bad thing?
Didn't say it was a bad thing. Just think it's funny that being usable in an unstable third world economy is about the only good use case for the amazing currency of the future.
The whole first world-third world designation thing is about as outdated at your information.
You're right I'll go dump all my retirement savings into whatever crypto is the next big thing tomorrow. What was I thinking, new money is so much better than old money. Cuz it's worth more money than old money and money's better.
P.S. it's easy to tell where the third world starts, it's where they use crypto instead of a central bank currency.
I mean, it's generally considered kind of a slur now? And also because it was a bit racist to begin with, since it measures progress against white, western ideas of progress.
But it's impossible to have a discussion about crypto with anyone who gets their information from one news source and a bunch of reddit comments, or whatever information you get from people who furiously agree with each other.
I don't think crypto is great, I think it's a useful tool.
I don't think you're arguing in good faith so w/e. Take it or leave it.
Oh shit, you finally got the point. I really don't care to argue with you. Your smarter than me. Bitcoin is clearly the wave of the future. I only read newspapers from the 90s or something. I must have no idea what it even is. Everyone who buys into crypto is a genius and we just don't understand it cuz it's so cool. New money>old money cuz techbro said so.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/730818/average-number-of-ethereum-transactions/
Yeah, I'll just unlearn all the monetary theory books I read because, trust me bro money is worthless. I got this new money, it's worth more money. I see now.
Didnt you know that a 27 year old technobro is smarter than generations of monetary systems built upon since the dawn of man? Lol
The society built on those monetary systems is literally destroying the planet. The history of those monetary systems is of the ruling class debasing currency and seizing as much value under the eyes of the law as possible for their private benefit going back thousands of years. Our entire legal system grew out of the Roman Empire, European feudalism, British Empire and then the slave-built corporatist state of the U.S.
Is your argument that "tradition must be right"? Slavery is traditional, war is traditional, pollution is traditional, animal agriculture is traditional, oppression is traditional, class hierarchy is traditional.
They're all anti-capitalist until they want to bitch about cryptocurrency.
Yeah, "give me anything but an alternative to the thing I hate". Reminds me of people who talk all day about global warming but, god forbid they have to eat a veggie burger instead of having an entire 10x as wasteful mode of production dedicated to bringing animals to their plate.
Thinking cryptocurrency is just a new dollar built on a ponzi scheme has nothing to do with supporting modern capitalism. New money has all the same issues as old money. Which it will be exchange for and values with. This entire circle jerk is ridiculous.
You know who owns a ton of the Bitcoin? Hedge funds and investment banks. You're supporting a system built on burning a whole bunch of fossil fuels to create a few lines of code that can be horded by the same people who horde all the wealth. You aren't changing shit.
Want to change something? Got get a gun and become a domestic terrorist or something. You aren't changing the world by buying crypto.
Blocking you dude, this is getting obnoxious.
Hey, the guys who never took an econ class know more than you. Trust me bro. It's amazing. It will change the world.
Public has started to realize what a joke the entire concept is. The true believers are all so mad now. Hopefully new investors dry up soon and the entire clown show can collapse with no new money flowing in (you know how a ponzi scheme goes bust).
Am I supposed to treat this like a good faith comment? Let's assume you're wrong, how would I even reply? It's basically "no u".
If you really know so much about monetary theory I'd expect you to lead with what you actually know, not just vaguely allude to how much you know. Right?
I'd expect that I wouldn't want to waste time trying to convince a brainwashed crypto bro or that I give a single fuck past making fun of you.
Here's some super basics of almost all monetary economic theory. Currency is a medium of exchange. It's velocity (or rare it moves through the economy) is a vital measure of the health of the economy and effectiveness of the currency. How easy is it to go buy something with Bitcoin, and how fast is it moving through hands in an economy? Oh, it's a joke as a currency you say? Description of how it is being used sounds exactly like a ponzi scheme for some reason.
See to everyone else, it's very, very obvious why it's a ponzi scheme. It will collapse someday. As it's only real use is as a very ineffective currency. Somehow people like you have made that worth tens of thousands of dollars to each other.
See, this is the classic bad faith anti-blockchain argument. Article we're talking about is about NFTs, which are based on Ethereum, an extremely sophisticated blockchain with proof-of-stake, smart contract capability, and a huge infrastructure of people who've built economic machinery on top of it and are using it actively. But you want to prove your point, so you cherry-pick Bitcoin, the very first "proof of concept" blockchain which has essentially had active development halt because the creator wanted anonymity, vanished into thin air, and the developers working on it largely refuse to hard-fork it, so which has no real smart contract capability, still uses wasteful proof-of-work, etc.
It's not "obvious" that it's a ponzi scheme, it's the point you want to make so you're just bending the facts and cherry-picking things to try to prove it. I'm not impressed. And tossing "monetary velocity" out there as a term isn't making me think you're some brilliant economist - if anything, monetary velocity is an overstressed concept in modern econ because the government sits around trying to manipulate it via interest rates instead of letting people's actual spending priorities dictate how the economy works, leading to a consumerist frenzy and catastrophic boom/bust cycle.
Oh no, I used super basic short terms to explain something to someone I think is a moron. Let me detail flaws in every digital currency, NFT and type out an entire book for you cuz I give a fuck. I look forward to laughing at the collapse and truly believe all of you are beyond educating. So, yes I am arguing in bad faith. I don't think you get that. Thought that was super obvious.
Well, maybe some day we'll all catch a glimpse of your true brilliance.
Never claimed to be brilliant, just said I'm not stupid enough to be unable to realize what is a clear ponzi scheme.
USD had value in that it is how i pay my taxes. I can either use USD to pay taxes or go to jail. That's about as concrete as value can get.
Yes, the value comes from ADOPTION.
So, you're claiming that you need a constant new stream of people buying into it, to make it work? Man, that's almost like the definition of a ponzi scheme. Weird.
Another "I know you are but what am I" class comment. I'm talking about actual adoption, usage, cyclical exchange, not buy low sell high, that should be obvious from what I wrote.
Moving on pal.
The issue is not much effort is put into developing price stability in cryptocurrencies, this is because it is counter to the incentives of the creators and early HODLers. They do not want price stability, they want significant price decreases, this causes people to speculate on the "currency" not use it as a currency. Until a cryptocurrency implements some form of MV=PY it will not really be successful as a currency.
How does one "implement" the equation for calculating GDP? All the (descriptive) variables in the equation are already present. IDK how that got 4 upvotes.
Several major cryptos are already used as media of exchange. That's the actual criteria for "success of a currency", relative usage. They haven't overtaken USD, but let's not pretend it's just a speculative vessel, Ethereum sees over a million transactions per day.
You cannot, but you can increase money supply money supply more stably when following average GDP growth, and increase money supply more when velocity decreased- and atrophy the supply when it increases. And a currency is much more than just what people can spend at a store. It is what people keep their savings in, what companies pay their employees in, what banks lend.
This cannot be done with an unstable currency- you cannot have a debt that will either go up or down 20% in value in the same year. I do not think fiats are inherently more stable, but some fiats have proven to be somewhat more stable because of responsible central banking- its not a good idea to count on central banks being responsible for ever. But essentially all widely spread cryptos continue to have a significant amount held by speculators and therefore they cannot be stable currencies.
The simple answer is that fiats are only more stable because their relative worth is more settled. For the same reason small stocks are unstable while big blue chip stocks are (relatively) not. If you look at logarithmic charts of any big crypto over time you can literally see the volatility tapering out as the market cap increases.
Of the cryptos that survived yeah thats been true, except for the speculative rushes encouraged by a lot of hodlers. Furthermore, even those transactions are high- the velocity is still much lower than in most fiats where people put their excess in a bank that then invests with it.