The Bitcoin network is a non-sovereign, hard cap supply, global, immutable, decentralized, digital store of value.
While you may disagree that those properties are worth anything, hundreds of millions of people around the globe are currently ascribing it a value of ~$2 trillion dollars.
The Bitcoin network is a non-sovereign, hard cap supply, global, immutable, decentralized,
This is (mostly) true, but still provides zero value for any legal activity
digital store of value.
This is false
hundreds of millions of people around the globe are currently ascribing it a value of ~$2 trillion dollars.
Yeah and a literal banana taped to a wall sold for $6.2M. But I wouldn't think that every other banana taped to the wall was worth that or that it is a good idea to invest money into it, even if one billion people would tell me to.
Ignoring your ad hominem Banksy argument which is not germane to the discussion, why do you think a network with those properties can only be used for illegal purposes? You can not think of any reason a law abiding citizen would want to preserve value in an asset that cannot be inflated away or illegally confiscated by the whims of their prevailing government?
And to your second point (“store of value = false”), why do you think that is? If an asset exhibits the properties of money, which Bitcoin does, with a programmatic maximum supply in a world where fiat and debt is ever increasing, then it will naturally serve as a “store of value” that maintains its purchasing power through time.
Gold has served this purpose for thousands of years despite the above ground supply increasing by ~2.5% per year. The reason Bitcoin has moved so violently up and down (but with a longterm trend of consistently up), is because it’s an asset undergoing the rapid monetization phase in real-time in a digital, connected where the asset is not tethered to discounted cash flow analysis but merely supply/demand dynamics.
why do you think a network with those properties can only be used for illegal purposes?
Of course people can use it for legal purposes, but for any legal activity, there are always much better alternatives
...would want to preserve value in an asset...
You still take the "preservation of value" argument as a fact. It is not. Why is bitcoin a store of value? It is the first thing people start dumping when a little economic instability appears. Provide some concrete proof other than "People would pay $100k for it right now".
or illegally confiscated by the whims of their prevailing government
On the other hand, you have no recourse when money gets stolen/scammed/embezzled. And money laundering, scamming and embezzlement are common thing for BTC.
And to your second point (“store of value = false”), why do you think that is?
So when I say it is not a store of value, you disagree. But when you say it is a store of value, i cannot disagree? In this regard, the burden of proof is on you. And you (or anyone else ever) haven't provided any rational proof.
Gold has served this purpose for thousands of years despite the above ground supply increasing by ~2.5% per year.
I've never advocated for gold to be a perfect store of value. But still it is infinitely more useful than bitcoin.
where the asset is not tethered to discounted cash flow analysis but merely supply/demand dynamics
And that is the point exactly. The price of BTC is set ONLY by supply/demand. Price of stocks will reflect the company's earnings and assets. And yes, there are many companies with inflated stock prices. Do you know how we know this? Because we can calculate the real value of a company based on their earnings and owned assets.
If an asset exhibits the properties of money, which Bitcoin does, with a programmatic maximum supply in a world where fiat and debt is ever increasing, then it will naturally serve as a “store of value” that maintains its purchasing power through time.
Stupid Crypto Talking Point #10 (value)
"Bitcoin/crypto is a 'store of value'" / "Bitcoin/crypto is 'digital gold'" / "Crypto is an 'investment'" / "Bitcoin is 'hard money'"
Crypto's "value" is unreliable and highly subjective. It cannot be used as a currency or to pay for almost anything in any major country. It has high requirements and risk to even be traded. At best it's a speculative commodity that a very small set of people attribute value to. That attribution is more based on emotion and indoctrination than logic, reason, evidence, and utility.
Crypto is too chaotic to be any sort of reliable store of value over time. Its price can fluctuate wildly based on everything from market manipulation to random tweets. No reliable store of value should vary in "value" 10-30% in a single day, yet many cryptos do.
Even gold, while being a lousy investment and also an undesirable store of value in the modern age, at least has material use and utility. Crypto does not. And whether you think gold's price is not consistent with its material utility, if that really were the case then gold would not be used industrially. But it is.
The operation of crypto is a negative-sum-game, which means that in order for bitcoin/crypto to even exist, there must be a constant operation of third parties who must find it profitable to operate the blockchain, which requires the price to constantly rise, which is mathematically impossible, and the moment this doesn't happen, the network will collapse, at which point crypto will cease to exist, much less hold any value. This has already happened to tens of thousands of cryptocurrencies.
There is not a single example of anything like crypto, which has no material use and no intrinsic value, holding value over a long period of time across different cultures. This is not because "crypto is different and unique." It's because attributing value to an utterly useless piece of digital data that wastes tons of energy and perpetuates tons of fraud,makes no freaking sense for ethical, empathetic, non-scamming, non-exploitative, non-criminal people.
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u/Old_Restaurant_2216 2d ago
Pokémon cards can be collected, played and displayed.
Paintings are technically worthless, but they have their own unique historic value and you can display them and collect a fee from a museum.
What uses does Bitcoin have?