Comment by esspee39 on 29/11/2017 at 20:38 UTC*

47 upvotes, 3 direct replies (showing 3)

View submission: /r/Bitcoin FAQ - Newcomers please read

I’m confused by the idea of “investing” in Bitcoin. Isn’t Bitcoin supposed to be a currency?

I’m reminded of the story of the guy who spent 10,000 BTC on pizza. It’s a bad thing that he spent currency, because the value of that currency is extremely volatile. And it has continued to be volatile for its entire existence. At what point will Bitcoin be spendable, instead of some inexplicable “magic internet money” that you just dump savings into? Is Bitcoin being spendable even the goal, or is Bitcoin just like a stock to speculate in?

Replies

Comment by belcher_ at 04/12/2017 at 15:43 UTC

3 upvotes, 0 direct replies

Currencies can be investments too, many people especially in less developed countries use hard currencies like USD or EUR as an investment because their own local currency.

Bitcoin has desirable properties for this use case: any amount can be stored safely encrypted on paper, it cannot be debased, it has no storage cost and is easy to hide. And it can be sent anywhere in the world over the internet without being blocked or seized. See: https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Bitcoin_as_an_investment

Bitcoin is a currency today. Yes the volatility has costs but for many use cases those costs are worth it. For example if you want to donate[1] to wikipedia or thepiratebay without giving up your ID then bitcoin is the only way to do that, regardless of volatility. Anyway, historically the volatility has been falling and this will probably continue.