Wish I’d bought more coins – Bitcoin and the cryptocurrency revolution

Listen to this article:

The world of cryptocurrency continues to change as it grows in popularity. Picture: https://techaeris.com

Bitcoin is making every investment asset in history look stupid. I own Bitcoin.

I got involved early on when it was worth literally about $US1 ($F2.03) – wish I’d bought more!

People mistakenly think the price of Bitcoin hitting US$100,000 is the ultimate aim. While the rise in value is nice for us early adopters of Bitcoin, it completely misses the point.

Bitcoin could go back down to $US1000 ($F2027) – I don’t think it will. But if Bitcoin does do something crazy in terms of price then so be it.

I feel like Bitcoin is a radical shift in thinking that is infecting the planet faster than any pandemic.

Bitcoin isn’t an investment. Bitcoin isn’t a get-rich-quick scheme.

However, if Bitcoin does keep accelerating in adoption then the foundation of society is going to change.

Society is built on centralisation. Society is set up by governments. Society is made up of races and cultures limited by political borders.

Bitcoin doesn’t have borders. There is no Bitcoin office. You can’t be shut down by the billionaire owner of Bitcoin.

The creator of Bitcoin is a mystery — it could be Batman for all we know.

You’re free to invest into Bitcoin or not.

You’re free to buy Bitcoin or not. You’re free to transact in Bitcoin – well you get the picture.

People get easily caught in the hype of Bitcoin, or the anger in the fact they didn’t buy Bitcoin, and so they feel like they must throw stones at anybody who did.

Here’s the point that is missed: Bitcoin doesn’t care.

Bitcoin doesn’t give a damn about your emotions.

Bitcoin doesn’t care if you got rich or missed the boat.

It’s the idea that inequality is bad.

It’s the idea that money created out of thin air and handed to a small few to inflate the stock market is fundamentally wrong.

It’s the idea homes shouldn’t cost a lifetime worth of hours stuck in an office.

It’s the idea you should be able to send money anywhere in the world within a few minutes, especially with our technology today as my mother is always harping to me about!

Like it or not, I suggest eventually, like the Internet, we will all be using Bitcoin.

Bitcoin is monetary information system sitting on an esoteric technology platform called blockchain.

Blockchain will eventually be the honesty you rely on to move a widget from A to B in either the physical world or the virtual world.

The idea is trending on Twitter almost every day. It’s taking over traditional news. People with an audience are talking about it. Social media is pushing content that talks about it.

Almost every online community has at least one ongoing conversation currently talking about it.

A financial system that excludes people was never going to be viable long-term. People are awakening to the monetary circus we live in.

People want change and so they are buying into the idea of Bitcoin. Many early tech giants got wiped out in the past 20 years since the dot-com bubble burst.

The same could possibly happen to Bitcoin. Bitcoin is the start of the evolution of the Internet 2.0 (or 2.1).

It may not be the end state. Although I think there is unlikely to be a direct technology challenger to Bitcoin and its single purpose of storing anybody’s built-up value (digital gold).

A Bitcoin competitor would likely be silenced before it got the chance to get off the ground.

Bitcoin snuck in through the back door and governments didn’t pay any attention to it.

In 2017 when the value of Bitcoin exponentially grew and exceeded US$10,000 there was a perfect opportunity to ban Bitcoin. It didn’t happen.

Now that Bitcoin is so big, and public companies like Tesla (with powerful CEOs) own it, it’s nearly impossible to ban it without creating global protests.

The Internet would rise up if anybody messed with Bitcoin now.

That’s the optimist’s point of view. Still, a better technology could come along. Ethereum could become the high-speed broadband competitor that swallows Bitcoin.

I don’t think so, as both have their place in the future. Bitcoin works as it is because it’s so stupidly simple.

It has one use. Its speed is irrelevant. Anybody can understand what Bitcoin is even if they have never turned on a computer. Bitcoin is where you store your time and value.

You can ignore Bitcoin. You can pretend its evil. Then you’re left with the following:

  • Stocks — record highs with a strong chance of a correction;
  • Gold — a heavy, expensive, under-performing fax machine (you never see the original);
  • Real estate — a good option if you can absorb the enormous upfront cost and the global property bubble;
  • Bonds — paying to own debt that pays you next to nothing in interest;
  • Derivatives — bet on the price of an asset without owning it. Welcome to the global casino that can keep going when sport stops due to a pandemic; and
  • Savings account — slightly more secure than storing money under the mattress.

The options to store value are pretty terrible for the foreseeable future.

Hence the reason Bitcoin, and to a lesser extent, Ethereum, have become interesting.

You can see why the idea of Bitcoin is gaining traction. It’s not that $100,000 per Bitcoin isn’t cool.

It’s that existing financial products and investment assets are broken.

The year 2020, taught the masses about money printing.

Money printing is where governments create money out of thin air, to collect more money on top of taxes, to pay for prior or current stuff-ups (pandemics, wars or mismanagement).

This process devalues any money you have.

If all your money is tied up in assets then you might think you’re safe.

The challenge is, creating money out of thin air distorts the price of assets like real estate and stocks.

This affects you in one simple way: the value of an asset becomes difficult to calculate.

When you don’t know the inherent value of an asset, you quietly have some of that value taxed away from you Or you become delusional and say “my stock portfolio went up 20 per cent!”

I attended Fiji’s annual licensed real estate agents (REALB) conference last month where a senior representative from a major commercial bank bluntly told attendees that the bank’s property valuers have been instructed to devalue all new
property valuations by 15 per cent!

An arbitrary figure with no factual basis. Tricking you into thinking you’re getting richer is one of the biggest lies of society.

Your psychology is predicated on you thinking you’re getting richer so you keep using the old financial world and payingtaxes and middlemen fees to banks and financial institutions.

Bitcoin lights a fire under the idea of middlemen.

You can trust a man, or you can trust irrevocable code.

The social frameworks are changing because they have to change.

A small few can’t continue to rule the world. A few giant tech companies can’t tell us what to think and how to feel.

At some point, everyday global citizens have to take back the Internet again.

Bitcoin is an idea that challenges ownership, values and the global financial framework.

When ownership changes, everything changes. Be open to the inevitable change that’s taking place.

That’s the point of Bitcoin that seems to be missed!

A paradigm shift of how the new norm is evolving to include disrupting financial  markets. Very aptly observed by world renowned physicist Albert Einstein –

“The measure of intelligence is the ability to change”.

Have a blessed weekend, stay safe and well in both digital and physical worlds.

  •  Ilaitia B. Tuisawau is a private cybersecurity consultant. The views expressed in this article are his and not necessarilyshared by this newspaper. Mr Tuisawaucan be contacted on ilaitia@cyberbati.com
Array
(
    [post_type] => post
    [post_status] => publish
    [orderby] => date
    [order] => DESC
    [update_post_term_cache] => 
    [update_post_meta_cache] => 
    [cache_results] => 
    [category__in] => 1
    [posts_per_page] => 4
    [offset] => 0
    [no_found_rows] => 1
    [date_query] => Array
        (
            [0] => Array
                (
                    [after] => Array
                        (
                            [year] => 2023
                            [month] => 12
                            [day] => 28
                        )

                    [inclusive] => 1
                )

        )

)

No Posts found for specific category