If one could remove the need for trust with no other costs, sure, why not? But in practice, using something shaped like bitcoin asks for very hard things: The f

If one could remove the need for trust with no other costs, sure, why not? But in practice, using something shaped like bitcoin asks for very hard things: The financial system started with very little trust, but it expanded because trust solved problems, like money being stolen on route, an associate running away and leaving and bank runs. Trust makes those problems mostly go away. Bitcoin has digital equivalents: 51% attacks, someone duplicating a private key, someone losing their private key and the money disappearing, exchanges becoming insolvent, getting hacked, or downright stealing, low transaction throughput, high costs per transaction, and high volatility. If you study the history of banking and finance, the blockchain is in 1700-1800 or so, and we solved those problems through more trust and faster communication. Our best solutions to both the blockchain and old finance problems? More trust, as it lowered overall risk. We can't just improve the fact that the current system requires a lot of trust with a new system that just happens to still need trust to work efficiently. Now, maybe we'll solve those problems in ways that don't requite more trust, but until then, cryptocurrencies will we far riskier than the existing financial system.