>I still don't understand what problem decentralised currency is supposed to solve. The problem(s) that proponents hope decentralized cryptocurrency will solve

>I still don't understand what problem decentralised currency is supposed to solve. The problem(s) that proponents hope decentralized cryptocurrency will solve have grown and evolved. So far, Bitcoin doesn't seem to fully solve them but these are some of the bullet points the idealists want: (1) real (not nominal) "buying power" wealth protection : A currency that government couldn't inflate seemed to be the original and biggest motivation from the perspective of Satoshi Nakamoto. The genesis block[0] of Bitcoin has an embedded comment about government bailout (debasement) because of the 2008 financial crash. (2) transactions of buying and selling without intermediaries: The charitable version of this scenario would be sellers accepting payments without paying fees and rent to bank-owned networks like VISA/Mastercard. Or transfer funds between accounts without bank wire fees. Sellers can also sell controversial items without being "approved" by companies like PayPal or Stripe. (What some call "censorship" or "deplatforming" by denying access to the payments infrastructure.) The uncharitable version of this scenario is buying & selling illegal things like drugs on Silk Road. (3) privacy of transactions: This is somewhat related to (2) because of no intermediaries. If a shopper uses Google Checkout, Amazon Payments, Apple Pay, or VISA/Mastercard to make a payment, that information can be used against them. This doesn't necessarily have to be illegal drugs. Some people are worried that buying a legitimate item such as a certain book can be unfairly used against them. The age of pervasive data collection and machine learning means buying "50 Shades of Gray" could result in insurance companies charging you higher rates or employment background checking firms lowering your "hiring" score. The Chinese "social credit" system using pervasive data about its citizens might be an example. (4) bypass government currency controls: citizens of restrictive countries like Venezuela want to protect their savings from corruption by converting it into a cryptocurrency. This is related to (1). (5) universal basic income : I just threw this last one in here because HN front page sometimes has a proposal to use decentralized cryptocurrency as a way to implement UBI. I'm skeptical of cryptocurrencies promises but I wanted to try to fairly lay out its aspirations. Are there any more I missed? In any case, different participants of cryptocurrency have different priorities as to the benefits of decentralized trustless currency. Some prioritize wealth protection more than censorship-free payments. Or vice versa. [0] https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Genesis_block#Raw_block_data https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Genesis_block#Raw_block_data