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If the bull case was only $150k, I might agree with you. The bull case is $5 million. But bitcoin has always been risky and can always go to 0 rather quickly.

If the bull case was only $150k, I might agree with you. The bull case is $5 million. But bitcoin has always been risky and can always go to 0 rather quickly. Anyway, there is no point at looking at nominal values given inflation, population growth, general progress. I like to look at everything as a ratio against total global numbers (global wealth, global debt, global population, global equality etc.). Unfortunately it’s hard to find reliable global numbers. The IIF only gives its numbers to a few hundred global banks and similar sized institutions.

adventured 6y ago
Once the bullish case is set at $5 million you might as well set it at $5 trillion. At $5 million it's approaching the value of all stocks on the planet. I don't have to elaborate on the economy those stocks represent, the annual profit generation. $100 trillion is nearly all household assets in the US, and nearly double all household assets in China. I like Bitcoin, it's simply not a believable bullish case at all.
- naveen99 6y ago
  Total wealth 500 trillion. Frequently Recommended institutional allocation 30-50% bonds. Bitcoin replaces the bulk of cash equivalents. Not impossible.
  - adventured 6y ago
    Getting nearly everyone on the planet to do that, including all governments to allow it, is impossible. As one very prominent example, the odds are dramatically higher that China will banish Bitcoin from being legal inside of their country than that they'll allow everyone to switch to using Bitcoin instead of the currency system they directly control (and can manipulate as it fits their aims). All nations generally feel the same way about controlling their own currency, they more than overwhelmingly prefer to retain that power in their political system. If Bitcoin actually threatens that they have all the guns that matter and will act accordingly legislatively. They might be willing to allow Bitcoin to be a store of value competitor to gold however, but that's all they're going to allow. We don't have gold backed currencies for the same reason we're not going to see Bitcoin overtake all national currency systems. The guys in power with the guns determine how your currency system works and they all universally say no: you may not have your fiat currency backed by gold (or in the future, swapped out for Bitcoin).
graeme 6y ago
At $5 million, at current mining rates, it would cost $1.7 trillion dollars per year in energy and equipment costs to run the network. That is fresh capital that needs to be shovelled in and burned each and every year. Not to increase the price, just to maintain the network. What is the network doing that would justify that investment? After halving the cost would drop to $850 billion a year but still.
- solosoyokaze 6y ago
  It doesn't really make sense to measure this in USD if one of the major hypothesis driving Bitcoin is that USD is being hyper inflated. Yeah, it might cost $1.7 trillion dollars but at that point a 3bd house might cost $5M. If you're going to pin BTC to USD, you need to use inflation adjusted numbers.
  - dragonwriter 6y ago
    > It doesn't really make sense to measure this in USD if one of the major hypothesis driving Bitcoin is that USD is being hyper inflated “USD is being hyperinflated” is an easily falsiable (and obviously false) statement, so basing anything on it is nonsense. (That it is imminently going to slide into hyperinflation is less easily falsified, which is why that is actually the perennial cry of cryptobugs, as it was for goldbugs—sometimes, the exact same people—before then.)
    - solosoyokaze 6y ago
      Isn’t it easy to verify? How much did a house cost 20 years ago? A 4 year college degree? How much were you paying per month for health insurance in the 90s? Salaries have not kept up. They’ve been amazingly static my entire life.
      - dragonwriter 6y ago
        You've mentioned three items that have experienced specific inflation at higher than the general rate of inflation (but even then mostly not at rates anywhere in the remote neighborhood that would qualify as hyperinflation [> +50%/month] even if they were the rate of general inflation.) So,yeah, when even the rapidly inflating segments aren't anywhere close to hyperinflation, it's pretty clearly not general hyperinflation. And stagnant wages are a completely unrelated issue to hyperinflation, though obviously wage increases mitigate and wage stagnation or decline exacerbates the effect of whatever inflation there is on wage earners.

adventured 6y ago

Once the bullish case is set at $5 million you might as well set it at $5 trillion. At $5 million it's approaching the value of all stocks on the planet. I don't have to elaborate on the economy those stocks represent, the annual profit generation. $100 trillion is nearly all household assets in the US, and nearly double all household assets in China. I like Bitcoin, it's simply not a believable bullish case at all.

naveen99 6y ago
Total wealth 500 trillion. Frequently Recommended institutional allocation 30-50% bonds. Bitcoin replaces the bulk of cash equivalents. Not impossible.
- adventured 6y ago
  Getting nearly everyone on the planet to do that, including all governments to allow it, is impossible. As one very prominent example, the odds are dramatically higher that China will banish Bitcoin from being legal inside of their country than that they'll allow everyone to switch to using Bitcoin instead of the currency system they directly control (and can manipulate as it fits their aims). All nations generally feel the same way about controlling their own currency, they more than overwhelmingly prefer to retain that power in their political system. If Bitcoin actually threatens that they have all the guns that matter and will act accordingly legislatively. They might be willing to allow Bitcoin to be a store of value competitor to gold however, but that's all they're going to allow. We don't have gold backed currencies for the same reason we're not going to see Bitcoin overtake all national currency systems. The guys in power with the guns determine how your currency system works and they all universally say no: you may not have your fiat currency backed by gold (or in the future, swapped out for Bitcoin).

graeme 6y ago

At $5 million, at current mining rates, it would cost $1.7 trillion dollars per year in energy and equipment costs to run the network. That is fresh capital that needs to be shovelled in and burned each and every year. Not to increase the price, just to maintain the network. What is the network doing that would justify that investment? After halving the cost would drop to $850 billion a year but still.

solosoyokaze 6y ago
It doesn't really make sense to measure this in USD if one of the major hypothesis driving Bitcoin is that USD is being hyper inflated. Yeah, it might cost $1.7 trillion dollars but at that point a 3bd house might cost $5M. If you're going to pin BTC to USD, you need to use inflation adjusted numbers.
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  > It doesn't really make sense to measure this in USD if one of the major hypothesis driving Bitcoin is that USD is being hyper inflated “USD is being hyperinflated” is an easily falsiable (and obviously false) statement, so basing anything on it is nonsense. (That it is imminently going to slide into hyperinflation is less easily falsified, which is why that is actually the perennial cry of cryptobugs, as it was for goldbugs—sometimes, the exact same people—before then.)
  - solosoyokaze 6y ago
    Isn’t it easy to verify? How much did a house cost 20 years ago? A 4 year college degree? How much were you paying per month for health insurance in the 90s? Salaries have not kept up. They’ve been amazingly static my entire life.
    - dragonwriter 6y ago
      You've mentioned three items that have experienced specific inflation at higher than the general rate of inflation (but even then mostly not at rates anywhere in the remote neighborhood that would qualify as hyperinflation [> +50%/month] even if they were the rate of general inflation.) So,yeah, when even the rapidly inflating segments aren't anywhere close to hyperinflation, it's pretty clearly not general hyperinflation. And stagnant wages are a completely unrelated issue to hyperinflation, though obviously wage increases mitigate and wage stagnation or decline exacerbates the effect of whatever inflation there is on wage earners.