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I met the author of a bitcoin book who told me he sends both btc and usdc to friends in Egypt. The bitcoin guy sends stablecoin!

lowkey 5y ago
I don’t see the irony. Both have their use-case. Bitcoin is scarce, hard money that has a historical tendency to go up in value significantly over time. Stablecoins have practical value as they hold their value over the short term while also having the Bitcoin-like ability to be transmitted across the world at 3am on a Sunday. Just as you wouldn’t hold all your assets in a single equity, there is room in the world for both Bitcoinand stablecoins. I would argue they are actually complimentary. Does that make me a hypocrite?
- lowkey 5y ago
  To be clear I am not a fan of USDT which has a somewhat shady history and questionable reserves as an asset backed stablecoin with a blacklist of addresses that can be arbitrarily seized just like USD. I am very interested in UST on Terra, an algorithmic stablecoin whose value is controlled by an automated on-chain process of burning or minting a volatile pair asset called Luna. Like Bitcoin it can be transmitted to anyone anywhere at any time. It is also a very fast blockchain where payments can be sent in a few seconds. Like Bitcoin, UST is censorship-resistant, so useful for political activists in less free countries. It also offers very compelling interest rates on savings that approach 20% APY as well as FDIC-like insurance options for ~2.5% that protect against unforseen failures of the USD peg or smart contract hacks. The more I learn about UST the more I see it as a more attractive alternative to the USD for power-to-peer cash, payments or short-term savings. Just as I continue to see Bitcoin as a more attractive store of value today and potential global reserve currency in the future. Terra UST stablecoins are a fantastic technology that solve important problems and they pair incredibly well with Bitcoin to form the base layer of a new monetary system designed to separate money from state. https://www.terra.money/ https://www.terra.money/
djohnston 5y ago
The fact they're sending a stable coin over Ethereum lends more credit to blockchain. They've pegged a fiat asset and it's way easier to use, granted on Ethereum gas prices are prohibitively high but that will change soon enough and there are other EVM chains with much cheaper gas and the same end experience.
- landemva 5y ago
  Yes, solid use case of sending near-fiat to be spent on daily life items. So far ethereum continues to have the focus and attention to adapt and grow. Schelling point effects.

lowkey 5y ago

I don’t see the irony. Both have their use-case. Bitcoin is scarce, hard money that has a historical tendency to go up in value significantly over time. Stablecoins have practical value as they hold their value over the short term while also having the Bitcoin-like ability to be transmitted across the world at 3am on a Sunday. Just as you wouldn’t hold all your assets in a single equity, there is room in the world for both Bitcoinand stablecoins. I would argue they are actually complimentary. Does that make me a hypocrite?

lowkey 5y ago
To be clear I am not a fan of USDT which has a somewhat shady history and questionable reserves as an asset backed stablecoin with a blacklist of addresses that can be arbitrarily seized just like USD. I am very interested in UST on Terra, an algorithmic stablecoin whose value is controlled by an automated on-chain process of burning or minting a volatile pair asset called Luna. Like Bitcoin it can be transmitted to anyone anywhere at any time. It is also a very fast blockchain where payments can be sent in a few seconds. Like Bitcoin, UST is censorship-resistant, so useful for political activists in less free countries. It also offers very compelling interest rates on savings that approach 20% APY as well as FDIC-like insurance options for ~2.5% that protect against unforseen failures of the USD peg or smart contract hacks. The more I learn about UST the more I see it as a more attractive alternative to the USD for power-to-peer cash, payments or short-term savings. Just as I continue to see Bitcoin as a more attractive store of value today and potential global reserve currency in the future. Terra UST stablecoins are a fantastic technology that solve important problems and they pair incredibly well with Bitcoin to form the base layer of a new monetary system designed to separate money from state. https://www.terra.money/ https://www.terra.money/

djohnston 5y ago

The fact they're sending a stable coin over Ethereum lends more credit to blockchain. They've pegged a fiat asset and it's way easier to use, granted on Ethereum gas prices are prohibitively high but that will change soon enough and there are other EVM chains with much cheaper gas and the same end experience.

landemva 5y ago
Yes, solid use case of sending near-fiat to be spent on daily life items. So far ethereum continues to have the focus and attention to adapt and grow. Schelling point effects.