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This is why Bitcoin is ideal. You can hold and transfer any amount, any time of day, without fear of surprises like this. Would I use it as a primary cash acco

This is why Bitcoin is ideal. You can hold and transfer any amount, any time of day, without fear of surprises like this. Would I use it as a primary cash account for my business today? No, because of the obvious exchange rate/price swings. But long-term, moving toward Bitcoin as a settlement layer (i.e., a modern SWIFT) would solve a ton of problems and avoid situations like this. The more people that do that/normalize it, the more stable the price in other currencies, too. I get that people like to hate on it because it's not a perfect solution to everything, but in a hostile unpredictable environment, it's a life saver.

staticidentity 2y ago
[flagged]
bootlooped 2y ago
I don't see why having a different settlement layer would prevent the bank from freezing money that they have custody of.
- rglover 2y ago
  It removes the bank from the equation. The point here being that you keep some of your funds in Bitcoin so that, in the event you have to deal with something like this, you can still find a means to get people paid. Long-term, if everyone does larger transactions in Bitcoin (e.g., payroll, invoice payments, etc), then problems like this never occur.
  - bootlooped 2y ago
    Then we're not just talking about a settlement layer, right? We're talking about holding crypto instead of cash, and self custody.
cultofmetatron 2y ago
solana seems t be even better for that tech wise. but yea, bitcoin is incumbant here
- rglover 2y ago
  Solana is centralized. The network should never go offline/have outages or be vulnerable to bad actors. At best, Bitcoin has the 51% attack problem which would require insane resources and convincing node operators to follow a fork of the network.
  - cultofmetatron 2y ago
    > Solana is centralized. The Solana website itself says its decentralized on the frontpage. from what I can see, the main difference is that solana is proof of steak the way etheream is going. while there is certainly a place for bitcoin's pow consensus, the electricity costs alone preclude it from being a serious contender to visa.
nonameiguess 2y ago
This doesn't make any sense. The problems a business faces are: - Receive money from customers. If the customers don't have Bitcoin, they're not going to pay you in Bitcoin. - Pay your employees and suppliers. Very few of them will accept Bitcoin. - Borrow money to cover differences between revenue and expenses. The entity loaning you the money may or may loan you Bitcoin, but what difference does it make? They're going to give you the same scrutiny and terms as any other lender in any currency. - Security for your enormous wads of liquid assets. Banks have vaults and FDIC insurance. Bitcoin has nothing on its own, and if you use an exchange, they can do exactly what a bank does and freeze your funds, or in many cases, just steal it and spend it themselves. You say later you just mean "well, you can withdraw some of your country's legal tender from the bank and store it as Bitcoin in case you need it later." You can just diversify the same way everyone else suggests by using multiple banks. If you trust zero banks, you can withdraw cash and stuff it under your mattress. You can loan it to a local drug lord. You can buy gold. You can buy forex and put it in a foreign bank. I guess some of these options are less liquid than others, but what advantage are you really claiming keeping your rainy day fund as Bitcoin has over anything else? Generally speaking, businesses tend to stick with things like commercial paper and treasuries and that has seemingly worked out fine. I wish we had real verifiable base rates on the probability that a business will go under because it's cash and near cash equivalents line item was seized by authorities even though they legitimately did nothing wrong versus a business will go under because it decided to keep all of its funds in cryptocurrency and it either tanked overnight, they lost the key, SBF took their money because he felt like it, or whatever other reasons might happen. Would you seriously bet the former is more likely than the latter?
- rglover 2y ago
  I didn't say keep all of your cash in Bitcoin. In the current epoch, I'd cite Murphy's Law and say that anything is possible and it's wise for a CEO/CFO to plan ahead in case this happens. Bitcoin is one among several options and an excellent safeguard against corruption, political persecution, etc. As for exchange hacks and lost keys, the business that relies on this will intelligently keep funds off-exchange/self-custody and use multisig wallets with signatures held by multiple officers of the company. Today, it's the "nuclear option." But if enough people start transacting in Bitcoin routinely, it's the ideal future.

staticidentity 2y ago

[flagged]

bootlooped 2y ago

I don't see why having a different settlement layer would prevent the bank from freezing money that they have custody of.

rglover 2y ago
It removes the bank from the equation. The point here being that you keep some of your funds in Bitcoin so that, in the event you have to deal with something like this, you can still find a means to get people paid. Long-term, if everyone does larger transactions in Bitcoin (e.g., payroll, invoice payments, etc), then problems like this never occur.
- bootlooped 2y ago
  Then we're not just talking about a settlement layer, right? We're talking about holding crypto instead of cash, and self custody.

cultofmetatron 2y ago

solana seems t be even better for that tech wise. but yea, bitcoin is incumbant here

rglover 2y ago
Solana is centralized. The network should never go offline/have outages or be vulnerable to bad actors. At best, Bitcoin has the 51% attack problem which would require insane resources and convincing node operators to follow a fork of the network.
- cultofmetatron 2y ago
  > Solana is centralized. The Solana website itself says its decentralized on the frontpage. from what I can see, the main difference is that solana is proof of steak the way etheream is going. while there is certainly a place for bitcoin's pow consensus, the electricity costs alone preclude it from being a serious contender to visa.

nonameiguess 2y ago

This doesn't make any sense. The problems a business faces are: - Receive money from customers. If the customers don't have Bitcoin, they're not going to pay you in Bitcoin. - Pay your employees and suppliers. Very few of them will accept Bitcoin. - Borrow money to cover differences between revenue and expenses. The entity loaning you the money may or may loan you Bitcoin, but what difference does it make? They're going to give you the same scrutiny and terms as any other lender in any currency. - Security for your enormous wads of liquid assets. Banks have vaults and FDIC insurance. Bitcoin has nothing on its own, and if you use an exchange, they can do exactly what a bank does and freeze your funds, or in many cases, just steal it and spend it themselves. You say later you just mean "well, you can withdraw some of your country's legal tender from the bank and store it as Bitcoin in case you need it later." You can just diversify the same way everyone else suggests by using multiple banks. If you trust zero banks, you can withdraw cash and stuff it under your mattress. You can loan it to a local drug lord. You can buy gold. You can buy forex and put it in a foreign bank. I guess some of these options are less liquid than others, but what advantage are you really claiming keeping your rainy day fund as Bitcoin has over anything else? Generally speaking, businesses tend to stick with things like commercial paper and treasuries and that has seemingly worked out fine. I wish we had real verifiable base rates on the probability that a business will go under because it's cash and near cash equivalents line item was seized by authorities even though they legitimately did nothing wrong versus a business will go under because it decided to keep all of its funds in cryptocurrency and it either tanked overnight, they lost the key, SBF took their money because he felt like it, or whatever other reasons might happen. Would you seriously bet the former is more likely than the latter?

rglover 2y ago
I didn't say keep all of your cash in Bitcoin. In the current epoch, I'd cite Murphy's Law and say that anything is possible and it's wise for a CEO/CFO to plan ahead in case this happens. Bitcoin is one among several options and an excellent safeguard against corruption, political persecution, etc. As for exchange hacks and lost keys, the business that relies on this will intelligently keep funds off-exchange/self-custody and use multisig wallets with signatures held by multiple officers of the company. Today, it's the "nuclear option." But if enough people start transacting in Bitcoin routinely, it's the ideal future.