The "killer currency" must reach a point where it is robust enough to withstand what Kroll, Davey, and Felten describe as a "Goldfinger" attack. [1] They use b

The "killer currency" must reach a point where it is robust enough to withstand what Kroll, Davey, and Felten describe as a "Goldfinger" attack. [1] They use basic game theory to show that any actor participating within the Bitcoin community would not commit a 51% attack. They go on to identify the biggest threat to a budding virtual currency: some outside actor being able to take a sufficiently large short position on Bitcoin (or otherwise gain utility from Bitcoin's destruction), then mounting or simply threatening to mount a 51% attack. This would start a death spiral that would cause rational actors not to participate in the network at an increasing rate. They conclude that good, active governance is necessary to make sure that Bitcoin and similar virtual currencies survive. The creators will need to "touch" the currency in order to protect and maintain its value. A true killer currency would be a virtual currency that is pegged to some well-chosen and largely diversified basket of essential goods such as wheat, lumber, metals, energy, etc. Peg the currency to a broad range of economic inputs and raw materials. [1] Full paper here: https://www.cs.princeton.edu/~kroll/papers/weis13_bitcoin.pdf https://www.cs.princeton.edu/~kroll/papers/weis13_bitcoin.pd...