The narrative of 'de-dollarization' and 'Bitcoin as a replacement for the US dollar' are two concepts in the modern economy that have recently gained traction. The former is attributed to countries and people who are reluctant to trade and exchange with the dollar, and the latter is a solution to the former. Below, I would like to share my views on the effectiveness and impact of Bitcoin on the post-dollar global economy.
There are currently plenty of arguments in favor of Bitcoin as a better medium of exchange. The ones that I liked very much are @JoeNakamoto's #255238 and @btc_remnant's #165552 The arguments are 100% correct because Bitcoin is cheaper, transparent, decentralized and, above all, a peer-to-peer system.
Currently no fiat currency symbolizes as a world currency and never will be. While there are as many fiat currencies as are countries in the world, no country is ready to accept a singular model of currency that works globally. The nations want their own printing machines and want to controll them in their own ways. There's a race between every nation and it seems that US dollar is currently winning it.
The excessive money printing by central banks around the globe signifies a devaluation of their fiat currency. The money printing is like an acceptance of their failure. They are accepting that their fiat currencies never had any value of their own, and even then, if fiat money is printed too much, it'll lose value.
Bitcoin is so different. It cannot be controlled by a single entity or nation. That's what decentralization brings with it. Bitcoin is a form of global democratic money that maintains itself on its own, viz. no need of regulations. I have no doubt that everyone will adopt Bitcoin once their now favourite fiat fleet sinks.
But Bitcoin's supply is finite with hard cap of 21 million coins. The recent adoption of Bitcoin as a store of value by governments and banks makes a strong case for Bitcoin on its way to de-dollarizing the global economy.
Believe it or not, the number of people using the US dollar is less than those using Bitcoin and any other form of crypto. Again, there is no system that can suppress the voice that is as loud as the entire human race.
Additionally, fiat currencies are not resistant to inflation. 1 dollar remains 1 dollar even after 100 years of hoarding. But Bitcoin is anti-inflationary or a hedge against inflation. Thus Inflation becomes a major reason that would put end to the old fiat feudal system.
At last, I just want to repeat it that Bitcoin has everything that makes it a first choice to become the first ever global currency. Unlike fiat currencies, 'Bitcoin is no nation's burden or no nation's privilege" So, It's only a matter of time before Bitcoin becomes the world currency and de-dollarizes the world. What do you think?
I expect a lot of turmoil in the de-fiatization process.
Near term, we might see weaker currencies fail and those countries peg to, or outright adopt, the US Dollar. That will cause the dollar to strengthen occasionally.
At the same time, de-dollarization will continue in unaligned parts of the world and they may attempt various commodity backings. That will cause gold and other monetary commodities to strengthen occasionally.
However, Bitcoin will be strengthening the whole time.
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This is the exact scenario I expect to happen
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Yes, the whole point is that the progress of Bitcoin doesn't get affected by any of fiat narratives. Bitcoin is above alm of it. It will be better if the world recognises this trait of Bitcoin asap.
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Bitcoin presents quite a dilemma to governments:
If they attack Bitcoin and fail, it would be great marketing for Bitcoin
If they don’t attack Bitcoin, Bitcoin continues its evolution from nascent money to ‘the’ money.
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Indeed, that's the whole point. Bitcoin is such a big thing that governments have to accept it, else they will also miss the train.
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This is an oversimplified and boring flavor of Bitcoin narrative that has been repeated ad nauseum for over a decade. The overlooked factors in posts like this are why we have an eternal September of people that think Bitcoin is failing and inevitably end up shitcoining or becoming lemmings for reckless and unnecessary forks.
Yes, Bitcoin is hard and fiat isn't. That doesn't mean the dollar is being replaced around the world as you might expect, evidence shows quite the opposite.
Heck, even this board is overrun with ECashers and other tokenized credit maxi's. I made the mistake of looking at Nostr this morning to see Bitcoiners simping over dollar based ECash transactions.
Since the fiat-shitcoin mind virus in still prevalent in the Bitcoin community after all this time, it's a guarantee that fiat shitcoins are here to stay in the world more broadly.
We must understand the reasons for this paradox:
First, Bitcoin's deepest exchange market is in dollars, this comes at the expense of worse fiat currencies, not Bitcoin. This last flex the dollar has is enough to keep it around longer than it otherwise might survive in a heads on competition. Dollarization is a pre-requisite to bitcoinization. This "dollar milkshake" has been playing out long before Bitcoin's existence, the consolidation of all the European fiats into the Euro-Dollar system might have been the first domino, BRICS next... and so on. Trade and borders are very real things, you still need some level of cooperation with 3rd parties to trade physical things with someone across the globe.
Second, no meaningful cohort outside of psuedo-governmental institutions under mandate save in dollars. Better money is meaningless when you have none.
Dollars are used to buy things, people without access to a dollarized banking system rarely have any earnings to save. In unbanked countries, shitcoins to transact dollar denominations are more common than Bitcoin, this is why Tether and other stables have such big markets. Bolivares still exist in Venezuela, where ironically Bitcoin Cash is used more than Bitcoin, despite both being worthless as a savings instrument.
I say this as someone working on Means of Exchange tech for Bitcoin and believe that Means of Exchange usecases are Bitcoin's second act to come, but it won't be the only means of exchange nevermind the predominant one.
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Dollarization is a pre-requisite to bitcoinization. Not invalidating any thing you said. However, I am a beginner so it might seem oversimplified to a veteran. Also, I was trying to tell that de-dollarization is happening. It's happening at macroeconomic levels now. Countries like China and Russia, and even India, are grouping together to find other means. They are so far successful as well in their attempts.
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As I stated, the world is NOT de-dollarizing, it is dollarizing at the expense of other fiats.
Brazil Russia India China (BRIC) were never dollarized, that's exactly why they've always been looked at as global competitors. They are global competitors to the dollar only because they make stuff and people buy it with whatever currency [they] demand.
Now should BRIC countries unify their currency, that would be teaming up to fight or slow the relative strength of dollarization happening around them. If they were dollarized it wouldn't matter, they could just Bitcoinize.
Small fish gets eaten by a medium sized fish, medium sized fish gets eaten by a large fish. Money works this same way. Dollar is the medium fish and it's got plenty of eating left to do.
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But ultimately it will be eaten by.
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You mean ideally... Ultimately implies some evidence of inevitability, but all evidence has been to the contrary.
Here we are on a Bitcoinized discussion board, and yet, there are territories dedicated to the proliferation of fiat payments tech.
Since there's always going to be people without any wealth to protect, there's always going to be a fiat shitcoin the wealthy use to coordinate them.
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Things are changing, mate. It won't be overnight but it surely be.
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Where is all the cash going that people are giving to buy bitcoin?
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6.25 bitcoin are being released to the miner that finds a block every 10 minutes. These miners have to may many of their expenses in fiat so I would guess that many of these bitcoins are those being exchanged most often.
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It's going to the bank accounts of those who are selling?
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In Argentina the first step is dollar then bitcoin.
Like El Salvador
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I don't know too much about Argentina by in El Salvador, Bitcoin is slowly becoming mainstream method of payments.
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El Salvador is a dollar and bitcoin economy
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Sure I think there are certain markets that de-dollarise, like nations settling with one another, but I do think there is a tailwind for the dollar from people who want to get out of their local currency, stablecoins continue to grow mainly USDT in many parts of the world, people would rather trust tether than their local currency/banks
Whenever I speak to people who are from other African countries but work here in South Africa, they're all in on USDT, since they don't need a bank account, can remit for cheap and plenty of grey market/cash businesses will accept it
Over time sure that means theres a lot of tether holders who could move over to Bitcoin, but for now, i think this is the first step
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Believe it or not, the number of people using the US dollar is less than those using Bitcoin and any other form of crypto.
Source? Pretty skeptical about this claim. I have traveled to many countries outside of the U.S. where people use USD as the preferred currency over their own, and it is in regular circulation: Laos, Cambodia, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, any Caribbean country, to name a few. To enter Cambodia e.g., you need $20 USD cash to get in. The general in full uniform promptly puts it in his pocket right at the immigration check point at the airport. And there is no country in the world, AFAIK, where money exchangers are not happy to exchange USD for local toilet paper fiat.
Side note: All fiat is toilet paper, it's just that USD is double ply.
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That is strong growth to be sure. Not sure how they distinguish individual wallets from users (not trivial), but the article which I skimmed did not specify that crypto usage surpassed USD usage.
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