pull down to refresh
0 sats \ 12 replies \ @Solomonsatoshi 23 Apr \ parent \ on: Bitcoin is Digital Gold! This isn't Wrong: Its like a DIGITAL Gold bitcoin
Whoooooosssssshhh!
In some countries (mostly more authoritarian ones) use of Bitcoin as a MoE is explicitly outlawed.
In the more 'liberal' western democracies, use of Bitcoin is usually not outright banned but is made extremely impractical by taxation reporting and payment obligations which result in most MoE being technically illegal and ultimately very slyly preventing widespread MoE use.
The Digital Gold narrative discourages MoE use and reinforces the speculative commodity narrative which along with tax reporting obligations results in considerable obstruction of use of Bitcoin as a p2p MoE.
You are royally missing the point of this post... I wonder if you read it frankly.
reply
I read it.
And I don't agree that Bitcoin is really being suppressed as an MoE.
In the long run people will use Bitcoin as a MoE they'll have no choice.
The US is 36 trillion in debt with apparently no way to pay it back.
So why the hell would someone want Dollars/Euros/Yen/paper money to use?
There is zero way that paper money can exist indefinitely... and no amount of cajoling and tricks can postpone the indebtedness of governments forever.
In the next 10 years when Lightning is "everywhere" and "Youtube Lightning" is a thing... noone will care about capital gains as it's good for business.
reply
Directed at Solomon, not you. He's a troll I guess.
reply
Some of what he says I agree with... that 'china has won the trade war' I agree they probably have.
But I disagree that the missing MoE is due to laws... it's due to the lack of education.
reply
Drugs are illegal too dude. But that hasn't 'banned' them or made them inaccessible.
Quite the contrary.
I believe people will use Bitcoin when they are ready... and it isn't the 'tax reporting' keeping people from using it, it's fiat money which is everywhere.
Why spend the money that 'goes up' when the paper money is guaranteed to 'go down' every year? There is an infinite amount of paper money... Bitcoin not so much so people spend the 'cheap' money rather than the 'hard' money first Gold is the same way.
Stacker News too is a total bubble... most people still know nothing about Bitcoin or think it's a speculative bubble/ponzi scheme of some sort. They have no idea where it fits in the big picture.
reply
Making drugs illegal makes them very profitable.
Making MoE use of Bitcoin illegal seriously reduces the number of people willing to use Bitcoin as a payment protocol as breaking those laws exposes them to risk of prosecution.
Thailand once led in adoption of Bitcoin then the military dominated Thailand government banned MoE use of Bitcoin and adoption plummeted. There are still a few brave Thai businesses who ignore this law but the law has resulted in considerable suppression of adoption and use of Bitcoin. Note Thailand is working directly with the Chinese in the development of the CBDC mBridge trade payments protocol and Thai government has used its own quasi CBDC payment system provide citizens with targeted payments during Covid- payments you can only use for essential like food not alcohol or cigarettes. Government who want to introduce CBDCs ghave a strong motive to prevent Bitcoin from getting popular uptake.
Even where Bitcoin MoE use is not outright banned as it is in most authoritarian countries the tax reporting obligations will discourage most people from using it as a MoE- most people don't want to break the law unless they really have a strong motive/reason to and there is no strong enough reason for most people to use Bitcoin as a MoE when that requires either absurd levels of recording and tax reporting, or ignoring the law and risking prosecution.
Here in New Zealand if you go to open a bank account you are asked whether you will be or ar involved in any 'crypto' activity- if you declare yes then you are very unlikely to be accepted by the bank. This applies equally to businesses. The banks and governments do not want citizens using Bitcoin as an alternative to fiat.
All governments who use fiat money to empower themselves and banks (nearly all governments! have strong motivation to prevent Bitcoin MoE use.
I cannot understand Bitcoiners who cannot see how Bitcoin being used as a MoE is a real threat to fiat operators and how fiat operators have either banned MoE use (eg China, Thailand etc) or stringently obstructed MoE use via tax requirements and threats of debanking(ie most of the 'liberal' democracies of the west).
@kepford cannot see and does not accept that China has won the trade war despite Trump already backing down and reframing his China tariffs ~ because USA cannot survive without the Chinese supply chains it has become dependent upon like a drug addict over the last 30-40 years.
Kepford ignores how the Bitcoin as Gold narrative encourages use of Bitcoin as a speculative commodity and discourages use as a MoE. Kepford cannot see how a world where Bitcoin is mostly used as a speculative commodity tracked and traced and taxed substantially reduces the threat it poses to fiat as fiats power comes primarily from its state backed monopoly over MoE.
Kepford calls me a troll when what Kepford does is exactly that which trolls do- they attack the messenger calling names while refusing to engage in good faith reasoned debate and contest of ideas - because they cannot accept the argument of the respondent but they cannot credibly refute them either.
The sly strategy of western bankers and governments has been to steer the Bitcoin narrative toward use as a speculative commodity and this has been largely successful with the vast majority of Bitcoin held by people under their jurisdictions held as a speculative commodity, taxed and tracked and traced and as a result posing very little threat to the fiat hegemony over MoE.
I do not accept that the outcome is inevitable- I do not want Bitcoin to end up completely captured and controlled as happened to gold in USA after Order 6102 and until 1971...if not since 1971 via ETFs and rehypothecation...
Yes we in most western democracies can still theoretically use Bitcoin as a MoE, but with hugely onerous technical barriers if we want to do so lawfully. Onerous barriers which have and will diasuade most businesses and consumers from bothering.
It is clear imo, that MoE use has been deliberately, slyly and successfully suppressed and that if we want to retain and expand the right to use Bitcoin as a P2P payments protocol the hugely obstructive tax requirements upon legal MoE use need to be acknowledged and removed.
Look at the pressure El Salvador has come under for simply declaring Bitcoin as legal tender.
Bitcoin as a MoE alternative to the state imposed bankers operated fiat monopoly is what the bankers and governments fear.
It frees us of their domination and control over all our market place exchanges.
Bitcoin seen as and used as a KYCed, taxed, speculative commodity ('digital gold') is of little threat to them.
P2P payments are where the revolution lives and hopefully thrives, or dies, due to the sly and the sly serial obstruction of the fiat hegemony operators.
reply
Why did I suggest you might be a troll. Stuff like this.
Kepford ignores how the Bitcoin as Gold narrative encourages use of Bitcoin as a speculative commodity and discourages use as a MoE. Kepford cannot see how a world where Bitcoin is mostly used as a speculative commodity tracked and traced and taxed substantially reduces the threat it poses to fiat as fiats power comes primarily from its state backed monopoly over MoE.
I ignore this? I literally describe what people think of when they compare bitcoin to gold. I then go on to explain why their view of gold is wrong. Then I say this
My belief is that people that think bitcoin is only a viable store of value don't really understand bitcoin.
I'm not ignoring anything. You seem to either not comprehend what I write or just don't read it.
I go on to say
So what am I saying? Bitcoin isn't digital gold but its a good analog. If you could make gold digital is would be great money. Bitcoin is a great store of value for the same reasons gold has been. Bitcoin however can be sent across great distances with ease and at the same time it can be stored for long periods of time at low cost. It is better than gold in both ways.
I then literally say what you say I'm ignoring.
It is better than gold in both ways. As a store of value and medium of exchange. I can't send an oz of gold across the globe in seconds. I can't validate the authenticity of my gold with a simple computer.
Yes the state is going to try to keep their monopoly on MoE as long as they can. That's not what this post is about. Its about gold and how it was once a MoE and why it isn't any longer. And also why bitcoin is like a digital gold. One that doesn't have the same weakness that led to gold being only a SoV.
Does that make sense? I think we mostly agree and you just want to argue. LOL.
reply
I agree you have addressed some of the issues and I may have missed some and more responded to the name calling as tends to happen when name calling starts and reasoned dialogue suffers as a result.
It is probably more a question of emphasis that is the issue for me.
I prefer to emphasize the risk involved in the 'bitcoin as digital gold' narrative- the risk that people do not see where the real power and importance of Bitcoin is- as an alternative to the nation states monopoly over money and our MoE.
I believe that is a real risk- as I acknowledged at the start- sure you can say Bitcoin is digital gold and that is not untrue- but what I want to emphasize is that the digital gold narrative plays into a perception of Bitcoin that enables capture by bankers and governments by reducing the awareness and emphasis on P2P payments.
P2P payments is where we are going to have to fight to gain the right to use Bitcoin.
It is already quasi banned in most 'liberal' western democracies -
How many p2p LN payments do I make that are legally compliant?
Almost NONE -certainly not when I zap or by a coffee or kebab at a LN accepting merchant (which I do often as I can!) - because the law is such a fucking ass and requires unreasonable and extraordinary recording and reporting obligations.
Most people however are not wanting to expose themselves to such risk.
They do not see the right to use Bitcoin as a MoE as such an important issue.
They blindly accept the state banker monopoly over MoE.
I do not take law breaking lightly either- it is only where the law is obviously and extremely unjust that I believe it is sometimes justified.
How do we remove such unreasonable and undue obligations that have been imposed on all Bitcoiners wishing to use Bitcoin as a MoE?
Not by ignoring the problem.
reply
We fight back by using the tech. Using it as a MoE. Doing what I can on that front.
reply
I read your comment, thank you for your point of view.
My opinion is that in the next 10 years we'll see "Youtube Lightning" or the equivalent... allowing you to 'tip' and sponsor through micropayments your Youtube content creator through Lightning payouts.
Youtube or the equivalent will take a cut... but the majority will go to the content creator, allowing for tipping and incentivization of good content and of course more ad revenue for Youtube.
In this world, which we'll get to eventually there will be no 'capital gains' taxes on Bitcoin at least at micropayments... and micropayments through Lightning will be everywhere on the internet. Anti-Spam, Anti-Bot, Anti-DDOS plus online tipping similar to Stacker News will be common.
It's just better money, capital, and trust maximization on Lightning/Bitcoin and we'll get there.
When people really want and need to use Bitcoin as better capital and better 'insurance' for their hard work and labor... they will and the laws and education will follow.
I'm sorry about your experience in New Zealand, Capital goes where it is treated best and ultimately the banks will want in on Bitcoin custody as well.
A far as mBridge is concerned... would you want to save in the Yuan? It's hitting multidecade lows right?
Yuan falls to 2007 lows as US tariffs on China kick in
https://www.reuters.com/markets/currencies/yuan-falls-2007-lows-us-tariffs-china-kick-2025-04-09/
reply
reply
Lightning now is ready and capable of widespread adoption but would Youtube be party to mass scale unlawful use, which such a tipping scheme would be- unless they somehow create the tax recording and reporting and payments methodology capable of compliance. I do not see how they could do that under the current BTC tax requirements laws and cannot see why governments who have put those laws in place would change them.
Why would the governments that have arbitrarily decreed Bitcoin as a speculative commodity then reverse this convenient description and thus allow and enable its mass scale adoption as a competitor to their fiat money?
Yes Bitcoin is better money, from the point of view of the individual user, but not from the point of view of the bankers and governments who gain huge power and wealth via fiat.
MBridge does not propose to make the Yuan a SoV vehicle- what mBridge does is makes trade payments between member nations faster, cheaper and capable of denomination in their respective currencies.
I recently made a payment for goods manufactured in China (because they can produce this product at 1/3 the cost a NZ factory can) and that payment goes via a New York bank which charges a fee on top of the fee I pay my NZ bank and eventually the payment is received by the Chinese factory in Yuan. So from NZD to USD to Yuan.
Under mBridge (if NZ was part of it) I could send payment denominated in NZD, USD or Yuan, but PAID directly from digital form NZD-Yuan.
Trial mBridge paymenets have been made and they are settled within seconds and cost a fraction of the SWIFT network cost. This is a huge reduction in trade payments friction- its not about what currency you might choose for SoV- I would always prefer Bitcoin for that!
My point being most businesses will see considerable advantage with the mBridge trade payments protocol over SWIFT which is slower and more expensive. And as China and Saudi Arabia and others are aware, subject to the risk of US sanctions.
mBridge is focused solely on cross border MoE, not SoV.
However mBridge in challenging the USD SWIFT MoE hegemony in a significant manner does have indirect implications for the SoV viability of the USD.
mBridge enables bilateral trade payments settlements using the respective digital currencies of the trading nations - those payments could be denominated in any currency to preserve the value of the payment between agreement and settlement but no exchange via US banks or USDs would be required, even if the payment was denominated in USD.
In money MoE is the primary strategic property.
SWIFT has (had?) strategic power because it can sanction nations and entities the USA disapproves of. But Chinas already operational alternatives to SWIFT (CIPS and shadow banking) can and do already provide N.Korea, Iran and Russia with effective trade payments MoE alternative to SWIFT...thus they can wage ongoing war against the US and its allies while maintaining trade payments.
SoV is more based upon the perceived and real integrity of those who control issuance and derivative of MoE fungability.
In a world where more and more trade is paid via mBridge how wealth would be stored would change and probably move away from USD denominated assets as the USA would have lost a significant monetary system hegemony but wealth storage might not move primarily toward Yuan denominated assets.
Gold and Bitcoin might be preferred by some.
reply