Crypto Buffet & Munger Deride Bitcoin as "Swapping Turds"

Please prove it.

 

I was questioning the claim that the ato accepts payment in bitcoin

 

They don't but there are crypto to BPay services. I've done it. Works great!

 

"Here's a real world use case of how crypto is disrupting current encumbents"

How is your example disruption? Isnt that just the addition of another layer into a funds transfer?

Using a middle man (RelayPay) to transfer payment via an EXISTING method (Bpay) seems inneficient, not disruption.

I'm still waiting to see a real world purpose for crypto, it's speculation for me till then. Money to be made for sure, but not a revelation just yet.

 

Bitcoin bounces back as El Salvador votes to make it legal tender

 

It’s going to be interesting to see how many South American countries follow suit

 

Yes! But I was more referring to a number of South American politicians signalling support on Twitter!

 

All the ones that export the white stuff?

 

Bitcoin has little to no intrinsic value because a Bitcoin doesn't physically exist, it can't be used to make anything unlike metals and gems. It also isn't linked to any national finance system (although El Salvador has recently adopted it), so there's no official value to the currency.

The Bitcoin community have agreed to use Bitcoin as money. So even though Bitcoin isn't backed by any government it's backed by the Bitcoin community. This means that Bitcoin only has value because people say it has value. That is not intrinsic value, but rather value based on demand. If somebody is willing to pay $50,000 dollars for a Bitcoin, then Bitcoin (to that person, on that day) has a value of $50,000. There is no government entity guaranteeing the value of Bitcoin, so the value is entirely determined by the people using or trading in Bitcoin.

Supporters of Bitcoin will argue that Bitcoin has rarity but Bitcoin's isn't physically imposed, it's technologically imposed. Bitcoin has little to no intrinsic value, only the value set by the market and influenced by the self-imposed limitations on supply. If tomorrow, the demand dries up and the market says Bitcoin has zero value, then it will have zero value. The whole purpose of Bitcoin was initially supposed to be for online transactions. However, even if you find a merchant that accepts Bitcoin the pricing and volatility of it don't make it a viable payment method because you don't know the real spending power of your Bitcoin from day to day.

Bitcoin is still an unproven technology/currency at this stage and there have been a plethora of virtual currency schemes that have been floated over the past 15 years or so such as Dexit, DigiCash, eCache, eCash, Internet Cash, Pecunix, WebMoney etc. What all these virtual currencies have in common is that they are failures.

In conclusion I see too many risks with Bitcoin for myself to invest in it personally. There's the risk the price will drop, there's the risk that your Bitcoin exchange or wallet will get hacked, which would wipe out your holdings. There's also the risk that you won't be able to find buyers when you want to sell, leaving you holding a bunch of worthless digital currency. I wouldn't be able to sleep at night having that level of risk and Bitcoin's volatility so I'll stick with the share market.

 

How secure / reliable is this site Simon? Where is its office headquartered?