Bitcoin Forum

Hi,

I am currently thinking whether the BTC would replace lets say Gold as kind of currency/reserve.

BTC has several natural properties similar like Gold:

1. They both would reach maximum amount.
2. They are both rare.
3. They are both too rare to scale, so that if people use them as currency, it would no doubt lead to deflation.

These attributes might be the reason why people think BTC would be a candidate for currency/reserve.

BUT.

In the real world, among all natural elements, gold is perfect maybe unique candidate as currency/reserve since it is reasonably rare.
In the virtual world, BTC coins are by some means not that rare if we think out of BTC system. There might be thousands of other possible algorithms which could generate other coin system which also have above attributes. We even already see for example, LTC, FP, XRP so on.

So, what is your opinion?

The US uses US dollar as it's reserve unit.  It's not on gold standard.

The biggest problem with Bitcoin as a reserve currency is that the regulations around Bitcoin are extremely immature.  That will be the biggest hurdle before any bank can lend bitcoins at the wholesale level.

i doubt so much, i don't see a really future to the BTC, if you don't have your payment in BTC, its little stupid to me, make a exchange vs €/$ or any currency to BTC for buy same items with the same price as if you buy with your currency without make anything.

Only with the mining how wining BTC form don't look to me the best way for make BTC a real currency

you lost me

if US government does not support US dollar as its currency and use its tax income as warrants, US dollars is no more than papers.

for BTC, there is no warrant at all. Consumption and demands are created out of nothing. It has value now only because more and more people are trying to benefit from it.

I would say BTC is no currency but some thing worth investing, for the moment.

I disagree, USD is a transactional unit because the US gov't acts as the central authority to back up and validate transactions.  BTC does this in a P2P system and provably does so.

The warrant that you are talking about is that US will fully enforce the validity of the currency.  This is very true, but recently people started to question that with the quantitative easing taken by the central bank.  While my personal view is that the central bank IS doing the right thing with QE, all I'm saying is that the warrant has come into question.

BTC provides a warrant for monetary supply by provable mathematical formulas.

They have entirely different properties. Gold cannot be sent over a communication channel. We can't discover more Bitcoin from a passing asteroid, etc.

I don't see it replacing gold/currency.  If anything, it will just have its place in the market in the future.

Just like a picture of a rainbow and a rainbow have different properties.  Seeing either I still smile :)

Bitcoin won't replace gold because it has so many technological and commercial uses. Bitcoin (or cryptocurrencies in general) could theoretically replace current currencies in the future, but it would depend on factors such as demand, value and its acceptance for goods and services.

I think BTC and other cryptocyrrencies will not replace gold but can be a good diversification.

Never.... BTC cannot be used physically for anything. Gold will still be there if computers, technology fail.. Nothing will ever replace gold, has been there for a tangible currency for thousands of years...

Gold is irreplaceable. It has existed even before the currencies existed.

But what is gold actually good for? I mean in a medival survival kind of situation, how did they ever start thinking "wow, this shiny metal sure is worth 2 cows"...

No, i think the reasoning was always "we all agree that 1 coin equals 1 bread, 10 loafs of equal one small pig, so 10 coins equal 1 small pig" etc.

Gold is one of the least reactive of all elements, meaning it has many uses in technology and manufacturing. :)

nope

I disagree vehemently.  The only reason gold gained credibility is because they had the most number of users in the historical days.

There is nothing intrinsic about gold which holds any value except that it has some properties as a heavy metal.  I could argue that my GPU has heavy metal properties.

All the gold bugs on this thread are just dealing with the realization that their penchant for gold is just based on history and past social proof not anything provably substantive.

Which gives gold its value.

So what's wrong with replacing that history with a proof by a mathematically correct formula? 

If it ever does, it wont be a long long time.

Gold? No.

Haven't you ever experienced a power shortage? Or being in a place where you couldn't get an Internet connection?

Bitcoins would be useless and without any value in case of a major disaster like an earthquake, whereas gold would keep some of its value.

Probably not because governments won't be able to have fake stashes of coins.  I'm sure they will find a way though.

I disagree.  The bitcoin network will still operate since it's vast and global.  

Also are there physical bitcoins that have been created with keys on them or something?  just use those.  BTC can become much much more widespread, physical wallets etc.

In a nuclear holocaust situation, "guns and gpus" will replace "guns and gold"