Gold is a decentralized way of storing wealth and conducting large scale transactions. It's also seen as a safe haven, even though it doesn't always behave as such. It's Bitcoin but without its convenience and physical form. Negative aspect of gold is that we don't know how much of this precious metal is in circulation and will ever be in circulation. We only know the value of all the gold in the world, but that concerns gold from which we know it exists. I'm totally not surprised if there is double that amount hidden somewhere by governments. Bitcoin's transparency prevents any type of supply and circulation cheating.

forbes

Japan's economy — which for years has struggled to return to its 1980's growth levels — could be about to boom once again, thanks to bitcoin, cryptocurrency and blockchain technology.

At the Japan Blockchain Conference this week in Tokyo (the first of what's expected to become a yearly event) the chief executive of financial services giant SBI Holdings Yoshitaka Kitao said he is betting that blockchain related technologies will fuel the next boom for the Japanese economy after decades of economic malaise.

In the 1970s, Japan had the world's second-largest GDP after the U.S. and this boom continued through to the 1980s. However, by the early 1990s Japan's economy had stalled, plunging the country into what has been called the "lost decade" of growth.

It has previously been suggested Japan's economy could be kick-started by a "technological boom."


Improved mobile connectivity through the long-awaited 5G technology, along with the Internet of Things (IoT), rapid increases in computing power and artificial intelligence, could combine to trigger an economic boom, in which Japan is well placed to lead the way.

SBI is investing in companies in Japan and across east Asia through its $460 million so-called AI & Blockchain Fund, established earlier this year.

"We want to take blockchain beyond financial," Yoshitaka Kitao said. "There's a lot of speculative demand around cryptocurrencies, which is why the price is going up so quickly, but people need to think about how these technologies are being used in real life and how they can improve people's businesses."

Yoshitaka expects this boom to happen within the next few years and has been steering SBI towards blockchain and cryptocurrencies as a result.

Earlier this year it was revealed SBI is planning to launch a cryptocurrency exchange this summer and has also invested in a renewable energy wind farm to begin mining Bitcoin Cash — which Yoshitaka believes is more viable than the original bitcoin.

"Bitcoin is too expensive and people are just holding it and hoping it increase in value," said Yoshitaka.

Unfortunately, such goal is quite hard, even impossible, to achieve, because world biggest countries in the first place are thinking about national interest, not about the global situation. Especially now, when there are the complicated political situation and a lot of conflicts between world "leaders", well-being of "simple" people sometimes can be sacrificed for the greater good of a nation. And of course a lot of money is spending on those conflicts, so it usually deepens financial problems of countries. So we can only hope that someday, we will become smarter and manage our resources more rationally.

i read the threads and opinions of traders. why you people worrying about the price of bitcoin. bitcoin have always high volatility which is clearly  known all old investors.   70% of investors of bitcoin are new here from last year don't worry about bitcoin price. In 2009 to 2011 bitcoin are not worthy but when in 2012 1000 merchants and world press started accept bitcoin then bitcoin price gone high  now in 2018 is so worthy. Now in FIFA WORLD CUP 2018 all Russian hotels will be accept bitcoin. so just wait for bitcoin to the moon in june 2018