Is Bitcoin money?

[haster100]

yes bitcoin is online money. There is a possibility of an online store to accept bitcoins for payment. There are a lot of bank bitcoins. Bitcoin is money for me. It is very useful and easy to use.

[godharigod01]

Bitcoin is a digital money that can be used to transact anything.

[Vendetta666]

Bitcoin is something radically new. Nothing like Bitcoin has been possible until now. I would go so far as to consider it sui generis; "in its own class".  This makes it important to understand what Bitcoin actually is before we try to describe it to others.

We're getting a good handle on the code, and of course on Bitcoin's function and utility, but what words should we use to describe Bitcoin itself? There has been some debate in other threads [mostly my doing] over how it is like/not like money, cash, dollars, etc. I'd like to start this thread by focusing on the term "money", and play Devil's avocate by asking for your best arguments that Bitcoin IS money.

My legal dictionary states "In usual and ordinary acceptation it [money] means gold, silver, or paper money, used as circulating medium of exchange, and does not embrace notes, bonds, evidences of debt, or other personal or real estate." [cites omitted]

Wikipedia says "Money is any object that is generally accepted as payment for goods and services and repayment of debts in a given country or socio-economic context. The main functions of money are distinguished as: a medium of exchange; a unit of account; a store of value; and, occasionally, a standard of deferred payment." [cited omitted]

Webster's Online Dictionary defines money as:

• 1. The most common medium of exchange; functions as legal tender; "we tried to collect the money he owed us".
• 2. Wealth reckoned in terms of money; "all his money is in real estate".
• 3. The official currency issued by a government or national bank; "he changed his money into francs".
• 4. A piece of metal, as gold, silver, copper, etc., coined, or stamped, and issued by the sovereign authority as a medium of exchange in financial transactions between citizens and with government; also, any number of such pieces; coin.
• 5. Any written or stamped promise, certificate, or order, as a government note, a bank note, a certificate of deposit, etc., which is payable in standard coined money and is lawfully current in lieu of it; in a comprehensive sense, any currency usually and lawfully employed in buying and selling.
• 6. In general, wealth; property; as, he has much money in land, or in stocks; to make, or lose, money.

[links omitted]
[/list]

I maintain that per these definitions, Bitcoin cannot possibly be described as "money". And further, I think that those who do describe Bitcoin as "money" are doing this community a disservice.

But that is just my point of view. Are there any that can convincingly argue otherwise, that Bitcoin IS money?

Bitcoin is a money that can not be handled because it is a digital asset that is used by the internet but the bitcoin can be the money you can hold because the bitcoin value is worth the money and is replaced by the cryptoworld. But those with knowledge bitcoin is not so much that they do not know bitcoin can be a bit of money

[ModGirl]

Its like gold

Your logic is fine. The Bitcoin is money at every time. Any person who is keeping Bitcoin is same like the real money in his hands with a high price. Because, whenever you need the currency, you simply sell your Bitcoin at high cost and get money with profit.  The demand of Bitcoin is too high in all over the world. The money we have that we use to pay for purchase of goods. The Bitcoin provides the same facilities to us with a fast and secure way.

[butcherme]

Well a lot of people would say yes. Bitcoin can be converted to fiat money and in some cases it can also be used as payment in some establishments. A lot of people became rich because of bitcoin and I really think it's really good to have bitcoin.

[btcCoincart]

That's all about money! Because now we have definition for crypto currency

[jayhawk1]

yes bitcoin is online money. There is a possibility of an online store to accept bitcoins for payment. There are a lot of bank bitcoins. Bitcoin is money for me. It is very useful and easy to use.

Bitcoin is definitely a modern form of the money. Though most of the people who are buying in bitcoin are treating it as a good way of investing their money but apart from using bitcoin as a way of investing money, you can also treat it like money. The usage of bitcoin is not that much significant now-a-days but this will become normal in the near future. Bitcoin is and will be used as money.

[Thecryptocurrency09]

Bitcoin is something radically new. Nothing like Bitcoin has been possible until now. I would go so far as to consider it sui generis; "in its own class".  This makes it important to understand what Bitcoin actually is before we try to describe it to others.

We're getting a good handle on the code, and of course on Bitcoin's function and utility, but what words should we use to describe Bitcoin itself? There has been some debate in other threads [mostly my doing] over how it is like/not like money, cash, dollars, etc. I'd like to start this thread by focusing on the term "money", and play Devil's avocate by asking for your best arguments that Bitcoin IS money.

My legal dictionary states "In usual and ordinary acceptation it [money] means gold, silver, or paper money, used as circulating medium of exchange, and does not embrace notes, bonds, evidences of debt, or other personal or real estate." [cites omitted]

Wikipedia says "Money is any object that is generally accepted as payment for goods and services and repayment of debts in a given country or socio-economic context. The main functions of money are distinguished as: a medium of exchange; a unit of account; a store of value; and, occasionally, a standard of deferred payment." [cited omitted]

Webster's Online Dictionary defines money as:

• 1. The most common medium of exchange; functions as legal tender; "we tried to collect the money he owed us".
• 2. Wealth reckoned in terms of money; "all his money is in real estate".
• 3. The official currency issued by a government or national bank; "he changed his money into francs".
• 4. A piece of metal, as gold, silver, copper, etc., coined, or stamped, and issued by the sovereign authority as a medium of exchange in financial transactions between citizens and with government; also, any number of such pieces; coin.
• 5. Any written or stamped promise, certificate, or order, as a government note, a bank note, a certificate of deposit, etc., which is payable in standard coined money and is lawfully current in lieu of it; in a comprehensive sense, any currency usually and lawfully employed in buying and selling.
• 6. In general, wealth; property; as, he has much money in land, or in stocks; to make, or lose, money.

[links omitted]
[/list]

I maintain that per these definitions, Bitcoin cannot possibly be described as "money". And further, I think that those who do describe Bitcoin as "money" are doing this community a disservice.

But that is just my point of view. Are there any that can convincingly argue otherwise, that Bitcoin IS money?

Bitcoin is not really considered as a money but how it functions is it. We who knows what is it can term it as a money. It just that some would still call what is it. But right now it is a modern money.

[seoincorporation]

I think bitcoin is becoming money, because you can use it as a coin (selling and buying stuff), but its price is always changing, so no, its not a coin (yet). Its value is working more like bonuses, where the real price of the stuff is just based in speculation. In the other hand, I think BTC is an active, a bonus, in a process to become money. But what is money? Historically, money is something with a value because there are not much, you can hold it, transform it, and trade with it, that's the reason because, for instance, salt was treated as coin for a long time in history.

The other kind of “historical money” was bartering, trading with stuff of use. But when coin appear in history, they were made by gold or silver or another material humanity decided to consider of value. So... is BTC money??? I think in a historical moment as the one we are living today, tech, is the new gold. There is a limited number of BTC in the world, it has value, you can trade with it... so, yeah!! BTC is becoming money. Just becoming... for now.

But it doesn't mean it's just money, yes it is money because it works like money, but bitcoin is a code, is a step in the evolution, is a block chain, is freedom, and is lot of things more... Not just money. 

[Aldi888.]

+1 agreed.  It's a commodity that can be exchange for money

[QWURUTTI]

Bitcoin is really money it is like we are working on internet where we get profit from these gambling - trading - investment these three are good income if you really wanted to earn bitcoin maybe we should work hard for it. But since bitcoin is unstable price where bitcoin decrease fast we lose instant profit when we stocking coins. But it is okay it is part like paypal tho.

[Sanchit]

Bitcoin can be considered as a money but a digital currency. All the transactions that can be made using Bitcoin or other cryptos just like conventional money but without any intermediary banks. Just the difference between the two is that Bitcoin is the result of mining process while other money is prepared by commercial banks.

[BountyX]

Bitcoin is for sure a store of value. Among certain circles of people it certainly already is money, since the people in these circles believe it is. Money is money only if enough people believe it is, and it is money only for them. This should answer your question.

[btcrut2017]

For me Bitcoin is not money. Bitcoin is an asset. If you have a couple of bitcoins then you got plenty of money, thought it depends on where you are situated. Money in a certain country is backed by a physical commodity as they say.

[jankekek]

bitcoin is a digital currency that is not tied to a bank or government and allows its users to shop without revealing their identity. These coins are created by users who "mine" their currency by lending computing power to verify other user transactions. They accept bitcoin in return. These coins can also be bought and sold by exchanging local currency.

[kkaroul4]

Bitcoin is something radically new. Nothing like Bitcoin has been possible until now. I would go so far as to consider it sui generis; "in its own class".  This makes it important to understand what Bitcoin actually is before we try to describe it to others.

We're getting a good handle on the code, and of course on Bitcoin's function and utility, but what words should we use to describe Bitcoin itself? There has been some debate in other threads [mostly my doing] over how it is like/not like money, cash, dollars, etc. I'd like to start this thread by focusing on the term "money", and play Devil's avocate by asking for your best arguments that Bitcoin IS money.

My legal dictionary states "In usual and ordinary acceptation it [money] means gold, silver, or paper money, used as circulating medium of exchange, and does not embrace notes, bonds, evidences of debt, or other personal or real estate." [cites omitted]

Wikipedia says "Money is any object that is generally accepted as payment for goods and services and repayment of debts in a given country or socio-economic context. The main functions of money are distinguished as: a medium of exchange; a unit of account; a store of value; and, occasionally, a standard of deferred payment." [cited omitted]

Webster's Online Dictionary defines money as:

• 1. The most common medium of exchange; functions as legal tender; "we tried to collect the money he owed us".
• 2. Wealth reckoned in terms of money; "all his money is in real estate".
• 3. The official currency issued by a government or national bank; "he changed his money into francs".
• 4. A piece of metal, as gold, silver, copper, etc., coined, or stamped, and issued by the sovereign authority as a medium of exchange in financial transactions between citizens and with government; also, any number of such pieces; coin.
• 5. Any written or stamped promise, certificate, or order, as a government note, a bank note, a certificate of deposit, etc., which is payable in standard coined money and is lawfully current in lieu of it; in a comprehensive sense, any currency usually and lawfully employed in buying and selling.
• 6. In general, wealth; property; as, he has much money in land, or in stocks; to make, or lose, money.

[links omitted]
[/list]

I maintain that per these definitions, Bitcoin cannot possibly be described as "money". And further, I think that those who do describe Bitcoin as "money" are doing this community a disservice.

But that is just my point of view. Are there any that can convincingly argue otherwise, that Bitcoin IS money?

I think bitcoin is a crypto-based world-based digital currency and the advantage of bitcoin is that there is no fake currency in bitcoin while the currency you specified by definition in the dictionary has a lot of counterfeit money

[SAYDAKHMETOV]

Bitcoin is already money. To date, Bitcoin has been recognized by many countries. And they can already pay for goods and services in some countries.

[bitcoinfrings]

For instance, I think that gold has really very few intrinsic value,

Gold and silver both have excellent industrial characteristics.  They are both excellent conductors, for example, with silver being the best elemental conductor known to science; and gold does not corrode even in harsh environments such as under the ocean floor.  Both are used extensively in electronics for space, and gold is used as a coating for glass windows, because it can filter out radiation and solar intensity much better than leaded glass.  Silver is also traditionally used in dishes because it has antibiotic effects, not because of it's color.  Polished lead can look almost as shiny, and that would not turn out as well.  Pure silver is not the only material that inhibits surface growth, but the only one known of before 1965, and still one of the better methods, and used in medicine to this day.  Silver is an excellent heat conductor as well, and used in heat paste to dissipate the heat of a computer's cpu.  Silver can be used to make better batteries, but they would literally cost a fortune.  Gold would make an ideal material for bullets, because it's more massive than lead, non-toxic to any form of life, and as soft as lead and therefore as likely to 'mushroom' effectively.

The point here is, the main reason that we don't see these uses is because of the monetary value of gold, not because it isn't useful.  The 'intrinsic' value doesn't have to add to, nor equal, it's monetary trade value; only provide for a natural price floor.

Actually I think that the fourth characteristic should be replaced by the "hard-to produce" aspect, or scarcity.

Scarcity is not a characteristic of money, because it's trade value adjusts to it's scarcity.  Historicly; gold, silver and copper coins were all inter-traded, but copper wasn't particularly scarce.  Iron/steel was more valuable during the middle ages, because kings had a hard time outfitting armies with weapons made of copper.  Steel cooking pots would have been considered expensive.  One contributing cause was that refinement of quality iron required much more energy and labor than copper, silver or gold.  All of those being softer metals, and therefore much less labor intensive than iron or steel.  These days, refined gold "above ground" is less scarce than silver of a comparable condition; yet gold is many times more valuable because of it's monetary value, which silver lost along the way.

Taken on the other side, platinum is much scarcer than gold, and today is much more valuable because there are industrial uses for which there are no acceptable alternatives, not because of any monetary value.  The miners were aware of platinum by the 1600's, but Spanish treasure ships were likely to forge it into a ship's ballast weight, a cannon, or even a cannonball rather than use it as money.  It was scarce stuff, and they knew it, but they didn't have any special use for it, and is was too scarce to attempt to make it into coins, because it was so scarce that most people had no experience with it, and would therefore be unlikely to be willing to trade in it at all.  Mercury was often found in silver (which is why it was called quicksilver) but also often found with platinum.  Mercury was significantly more valuable than platinum because doctors of the day believed it had medicinal properties.

To the best of my knowledge bitcoin is money

[berriesjob]

Basically speaking, Bitcoin is also a kind of money that is passed around virtually. No tangible cash is seen but transactions can still be done with it.

[Roland Black]

Owning Bitcoins

BITCOINSare stored in a “digital wallet,” which exists either in the cloud or on a user’s computer. The wallet is a kind of virtual bank account that allows users to send or receive bitcoins, pay for goods or save their money. Unlike bank accounts, bitcoin wallets are not insured by the FDIC.