the biggest catalysts for growth (imho) are
[1] the amount of international insta-pay money/value it leaves on the table (to buy things), business wants a cut of that, the larger the market cap, the more money, this self reinforces, $100B leaves a lot more on the table, 1T please sign me up now level
[2] The huge margin on Forex/remittances that BTC will consume, you know western union et.al will be out of business
[3] Alternate class of capital investment, that will force any fund or investor to keep a % off value in BTC.
[4] The large $ transfer that can be done with BTC
[5] Store of wealth (though PeerCoin may come to dominate here)
[6] A good percentage of banking/financial infrastructure, both retail and commercial is rendered obsolete. Add up the value of all those wages, software, security, account costs, real-estate of all the banks in the world, works out to quite a bit that is no longer needed.
[7] In efficient economic policy, QE and friends,
[8] In efficient state regulation will drive business to efficient state regulation regimes, and so discipline the former
[9] media hype, and its not just hype, its actually chronicling a historical and revolutionary period, that most don't yet understand this is what it is.
When I say revolution, I mean this,
A scene in the Grapes of Wrath always stuck with me,
it was the one where a tenant farmer and a tractor operator who is about to level the farmer's home. The farmer wants to know whom to shoot. The driver says he is just following orders; if the farmer shoots him another man will be sent to level the home down.
'You're not killing the right guy.'
'Who gave you orders?'
The bank: 'Clear those people out or it's your job.'
But there is no sense shooting the bank's directors because they got their orders from the East: make the land show profit or else. Where does it stop, the farmer asks.
'I don't aim to starve to death before I kill the man that's starving me.'
'Maybe it isn't men at all,' the operator says, 'maybe it's the "property" that's doing it.'
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7JEYHczRar8I mulled this one over for years trying to think of an answer
The Bitcoin protocol and crypto's in general has reversed this position and provided the answer,
Now the institutions of the state Banks and the State are now faced with the question 'who do we shoot' and they have no real answer, except, change the fundamental mathematical properties of the Universe that's what doing it.
Perhaps one of the most important features of bitcoin, is what I term as
"the elision of sovereignty from the state to the individual"
BTC is the first vehicle to really make some in roads into this.
Perhaps a more thorny question is what else may find sovereign power...but that a bow to far for now.
