Is it possible to live without banks?

[Gyfts]

Yes, we could live without banks, and it is really hard for us, citizens of the community. The governments are the regulator of the money in a certain country, especially money of the people and the taxes. If there is no banks, there's no taxes that the government can collect and it will become not that effective and we will not have enough budget for the expenses and growth of our country and economy.

So then that would mean you could not live without banks because there isn't a centralized authority to collect taxes then? I'm not sure of the point you're making here.

Centralized bank are essential especially that we need the authority to regulate our money and produce fiat or paper money so that we can use cash in many transactions. Digital money is not that guaranteed to use in most of our payments because sometimes not all of us have an access to internet especially those indigenous people. It is still effective if we use paper money that's provided by our banks and spread it all over the country so that we have a tangible thing to use.

Fair point but to be clear, it's not like indigenous people are included heavily in the financial market. If you take the GDP of indigenous communities, I can't imagine it would be much. They tend to be the lowest income group on the U.S. as well.

But even they have access to technology if USD crashed and they were forced to use digital currency.

[Yatsan]

We can live without banks! But every countries economy will be shit. There will be no tax for people so the development of the country will not happen, every public place and roads are not going to be develop and the real people that are going to suffer is the poor people that are relaying only on the government. Public health care, education etc. Will be paid service, the private sectors are going to do it.

Banks are needed and it's impossible for a country to work normally if there's no bank that will regulate their peoples money.

[Freeesta]

If the whole world is switching to cryptocurrency, then most likely yes. People will be able to live comfortably without the services of banks. But in fact, the system will not change that way. When switching to cryptocurrency, banks will also begin to use cryptocurrency as a means of payment. Representatives of large banks will not allow the crisis of their companies.

[LogitechMouse]

Living without banks is still possible but transitioning from a living where we are dependent on banks in some cases to a living where we are using digital assets like crypto will take some time or worse it will never happen.

We know already that most of the people are still using fiat currency right now and who are printing it? Central banks. Banks are giving out loans to other people so there are still some people who are depending on banks thru loans. It would be hard for them to get a loan thru crypto since it is decentralized. I know that this is possible but it will take centuries in order for the world to make a transition from our current monetary system to another one.

One thing more is that I don't think that most banks will allow this to happen. It will be disastrous for them too alongside with the employees who are working for the banks. Most of them will be out of jobs if there are no banks. Don't take me wrong with this but I just see it that way since it can happen too.

[Tahid12]

With the world's economy collapsing, people are looking for alternative safe-haven assets to use in times of turmoil. Interest in crypto has sparked a lot ever since the stock market went on a decline. If people decide to use crypto, precious metals, and physical cash, will it be possible to live a normal life without a bank?

Of course possible. I believe, the day is not so far when people would able to live their normal life without a bank

In my case, I'd be willing to exit the banking system in order to have true sovereignty over my money. After all, that's what crypto is all about. If you could live your normal life without the need to ever interact with a bank (having a bank account to make transactions, etc), it'll be a blast. With the world shifting towards the online realm for e-commerce, virtual meetings, and more, it seems likely that people will be using decentralized money more thoroughly. There are still people using credit/debit cards, but that may change soon as Fiat becomes hyper-inflated.
What are your thoughts?

I agreed with you. Now we can buy any product from online and locally, anything we need in our life, by using credit/debit cards. Put up our money in credit/debit, is also safe way. So no need bank. But now our country & emonomy both are depend on bank, a lot. So Although there would be some problems cope with new technology(without bank) but those would have solved with time

[drlukacs]

With the world's economy collapsing, people are looking for alternative safe-haven assets to use in times of turmoil. Interest in crypto has sparked a lot ever since the stock market went on a decline. If people decide to use crypto, precious metals, and physical cash, will it be possible to live a normal life without a bank?


What are your thoughts?

You are slowly looking down on the function of a bank to the economy. Without banks, businesses cannot become as strong as they are now. The majority of businesses now owe a lot to the bank. All startups like us need capital to run the project and maintain it for a long time. If there is a shortage of banks, there will probably be lending services with high interest rates and the financial market will become chaotic. We need big and reputable banks, they divide money among the whole economy and help a lot for businesses and individuals who need it.

[stompix]

Guys, you're looking at this scenario wrong...

Can you buy a can of Pepsi from a shop without using a bank? Yeah of course you do!!!!
Can the shop buy a can of Pepsi to sell it to you without a bank? It gets harder!
Can Pepsi produce and sell it to the shop without a bank? Nope.

Without banks you might be able to live, but only as long as the others will still keep using banks!
My family sells meat from a small shop, we still accept cash, and we could still sell products without credit or debit cards. But the moment we close out bank accounts we won't be able to pay our suppliers, gas, other partners, access credits line when we don't get the payments in time, so we will close the shop down and you will have to go to another store.

Just because a guy can live in the woods and in 8 hours of searching he finds enough berries and mushrooms to survive it doesn't mean all 7 billion people could regress to being hunters and gatherers

We can live without banks! But every countries economy will be shit. There will be no tax for people so the development of the country will not happen,

.

Banks have nothing to do with tax.
I paid with BTC for multiple items here and always I was taxed and paid VAT on it.
People who think that with cryptos they can avoid taxes are living a fairy tale, you will still be taxed on your wage unless your employer will try to avoid the law and do this unlawfully, you will still be taxed at the stores if they will follow the law and issue receipts, it doesn't matter if it's crypto or cash.

[LeGaulois]

...

In theory this can be covered by Bitcoin P2P lending, or even by "Bitcoin banks". The main problem here is, however, volatility. If you borrow 1 BTC and just there is a Bitcoin rally, you'll have problems to pay it back. Thus, at this moment, the P2P lending market is not very developed (it exists mostly to provide capital to short sellers) and is not adequate for the "average Joe".

Volatility is also a problem if you got your salary in BTC and don't want it to lose value if there is a crash. (For the volatility problem I'm reseaching for a solution "without" centralized providers, see here).

Right, I didn't even consider the volatility side but as for the Bitcoin lending industry, seeing how it's currently developed it won't really work.

Let me explain: Currently, if a person is looking to borrow money and try to use a lending platform such as Nex.io, Celsius, or any others he needs collateral. It's almost impossible for a company not yet launched to provide any, otherwise, there is no use to borrow money if the company already owns the funds. Better for the company to sell the collateral and start with it. But as I said companies rarely have collateral, they have perhaps 10% and a money machine idea.

Using a P2P lending platform still has problems. I don't see random individuals ready to lend money to the first foreigner coming without knowing him etc. That's how it worked on BTCJam and see yourself how the story finished.

...

Also here ... Joe would have to lend Bitcoins to someone and he would get paid interest for that. But the volatility-related risks are still to high for "average Joes".

In reality, how would you see this structured (without a 3rd party), and especially how the lenders could be protected?
If I come to your door to tell you "I need 5 bitcoins, I will pay back later 0.5 BTC per month" I doubt you will say Yes

...

This depends heavily on the country you live. In my country I can pay almost all services with cryptocurrencies, but only via a third party payment processor company (which again, are not banks but also regulated and mostly have KYC/AML procedures).

Are you referring to BitcoinSuisse? Just asking in case there is another country where it's possible to do it (I remember a state in the US too)

[mu_enrico]

You should explain more what you mean by "banks."
Yes you don't have to use banks to save money, and to send/receive payments. However, businesses still need loans, therefore liquidity must be provided by some entity.
If you are just a worker, living alone, who lives from a monthly paycheck, you don't need a bank. Years ago I rarely touch my bank account, there is no internet yet, and I remember I don't have problems in my daily life. But after you have a family, you want to buy a house, etc., then you need to borrow from some entity. It sucks but I don't know how to create better system than this. It's like a love and hate relationship.

[DoublerHunter]

^ It is possible for everyone to live in a world without a bank as long as the technology that the government will use a high-end technology such as the blockchain technology that will provide a seamless transaction when it comes to financing. But it will be an advantage to everyone for bankless transactions will give us full control in all of our assets. Nevertheless, this dream may really happen in the future and intensive studies must take place first before implementing it for the people are not yet ready for a digital world.

[mu_enrico]

^ It is possible for everyone to live in a world without a bank as long as the technology that the government will use a high-end technology such as the blockchain technology that will provide a seamless transaction when it comes to financing. But it will be an advantage to everyone for bankless transactions will give us full control in all of our assets. Nevertheless, this dream may really happen in the future and intensive studies must take place first before implementing it for the people are not yet ready for a digital world.

LMAO nice joke mate! Sure, much seamless, 10th generation of blockchain needed! What happens if some entity manages to use/develop such remarkable technology? Do they become a bank?

[webtricks]

With the world's economy collapsing, people are looking for alternative safe-haven assets to use in times of turmoil. Interest in crypto has sparked a lot ever since the stock market went on a decline. If people decide to use crypto, precious metals, and physical cash, will it be possible to live a normal life without a bank?

There are still people using credit/debit cards, but that may change soon as Fiat becomes hyper-inflated.

What are your thoughts?

It is wrong to assume that inflation makes fiat currency useless. Well, it may make one unit of fiat worth less than what it used to before, but still fiat will be widely used for valuing every goods or service which keeps currency relevant.

Only hyper-inflation makes currency irrelevant because general public lose the trust in the currency and no longer want to use that currency for the valuation of goods and services. But again, hyper-inflation is not global phenomena. You can't say every currency becomes hyper-inflated at the same time. It is not possible at all. Hyper-inflation is the comparative phenomena when economic situation in one country becomes excessively worse as compared to other nations. Then people in that country move on to foreign currencies rather than using local currency.

On whole, I don't see your argument strong enough to believe that fiat currency (as well as banks) going out of play any time soon.

PS: Money is not investment. Even if per unit value of fiat currency is decreasing and stock market is falling, provided if local currency is not experiencing excessive inflation, people will continue their faith in currency.

[Rulelies]

I think banks are still very useful in the society and it will be very difficult to live without the banks. The only things that will happen is that the banks will work in new ways. Maybe the likes of blockchain and other wallets might be the new banks

[Sanugarid]

Without any kind of bank? Not just the current form of bank that we all know? I really doubt it.

There should be no doubt. It will be difficult for every one if we don't have banks that regulate or control the money flow.

Rudimentary forms of banks could be traced back thousands and thousands of years ago. This early, even before the peak of the crypto age, we already have what are called crypto banks. So I don't think the banks will perish soon with the advent of crypto. It could transform, though, as it always has been. With our virtual currencies, we could very well see virtual banks as well.

As long as there will be currencies there will be banks to regulate it, why? coz the government need to do so. This is also answers the question of eliminating banks because we already have crypto, world won't work if we do it decentralized, that's why we keep adding these cryptocurrency to our financial structure. Visa for example added bitcoin on their payment method, but once bitcoin loses its value it will leave them no option but to drop it, see how risky to be decentralized?

For now, I cannot live without banks. I cannot even live with crypto alone.

Just think if we don't have banks, you'll see more crimes related to theft lol.

[shield132]

With the world's economy collapsing, people are looking for alternative safe-haven assets to use in times of turmoil. Interest in crypto has sparked a lot ever since the stock market went on a decline. If people decide to use crypto, precious metals, and physical cash, will it be possible to live a normal life without a bank?

In my case, I'd be willing to exit the banking system in order to have true sovereignty over my money. After all, that's what crypto is all about. If you could live your normal life without the need to ever interact with a bank (having a bank account to make transactions, etc), it'll be a blast. With the world shifting towards the online realm for e-commerce, virtual meetings, and more, it seems likely that people will be using decentralized money more thoroughly. There are still people using credit/debit cards, but that may change soon as Fiat becomes hyper-inflated.

What are your thoughts?

Everything is possible, we can live without banks but our quality of life will decline a lot.

First of all, what are banks and why are they important?
Banks are source of money where there is supply that collects money from those who have a lot (or more than enough and don't know where to store it safely) and forwards on those who have deficit of it. Banks take all responsibility and risks that this action carries while giving benefits to both side: profit to lender and necessary money to borrower. This is one of the most important fuction of banking and as a resule of this, a lot of services, projects and in overall business was created and developed further.
On another hand, modern banking has too much necessary functions than it had before. Nowadays we use cards provided by them to make transaction in stores, markets and etc. We are able to buy things online securely via our cards and more. We are moving from cash to fiat as time goes and all of these actions strenghten our connection with banks, in overall we depend on banks more than ever.

Btw at the same time banks are our enemies too. What banks do is maximizing of their profits and increasing loan percentages, charging a lot of fees and more. This in overall makes a lot of money to go from people to bank, making people poor but banks - rich institutes. I guess that's not good at all. Another bad thing is how they use our transactions for marketing purposes, not only them but walmart, google and other companies but this is different task.

[ethereumhunter]

If your means to live without banks here is we don't have an account in any banks, then I will say yes, we can live without banks. We can save the money in someplace without a bank interfere. I think that could be like what I watch on Fast Five which one rich person is saving all of his money in one big box in the police office. That rich person doesn't have an account in any bank. So I guess that someone can do that, and he can use one big box like in the movie to store all of his money.

But if we talk about crypto, I think we cannot do that because crypto needs approval from the government which is not all of the governments now approve. But it could happen in the future if the government see the chance for their people to change their life, and they can manage their own money besides using the banks.

[justdimin]

Do we really want to live without banks tho? I mean I get it, you guys all seen how horrible banks could become and you think that banks should no longer exist and we should live in a world where banks are no longer needed as well. However we are forgetting one eternal truth, something is as bad as the people who manage it. So, banks could very well be used for awesome stuff, look at banks in countries that really cares about these kinds of stuff.

It is not a bank but I want to give an example, Mcdonalds in Norway actually provides healthcare payments, unionized worker hiring, paid leaves, maternal leaves and many other developed stuff for their workers and still profit from it, they do NONE of those in USA because they don't have to there and profit. As you can see a company can't have a soul, can't have a morality, they are just there to pump money.

So. if government of USA forces mcdonalds to be like the Norway solution, they would still profit, while everyone else would be happy too. Use this logic to banks, banks could exist, just make it a proper place and not just "I don't care if people die, I want profits" place and you will get good results.

[JimboToronto]

Lots of people don't use banks.

I haven't had a bank account in years. I've only had a credit card for a few years now. Before that I went years with neither bank account nor credit card. I keep my savings secure in Bitcoin and earn all my revenues and make all my payments and purchases in cash.

Cash rules. I've never had cash bounce, get a stop-payment, require 3 pieces of signed ID, or put on hold for several business days. I've never had cash refused nor been charged interest nor service fees.

Whenever I've had to deal with a check, I've always been able to find someone to endorse it over to in lieu of a cash payment. Since I got a credit card, I usually sign it over to them. The only reason I got a credit card was to get a free t-shirt at the ballpark by filling out a questionnaire. I was shocked when they actually sent me one. I've since found it useful for purchasing air fares since Expedia stopped taking Bitcoin. It also helps because some hotels require it and it is useful for online purchases.

I pay my taxes and utilities with postal money orders if cash is too inconvenient. I live downtown in a big city so I can usually pay in cash directly. I usually pay my bills months at a time in advance and always keep a "negative balance" (meaning they owe me money) on my credit card.
____

Where I am now, waiting out the covid-19 scare in a remote village in the Mexican jungle, absolutely no one uses banks. No one has a bank account nor receives nor writes checks. In fact there are no banks nor ATMs.  The nearest bank is almost an hour's drive away. I now own 6 properties here, including 3 houses, and all were bought with cash, except my first one which was bought partially with Bitcoin.
____

Screw the banks.

[d5000]

Currently, if a person is looking to borrow money and try to use a lending platform such as Nex.io, Celsius, or any others he needs collateral.

True, the current DeFi lending services aren't for people who need crypto without already owning some. It's simply a different type of service. In a totally decentralized way, I can't imagine a DeFi service without collateral. But at the other hand, there is a method that can be used for crowdfunding, at least for companies: ICOs. They could be described as a special case of P2P lending.

Using a P2P lending platform still has problems. I don't see random individuals ready to lend money to the first foreigner coming without knowing him etc. That's how it worked on BTCJam and see yourself how the story finished.

That's what I meant with the part of my post where I argue that banks won't disappear even with massive crypto adoption, as they are the entities who most know about risk management. They can accept more types of collateral and securities than DeFi services could (as these depend on cryptocurrencies), like a house, or an income receipt. Loans will be, in my opinion, a service where banks and similar "financial service firms" will always have an overwhelming market share - at least until AI becomes that smart that we can automatize it, but I think this is very far away still (I think we agree here, actually).

In reality, how would you see this structured (without a 3rd party), and especially how the lenders could be protected?
If I come to your door to tell you "I need 5 bitcoins, I will pay back later 0.5 BTC per month" I doubt you will say Yes

Here I was taking into account the DeFi services with collateral requirements that already exist. For someone who already owns cryptocurrencies and would lend it to another person who wants to use it for short selling activities and get some interest for it, it may work, but there is still the volatility risk.

Are you referring to BitcoinSuisse? Just asking in case there is another country where it's possible to do it (I remember a state in the US too)

I know these services from South American and European countries. Examples:

https://www.satoshitango.com/es-AR/ (Argentina)
https://www.servicrypto.com/ (Colombia)
https://www.bitpanda.com/en/payments (Germany and other Euro countries)
https://bity.com/de/products/crypto-online-bill-pay/ (for Euro/CHF)

Of course you could argue that they're "almost banks", and that these services also need full-fledged banks to work. This is however not a technical requirement - with more adoption/growth the service providers could accept their services directly without an intermediate bank.

[BuNga_cute]

In my opinion it is impossible to live without banks, especially since not all countries have legalized crypto. For me the presence of crypto
is not to turn off the bank. But only as an alternative payment, so bank or fiat collaborate with crypto. For example in my country it is
impossible live without a bank, because crypto is prohibited as payment. Then I had difficulty buying the necessities of everyday life with
crypto. Because the number of merchants that accept payments by crypto is still limited.