ARGENTINA COULD BE THE 1ST COUNTRY USING BITCOIN AS OFFICIAL CURRENCY

[harrymmmm]

it's too much of a gamble, even for a country like argentina.. besides, i doubt their population doesn't have the capacity to use it as the country's main currency.

Even in this unlikely case, they probably wouldn't adopt bitcoin per se.
They'd most likely peg their currency to it for the reasons you mention (like pegging your currency to a basket of trade weighted other currencies)..

[polynesia]

governments dont use gold as a currency because if they try gold price will raise too much.

That is true. Anything whose supply is finite is deflationary in nature (vs other goods). So governments would be uncomfortable using it as currency.
That is why the gold-backed Bretton Woods system failed.

[aesma]

Many posts about a country not wanting to surrender its currency, makes you wonder if the Euro exists.

[zen2]

Very interesting idea really but to make such great change in one country is not easy, it requires changing a lot lows, preparing people for this, informing public, bank regulations, financial regulations...
Of course, first you will need to get support from politicians who probably rarely using even simple email and it's question how much they can understand Bitcoin concept.
I really doubt such idea is possible now. 

[zedicus]

it's too much of a gamble, even for a country like argentina.. besides, i doubt their population doesn't have the capacity to use it as the country's main currency.

Even in this unlikely case, they probably wouldn't adopt bitcoin per se.
They'd most likely peg their currency to it for the reasons you mention (like pegging your currency to a basket of trade weighted other currencies)..

The argentina peso is already more or less pegged to the dollar on the government sanctioned currency exchanges. The most likely scenario is that Argentina would have a much higher adoption rate of bitcoin then the rest of the world. The government of Argentina is unlikely to give up control of their currency as they are more or less a deadbeat government (has a history of defaulting on their obligations). 

[kleeii]

I doubt that this kind of adoption with official sanction will happen anytime soon
Argentina is too deeply steeped in the traditional financial system for this to happen easily

[polynesia]

The argentina peso is already more or less pegged to the dollar on the government sanctioned currency exchanges. The most likely scenario is that Argentina would have a much higher adoption rate of bitcoin then the rest of the world. The government of Argentina is unlikely to give up control of their currency as they are more or less a deadbeat government (has a history of defaulting on their obligations). 

It is not an efficient peg. They don't have the reserves to defend the peg.
There is a huge premium on the USD in the black market.

[Timetwister]

Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! Yes, sure, a super interventionist government giving up control on their currency. Do you have any idea of how high is inflation there?

[johncarpe64]

The argentina peso is already more or less pegged to the dollar on the government sanctioned currency exchanges. The most likely scenario is that Argentina would have a much higher adoption rate of bitcoin then the rest of the world. The government of Argentina is unlikely to give up control of their currency as they are more or less a deadbeat government (has a history of defaulting on their obligations). 

It is not an efficient peg. They don't have the reserves to defend the peg.
There is a huge premium on the USD in the black market.

They don't have enough foreign currency reserves to cover the value of all of the pesos in circulation however they do have enough to cover foreign trade out of Argentina. The reason the dollar trades at such a premium is because it is widely believed that the government will further devalue the peso in the near future (lower the peg), and have capital controls in place that prevent too much money from leaving the country.

[UnitedColors]

Argentina's economy is the fastest-growing in South America so i'm not surprised they decided to say YES to Bitcoin.

[Timetwister]

Argentina's economy is the fastest-growing in South America so i'm not surprised they decided to say YES to Bitcoin.

More than Chile? No way. http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.KD.ZG

Uruguay is also growing more.

[arcanum]

This tthread title is missleading. THere is nothing that aims towards this.

[MaryKris]

Whats the current currency of Argentina?

[Timetwister]

Whats the current currency of Argentina?

Argentinian peso, which has gigantic inflation. 

[master-P]

Whats the current currency of Argentina?

Argentinian peso, which has gigantic inflation. 

That is crazy. I think this level of inflation will likely give the people of argentina incentives to use bitcoin more then they do not, however the Argentina government will likely not adopt bitcoin as an official currency as it would mean they would lose control over the currency base.

[EarthBound]

They should at least have another go at the Islas Malvinas aka Falkland Islands

[Skydog]

No. Bitcoin has way to much vortality to be used in Argentina. You think 20 % inflation is worse? Try 90 % over the last months. And now it doesn't matter that it went up there before because most people can't sit on their money until "its up" again. $ is king in Argentinia.

[snappa4ever]

No. Bitcoin has way to much vortality to be used in Argentina. You think 20 % inflation is worse? Try 90 % over the last months. And now it doesn't matter that it went up there before because most people can't sit on their money until "its up" again. $ is king in Argentinia.

Bitcoin is more stable then Argentina's peso. It is also not subject to the control of argentina's government which has a history of not making good on it's promises to repay creditors.

[fa]

To completely replace a fiat?    Still a long way to go. But BTC will surely prevail.

[Timetwister]

Whats the current currency of Argentina?

Argentinian peso, which has gigantic inflation. 

That is crazy. I think this level of inflation will likely give the people of argentina incentives to use bitcoin more then they do not, however the Argentina government will likely not adopt bitcoin as an official currency as it would mean they would lose control over the currency base.

Of course the government won't give up control on their currency. But citizens look for other options, even if they aren't legal, to protect from inflation. And bitcoin is a really good one, so I expect bitcoin to grow specially in countries with high inflation, like Argentina or Venezuela.