Created just over twelve years ago by the mysterious Satoshi Nakamoto, bitcoin remains something of a mystery to the general public. As a result of constant vilification by the powerful at the helm of the current system, the majority of people believe bitcoin is dangerous.
Governments, central bankers, economists and many journalists continue to say that bitcoin is too unstable and that it is mainly used for criminal activities.
Some even go further and call it fraud.
The value of a currency is something completely subjective
Those opposed to bitcoin will tell you that it has no intrinsic value. In fact, seeing its price reach $60,000 strikes them as something extremely dangerous. To hear them tell it, Bitcoin is a giant bubble that will end very badly.
Too busy constantly denigrating Bitcoin with false arguments, these people can't even understand why Bitcoin is so successful. Their fear of a total paradigm shift that challenges all their unfair privileges in the current monetary and financial system prevents them from seeing the truth.
The first thing is that bitcoin has no intrinsic value as they understand it. But neither the US dollar nor other fiat currencies have any inherent value.
Here I return to the subjective notion of value. In economics, this subjective conception of value postulates that to be valuable, an object must be useful and scarce. Furthermore, this theory also recognizes that an object may meet the needs of one individual and not another.
Fiat currencies have value because they are useful to hundreds of millions of people today. Their value is guaranteed by governments. In the case of the US dollar, some will say that its value is guaranteed by the strength of the US military.
Unlike the US dollar, bitcoin is extremely scarce
As for scarcity, it's easy to agree that these fiat currencies are not actually scarce. In fact, look at the incredible increase in the M2 money supply over the last year in the US:
More than 20% of U.S. dollars in circulation have been printed out of thin air over the past twelve months.
This continual devaluation of the circulating supply of fiat currencies has dramatic consequences for the wealth of the majority of Earth's inhabitants. All the money produced remains in the hands of a small minority, as evidenced by the infinite decline in the velocity of the M2 money supply over the same period:
Money no longer circulates in the economy and remains in the hands of billionaires whose cumulative wealth has increased by more than $850 billion in 2020 in the US.
This phenomenon is not new, as it was already described in the 18th century by the economist Richard Cantillon. His work on the subject gave rise to the theory of the Cantillon effect, which we are now experiencing in full.
The problem with the current system is its centralization in the hands of people who cannot be trusted
The problem with the current system is that too much power is given to a small minority of people. I am referring to the central bankers who have the power to create as much fiat money out of thin air as they deem necessary. History has shown us that they cannot be trusted to carry that great power responsibly.
The centralisation of the current system creates a complete injustice for hundreds of millions of people around the world.
Bitcoin is the answer to this centralisation problem. Bitcoin is a decentralized system, P2P money. With bitcoin, the power of money is back in the hands of those who should never lose it: the citizens of the world.
Extremely scarce and already useful to more than a hundred million people, bitcoin is therefore valuable according to the subjective concept of value I outlined earlier.
Bitcoin proves to us day after day that the future belongs to decentralisation.
The dangers of centralisation emerge in social networking platforms
The dangers of centralisation are demonstrated to us every day. Take, for example, social networking platforms, where a few people have the power to delete people's profiles forever.
Facebook or Twitter may arbitrarily decide that you will never be allowed to have an account on their platform again.
With these social networking platforms in monopoly positions, you suddenly lose access to thousands or even millions of people who should have the power to decide whether your content is of interest to them or not.
Centralization gives too much power to those people who think they are above the people.
Google and Apple also abuse their power with their app stores
The example of app stores is telling. Google and Apple reign as absolute masters with the Play Store and App Store.
They can make arbitrary and unfair decisions that threaten the businesses of thousands of people. How many mobile app development startups have gone bankrupt due to total ban decisions by Google or Apple?
Too much!
I myself have had major issues in the past with my Google developer account. I invite you to read about my experience in this article. Google just terminated my Google Play publisher account for an hour after 10 years of loyal service ".
After creating a viral effect around my story, I managed to get my programmer profile back, but I now live with the sword of Damocles over my head . With the next arbitrary decision from Google, I could lose my Google developer account forever.
The fact that I can develop apps more than ten years in the platform does not count. I end up not publishing any more apps for fear of closing my account for good.
Again the dangers of centralisation.
All centralised platforms pose a threat to consumer freedom
The YouTube platform has the same problem. Thousands of content creators are banned or suspended every day in a completely arbitrary way. Google's notorious bots pass through and ban at any cost. It is impossible to discuss with these bots.
Some may be lucky if their YouTube channel is important enough and they see their account restored.
The lucky ones might even get an apology from Google. Regardless, it's not possible to live with this kind of fear all the time.
All these centralised platforms send you the same message as the current monetary and financial system. You must obey our unfair arbitrary rules and decisions whether you like it or not.
Final thoughts
Bitcoin is extremely successful because it allows millions of people to take back control of their money. And in doing so, you gain freedom over your lifetime. And that's what people just yearn to get. The great value of bitcoin lies here: in the power it returns to its users.
In the future, decentralized platforms will eventually take over the centralized platforms of the tech giants. It is only a matter of time, because the future belongs to decentralised systems. People want this, as the incredible success of Bitcoin shows us.
If you want to know what to invest in for the future, the best thing to do is probably look at all the solutions and systems that offer to decentralize their domains to give power back to the people.
Just like Bitcoin, these solutions and systems will have a very bright future ahead of them.