Surprise, bitcoin is back above $50,000
The price of the best-known cryptocurrency, Bitcoin, is once again above $50,000, with an all-time high of $65,000 dollars just a stone’s throw away. And as always happens with these increases, there has been much wailing and gnashing of teeth from of those who thought of buying a while ago and did not, as if anyone who fails to make a killing is missing the point of life.
The simple truth here is that all the speculation involving bitcoin — or Ethereum, the other cryptocurrency popular on the markets — is part of its adoption process, but in no way essential to it.
Let me explain: speculation, such as regulatory processes, frauds, bankruptcies, altcoins, shitcoins or scams, are an essential part in the process of determining the value of an asset, in generating confidence about its operation. Contrary to what many people may think, disruptive innovation virtually never happens by fiat. A truly disruptive innovation like Bitcoin or Ethereum cannot be decreed into use, imposed by a government. The public and the markets decide whether it has any value proposition.
That process of value discovery is extremely complicated and costly. For a long time, skeptics have called cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum of all sorts of things: pyramid schemes, as if a scam could last so many years and pass all regulatory scrutiny…
