Why the ‘Big Short’ Guys Think Bitcoin Is a Bubble
Rather balanced article, but like many fails to mention one really important aspect of Bitcoin:<p>There is a IMO a very tangible market demand for a financial product that allows one to <i>completely</i> shield value from the myriad of value-eroding propositions that have been baked into the traditional financial system to essentially bleed you dry on a long enough timeline.<p><pre><code>    - &quot;management&quot; fees
    - capital gain taxes
    - death taxes (inheritance taxes)
    - asset seizures (divorces, bankruptcy, random court decisions against you, Cyprus Bank Disaster [1], etc...)
    - inflation (govt mandated or otherwise)
    - etc ...
</code></pre>
No such product exists today in traditional finance, and imo quite a bit of the demand for Bitcoin comes from there.<p>For example, many of the traditional way to shield your wealth (stock market, commodities, real-estate) fail to be prone to some of the events I list above.<p>You may not agree that Bitcoin solves all of the above, in which case please list something that gets as close.<p>The fact that some of the things listed above will be viewed by some as &quot;morally reprehensible&quot; is irrelevant to the conversation: moral or not, the demand still exists.<p>And for folks who look at Bitcoin for this (shielding wealth) the fact that Bitcoin has gone parabolic in the last 10 years is kind of a nice cherry on the cake.<p>Yes, if you decide to use BTC to shield value, you are taking a rather big risk (volatility, BTC could be hurt by govt cracking down on it, there will be a huge &quot;event&quot; when Tether finally implodes, etc ...).<p>But again, please list something that comes any closer to solving the problem.<p>The above is why I believe people who claim Bitcoin has no &quot;intrinsic value&quot; (a term I consider to be entirely meaningless) are wrong, even using their own definition of &quot;intrinsic value&quot;.<p>[1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;2012–2013_Cypriot_financial_crisis" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;2012–2013_Cypriot_fina...</a>