David Rosenthal on cryptocurrencies
There is a misconception that Bitcoin electricity usage is increasing exponentially and uncontrollable. In fact, it is limited by Bitcoin price times Bitcoin issuance rate. For example, at current BTC price, electricity usage has an upper limit of $37m per day. If miners spend more than that, their operation becomes unprofitable. In fact, they spend less, because there are also other expenses.<p>From April 2024, the new upper limit will be $18mln&#x2F;day, if the price remains stable. If Bitcoin price rises in line with it&#x27;s decreasing issue rate, in 12 years we&#x27;ll have Bitcoin at $328,000, but the electricity costs will stay same as today.<p>$37m per day is about $1.1B a month. If we divide this by world&#x27;s population of 8 billion people, we arrive at a figure of 14 cents per month.<p>14 cents is what you are paying to Visa for your morning croissant in transaction fees. On top of this, you pay a lot of taxes to the government to maintain and secure the money system.<p>Now what are we getting for 14 cents a month? We are getting money that is unforgeable, uninflatable, irreversible, uncensorable, electronic, capable of millions of transactions per second, available to anyone worldwide 24&#x2F;7&#x2F;365. We are getting a piece of freedom in a world that is becoming more and more centralized and controlled from above.