I think one of the reasons that turn bitcoin into a fad because it was invented in the US. if it were invented in some banana republic, then its popularity wouldn't have flown so high. What if it were invented in Greece, Argentina, N Korea, Cuba,... not a lot of people would have readily adopted it. Since bitcoin was invented in the US, whose currency is the world currency. that has helped bitcoin thrive. bitcoin has thrived on the borrowed prestige of the dollar (prestige of a nation to be more exact). it's like mafia boss is telling a son of banker "I'm lending you this money because your father is a banker". (the prestige is gained by close association). have you heard of Dr. Ruja Ignatova aka OneCoin Cryptoqueen who pulled $500 million stunt? [video=youtube] [/video]
Oh gosh i remember this guy. He advised against investing your savings into Ripple and that was a few months ago when it was at 0.5$ and now it's more than x3. He is trying to be smart and rational, trying to display "common sense" and make fun out of everyone who is "irrational and stupid". That's the kind of people that do the worst in the markets. If you are average(which by definition most people are), your ass will suffer. Speaking from personal experience. The gifted ones/natural talents are the ones who are really stupid and the ones who are really smart(they learn quickly to dumb down).
The main suspect in one of the largest Ponzi schemes ever – Onecoin – Ruja Ignatova, also known as the Cryptoqueen, allegedly holds 230,000 bitcoins, currently worth well over 8 billion USD according to court documents. The documents filed by victims of the Onecoin Ponzi scheme also reveal that Ignatova possibly received the coins from a royal family member in Dubai – Sheikh Al Qassimi – the son of one of the wealthiest men in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), who allegedly handed Ignatova four hard wallets (USB sticks) containing 230 000 Bitcoins worth at the time of the transaction about 50 million USD in exchange for Onecoin bank accounts, other assets, and real estate in the UAE worth over 1 billion USD. Although few details about the transaction are clear, it is said to have happened in October 2017, when bitcoin was trading at a price of about 6000 USD and Ignatova was already in the focus of an investigation.
Ruja Ignatova was born in the Bulgarian city of Sofia, but she moved to Germany at the age of 10. She obtained a university degree in European private law from the University of Konstanz in 2005.OneCoin, the cryptocurrency with which she has been successful since 2014, is not Ignatova's first questionable venture. In 2012, Ignatova was convicted of fraud in Germany in a case involving a company that was declared bankrupt under dubious circumstances, shortly after she took over the company. She received a 14-month suspended prison sentence for this.Ignatova has also been involved in a failed multi-level marketing program called BigCoin. But that was child's play compared to the OneCoin project.