Yes, if you own bitcoin the digital asset, you are part owner of the Bitcoin monetary network and bitcoin is traded on exchanges all over the world as well as p2p markets, i.e. restaurant in Lugano or a vegetable market in Turkey All of the Bitcoin miners and their infrastructure costs and operational costs exist for bitcoin the digital asset If you bring up imaginary whales as your argument, then you have to look at your motives Yes, Bitcoin is a bank, when you buy bitcoin using your fiat currency, you have effectively opened a digital bank that you take full ownership, no need for custodial intermediaries, you simply store in your own wallet This is one of the reasons El Salvador presented to their lawmakers that over 70% of the population was unbanked even after decades that banks have been there You're getting overwhelmed by the many use-cases of Bitcoin and you try to paint them in the negative. Bitcoin the digital asset can be used as MoE, but also as investment asset, but also a transfer of value mechanism across borders instant settlement and for low costs and many more
Dalio and Soros have recently gone long on BTC, despite their age. I think that should account for possibly something...
Unless they are making offers to buy Bitcoin then they're not "backing it". It's really that simple. Hahaha! Nothing says fraud free like a new crypto firm failing every five minutes. So a long as you perfectly generate your keys, never use a computer with any security flaws whatsoever, never make any mistakes, and magically find a bunch of counterparties to do business with that will transact directly in Bitcoin and are willing to provide all services and products up front you're fine... As long as you don't care about privacy either, or getting hauled in by the government. Bitcoin is a ridiculously flawed system, but all these people keep clinging to it becaus they want to get rich quick, not to help oppressed people in poor counties. Oppressed people would be much better served by a stable currency, that was administered by a collection of reasonable people. https://xkcd.com/538/
Huh? The price of one BTC has gone from zero to $25,000.00 over the past decade, so there's definitely no shortage of offers for it.
But you are just changing the subject. You made some specific statements about what was "backing" Bitcoin. I'm pointing out the the only people backing it are they people willing to buy it. There are plenty of others willing collect money as an intermediary, or to be the next FTX. I will concede that there are many willing buyers at the moment, but not everyone even vaguely involved with Bitcoin should be construed as backing it.
BTC is a digital asset. I wonder why you wouldn't think the thousands and thousands of people running machines to mine BTC, validate transactions, and secure the network aren't backing it. If it weren't for their ongoing efforts there wouldn't be any BTC for anyone to buy.
That's what bothers me. You are relying on miners to keep the system going. At what price does it become unprofitable to mine? No miners; no system! Once the final bitcoin has been mined, how are miners going to be paid? If the fees are high enough to keep the system going, will they be too high to make small transactions?
You're conflating companies or people that commit fraud with Bitcoin but this is incorrect Give me the txid that was fraudulent on the Bitcoin blockchain and I'll take a look -------- If someone paid for a good or service using a check and the check bounces, that is fraud, the person spent more $ than he/she had in the bank account If someone buys a laptop and then reports it to the cc as unauthorized and gets the charge reversed, that is fraud If someone sells a solid gold bar for $ and the buyer later discovers the core is some other material, that is fraud None of those are possible on the Bitcoin monetary network. Every transaction is valid and fraud-free when you use the Bitcoin monetary system That is why the Bitcoin monetary network settled $8 Trillion of value last year This is why the market cap value of Bitcoin will eventually be over $200 Trillion and one bitcoin will be worth over $10M each You cannot spend 0.5 btc if you only have 0.45 btc in your wallet, you cannot pay someone with bitcoins and then later reverse it so you can get your bitcoins back, and you absolutely cannot spend fake bitcoins https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/16/business/citibank-revlon-loan.html