Bitcoin in Its Present, High-Profile Form Cannot Be Money

About the previous assertion, it should in no way be taken as a knock on crypto more broadly, or private money.

Bitcoin, in its current incarnation, cannot be considered money. This statement is not intended to disparage cryptocurrencies or private money in general. Evidence for this claim can be found in my 2022 book The Money Confusion: How Illiteracy About Currencies and Inflation Sets the Stage for the Crypto Revolution.

I believe that cryptocurrencies can – and should – replace government money precisely because governments have always devalued their currencies. Seriously, what could be more high-profile than devaluation? Few actions by a government are more visible than the devaluations that governments have consistently imposed on us because government money (e.g., dollars, pounds, euros, yen) is what we earn in exchange for our labor.

Devaluation allows governments to essentially steal the fruits of our labor by reducing the exchangeable value of the money that individuals receive in exchange for their work. This serves as a reminder that despite economists' claims, inflation is not a “stealth tax.” Inflation is blatant. We quickly become aware of the bitter consequences of theft.

The challenge now is that private money forms of crypto have yet to differentiate themselves from government money. Consider once again the most well-known cryptocurrency, bitcoin.

If you're reading this opinion piece, you either already own bitcoin, have owned it in the past, or have spent the last week, in particular, wishing you owned it. But that's not surprising. With the coin having surged past $90,000 apiece, many of you are lamenting not buying the coin a year ($36,000), two years ($16,000), five years ($8,000), eight years ($735), and fifteen years ago when thousands of bitcoins were traded for two PapaJohn's pizzas.

For the sake of argument, let's disregard the numerous ups and downs that bitcoin has experienced on its path to where it is today. That's precisely what owners and proponents of the coin want us to do. With bitcoin on a tear, it's only natural for those who held on or those who simply believe to agree wholeheartedly with the popular notion that bitcoin's surge is only in its early days. That's what Michael Saylor, the most prominent bitcoin proponent and owner, is asserting.

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Ok, but if you agree with the present narrative that bitcoin's surge is of the early days variety then you're by definition accepting what’s similarly true, that bitcoin will never be money. Think about it.

The sole use of money is as a medium of exchange. No one buys, sells, lends or borrows with money. More realistically production always buys production, and production is always loaned in return for future production. Money is just the reasonably trusted store of value that moves production between buyer, seller, lender, and borrower. If the latter is true, and it is, how can bitcoin ever be money? More specifically, what bitcoin cheerleader would ever buy, sell, lend or borrow in an alleged exchange medium that is only going up?

It’s just a gentle reminder that if bitcoin is what its proponents want it to be (up, up, and up) then it can only be an exchange medium insofar as those purchasing with it suffer inflation in reverse as the value of goods purchased in return for the coin relentlessly shrink in value relative to the coin itself. In other words, bitcoin's alleged feature is its bug. And then this alleged feature imagines that there's such thing as a speculation that only goes up.

Oh well, even proponents of the constant that is gold (it only moves up when fiat currencies in which it’s priced are going down - a real inflation hedge) don’t think the above about the yellow metal. They know well that persistently devaluing governments sometimes go the other way. What will keep bitcoin afloat once its alleged purpose is discredited by the very “feature” that proponents claim will have it on an upward path forever?