Tim Wu reflects on the rise of Bitcoin, and wonders if it stems from a trust deficit of traditional banking systems and a giant leap of faith in technology
You don’t need brilliant financial analysis skills to notice that Bitcoin is in a bubble. It has grown in value from about 39 cents to over $15,000 in just eight years and has recently attracted broad media attention by doubling in just a few days. The conventional wisdom had it that illegal and illicit transactions—buying drugs or transferring money out of Argentina—accounted for much of Bitcoin’s value. Today, the mainstream view sees mere greed and speculation.
Yet, as Bitcoin continues to grow, there’s reason to think something deeper and more important is going on. Bitcoin’s rise may reflect, for better or worse, a monumental transfer of social trust—away from human institutions backed by governments and to systems reliant on well-tested computer code. It is a trend that transcends finance—in our fear of human error, we are putting an increasingly deep faith in technology.
Bitcoin may be in a bubble, but not all bubbles are created equal. Some are shimmering nothings, reflecting little more than an underlying pyramid scheme. But others are like ocean swells that could become enormous waves. Consider the tech stocks of the late 1990s—a bubble, to be sure, but in retrospect, was Amazon really overvalued?
This story is from the February 01 ,2017 edition of The MAN.
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This story is from the February 01 ,2017 edition of The MAN.
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