Gold is also, funnily enough, a better currency at this point. You can go to some small village in Yemen or Africa and sell your gold to a merchant, try that with any of the cryptos.
Being pedantic , it is actually possible to "make" gold "Gold can be created from other elements. But the process requires nuclear reactions, and is so expensive that you currently cannot make money by selling the gold that you create from other elements." Still give it 50 years and I dare say you may be able to make it commercially , a little like the way Diamonds are going.
One way to get around the value problem is to buy 1,000 acres of (Scottish) moorland at a cheap rate. Then announce the NEW coin is backed by this 1,000 acres and therefore worth X. What you don't put in the ad is that the sale of the second coin makes each only worth 500 acres etc.
Gold is overrated in a digital world and is currently in a long-term bear market. It's not as simple as just creating another coin, the 'network effect' is where a coin derives most of its value. Bitcoin has numerous advantages over gold, hence why it commands a significant premium. Yes, it doesn't have intrinsic value, is a difficult asset to value and is extremely volatile but that doesn't mean it doesn't have utility and numerous reasons that make it a superior investment choice for investors. As a store of value, bitcoin doesnt need to be technically superior than its alt-coin counterparts, it just needs to have a stronger network effect and be more accessible and transferable than gold. Gold is in big trouble. If I was a large holder of gold, I'd be worried. The network effect is not something that will easily erode either. Once a digital store of value has a superior network effect and technical superiority (I.e anonymity, lower transaction cost, faster processing) is secondary, it's pretty much bulletproof.
[Q yes you can get tonnes of Gold for just a few ounces of Bitcoin ( is very light and verrrry valuable ) (Twit)
This is my investment thesis. I have made more money in four years of crypto investment than in stocks, options on futures, and real estate.
I agree. Cryptos are far from anything useful.. for now. But without doubt, a way to transfer an alternative asset electronically, almost immediately, to any country in the world, that is almost impossible to shutdown will without doubt have a future. The future of the world both politically and economically is digital. And with a few lines of code can be transferred to real goods if an online store accepts crypto coins. Which they certainly will in the future. Gold has its uses too, but its value is derived from what? The fact it is a rare commodity? My finger paintings from kindergarten are rare, doesn't mean they are worth anything. Gold is valuable because people psychologically believe it has value, I don't think it looks particularly nice but we all decided gold jewellery/artefacts are worth having. Just as we have decided cryptos are, there's no intrinsic need to our survival in either of them. The main difference between them is one is tangible the other isn't. But that's also its drawback, if you think you will be protected by holding gold if the financial system collapsed or WW3 broke out you're mad. Try carrying a suitcase of gold around without a forklift or finding a middleman that will convert it to what exactly? If you are in a doomsday scenario the $ is already worthless.
You're talking about the future, I'm talking about the present. The fact remains one is in abundance and the other one is in limited supply. You're comparing original artwork to printing images. In the end one has been around for a couple of years. Gold has been around for millennia.