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Ask HN: What real world problem does cryptocurrency solve?

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Re: Ask HN: What real world problem does cryptocurrency solve?

#91

Post by MisterBastahrd »

ur-whale wrote: post #6

Have you ever been through a contentious divorce? Specifically one where the other party is laying claim to assets you earned? In these type situations, an asset that: 1) no one knows you own 2) even if people know you own them, can't be seized short of torturing you to regurgitate the password 3) can be transferred to any person of your choosing and in any jurisdiction of your choosing in a matter of minutes. seems…

There's gonna be plenty of knowledge about how much you own as soon as you sell some of it. God help you if you try to get that past the legal system.

Re: Ask HN: What real world problem does cryptocurrency solve?

#92

Post by Andrew_nenakhov »

Sending money to people when banks refuse to provide the service.

A few years ago I had a client in Indonesia, who couldn't pay me via banks, because Indonesia banks just said 'no' to transfers to Russia, and Paypal/WesterUnion fees were exorbitant. We tried bitcoin and were blown away: the whole operation (buying btc for Indonesian currency, sending it, selling it for Russian currency) transaction did cost far less than just converting USD to RUB in a bank.

One acquaintance of mine lives in Turkey and Turkish banks refuse to open an account for him. So he receives his payments via Bitcoin and converts them to local cash currency via a local trader.

Also, Bitcoin is the last available way to fund anti-Putin opposition in Russia, our authoritarian government has blocked all other ways to do it.

Re: Ask HN: What real world problem does cryptocurrency solve?

#93

Post by sjducb »

meheleventyone wrote: post #33
sjducb wrote: post #16

- The currency of my country is collapsing, I need to buy something which has a value unconnected to my country. - My country imposes export controls on foreign currency. I want to move my money out of my country. - I am unbanked and want to buy a good or service on the internet. - I do not trust the counterparty that I am dealing with on the internet. Using cryptocurrency means that my maximum loss is the vavlu of t…

> I've lost my phone and wallet, I can still get cash from a bitoin ATM using the crypto I'm storing in my brain. To be a bit mean but how do you find the Bitcoin ATM?

How did anyone find anything before smartphones?

Re: Ask HN: What real world problem does cryptocurrency solve?

#94

Post by CodeGlitch »

knapcio wrote: post #50

That’s an excellent question. I’ve been thinking about this topic a lot. Here’s some problems I think a good cryptocurrency solves: - Trust: you don’t need to trust any authority or money emitter when using a cryptocurrency. - Anti-inflation: It’s not possible to print e.g. bitcoin so you are not hit by the “inflation tax” - Nowadays, governments and other institutions can easily block a bank account with very little…

> Nowadays, governments and other institutions can easily block a bank account with very little reasons and then you need to go through a long process of proving your innocence.

This has been happening to immigrants from Hong Kong to the UK who have an HSBC Bank account... On the request of the Chinese government. HSBC has quite a big presence in China and Hong Kong, so I'm not sure they have much of a choice. Sucks either way.

https://www.reuters.com/business/finance/hsbc-aiding-crackdo...

Re: Ask HN: What real world problem does cryptocurrency solve?

#95

Post by sjducb »

zwkrt wrote: post #56
sjducb wrote: post #16

- The currency of my country is collapsing, I need to buy something which has a value unconnected to my country. - My country imposes export controls on foreign currency. I want to move my money out of my country. - I am unbanked and want to buy a good or service on the internet. - I do not trust the counterparty that I am dealing with on the internet. Using cryptocurrency means that my maximum loss is the vavlu of t…

So to summarize, it is useful for variously exfiltrating money out of a country, laundering, and for people who are savvy enough to use crypto but not sensible enough to have a bank account. The point about currency collapse is interesting to me, because (like almost all crypto apologist points) it assumes you already have a bunch of it/made a bunch of money on it before the bad thing happens. Everyone else gets to s…

Currencies rarely collapse instantly. You've usually got months to years of warning. Lots of time for people to get their cash out.

If you were Lebanese I would argue that having a bank account was a silly thing to do. Foreign bank accounts were illegal/difficult and domestic bank accounts are now worthless. You could own crypto or some kind of real good, such as a warehouse full of a commodity like wheat or diesel. Those are your options for hanging on to your wealth.

Re: Ask HN: What real world problem does cryptocurrency solve?

#96

Post by sjducb »

Ekaros wrote: post #86
risyachka wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can always find someone to sell USD for crypto in cash. And you will be able to do it only because crypto allows you to actually own your assets.

Question really isn't about USD or Euro. You are already quite happy if you have either. But let's say you are in Africa and have a lot of local hyper-inflating currency. Who will give you crypto for that? Or at least more than they need for immediate needs.

Anyone who needs to buy goods and services, or settle debt, in the local currency.

Re: Ask HN: What real world problem does cryptocurrency solve?

#97

Post by erc20 »

foogazi wrote: post #88
krsdcbl wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like paypal is, quite in the contrary, the best example of why you do might want crypto. Background: my mother had her account and assets frozen for a crazy long time after changing her name. Turns out accounts are bound to your name only, and support is unhelpful at best, so when her business started turning profit and she wanted to change her private acc to business they locked up her funds and refused to pr…

> so when her business started turning profit and she wanted to change her private acc to business they locked up her funds How would crypto have solved this ? Can she do business accepting only bitcoin ? How does crypto accounting work ?

Good questions.

A crypto payment processor allows setting up a payment gateway like Paypal, but accepting USDC instead. When accepting payment, the amount is deposited into the business owner's own wallet. The business owner can choose to accept payment in USDC. USDC is a ERC20 token, each backed by 1 USD or Treasury equivalent, operated by Circle, registered with FinCEN and dozens of other regulators, with monthly reports published by Grant Thornton. USDC token is available for use on the Polygon network, where a transfer costs between a tenth to one cent.

The main advantage over Paypal using the above process involving USDC on Polygon is, she can run her business via a wallet she controls without worrying about a clumsy corporate locking up her funds, and lower transaction fees.

The main disadvantage is - her customers must use USDC on the Polygon network - and adoption of crypto for ecommerce payments, let alone on a specific network like Polygon, is still early.

Re: Ask HN: What real world problem does cryptocurrency solve?

#98

Post by frb »

janandonly wrote: post #61

With inflation at 7.5%, you lose half your money in 9 years. The only way to outperform that consistently, that I have found, is to Dollar Coast Average: to buy small amounts of Bitcoin per day/week/month. For example: if You start on 01/01/2019 and put in $10 every week, then by now you would have put $1630 into bitcoin. But there is the thing: the value of that stash of bitcoins today is .... $6,330.56 See how this…

While I'm doing the same on a small scale for fun, I think it's important to mention that this is not some magic feature of Bitcoin, but just a speculative effect that works with any kind of asset, as long as its value grows disproportionally to the value of the currency you bought it in.

This only works as long as the price of Bitcoin (and other crypto currencies) "goes up". If it stagnates or drops, you can lose money, even more than the current inflation.

E.g. Calculating the Dollar Cost Average for the last year would show that you probably would have lost money, with a negative ROI of -11%.

Re: Ask HN: What real world problem does cryptocurrency solve?

#99

Post by meheleventyone »

nlitened wrote: post #85
meheleventyone wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You already need crypto though.

You don’t need to buy it, you can just accept it as a fee for your work.

So now the unbanked need an entire shadow economy to exist in their country to take part!? Plus all the accoutrements to access crypto.

Re: Ask HN: What real world problem does cryptocurrency solve?

#100

Post by meheleventyone »

sjducb wrote: post #93
meheleventyone wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I've lost my phone and wallet, I can still get cash from a bitoin ATM using the crypto I'm storing in my brain. To be a bit mean but how do you find the Bitcoin ATM?

How did anyone find anything before smartphones?

Well there are enough normal ATMs in most of the world that just wandering to the nearest bank is quite simple. There are quite a lot of countries without a single Bitcoin ATM let alone them being widely locatable where you happen to be.
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