I am just passing this along because I cover this as a hobby on my blog and I know there are a few people here who may have some interest in it. What is happening in the world of currencies (of all kinds) is somewhat amazing these days.
People now know about Bitcoin and other cryptos. In response to that innovation, central banks all over the world (and even the IMF) are studying whether they should issue their own "digital" versions of their own currencies (for the IMF it would be the SDR). An expert who tests these ideas for central banks advises me that by next year we may see the first central bank digital currency arise in Singapore. IBM has a distributed ledger technology (hyperledger) that central banks could use to support currencies like this. To be clear, a central bank digital currency is really just an electronic form of cash backed directly by the central bank. So their only real innovation might be to use distributed ledger technology to record the transactions and possibly to allow individual citizens to open an account directly at the central bank. They are studying the pros and cons of all that.
This week another new concept (Glint) launched in London. This has some pretty powerful app technology. I interviewed the Glint CEO about it here:
https://lonestarwhitehouse.blogspot.com/2017/11/new-gold-backed-payment-system-from.html
This one app (once it is fully implemented) will allow the Glint account holder to move between major fiat currencies like dollars, pounds, euros, yen etc. in real time on their mobile phone for a .5% fee per transaction. If they prefer they can also buy and own actual physical gold with the same app and also spend the gold just like a fiat currency at any merchant that accepts MasterCard (all instantly in real time at point of sale).
Not to be left out, we now have the first app that will allow people to do pretty much the same thing with Bitcoin and some other cryptos for the same .5% fee. Here is an article on that:
http://www.businessinsider.com/lond...hes-prepaid-cryptocurrency-debit-card-2017-11
So we have no shortage of currency options available these days. No matter what you like, you should be able to find something that suits your needs. I will add that trying to cover all this is interesting, but also pretty challenging with so many things happening and technology changing constantly.
Why so many choices? Basically you have those who are OK with the present fiat currency system and more and more people (we are talking millions worldwide) who don't trust it to be sustainable over time (think it will collapse eventually due to debt problems). That latter group is driving demand for Bitcoin and gold alternatives as a way to diversify out of the existing system to some extent. Older people in that latter group tend towards gold and younger people towards Bitcoin with some people liking an allocation to both as an alternative.
Other than that, things are pretty simple.
People now know about Bitcoin and other cryptos. In response to that innovation, central banks all over the world (and even the IMF) are studying whether they should issue their own "digital" versions of their own currencies (for the IMF it would be the SDR). An expert who tests these ideas for central banks advises me that by next year we may see the first central bank digital currency arise in Singapore. IBM has a distributed ledger technology (hyperledger) that central banks could use to support currencies like this. To be clear, a central bank digital currency is really just an electronic form of cash backed directly by the central bank. So their only real innovation might be to use distributed ledger technology to record the transactions and possibly to allow individual citizens to open an account directly at the central bank. They are studying the pros and cons of all that.
This week another new concept (Glint) launched in London. This has some pretty powerful app technology. I interviewed the Glint CEO about it here:
https://lonestarwhitehouse.blogspot.com/2017/11/new-gold-backed-payment-system-from.html
This one app (once it is fully implemented) will allow the Glint account holder to move between major fiat currencies like dollars, pounds, euros, yen etc. in real time on their mobile phone for a .5% fee per transaction. If they prefer they can also buy and own actual physical gold with the same app and also spend the gold just like a fiat currency at any merchant that accepts MasterCard (all instantly in real time at point of sale).
Not to be left out, we now have the first app that will allow people to do pretty much the same thing with Bitcoin and some other cryptos for the same .5% fee. Here is an article on that:
http://www.businessinsider.com/lond...hes-prepaid-cryptocurrency-debit-card-2017-11
So we have no shortage of currency options available these days. No matter what you like, you should be able to find something that suits your needs. I will add that trying to cover all this is interesting, but also pretty challenging with so many things happening and technology changing constantly.
Why so many choices? Basically you have those who are OK with the present fiat currency system and more and more people (we are talking millions worldwide) who don't trust it to be sustainable over time (think it will collapse eventually due to debt problems). That latter group is driving demand for Bitcoin and gold alternatives as a way to diversify out of the existing system to some extent. Older people in that latter group tend towards gold and younger people towards Bitcoin with some people liking an allocation to both as an alternative.
Other than that, things are pretty simple.
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