Yes, but that would also apply if what I had was a used car, rather than bitcoin or gold, etc. The requirement for intermediate conversion to another currency in order to realize value implies that bitcoin isn’t (at least yet) a currency (even in the case where foreign currency isn’t local currency, there is a context where it is currency: that foreign country). I can also buy milk by exchanging my car for local currency, and it has at least some intrinsic value. I realize that the currency/money question is far more complex (my car is neither fungible nor easily portable), but I wonder how many of those speculating on bitcoin’s value appreciate that or are capable of explaining why Bitcoin has any advantages over gold or bearer bonds as a repository of value. Or, for that matter, how speculating in Bitcoin in the 20th century is different from speculating in Tulips in the 17th.

Right now, Bitcoin’s primary economic role seems to be as a demonstration of just how many Greater Fools the internet and social media give us access to.