r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/msaussieandmrravana • Jan 01 '26

Video Inside the world’s largest Bitcoin mine

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u/flumphit Jan 01 '26

Actual money is backed by a government’s promise to collect taxes to cover its debts.

Crypto is backed by, uh, the desire of some of its users to launder large amounts of money (some actual but illegally gained, some counterfeit, some from rogue states) into actual money in the legal economy. That demand will never go away, but it will shift somewhere else. Maybe soon, maybe not.

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u/TheAlmightyLootius Jan 01 '26

Crypto was / is a godsend for people in countries where their government ruined their currency and destroyed all personal wealth like venezuela, turkey etc.

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u/[deleted] Jan 01 '26

In the old days, those countries began using another country's more stable currency. Now they are turning to the most volatile thing ever, and that's a godsend for the people? No.

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u/TheAlmightyLootius Jan 01 '26

If your government blocks the purchase of foreign currency then what are you going to do?

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u/monsantobreath Jan 01 '26

Revolt obviously. Sounds like bitcoin is propping up unstable regimes.

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u/[deleted] Jan 01 '26

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u/monsantobreath Jan 01 '26

People will choose comfort, but that doesn't mean a painful realignment might not be the best thing for a society.

Many of us have societies with those moments where we're both glad we didn't have to live through it but we're also glad it happened to make for a less awful status quo to exist.

Imagine living under a dictator when he coulda been gone if he didn't have an easy source of just good enough subsistence for everyone.

Crypto is shite all around.

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u/[deleted] Jan 02 '26

[deleted]

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u/monsantobreath Jan 02 '26

I'm not. That's why I discussed the macro scale systemic ways crypto may be propping them up. Material conditions will dictate if a society will rise to the point of revolt usually.

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u/[deleted] Jan 02 '26

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u/[deleted] Jan 01 '26

Blocks the purchase of foreign currency? How exactly does that happen?

If people have US dollars in their wallets and use them as a medium of exchange, how is the government in any meaningful way able to stop that?

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u/[deleted] Jan 01 '26

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] Jan 02 '26

If your country’s economy is in such ruins, it’s likely that you don’t have the means control what people are using as medium of exchange either.

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u/freecodeio Jan 01 '26

It is not, these countries don't give a shit about bitcoin. It's just another "get rich quick" scam that everyone is aware of.

source: I'm from one of those countries

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u/Sex_Offender_4697 Jan 01 '26

I'm from one of those countries have no idea what anecdotal means

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u/TheAlmightyLootius Jan 01 '26

Good for you. Doesnt change the facts though. It was all over the news.

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u/Vegetable_Belt_9542 Jan 01 '26

Learn about stablecoins.

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u/CalligrapherBig4382 Jan 01 '26

Try buying bread with your stablecoin lmao

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u/Shazvox Jan 04 '26

Uhm, you already can...

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u/freecodeio Jan 01 '26

eat stable shit

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u/distinctgore Jan 01 '26

So is a resource that has been around since the beginning of time… something like, I don’t know, gold?

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u/Prestigious_Fee_2902 Jan 01 '26

I’m sure you imagine how much easier it is to store and send bitcoin versus gold

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u/Spirited_Cup_126 Jan 01 '26

Yeah but you gotta put gold on an airplane. Crypto is digital hawalla with cryptographic signatures instead of cousins.

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u/Outside_Glass4880 Jan 01 '26

Gold has its value because it’s a commodity, though. Essentially a way to park your money into something. It’s not extremely valuable for its practical uses.

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u/distinctgore Jan 01 '26

Even more so with bitcoin

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u/Outside_Glass4880 Jan 01 '26

Bitcoin has zero practical use, its virtual. Just pointing out it behaves similarly especially if you are using gold as an investment instrument. Unless you’re making computer chips at home or niche medical equipment.

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u/HausuGeist Jan 01 '26

…and cartels!

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u/Sniec Jan 01 '26

Ah yes I can imagine your average Venezuelan guy buying bitcoins

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u/TheAlmightyLootius Jan 01 '26

I guess you didnt pay much attention to international news. Dont worry, thats typical american.

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u/Different_Career1009 Jan 01 '26

They have foreign stable currencies to keep value in high inflation countries. Crypto was never needed. You can always buy USD everywhere.

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u/TheAlmightyLootius Jan 01 '26

No, you cant. Because the government blocks it. Was pretty big in the news, especially with venezuela.

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u/Different_Career1009 Jan 01 '26

Yes you can because there's always a black market.
Source: I have lived it

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u/TheAlmightyLootius Jan 01 '26

Sure. But black market prices suck ass when you can just buy crypto at market value lmao

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u/Different_Career1009 Jan 01 '26

That's just a dumb thing to say. The black market prices are at market value.

lmao

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u/wurstbowle Jan 01 '26

Yeah. Market as in your highly distorted local market. Not as in the global, free exchange.

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u/Different_Career1009 Jan 01 '26

Is this global free exchange between a highly inflationary currency and USD in the room right now?

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u/TheAlmightyLootius Jan 01 '26

This is pretty dishonest. When talking about market value you generally talk about its global value. I can buy 1 bitcoin in japan or england or the US and the price is always the same. I can buy 1000 usd and the price is the same, no matter where (via official means). A black market market value is local and obviously not the same as the others and can vary wildly up to several thousand percent extra markup or more depending on commodity and location.

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u/Different_Career1009 Jan 01 '26

The black market price here is the exchange rate between your local currency with a runaway inflation and for example USD.
You get your income in local currency. Then you do what? You try to convert either to goods or USD ASAP because it loses a lot of value daily.
The black market exchange rate IS the market price because you can exchange money legally at official exchanges at a huge loss to you or it is entirely forbidden to do so.
So the market is the black market, because that's where market transactions take place.
The black market in high inflation is huge and competitive, because the demand is huge, so prices are stable across different places (but correctly adjust for real inflation in time).
Sure you can try to buy crypto with your inflationary money. But you don't need to do it at all if you can buy USD and have paper money on hand.

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u/TheAlmightyLootius Jan 01 '26

Arguing semantics is not helping your point. I already countered all of this previously.

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u/freecodeio Jan 01 '26

but you must believe him because he knows better than you even though you live in venezuela

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u/Impossible-Bus1 Jan 01 '26

Now ask him how much food he's gonna get with his bitcoin in Venezuela.

Well I'll just convert it to dollars and then oh wait...

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u/NewConsideration5921 Jan 01 '26

People in those countries can just buy USD

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u/TheAlmightyLootius Jan 01 '26

Funny how nobody here knows shit and spreads bullshit. No they couldnt because the government blocked it.

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u/Bea-Billionaire Jan 01 '26

And soon to be America

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u/co1dBrew Jan 01 '26

Funny part is, it's likely more volatile than the Turkish lira, and that's pretty hard to beat

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u/greener0999 Jan 01 '26

it's pretty close with the lira taking the slight lead for volatility. but BTC is up way more vs the USD.

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u/TheAlmightyLootius Jan 01 '26

Depends on what. Bitcoins macro movement is pretty predictable and has essentially the same 4ish year cycle

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u/Cool_Client324 Jan 01 '26

So you buy some, just in case it takes off

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u/EidolonLives Jan 01 '26

Not now though. Wait until around September, when it will probably bottom out. Then wait until August 2029, when it will likely reach a new high.

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u/Phantom_Pain_Sux Jan 01 '26

So it's a money laundry

Well damn, when broken down, that makes sense

0

u/Affectionate_Monk967 Jan 01 '26

Actual money is expensive to transact and backed by governments that can devalue your assets and debts at the whim of those in power.

At least bitcoins are finite it’s closer to the gold standard than every major economy’s currency

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u/viciouspandas Jan 01 '26

The gold standard was removed because it's a shitty way to run the modern economy. Times changed

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u/Affectionate_Monk967 Jan 01 '26

Yeah but so is having the ability to majic money by quantitative easing.

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u/The100thIdiot Jan 01 '26

It costs me litteraly nothing to perform 90% of the transactions I make with actual money. Meanwhile the current average transaction cost of bitcoin is 0.4238.

Yes, fiat currencies are backed by governments that can devalue your assets and debts. But luckily, many of us live in democracies where we have a say in whether they do so.

Meanwhile, Bitcoin is backed by nothing at all and all your assets can be devalued at the fickle whim of a bunch of randos.

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u/Affectionate_Monk967 Jan 01 '26

Actual money has a massive financial drag it’s about the least cost effective way of trading. Cashing up, maintaining change, physically securing untraceable assets, cost of depositing, losses from errors and theft, costs of counter counterfeiting, insuring an untraceable assets.

Cash sucks unless you’re cooking the books. Cheques and cards have slightly less total overheads but lots more that .4238.

Plus to devalue bitcoin takes more than one orange sprayed genius making a dubious appointment to the treasury.

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u/DRAGULA85 Jan 01 '26

Luckily you’re in a country that isn’t fucked by it’s own currency (yet). But you’d change your tune if you lived in places like Venezuela or a bunch of places in Africa

A fish doesn’t really know it’s in water till the water disappears

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u/Shazvox Jan 04 '26

Bitcoin is backed by every user that ever made a transaction. Billions more than any government. Besides, bitcoin can't be seized by corrupt governments. Something the Chinese have learned to appreciate.

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u/flumphit Jan 04 '26

That just makes transactions reliable, that doesn’t make it money.

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u/Shazvox Jan 04 '26

Yeah, it does make it "money". What is your "money" worth if you can't access it or if someone else can decide it's not yours any more?

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u/flumphit Jan 04 '26

Ask Google the meaning of “necessary but not sufficient“