Cryptocurrencies, Yay or Nay? Quintin Moorcroft

2018-09-18

What is a cryptocurrency? Bitcoin, right? Blockchain? Easy, that is the thing that you put in your backyard to tie the old mother-in- law to.

Wrong and wrong. So let us try and clarify. Cryptocurrency is nothing more or less than e-Bucks. You will never be able to get a physical e-Buck in your hand, but if you have it, you can spend it. Bitcoin was created to be no more than an easy and cost-effective way to send money anywhere. It takes 45 minutes for you to send money from South-Africa to Siberia, and the transaction fee is less than 0.01%, brilliant, right?

The unfortunate reality is that Bitcoin, and other cryptocurrencies, have morphed into something totally different. Say Bitcoin in a pub and you are most likely to get a proper beat down. If you did the same in early December 2017, EVERYBODY would chip in and tell you exactly how much money they made by buying Bitcoin and holding it as an investment, because we all knew Bitcoin was going to reach $ 50 000.

Low and behold, the bubble burst and guys that bought in December 2017 has lost 60% of their investment. Bad luck, some might say, bad timing, others might say. Sorry to say, it was bad judgement. Cryptocurrency was never meant to be an investment, it was simply meant to be a cheap and efficient peer-to-peer payment system.

I can see some people with angry eyebrows. "But sir, we were told to invest, we were told that we can double our money in two days, we were told that Bitcoin is the safest investment in a million Sundays." We were told? As a reasonable, bona fide adult, would you give R 100 000 to a random person, that you have never met, or spoken too? I doubt it. So why blame cryptocurrencies?

The unfortunate reality is that people do not really understand what crypto is, and that opened the way for scammers, yes, BTC Global, yes, Bitclubpool, yes, Bitconnect, to take over R 6 billion from the unwise and uninformed masses, and that is only in the past 12 months.

As with any problem, there is a solution. The problem with cryptocurrency is the inherent anonymity thereof. But that is not an unsurmountable problem, choose a cryptocurrency that is not anonymous. Why? Rather simple, if it is transparent, then it is the exact same thing as a bank account. The next step is to find one, there is over 1600 cryptocurrencies in the cryptospace, but in reality, 1000 are scams or worthless coins, 500 are just silly beyond belief e.g. CannaCoin with which you can buy only cannabis, another 98 are anonymous so that only leaves a very few that will endure in the long run.

So, when you want to buy a crypto, first make sure that is adheres to the KYC (Know your client) and AML(Anti-money-laundering) regulations, then make sure to read the whitepaper of the crypto, in order to understand what is was created for. Ask questions, do some homework. The only way that the crypto world will be cleaned up, is by a combined effort of all current and prospective users. Remember the old adage, if it looks like a duck and sounds like a duck, chances are, it is a duck.

E: q.moorcroft@cryptouniverse.co.za
W: www.cryptouniverse.co.za
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 Quintin Moorcroft Cryptocurrencies, Yay or Nay.pdf


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