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Comment by democracy | Hacker News Reader

...another fairytale about people in poor countries using crypto ))))

Nothing beats good old USD or EURO as an asset if you live in a country with hyperinflation.

i trade bitcoin with other people here in argentina several times a year; it's by far the easiest and safest way to send money either into or out of the country, and it's widely used by money changers

remember that this is a country where the police take dollar-bill-sniffing dogs onto river ferryboats to prevent people from taking usd or eur across the river to their bank in uruguay

someone in a [dead] comment said, 'The most traded crypto assets in Argentina, by far, are dollar-pegged crypto-currencies.' this is absolutely correct, and from my point of view it's a total plague. also virtually everybody has their bitcoins in binance. but most of those people will still buy and sell bitcoin if that's what you want

USD and Euro are great assets to hold if you have the ability to access banking services that support them, which isn't universal.

Are you questioning the data?

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1202468/global-cryptocur...

"The data" that you link to doesn't support your assertion that people in third world countries use bitcoin to protect themselves from hyperinflation.

Also USD and Euro are NOT great assets to hold. People only hold cash because they need it for transactions purposes.

It is the best asset to hold if you local currency goes -5% every day. Easy to buy (officially and not), easy to liquidate, can be used as unofficial currency for trade

Not by any stretch of the imagination. A highly volatile asset isn't suitable for storing value reliably. This is because the chances of you having to liquidate your position at a loss are very high.

personal experience?

No, I have a background in finance.

Ok, and you are wrong

That's a very convincing argument.

sometimes your "forex banking services" are dodgy people on the street - that's how late USSR functioned...

Did the USD or EURO gain +7000% in the last decade? Didn't think so.

If it did, your salary must have shrunk by 87.5% (or the company that you work for would have gone out of business).

Because in reality all salaries went up exactly the right amount to compensate for inflation? Hm, the system doesn't seem to work like that.

If you think that a business can remain in business after its revenue shrinks by a factor of 8 without wage costs adjusting accordingly, you need a reality check.

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