rfenst wrote:For better or worse crypto will be the the new world currency in our lifetimes. Better to figure it out earlier (now) rather than later.
For me, here is the issue with crypto being more widely accepted and used in normal everyday money transactions. It will come down to if the big guns (governments, regulation agencies, financial agencies) can try to regulate it. Let's set aside blockchain technology for the minute - crypo is based on blockchain but blockchain is deeper than just crypo.
Crypo has a foundation of being a decentralized form of currency. It's unregulated. This doesn't sit well with regulatory authorities like the SEC. These regulatory agencies do have a point and provide a service - some level of reassurance and protection that your money doesn't dry up overnight and those companies that hold you money are on the up-and-up (to some level).
So it's a conundrum. How do you regulate a financial industry that has a foundation of not being regulated? How do you protect the user/consumer from their money just drying up overnight? If your bank closed it's doors tomorrow, you still have insurance that your money with them is not flushed down the toilet. This is not so in the crypto market.
The Federal government already has been making moves in that direction. When doing you're income taxes, there is a section on the 1040 form with form 8949 where you are supposed to enter profits/losses from crypto trading. Crypto exchanges are also supposed to provide you with a 1099-K form.
Canada approved a Bitcoin ETF back in 2021 (?) for trading on the Canadian stock market.
https://www.barrons.com/articles/bitcoin-etf-canada-sec-51645226649. There have been numerous attempts to do so on the US stock market (I think Fidelity, Vanguard, and VanEck tried) but so far the SEC rejected them. (
https://fortune.com/2022/01/28/when-will-bitcoin-etf-make-stock-market-fidelity-sec-metaverse/)
There are a couple ETF's that have been approved and are traded on the NYSE but they are not directly crypto coins but Bitcoin "linked" type of assets using Bitcoin futures and stuff.
ProShares has one with the ticker BITO (
https://www.proshares.com/our-etfs/strategic/bito/). I think Fidelity put together one too (https://www.investopedia.com/investing/why-fidelity-got-bitcoin/)
Let's not be naive. These big banking and investment institutions have their finger on the pulse of crypto and likely have been mining coins their own just waiting to get the SEC to give the OK.
It's still a bit murky but once the SEC and other regulatory agencies can find a way to regulate the unregulated crypo market and get a slice of the pie, it will become more mainstream for everyday transactions.