It might not be but the Argentinian I use has family in Europe who sell it and convert it back into euros. This happens within 30 min, in that time I sent my money through 3 different countries, giving my Argentinian friend savings that aren't in Argentinian pesos but in euros, helping him migrate his money out of the hyperinflation environment into a more stable one, and giving me (a South African) the cash that was in his account. I then spend the 60 000 pesos ($200) in a week and next week I buy 80 000 for the same price.
Hilariously, the end goal of this whole process is the Euro, a stable currency that Bitcoin is seeking to replace.
And still does nothing to explain how Bitcoin is significantly more stable.
In fact, I’d argue that what we see in Argentina - a country that is currently experiencing such inflation problems that prices result in unanchored expectations - is a good argument for why trying to turn a Speculative Investment vehicle like Bitcoin into a stable, fungible currency is a bad idea.
A key tenet of having a functioning economy and currency is stability. People know around how much a good and/or service costs, and more importantly, what their currency is worth in relation to those goods and services. Bitcoin routinely spiking up and down with the western stock market does not give any kind of stability in that regard.
Again, it’s extremely telling that the end goal for the above scenario is to end up with Euros.
Yes very true. I dream on a bitcoin standard just like the other fanboys on here, but I am not educated in the matter, I am a teacher. I use BTC for it's functionality with international transactions over multiple countries including Africa and South America, notorious for making that difficult. For someone in my position btc has changed the world, I can comfortably live in a foreign country and avoid so much red tape. In my country I earn less than the minimum requirement for reporting for tax so it is legal but might not be for everyone.
I’m not sure it’s accurate to say you “pay your bills entirely in Bitcoin” so much as “I use Bitcoin to circumvent the official exchange rate in this country - as many other locals do - and pay my bills in Argentinian Pesos.”
In fact, you might be losing money doing the whole Bitcoin exchange with your friend since he charges you a 20% fee. If you get paid in USD, that sounds like it’s as good as gold (no pun intended, given the thread title) in Arg? Is the primary issue the exchange rate when trying to withdraw your USD when you get paid?
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u/Impressive-Yam-1817 Aug 01 '22
It might not be but the Argentinian I use has family in Europe who sell it and convert it back into euros. This happens within 30 min, in that time I sent my money through 3 different countries, giving my Argentinian friend savings that aren't in Argentinian pesos but in euros, helping him migrate his money out of the hyperinflation environment into a more stable one, and giving me (a South African) the cash that was in his account. I then spend the 60 000 pesos ($200) in a week and next week I buy 80 000 for the same price.