pretty remarkable to see Coinbase making the argument that crypto is not like stocks, it's like baseball cards, American Girl dolls, or Beanie Babies
it's the future of finance! except when the SEC comes knocking, then it's just a harmless little toy, your honor
@molly0xfff All of the examples they provide are tangible assets with (varying levels of) inherent value.
Crypto never provides anything tangible. It's treated like money, but without a government to make its value stable. It's treated like stocks, but there's no business that increases it's value.
I think regulators are having a difficult time because it's clearly a scam, but people are trading real money for something that doesn't quite fit existing definitions in regulations.
@fic8 @molly0xfff Baseball cards have intrinsic value by nature of being a physical object and they gain extrinsic value through social value (fans).
Security of crypto is dubious, as most technologies use a public blockchain where wallets are easily tied to individuals. And because the value fluctuates rapidly, by the time the transaction has been verified, one of the two parties will have lost value vs government backed currency. Which is important, because you still need to pay rent in $$$
@Wbud @molly0xfff the only intrinsic value of baseball cards (or cash) is that they can be recycled into useful paper.
baseball cards "gain extrinsic value through social value (fans)"? Sounds like how many treat crypto... even if they shouldn't.
The security of cryptocurrency is well-defined. Privacy, on the other hand...
As for price volatility, the receiving party typicially bites the volatility (for better or worse) in exchange for a small ~1% fee.
Molly White
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