Bitcoin: Fake Asset or Security?

We’ve all heard of fake news, but consider the growing possibility of fake or at least virtual assets. Investors face a deliberately orchestrated shortage of real investments c/o global central banks in markets such as stocks and real estate. Is there any wonder that the financial engineers of Wall Street have again begun to manufacture new derivatives leveraging the real world?

Case in point, bitcoin. The most recognized “digital currency,” bitcoin is a form of high-tech gaming instrument that fulfills just one of the traditional roles of money, but is among the world’s fastest appreciating – and most volatile-- “asset" classes.

Adherents call the limited supply of bitcoin the ultimate expression of Milton Friedman style monetarist discipline. They view the digital medium as a rational response to the fiscal and monetary chaos visible in most of the industrial nations.

But despite the huge gains seen in bitcoin vs conventional currencies, Jim Rickards says he’s sticking with his preferred investments: gold, cash and silver. “I don’t own any bitcoin, but for those who have a preference for bitcoin, good luck,” he told Kitco News.

Bitcoin has been blessed by a federal regulatory agency in Washington. “On Monday, a bitcoin options exchange called LedgerX won approval from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to clear bitcoin options, making it the first U.S. federally regulated platform of its kind,” reports The Wall Street Journal.

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