Right, I think a problem with a lot of these discussions is that people are using (at least) three different conceptions of what "value" means.

- value based on intrinsic utility (gold/oil)

- value based on potential future utility (stocks)

- value based on extrinsic utility (USD/coordination)

The issue, of course, is that people disagree which category Bitcoin (and other cryptos) belong to. The other problem is that a singular thing doesn't necessarily only belong to one category. For example, I put gold in the intrinsic category, but it probably belongs in the extrinsic category too, as gold is used as a medium of exchange that is not directly tied to its intrinsic properties, but merely has intrinsic properties that are useful in that regard (fairly scarce, not varnishing, etc).

Thanks, that's a really good post and agree with everything.

Maybe it's also useful to separate out the second bullet into:

- value based on potential future [extrinsic] utility

- value based on potential future [intrinsic] utility

There is a difference in buying stocks which have future cash flows that the value is theoretically based on (which are typically generating revenue/profit/dividends because of the business activity) to speculating on forex or bitcoin (where you are just speculating that someone will be willing to pay more than you bought it for in the future).