They can, but if you'd like to convert that into fiat (I know a dirty word) you will most likely need an exchange.
Its like a list of all the small shop money exchanges that exists. But it doesn't mean its decentralized. It also means you always need a trusted third party for the exchange.
Wasn't crypto about going rid of those trusted third parties?
For most cases, yes. Binance, Gemini and some others provide a version of their token that can run in multiple chains. It's supposed to be 1:1 backed by BTC, but you have to trust them fully.
It's a little bit better for WBTC [0]. WBTC is a consortium of 30+ crypto projects who keep the BTC under their control through a multi-sig wallet, and that can be audited on-chain. In this case, the majority of the signers would have to conspire in order to steal the funds or do anything malicious.
renBTC is even more decentralized. It is part of the ren "network" [1], which provides inter-blockchain applications. I haven't looked yet how it works exactly, but my understanding is custody of BTC happens though a proper dapp. Last year I wanted to get rid of all my BTC, and I did it though ren. It was BTC -> renBTC -> DAI.
[0]: https://wbtc.network
In this case, what would happen would likely be pay extremely high gas fees or wait very long for the transaction to be picked up, isn't it?
I think what gets people making these comments is there really is no crypto free lunch yet that includes stable UX and fees.
What is its job? How often do you think goods and services are paid for with Monero? How often do you think the coin is used purely as a speculative asset?
It's certainly used far less often for small-scale, personal transactions. Businesses mostly don't support it yet. I'm hoping that will change. The only company I do business with that supports Monero is Mullvad, and that was only a recent addition. The media is certainly doing a good job of pinning the "Monero = bad guy naughty money" connotation to it. That connotation means it's doing its job though. If organized crime thinks it's secure and private enough, then it's definitely good enough for me.
I honestly can't answer the speculative asset usage part with any empirical evidence, but it seems to be used speculatively no where near as much as Bitcoin and Ethereum. I don't see crypto hype-guys chanting "MO-NER-O!" at all really in comparison to the other two.
Although those goods are predominantly illegal drugs.
When a cryptocurrency is mainly used for speculation rather than payment, it's a scam.
I don't crypto, but, isn't monero the coin whose primary intended use case is enabling illegal transactions by rendering them untraceable even to the police?
Are ... we calling that a good actor? Or do I just misunderstand what they're for?
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> Now that is hyperbole.
No, it's not. Hyperbole doesn't mean "thing I don't agree with" or "thing I believe is wrong."
The person speaking very clearly wasn't exaggerating and very clearly meant themselves to be taken literally.
As I see it, if any crypto wasn't a scam, crypto fans would have long since agreed to give that thing as an example. The fact that the entire "industry" can't come up with a single compelling example, a decade and a half and twenty billion dollars in, is about as clear and obvious a proof as is actually possible.
Maybe Stripe should stop their crypto endeavors because they have a crypto offering which means it's a scam.
They probably should, yes. It makes them look sketchy and less trustworthy by association.
If you are saying 'ALL crypto is a scam' this also includes all and any crypto offerings by any company. Stripe, Coinbase, FTX, Binance, Moneygram etc are included. Not to mention the 'DeFi' space as well.
Stripe went in to Bitcoin, exited Bitcoin, then invested into a shitcoin called 'Stellar' and went back into crypto again supporting crypto exchanges like FTX, NFTs and offering crypto payments with 'Polygon'.
That is hardly getting 'suckered in'. I would argue that they are 100% fully complicit in the crypto scam.
Since we agree that 'crypto is all a scam', it should mean that Stripe, Coinbase and all the other companies that have crypto operations should be called out for their participation in the scam and they should immediately shut down their operations since 'all crypto is a scam' right?
They have a crypto division that will be used for crypto payments and NFTs. They also invested into a crypto token called 'Stellar' back in 2014 and said nothing since on the matter.
Plus the CEO of Stripe advises Stellar. [0] Moneygram is also working on the scam as well with this Stellar token.
I don't know about you but it seems that both Stripe and Moneygram are complicit in the crypto scam the same way that the crypto exchanges are.
Also you said 'ALL' by the way so this means no exceptions.
Contradicts:
> All crypto is a scam.
As you are trying to legitimise both of them of having a 'use-case' for their crypto offerings, holdings, etc which regardless of their business models and what they do as companies, it is still all a scam.
If we agree that both Stripe and Moneygram are fully involved in the scam by having heavy involvement in crypto offerings, holdings, etc, Then yes. They are a scam as well as everything they are offering is as well. No exceptions.
I'm going to politely bow out of this debate, this isn't a productive use of time.
In case you forgotten, you said: 'All crypto is a scam.' [0]
That means everything including anyone who is using it, or has holdings or are insiders which includes Stripe, Moneygram, Square (now Block) and especially Signal who are still directly involved in the entire scam. All the ones I've listed either got no backlash or did have some but never removed their crypto products, which certainly still makes them fully involved in the entire crypto scam as they continue to offer it.
Trying to give exceptions to companies like Moneygram and Stripe, Square, etc is legitimising their crypto offerings as a 'use-case' which contradicts what you said with it all being a scam, since we both know what they are offering is nothing but still a scam which they are all involved in.
There is no mental leaps here, No exceptions or any use-cases with that statement. If another commenter got the point straightaway [1], it is not hard to recognise that.
Cryptocurrencies can be held in offline wallets i.e non-custodial hardware or software wallets, like Metamask, Trust Wallet, Ledger Nano, Tezos etc.
But no, let's rush into the comments section and scream our heads off and create panic that it is 'exchanges === all crypto is scam'.
When it is really a case of what happens when you store your crypto on an exchange rather than a non-custodial wallet.