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evlPanda said..
So a currency is:
#1: Exchangable
#2: Stable
From up above somewhere: You can no more hold a bitcoin in your hand than you can an Australian Dollar. That coin/note is an "I Owe You".
I am not a financial expert, so my opinions are merely just that, my own take on currencies and how I view the financial systems.
I believe for a currency to be legit, it also needed to be "trusted". It is a bit like credit. Not many people have a spare $300,000 sloshing around at the bottom of his sofa. So if he wanted to buy a service such as getting his milking machine fixed, he will need to ask it to be fixed first and pay the service provider later. Cows needed to be milked twice daily, so no delay is permissible.
Now would the service provider turn up or demand "Show me the money !" Now there must be an "implicit" trust between the 2 parties. The trust being the dairy farmer will pay up when he himself gets paid. On top of that, based on historical reasons, the farmer is (1). A good bloke, and (2). He can be trusted.
Now there is another level of trust, and it is "explicit" trust. It being a signed "Work Order". That is a legal document stating that a service is asked for by the farmer at an "agreed" price. That document, when push comes to shove, is the basis for legal arguments.
The current financial situation in the dairy industry in bad. Service providers are owed $millions by the farmers. Now the service providers have 2 clear and very difficult choices to make. (1). To call in the credit, and (2). Sue.
None of these choices are good as they may cause the farmers to go bankrupt resulting in zero for the creditors. To sue is equally pointless as how do you get blood out of stones? Most farmers are honest lot, and they will honour their debts if they could.
So it all comes back to TRUST. You trust each other to be able to pay it back what is owed. That I believe is the same with currencies. Straya and most nations are a "going concern" and they will honour their debts, so each nation's currency is hence a legit transactional exchange.
With the virtual currencies, no one is ultimately responsible for it coming and going but a spaghetti mess of algorithms limited only by Geeks' imagination. When crap meets a fast spinning fan, who do you see ? Most critically, who cares ? You think Mr. Trumble will send in his team of AFP to check it out ?