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Central bankers are being warned by researchers that the crypto revolution will overtake the system they are in-charge of preserving. Recently, British economic historian and author Niall Ferguson told the Bank of England that Bitcoin is the financial system of the future.

Also Read: This Week in Bitcoin: McAfee’s Bullish Prediction and a Guy Living in His Car

The Future of Finance

Niall Ferguson is a noted historian, commentator, and the author of fifteen books including The Ascent of Money and The House of Rothschild. On Tuesday he has given a seminar to the Bank of England, talking about the 2008 financial crisis and the reactions to it to this day. In his conclusion of the subject, he mentioned that bitcoin is part of the major challenges ahead for the current fiat-based system.

Ferguson said: “The financial system of today is not fundamentally that different than the financial system of the pre-crisis period, except that big banks are better capitalized. I don’t think much else is really different. The novelties, the things that will really matter ten years hence are still relatively small in scale. Whether its bitcoin or cryptocurrency generally or the massive revolution in online payments that is being achieved by the big Chinese tech companies, that’s the financial system of the future, and it is still small enough not to be systemically important in 2018. In short, I am left feeling we are only a matter of time before the next crisis.”

Bombarded by ICOs

The above isn’t such a surprising statement coming from Ferguson. Back in December 2017 he wrote: “At some point, no doubt, regulatory changes in the US will deflate the current bitcoin bubble. But they will not halt, much less undo, this financial revolution. Think about it this way. The maximum number of bitcoins that can be created is 21m. The number of millionaires in the world, according to Credit Suisse, is 36m. Their total wealth is $128.7 trillion. If millionaires collectively decided to hold just 1% of their wealth as bitcoin, the price would be not $15,000 but north of $60,000. If they raised that to 5%, the right price for bitcoin would be above $300,000. I am not saying this is certain to happen. I’m just saying my teenage son thinks it could.”

Since then he has also been exposed to more sides of the cryptocurrency market, such as the endless flood of ICO offers. “I wish I had a bitcoin for every phony white paper I’ve been shown the last six months, by people trying to raise money before the SEC clamps down,” Ferguson reportedly said last week. “When there’s no regulation, then the rogues are very quickly on the scene.”

Ferguson isn’t the only noted academic figure that looked at how bitcoin fits economic history recently. Last Monday, Professor Robert Shiller, who received the 2013 Nobel prize in economics and is famous for the Case-Shiller Index, published an article talking about the way the allure of bitcoin fits enthusiasm around previous attempts to reinvent money.

What role in the economy do you see Bitcoin fulfills in ten years from now? Share your thoughts in the comments section below. 

Images courtesy of Shutterstock.

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The post Niall Ferguson Tells Bank of England Bitcoin Is Financial System of the Future appeared first on Bitcoin News.

The altcoin markets might be in freefall, ICOs dead in the water, and bitcoin nursing a fixed scowl, but you wouldn’t know it on crypto Twitter. Over the past 48 hours, its leading lights have been more preoccupied with having their profile pics “bogged” than posting charts. The Bogdanoff twins are one of the many memes to have taken over the crypto community, providing welcome relief amidst the growing gloom.

Also read: BTCC to Launch New Exchange Platform in June

When the Market Dies, the Memes Flourish

It would be easy to write memes off as the frivolous, ephemera that they are. And it’s true that most crypto memes are so esoteric and asinine as to defy explanation. How to account for the phenomenon that is “bog posting” for example, a bizarre tribute to France’s plastic surgery twins who reputedly have the power to crash the crypto markets with one phone call? Or pink wojak, the permanently distressed trader whose every move goes against him – often thanks to a well-timed call from the bogs themselves?

For anyone new to crypto, the meaning behind the memes and shitposting must be an utter mystery. Even those raised in the crypto trenches would struggle to explain why or how such characters came to be synonymous with the constant pain of being at the mercy of bitcoin whales who manipulate the market. All they could tell you, if pressed, is that in times of turmoil, memes make everything better. The world may be burning and the markets dumping, but so long as there are exploitable memes to share, the pain is bearable.

Rare Pepes, Pink Wojaks and Telegram Stickers Galore

In crypto, as on the web at large, many of the memes originate from the home of dank memetics – 4chan – before permeating mainstream culture. The forum’s /biz/ message board has been pivotal in spawning much of the content that’s come to be synonymous with crypto trading. /Biz/, whose unofficial motto is “Buy high, sell low”, has been particularly prolific when it comes to churning out pink wojaks, with one Twitter account dedicated to sharing the best of the bunch.

And then there’s Pepe the frog, who’s never far away when the subject of 4chan memes is broached. One of the most popular dapps over the past week has been the Peppedapp, a place to “Share, buy and sell the dankest memes on Ethereum”. In the last seven days it has been responsible for thousands of transactions involving hundreds of ether. Many traders have been steering clear of the markets amidst lingering uncertainty, but the Peppedapp Telegram group, home to 1,400 collectors of rare Pepes, has been a hub of activity as traders exchange limited edition cards and speculate how much the McAfee card might be worth by June.

He Sold?

Crypto was geeky from the outset, and over the years its arcane rituals, celebrations and jargon have become embedded in its culture and as immutable as the genesis block itself. It doesn’t really matter why “Fit Vitalik”, “Carol trying to use the Lightning Network”, or “The Bogs” came to be. All that matters is when your portfolio doesn’t bear looking at and there are no ICOs worth FOMOing into, crypto will remain as relevant and irresistible as ever. It’s not just the best music that’s made in tough times: so are the best memes. Sure, they’re stupid as hell. But they’re also part of the fabric that makes cryptocurrency so compelling.

What are your favorite crypto memes? Let us know in the comments section below.

Images courtesy of Shutterstock, Twitter, Telegram, and Peppedap.

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The post Bogs and Wojaks: How Crypto Memes Help Traders Deal with the Downturn appeared first on Bitcoin News.