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claims/bitcoin-esg.md
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* [Environmental footprint of mining](environmental-footprint.md)
**Sustainability Problems**
**Social Problems**
* [Crypto is a market bubble](is-bubble.md)
* [Predatory inclusion](is-predatory.md)

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# Bitcoin is the basis for a new gold standard
The neo-metallist claim is that bitcoin can operate as a new asset class which exhibits similar financial properties to [gold](../concepts/gold.md). The strong version of this claim asserts that a new [gold-standard](../concepts/gold-standard.md) can be built on top of bitcoin and that this can form the basis for a market economy.
The neo-metallist claim is that bitcoin can operate as a new asset class which exhibits similar financial properties to [gold](../concepts/gold.md). The strong version of this claim asserts that a new [gold standard](../concepts/gold-standard.md) can be built on top of bitcoin and that this can form the basis for a market economy.
These claims do not stand up to scrutiny as bitcoin has no consistent track record of being a reliable store of value, it's price movements are extremely volatile and thus is not a reliable place to store value on long time scales. Bitcoin's price behavior is uncorrelated with gold and is largely correlated with the broader stock market making it an unreliable safe haven in times of market volatility since it is directly exposed to the price action of the Nasdaq.

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# Are crypto assets a hedge against "debasement" of the dollar?
# Crypto assets are not a hedge against the "debasement" of the dollar
Crypto assets are not a hedge against the "debasement" of the dollar. This thesis is predicated on an [Austrian economics](../concepts/austrian-economics.md) reading of United States monetary policy and policy a conspiracy theories about the Federal Reserve.
## References
As part of the normal functioning of the dollar system, the Federal Reserve will make
[interventionist](../concepts/keynsian-economics.md) adjustments to its quantitative easing policy and interest rates with the aims of achieving dollar price stability. The economy adjusts to these changes and factors them into the pricing of goods and services and this system results in relatively predictable inflation which encourages economic growth. The use of the pejorative term "debasement" to describe the natural and principled monetary policy rests on a fallacy which presumes fringe economic theories.
Crypto assets are not a hedge against these empty notions, because "debasement" does not exist as a phenomenon.
## References
1. Hanley, Brian P. 2018. ‘The False Premises and Promises of Bitcoin’. ArXiv:1312.2048 [Cs, q-Fin], July. http://arxiv.org/abs/1312.2048.
1. Roche, Cullen O. 2011. ‘Understanding the Modern Monetary System’. http://ssrn.com/paper=1905625.
1. Binder, Carola. 2021. ‘Technopopulism and Central Banks’. SSRN Electronic Journal. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3823456.
1. Braun, Benjamin, and Daniela Gabor. 2019. ‘Central Banking, Shadow Banking, and Infrastructural Power’. https://doi.org/10.31235/osf.io/nf9ms.
1. Brennecke, Martin, Benjamin Schellinger, Nils Urbach, and Tobias Guggenberger. 2022. ‘The De-Central Bank in Decentralized Finance: A Case Study of MakerDAO’. In 55th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (2022). https://doi.org/10.24251/HICSS.2022.737.
1. Malloy, Matthew, and David Lowe. 2021. ‘Global Stablecoins: Monetary Policy Implementation Considerations from the U.S. Perspective’. Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2021 (020): 1–14. https://doi.org/10.17016/feds.2021.020.

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# Is crypto providing faster payment rails or better remittance services?
# Crypto is not providing faster payment rails or better remittance services
Since crypto assets [cannot function as a currency](is-bitcoin-currency.md) they are not useful in building payment rails or remittance services. Crypto assets can be used as an intermediate asset in which trades can be settled in, but this does not serve a technical of financial purpose and simply introduces an unnecessary conversion step for no reason.
If a person wants to send money abroad, say from US dollars to Indian rupees they would typically use a service like MoneyGram or WesternUnion. These services charge a transaction fee and do a direct swap of dollars to rupees from the reserves the company holds in both currencies.
If one postulates using a crypto asset or stablecoin as a means to do remittances then they are stilled faced with the *last leg problem*. Their relative in India still has to convert the crypto asset into the local currency to buy domestic goods and services since supermakets and stores don't accept crypto assets. So instead of a dollar-to-ruppee conversion we would hypothetically do a dollar-to-bitcoin-to-rupee conversion. This introduces [price-risk](../concepts/price-risk.md), [counterparty-risk](../concepts/counterparty-risk.md) and unnecessary conversion fees to accommodate the extraneous third exchange. This is unnecessary complexity and likely more expensive, for no reason.
See industry analysts describe this proble in more depth: [Does Bitcoin/Blockchain make sense for international money transfers?](https://www.saveonsend.com/bitcoin-blockchain-money-transfer/)
## References
1. Rosenthal, David. n.d. ‘Stanford Lecture on Cryptocurrency’. Accessed 2 March 2022. https://blog.dshr.org/2022/02/ee380-talk.html.
1. Steele, Graham. 2021. ‘The Miner of Last Resort: Digital Currency, Shadow Money and the Role of the Central Bank’. Technology and Government, Emerald Studies in Media and Communications, Forthcoming.
1. Amato, Massimo, and Luca Fantacci. 2020. A Fistful of Bitcoins: The Risks and Opportunities of Virtual Currencies. Bocconi University Press. https://www.egeaeditore.it/ita/prodotti/economia/a-fistful-of-bitcoins.aspx.
1. Coeckelbergh, Mark. 2015. Money Machines: Electronic Financial Technologies, Distancing and Responsibility in Global Finance. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.1177/0094306116671949n.
1. Diehl, Stephen. 2021. ‘The Non-Innovation of Cryptocurrency’. 7 July 2021. https://www.stephendiehl.com/blog/non-innovation.html.
1. Krugman, Paul. 2018. ‘Transaction Costs and Tethers: Why I’m a Crypto Skeptic’. The New York Times 21.
1. ———. 2021. ‘Technobabble, Libertarian Derp and Bitcoin’. The New York Times 21.
1. Plant, Luke. 2022. ‘The Technological Case against Bitcoin and Blockchain’. Luke Plant’s Home Page. 5 March 2022. https://lukeplant.me.uk/blog/posts/the-technological-case-against-bitcoin-and-blockchain/.
1. Stinchcombe, Kai. 2017. ‘Ten Years In, Nobody Has Come Up With a Use for Blockchain’. Hackernoon. 22 December 2017. https://hackernoon.com/ten-years-in-nobody-has-come-up-with-a-use-case-for-blockchain-ee98c180100.
1. Cembalest, Michael. 2022. ‘The Maltese Falcoin: On Cryptocurrencies and Blockchains’. https://privatebank.jpmorgan.com/content/dam/jpm-wm-aem/global/pb/en/insights/eye-on-the-market/the-maltese-falcoin.pdf.
1. Weaver, Nicholas. 2018. Blockchains and Cryptocurrencies: Burn It With Fire. Berkeley School of Information. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xCHab0dNnj4.
1. White, Molly. 2022a. ‘Blockchain-Based Systems Are Not What They Say They Are’. Molly White (blog). 9 January 2022. https://blog.mollywhite.net/blockchains-are-not-what-they-say/.
1. ———. 2022b. ‘Anonymous Cryptocurrency Wallets Are Not So Simple’. Molly White (blog). 12 February 2022. https://blog.mollywhite.net/anonymous-crypto-wallets/.
1. ———. 2022c. ‘Cryptocurrency Off-Ramps, and the Shift towards Centralization’. Molly White. 12 February 2022. https://blog.mollywhite.net/off-ramps/.
1. ———. 2022d. ‘Cryptocurrency’s Robinhood Effect’. Molly White. 17 February 2022. https://blog.mollywhite.net/cryptocurrencys-robinhood-effect/.
1. Cembalest, Michael. 2022. ‘The Maltese Falcoin: On Cryptocurrencies and Blockchains’. https://privatebank.jpmorgan.com/content/dam/jpm-wm-aem/global/pb/en/insights/eye-on-the-market/the-maltese-falcoin.pdf.
1. Weaver, Nicholas. 2018. Blockchains and Cryptocurrencies: Burn It With Fire. Berkeley School of Information. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xCHab0dNnj4.
1. Steele, Graham. 2021. ‘The Miner of Last Resort: Digital Currency, Shadow Money and the Role of the Central Bank’. Technology and Government, Emerald Studies in Media and Communications, Forthcoming.
1. Amato, Massimo, and Luca Fantacci. 2020. A Fistful of Bitcoins: The Risks and Opportunities of Virtual Currencies. Bocconi University Press. https://www.egeaeditore.it/ita/prodotti/economia/a-fistful-of-bitcoins.aspx.
1. Krugman, Paul. 2018. ‘Transaction Costs and Tethers: Why I’m a Crypto Skeptic’. The New York Times 21.
1. ———. 2021. ‘Technobabble, Libertarian Derp and Bitcoin’. The New York Times 21.
1. Stinchcombe, Kai. 2017. ‘Ten Years In, Nobody Has Come Up With a Use for Blockchain’. Hackernoon. 22 December 2017. https://hackernoon.com/ten-years-in-nobody-has-come-up-with-a-use-case-for-blockchain-ee98c180100.

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# Legality of crypto assets
Crypto assets are unlicensed [security](../concepts/security.md) contracts for unregulated [speculative](../concepts/speculation.md) investments. The legality of this depends on jurisdiction.
Crypto assets are unlicensed [security](../concepts/security.md) contracts for unregulated [speculative](../concepts/speculation.md) investments. Crypto assets are effectively like buying unregulated penny stocks, except with no recourse to the courts in the case of the project being a [Ponzi scheme](../concepts/ponzi-scheme.md) or [exit scam](../concepts/exit-scam.md).
The legality of buying these risky products depends on the jurisdiction of the buyer and seller.
In the United States the sale of unregistered securities to the public is illegal. The legality of the purchase of of unregistered securities will depend on the facts and circumstances of the sale, but regardless of legality these type of extra-legal transactions expose the buyer to unnecessary [risk](../concepts/risk.md) compared to buying normal [financial assets](../concepts/financial-asset.md) within the regulatory perimeter. Buying crypto assets is thus legally inadvisable from both a risk and compliance perspective.
## References
1. Bindseil, Ulrich, Patrick Papsdorf, and Jürgen Schaaf. 2022. ‘The Encrypted Threat: Bitcoin’s Social Cost and Regulatory Responses’. 7 January 2022. https://www.suerf.org/docx/f_88b3febc5798a734026c82c1012408f5_38771_suerf.pdf.

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# Is private money a desirable system?
# Private money is not desirable
The aspirations of some [cryptoasset](../concepts/cryptoasset.md) is to reinvent historical ideas of private money issuance, effectively shifting the control of an alleged currency from the democratically elected officials to the unaccountable individuals in the private sector. Unless one subscribes to extreme forms of [libertarianism](../concepts/libertarianism.md) or [anarchocapitalism](../concepts/anarchocapitalism.md) this is not a desirable state and the historical precedence on private money is one of repeated disasters compared to the normal issuance of money.
The so-called *Wildcat Banking Era* in the United States is the best example of widespread use of private money. There was no single issuer of the dollar and most banks would issue their own bank notes which would circulate in a local economy as a form of [money](../concepts/money.md). However these notes had no stable value and would not trade at par with each other, this introduced massive arbitrage opportunities for people to trade more valuable bank notes for less valuable ones. However none of this market for secondary currency exchange was beneficial for the end users or conducive for commerce. Shopkeepers would be forced to do unnecessary currency conversions for their customers, denominate their goods in multiple currencies and incur both [price-risk](../concepts/price-risk.md) and exchange risk.
Money exists as a platform to enable commerce and disparate competing currencies within one economic region undermine the project and introduce unnecessary friction to commerce. Thus private money is not desirable from a pure [capitalist](../concepts/capitalism.md) perspective.
## References
1. Steele, Graham. 2021. ‘The Miner of Last Resort: Digital Currency, Shadow Money and the Role of the Central Bank’. Technology and Government, Emerald Studies in Media and Communications, Forthcoming.
@ -16,7 +22,4 @@
1. North, Peter. 2007. Money and Liberation: The Micropolitics of Alternative Currency Movements. University of Minnesota Press. https://www.upress.umn.edu/book-division/books/money-and-liberation.
1. Pacione, Michael. 1997. ‘Local Exchange Trading Systems as a Response to the Globalisation of Capitalism’. Urban Studies 34 (8): 1179–99. https://doi.org/10.1080/0042098975583.
1. Petz, Marcus. 2020. ‘When Is Money Not a Currency? Developments from Finland of Proto-Community Currencies’. International Journal of Community Currency Research 24 (2): 30–53.
1. Schroeder, Rolf F. H. 2020. ‘Beyond the Veil of Money: Boundaries as Constitutive Elements of Complementary Currencies’. The Japanese Political Economy 46 (1): 17–41. https://doi.org/10.1080/2329194x.2020.1762499.
## References
* [@larue_case_nodate]
1. Schroeder, Rolf F. H. 2020. ‘Beyond the Veil of Money: Boundaries as Constitutive Elements of Complementary Currencies’. The Japanese Political Economy 46 (1): 17–41. https://doi.org/10.1080/2329194x.2020.1762499.

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# Is crypto a means to fund public goods projects?
## References
# Crypto is not a sustainable way to fund public goods

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# Can I raise money for my non-profit using crypto tokens?
# Can I raise money for my non-profit using crypto tokens?

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# Cryptoassets are being used to build a new internet
# Crypto is not building a new internet
The meme of a "new internet" is a consistent and persistent marketing term that has always existed in technology, to the point where the term itself is widely considered a joke. Many technologies are described as being a new iteration of the internet as a way of generating hype or marketing themselves to the public or regulators as important "innovation". [Crypto assets](../concepts/cryptoasset.md) continue on in this marketing trend, yet the underlying reality of the tech is completely removed from any level of paradigm shift that the early internet ushered in.
The early internet was a collaboration between the United States defense sector and private academic institutions to build early networking solutions, originally for defence applications to connect different national laboratories. The evolution of the internet expanded with the development of the world wide web in 1989, whose initial development at CERN in Switzerland allowed the dissemination of scientific research in a new form called *hypertext* which would form the foundation for the now ubiquitous HTML.
At each step along the evolution early of the internet, its design was informed and shaped by real applications and the solutions which developed rapidly were fit-for-purpose. Crypto does not resemble this kind of technical formation in any way, because crypto is a solution in search of a problem whose existence is predicated on the political imaginaries of its acolytes who advance the solution allegedly as a means to do reconfiguration projects or enrich themselves through [regulatory arbitrage](../concepts/regulatory-arbitrage.md). Thus there is no resemblance to the early internet in either form or function.
The notion that crypto is building new internet is pernicious form of myth-making that wrapped in phoney populism as an excuse for the already wealthy to enrich themselves on the back of securities fraud and phoney aimless innovation detached from any real world problems.
## References
1. Morozov, Evgeny. 2022. ‘Web3: A Map in Search of Territory’. The Crypto Syllabus. 13 January 2022. https://the-crypto-syllabus.com/web3-a-map-in-search-of-territory/.
1. Blank, Steve. "A Secret History of Silicon Valley." Computer History Museum (2008).
1. O’Reilly, Tim. 2021. ‘Why It’s Too Early to Get Excited About Web3’. O’Reilly Media. 13 December 2021. https://www.oreilly.com/radar/why-its-too-early-to-get-excited-about-web3/.
1. Morozov, Evgeny. 2022. ‘Web3: A Map in Search of Territory’. The Crypto Syllabus. 13 January 2022. https://the-crypto-syllabus.com/web3-a-map-in-search-of-territory/.
1. Patterson, Dan. 2022. ‘Internet Guru Tim O’Reilly on Web3: “Get Ready for the Crash”’. CBS News. 10 February 2022. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/web3-cryptocurrency-nft-tim-oreilly/.
1. Weaver, Nicholas. 2021. ‘The Web3 Fraud’. USENIX. 16 December 2021. https://www.usenix.org/publications/loginonline/web3-fraud.
1. Tante. 2021. ‘The Third Web’. Nodes in a Social Network (blog). 17 December 2021. https://tante.cc/2021/12/17/the-third-web/.
1. Marlinspike, Moxie. 2022. ‘My First Impressions of Web3’. Moxie Marlinspike. 7 January 2022. https://moxie.org/2022/01/07/web3-first-impressions.html.
1. Levine, Matt. 2022. ‘Web3 Takes Trust Too’. 10 January 2022. https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-01-10/web3-takes-trust-too.
1. Soatok. 2021. ‘Against Web3 and Faux-Decentralization’. Dhole Moments. 19 October 2021. https://soatok.blog/2021/10/19/against-web3-and-faux-decentralization/.
1. Tonelli, Emily. 2022. ‘Internet Guru Tim O’Reilly: Crypto and NFTs Are “Pretty Serious Speculative Bubble”’. Decrypt. 10 February 2022. https://decrypt.co/92676/internet-guru-tim-oreilly-crypto-nfts-serious-speculative-bubble.
1. Yaffe-Bellany, David. 2022. ‘Millions for Crypto Start-Ups, No Real Names Necessary’. The New York Times, 2 March 2022, sec. Technology. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/02/technology/cryptocurrency-anonymity-alarm.html.
1. Zitron, Ed. 2022. ‘Solutions That Create Problems’. Substack newsletter. Ed Zitron’s Where’s Your Ed At (blog). 23 February 2022. https://ez.substack.com/p/solutions-that-create-problems.
1. Diehl, Stephen. 2021. ‘Web3 Is Bullshit’. 4 December 2021. https://www.stephendiehl.com/blog/web3-bullshit.html.
1. White, Molly. 2022. ‘It’s Not Still the Early Days’. Molly White. 14 January 2022. https://blog.mollywhite.net/its-not-still-the-early-days/.
## References
* [@levine_web3_2022]
* [@morozov_web3_2022]
* [@weaver_web3_2021]
* [@soatok_against_2021]
* [@tante_third_2021]
* [@oreilly_why_2021]
1. White, Molly. 2022. ‘It’s Not Still the Early Days’. Molly White. 14 January 2022. https://blog.mollywhite.net/its-not-still-the-early-days/.

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# Crypto assets pose a risk to the state
Crypto assets exist for a single purpose: [regulatory arbitrage](../concepts/regulatory-arbitrage.md). Effectively to undermine the rule of law and circumvent controls that nation states have put in place to safeguard the public and protect their economic interests. These include controls like [sanctions enforcement](../concepts/sanctions-enforcement.md), [know your customer](../concepts/kyc.md), [anti-money laundering](../concepts/aml.md) and [counter-terrorism financing](../concepts/ctf.md).
Dark flows of crypto assets outside of the regulatory perimeter undermines these controls by allowing criminals to circumvent the law and engage in [illicit financing](../concepts/illicit-financing.md) and avoid law enforcement controls. This undermines the rule of law and the capacity of the state to protect its national interests.
While crypto assets don't pose an *existential* threat to the state per se, they do enable crime and undermine policy which weakens trust in democratic institutions and threatens the way of life for law-abiding citizens.
## References
* [@jeong_bitcoin_2013]
* [@orcutt_this_2020]
* [@popper_bitcoin_2020]
* [@corbet_destabilising_2020]
* [@ludlow_crypto_2001]
* [@wolf_libertarian_2019]
1. Bindseil, Ulrich, Patrick Papsdorf, and Jü rgen Schaaf. 2022. ‘The Encrypted Threat: Bitcoin’s Social Cost and Regulatory Responses’.
1. Diehl, Stephen. 2021a. ‘The Political Case for a Blanket Cryptocurrency Ban’. 30 March 2021. https://www.stephendiehl.com/blog/banbitcoin.html.
1. ———. 2021b. ‘How to Destroy Bitcoin’. 13 July 2021. https://www.stephendiehl.com/blog/destroy-bitcoin.html.
1. ‘Guidance on Cryptoassets’. 2019. Financial Conduct Authority. https://www.fca.org.uk/publication/consultation/cp19-03.pdf#page=11.
1. Hacker, Philipp, and Chris Thomale. 2018. ‘Crypto-Securities Regulation: ICOs, Token Sales and Cryptocurrencies under EU Financial Law’. European Company and Financial Law Review 15 (4): 645–96.
1. Huang, Sherena Sheng. 2021. ‘Crypto Assets Regulation in the UK: An Assessment of the Regulatory Effectiveness and Consistency’. Journal of Financial Regulation and Compliance.
1. Rae, Shaela W, and Lorraine Mastersmith. 2019. ‘Crypto Asset Trading in Canada: Entering a New Era of Regulation’. Banking & Finance Law Review 35 (1): 153–85.
1. Shri T Rabi Sankar. n.d. ‘Cryptocurrencies – An Assessment’. Reserve Bank of India. Accessed 2 March 2022. https://rbi.org.in/Scripts/BS_SpeechesView.aspx?Id=1196.
1. Zwitter, Andrej, and Jilles Hazenberg. 2020. ‘Decentralized Network Governance: Blockchain Technology and the Future of Regulation’. Frontiers in Blockchain 3. https://www.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fbloc.2020.00012.

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# Does bitcoin threaten the US dollar as reserve currency
# Bitcoin does not threaten the US dollar as reserve currency
Crypto assets, such as bitcoin, do not threaten the US dollar as an international [reserve currency](../concepts/reserve-currency.md) currency because they [cannot function as a currency](is-bitcoin-currency.md). To quote financial historian Adam Tooze:
> [The dollar] is backed by "nothing" other than the trifling matter of tens of trillions of dollars in private credit, the rule of law and the power of the state, itself inserted into a state system. In other words, the entire structure of global macrofinance.
Since bitcoin cannot be used to issue debt products, denominate contracts or scale to act as a medium of exchange for commerce it lacks *any* of the properties of [money](../concepts/money.md) that a reserve currency would have to fulfil. Bitcoin cannot upend the entire structure of global macrofinance any more than beanie babies or tulip bulbs could.
## References
*
1. Varoufakis, Yanis. 2021. ‘What Is Money, Really? And Why Bitcoin Is Not the Answer (Even If Blockchain Is Brilliant & Potentially Helpful in Democratising Money)’. Yanis Varoufakis (blog). 2 August 2021. https://www.yanisvaroufakis.eu/2021/08/02/what-is-money/.
1. Taleb, Nassim Nicholas. 2021. ‘Bitcoin, Currencies, and Fragility’. ArXiv:2106.14204 [Physics, q-Fin], July. http://arxiv.org/abs/2106.14204.
1. Corradi, Fiammetta, and Philipp Höfner. 2018. ‘The Disenchantment of Bitcoin: Unveiling the Myth of a Digital Currency’. International Review of Sociology 28 (1): 193–207. https://doi.org/10.1080/03906701.2018.1430067.
1. Bratspies, Rebecca M. 2018. ‘Cryptocurrency and the Myth of the Trustless Transaction’. Mich. Telecomm. & Tech. L. Rev 1. https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3141605.
1. Diehl, Stephen. 2021a. ‘The Non-Innovation of Cryptocurrency’. 7 July 2021. https://www.stephendiehl.com/blog/non-innovation.html.
1. ———. 2021b. ‘The Intellectual Incoherence of Cryptoassets’. 7 November 2021. https://www.stephendiehl.com/blog/crypto-absurd.html.
1. ———. n.d. ‘The Case Against Crypto’. Accessed 17 February 2022. https://www.stephendiehl.com/blog/against-crypto.html.
1. Krugman, Paul. 2018. ‘Bitcoin Is Basically a Ponzi Scheme’. The Seattle Times 30.
1. ———. 2021a. ‘Technobabble, Libertarian Derp and Bitcoin’. The New York Times 21.
1. ———. 2021b. ‘The Brutal Truth About Bitcoin’. The New York Times 21.
1. Olson, Dan. 2022. Line Goes Up – The Problem With NFTs. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQ_xWvX1n9g.
1. Plant, Luke. 2022. ‘The Technological Case against Bitcoin and Blockchain’. Luke Plant’s Home Page. 5 March 2022. https://lukeplant.me.uk/blog/posts/the-technological-case-against-bitcoin-and-blockchain/.
1. Stinchcombe, Kai. 2018. ‘Blockchain Is Not Only Crappy Technology but a Bad Vision for the Future’. Medium (blog). 9 April 2018. https://medium.com/@kaistinchcombe/decentralized-and-trustless-crypto-paradise-is-actually-a-medieval-hellhole-c1ca122efdec.

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# Is a unregulated transnational payment rail even desirable?
# An unregulated transnational payment is not desirable
Panama Papers
The stated aspirations of some crypto projects is to build a global transnational payment system which is [censorship resistant](../concepts/censorship-resistence.md) against nation state actors, effectively allowing parties from any jurisdiction to move value anonymously and with no controls. However from the perspective of civil society this is not desirable since the world already struggles with an excess of offshore tax evasion and dark money flows, as evidenced by the recent Panama Paper leaks.
See [shadow banking](../concepts/shadow-bank.md).
Today there already exists and enormous [shadow banking](../concepts/shadow-bank.md) space which facilitates the creation of credit and movement of money through jurisdictions with questionable money controls and loose enforcement of policy. Many wealthy individuals avail themselves of this transnational network of trusts and shell companies to avoid paying taxes in their country of residence, opting to instead hide their money abroad in opaque financial structures set up in island nations like the Bahamas or Cayman Islands.
The incorporation of crypto into the shadow banking system, which is already happening, is providing even easier access for disreputable individuals to avoid taxes and to expand their holdings abroad. Instead of offshore shell companies, these individuals will use [stablecoin](../concepts/stablecoin.md) and [cryptoasset](../concepts/cryptoasset.md) to hide their money from tax authorities.
From the public interest perspective none of this setup is desirable, since it allows the already wealth to avoid paying taxes and supporting [public goods](../concepts/public-goods-problem.md) and the welfare state which supports people will less resources than wealthy individuals. Crypto thus exasperates wealth inequality and allows individuals to circumvent the rule of law and undermine the entire social contract of democracy.
## References
* [@pilkington_can_2017]
* [@allen_defi_2022]
* [@braun_central_2019]
* [@steele_miner_2021]
* [@li_money_2021]
1. Allen, Hilary J. 2022. ‘DeFi: Shadow Banking 2.0?’ William & Mary Law Review, Forthcoming.
1. Steele, Graham. 2021. ‘The Miner of Last Resort: Digital Currency, Shadow Money and the Role of the Central Bank’. Technology and Government, Emerald Studies in Media and Communications, Forthcoming.
1. Gorton, Gary B., and Jeffery Zhang. 2021. ‘Taming Wildcat Stablecoins’. SSRN Electronic Journal. https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3888752.
1. Malloy, Matthew, and David Lowe. 2021. ‘Global Stablecoins: Monetary Policy Implementation Considerations from the U.S. Perspective’. Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2021 (020): 1–14. https://doi.org/10.17016/feds.2021.020.
1. Pupolizio, Ivan. 2021. ‘From Libra to Diem. The Pursuit of a Global Private Currency’. Global Jurist. https://doi.org/10.1515/gj-2021-0055.
1. Orcutt, Mike. 2020. ‘This Is How North Korea Uses Cutting-Edge Crypto Money Laundering to Steal Millions’. MIT Technology Review. MIT Technology Review. http://www.technologyreview.com/2020/03/05/916688/north-korean-hackers-cryptocurrency-money-laundering/.
1. Fanusie, Yaya, and Tom Robinson. 2018. ‘Bitcoin Laundering: An Analysis of Illicit Flows into Digital Currency Services’. Center on Sanctions and Illicit Finance Memorandum, January.

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# Web3 is not decentralized
In all scenarios web3 still requires central parties for its technical operation and simply involves [recentralization](../concepts/recentralization.md) of services that already exist. Since web3 is centralized then it has neither the [censorship resistance](../concepts/censorship-resistence.md) properties or [decentralization](../concepts/decentralization.md) claims its myth-making and marketing claims.
Web3 is either a completely nonsensical buzzword, or a term about reinventing existing business models either poorly or as a thinly veiled scheme for securities fraud for transferring wealth from the public to a few (centralized) operators of the scheme.
## References
1. Walch, Angela. 2019. ‘Deconstructing ‘Decentralization’: Exploring the Core Claim of Crypto Systems’. C. Brummer (Ed.), Crypto Assets: Legal and Monetary Perspectives, 1–36. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3326244.
1. Allen, Hilary J. 2022. ‘DeFi: Shadow Banking 2.0?’ William & Mary Law Review, Forthcoming.
1. Soatok. 2021. ‘Against Web3 and Faux-Decentralization’. Dhole Moments. 19 October 2021. https://soatok.blog/2021/10/19/against-web3-and-faux-decentralization/.
1. Zhang, Zhexi. 2019. ‘The Aesthetics of Decentralization’. PhD Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. https://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/123614.
1. Tante. 2021. ‘The Third Web’. Nodes in a Social Network (blog). 17 December 2021. https://tante.cc/2021/12/17/the-third-web/.
1. Weaver, Nicholas. 2021. ‘The Web3 Fraud’. USENIX. 16 December 2021. https://www.usenix.org/publications/loginonline/web3-fraud.
1. Marlinspike, Moxie. 2022. ‘My First Impressions of Web3’. Moxie Marlinspike. 7 January 2022. https://moxie.org/2022/01/07/web3-first-impressions.html.
1. Diehl, Stephen. 2021. ‘Web3 Is Bullshit’. 4 December 2021. https://www.stephendiehl.com/blog/web3-bullshit.html.
1. Levine, Matt. 2022. ‘Web3 Takes Trust Too’. 10 January 2022. https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-01-10/web3-takes-trust-too.
1. Aramonte, Sirio, Wenqian Huang, and Andreas Schrimpf. 2021. ‘DeFi Risks and the Decentralisation Illusion’, 16.
1. Arnosti, Nick, and S Matthew Weinberg. 2022. ‘Bitcoin: A Natural Oligopoly’. Management Science.
1. Azouvi, Sarah. 2021. ‘Levels of Decentralization and Trust in Cryptocurrencies: Consensus, Governance and Applications’. PhD Thesis, University College London. https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10139069/.
1. Babu, Asvatha. 2020. ‘Behind the Veil of Decentralization: Analyzing Blockchain Frames and Sponsors in US News’. SSRN Electronic Journal. https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3749482.
1. Becker, Moritz. 2019. ‘Blockchain and the Promise (s) of Decentralisation : A Sociological Investigation of the Sociotechnical Imaginaries of Blockchain’. In Proceedings of the STS Conference Graz 2019, 6–30. https://doi.org/10.3217/978-3-85125-668-0-02.
1. Bodó, Balázs, Jaya Klara Brekke, and Jaap Henk Hoepman. 2021. ‘Decentralisation: A Multidisciplinary Perspective’. Internet Policy Review 10 (2): 0–21. https://doi.org/10.14763/2021.2.1563.
1. Cong, Lin William, Zhiguo He, and Jiasun Li. 2021. ‘Decentralized Mining in Centralized Pools’. Review of Financial Studies 34 (3): 1191–1235. https://doi.org/10.1093/rfs/hhaa040.
1. Garrod, J. Z. 2016. ‘The Real World of the Decentralized Autonomous Society’. TripleC 14 (1): 62–77. https://doi.org/10.31269/triplec.v14i1.692.
1. Halpin, Harry. 2020. ‘Deconstructing the Decentralization Trilemma’. ICETE 2020 - Proceedings of the 17th International Joint Conference on e-Business and Telecommunications 3: 505–12. https://doi.org/10.5220/0009892405050512.
1. Humayun, Syeda Mariam. 2019. ‘Creation and Resilience of Decentralized Brands: Bitcoin & the Blockchain’. PhD Thesis. http://hdl.handle.net/10315/37662.

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# Is web3 a well-defined term?
# Web3 is not well-defined
Web3 does not have any universally agreed upon definition.
Web3 has been accused of becoming an intellectual nexus for many internet "thought leaders" to pontificate about grand visions of technical and financial reconfiguration largely detached from any concrete plans or implementations of these ideas. This may give rise to a [bubble](bubble.md) in the sale of [security](../concepts/security.md) tokens detached from any progress on building real companies or technologies and may even disincentivize productivity in favour of pure [speculation](../concepts/speculation.md) on [ficticious commodites](../concepts/ficticious-commodity.md).

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Crypto exchanges are not regulated as brokers, but instead as [money services businesses](money-services-business.md).
See also [market maker](market-maker.md) and [regulation](../claims/regulation.md).
See also [market maker](market-maker.md) and [regulation](regulation.md).
## References

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The mandate of central banks is often to control domestic employment and maintain price stability of a national currency.
## Examples
Examples of central banks include:
* Federal Reserve
* United States Federal Reserve
* European Central Bank
* Bank of England
## References
* [@braun_central_2019]
1. Braun, Benjamin, and Daniela Gabor. 2019. ‘Central Banking, Shadow Banking, and Infrastructural Power’. https://doi.org/10.31235/osf.io/nf9ms.

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# Decentralization
A technical and marketing buzzword use amorphously to refer to an unclear set of aspirations about a technology or community.
A technical and marketing buzzword use amorphously to refer to an unclear set of aspirations about a technology or community. Appeals to decentralization will often involve co-mingling with other loaded or misinterpreted words such as:
In information technology it refers to a type of network topology in which a system has no single point of failure and whose workload or actions are performed in parallel by multiple computers which provide a shared service.
* Immutable
* Decentralized
* Trustless
* Secure
* Tamper-proof
* Disintermediated
* Open/Transparent
* Neutral
* Direct transfers of value
The internet is the canonical example of a decentralized network.
Use of term decentralization is often falsely used interchangeably with "democratization", which has an orthogonal meaning.
This term is often falsely used interchangeably with "democratization", which has an orthogonal meaning.
In information technology it refers to a type of network topology in which a system has no single point of failure and whose workload or actions are performed in parallel by multiple computers which provide a shared service. The internet is the canonical example of a decentralized network.
## References
* [@diehl_decentralized_2021]
* [@schneider_decentralization_2019]
* [@bodo_decentralisation_2021]
* [@zhang_aesthetics_2019]
1. Walch, Angela. 2019. ‘Deconstructing ‘Decentralization’: Exploring the Core Claim of Crypto Systems’. C. Brummer (Ed.), Crypto Assets: Legal and Monetary Perspectives, 1–36. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3326244.
1. Becker, Moritz. 2019. ‘Blockchain and the Promise (s) of Decentralisation : A Sociological Investigation of the Sociotechnical Imaginaries of Blockchain’. In Proceedings of the STS Conference Graz 2019, 6–30. https://doi.org/10.3217/978-3-85125-668-0-02.
1. Soatok. 2021. ‘Against Web3 and Faux-Decentralization’. Dhole Moments. 19 October 2021. https://soatok.blog/2021/10/19/against-web3-and-faux-decentralization/.
1. Zhang, Zhexi. 2019. ‘The Aesthetics of Decentralization’. PhD Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. https://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/123614.
1. Allen, Hilary J. 2022. ‘DeFi: Shadow Banking 2.0?’ William & Mary Law Review, Forthcoming.
1. Tante. 2021. ‘The Third Web’. Nodes in a Social Network (blog). 17 December 2021. https://tante.cc/2021/12/17/the-third-web/.
1. Weaver, Nicholas. 2021. ‘The Web3 Fraud’. USENIX. 16 December 2021. https://www.usenix.org/publications/loginonline/web3-fraud.
1. Diehl, Stephen. 2021. ‘Web3 Is Bullshit’. 4 December 2021. https://www.stephendiehl.com/blog/web3-bullshit.html.
1. Levine, Matt. 2022. ‘Web3 Takes Trust Too’. 10 January 2022. https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-01-10/web3-takes-trust-too.
1. Aramonte, Sirio, Wenqian Huang, and Andreas Schrimpf. 2021. ‘DeFi Risks and the Decentralisation Illusion’, 16.
1. Arnosti, Nick, and S Matthew Weinberg. 2022. ‘Bitcoin: A Natural Oligopoly’. Management Science.
1. Azouvi, Sarah. 2021. ‘Levels of Decentralization and Trust in Cryptocurrencies: Consensus, Governance and Applications’. PhD Thesis, University College London. https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10139069/.
1. Babu, Asvatha. 2020. ‘Behind the Veil of Decentralization: Analyzing Blockchain Frames and Sponsors in US News’. SSRN Electronic Journal. https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3749482.
1. Bodó, Balázs, Jaya Klara Brekke, and Jaap Henk Hoepman. 2021. ‘Decentralisation: A Multidisciplinary Perspective’. Internet Policy Review 10 (2): 0–21. https://doi.org/10.14763/2021.2.1563.
1. Garrod, J. Z. 2016. ‘The Real World of the Decentralized Autonomous Society’. TripleC 14 (1): 62–77. https://doi.org/10.31269/triplec.v14i1.692.
1. Halpin, Harry. 2020. ‘Deconstructing the Decentralization Trilemma’. ICETE 2020 - Proceedings of the 17th International Joint Conference on e-Business and Telecommunications 3: 505–12. https://doi.org/10.5220/0009892405050512.
1. Humayun, Syeda Mariam. 2019. ‘Creation and Resilience of Decentralized Brands: Bitcoin & the Blockchain’. PhD Thesis. http://hdl.handle.net/10315/37662.
1. Mannan, M. & Schneider, N. 2020. ‘Exit to Community: Strategies for Multi-Stakeholder Ownership in the Platform Economy’. Georgetown Law Technology Review 4 (1): 2017–19. https://georgetownlawtechreview.org/exit-to-community-strategies-for-multi-stakeholder-ownership-in-the-platform-economy/GLTR-05-2021/.
1. Manski, Sarah, and Michel Bauwens. 2020. ‘Reimagining New Socio-Technical Economics Through the Application of Distributed Ledger Technologies’. Frontiers in Blockchain 2 (January): 1–17. https://doi.org/10.3389/fbloc.2019.00029.
1. Rocas-Royo, Marc. 2021. ‘The Blockchain That Was Not: The Case of Four Cooperative Agroecological Supermarkets’. Frontiers in Blockchain 4 (April): 1–10. https://doi.org/10.3389/fbloc.2021.624810.
1. Sai, Ashish Rajendra. 2021. ‘Towards a Holistic Assessment of Centralization in Distributed Ledgers’. https://ulir.ul.ie/handle/10344/10766.
1. Sai, Ashish Rajendra, Jim Buckley, Brian Fitzgerald, and Andrew Le Gear. 2021. ‘Taxonomy of Centralization in Public Blockchain Systems: A Systematic Literature Review’. Information Processing and Management 58 (4): 102584. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ipm.2021.102584.
1. Schneider, Nathan. 2019. ‘Decentralization: An Incomplete Ambition’. Journal of Cultural Economy. https://doi.org/10.1080/17530350.2019.1589553.

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# Systemic Risk
Systemic risk is the possibility that an event in a single asset or company could trigger severe instability or collapse an entire industry or economy.
# Crypto could be a systemic risk in the future
Assets considered to be a systemic risk are called "too big to fail".
Systemic risk is the possibility that an event in a single asset or company could trigger severe instability or collapse an entire industry or economy. Asset classes or companies are considered to be a systemic risk when they are "too big to fail". Systemic risk and was a major contributor to the subprime mortgage crisis crisis of 2008.
Systemic risk and was a major contributor to the subprime mortgage crisis crisis of 2008.
Crypto assets do not currently pose a systemic risk to the United States economy, but may in the future if their growth is left unchecked. Allegedly the [paper wealth](paper-wealth.md) locked up into crypto tokens is allegedly only on the order of the $1 trillion which is inconsequential next to the amount of capital allocated in both the US equities and bond markets. Crypto is still a relatively tiny asset class and a sudden crash in the market, while devastating to individual retail investors, would likely not bring amount much damage to financial institutions or markets as a whole.
Because of regulation and [risk](risk.md) aversion most banks and companies have very little exposure to the crypto market and will not put crypto assets directly on their balance sheet. This fundamentally limits the amount of damage a sudden crash in crypto assets could actually cause as most companies would simply not be within the financial "blast radius" were the market to go to zero overnight.
In the event of a sudden crash retail investors and the public who have chosen to gamble on crypto assets would see all of their wealth disappear instantly, likely with no recourse or chance of a bailout. This would be a very socially socially corrosive event which would be financially devastating to the public and erode trust in institutions. This is real problem that crypto assets and their insane risk properties introduce.
## References
1. Nolan, Hamilton. n.d. ‘The Ticking Bomb of Crypto Fascism’. Accessed 21 March 2022. https://inthesetimes.com/article/the-ticking-bomb-of-crypto-fascism.

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* [Value](../concepts/value.md)
* [Risk](../concepts/risk.md)
* [Regulation](../claims/regulation.md)
* [Regulation](../concepts/regulation.md)
* [Market manipulation](../concepts/market-manipulation.md)

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# Claims TODO
- [x] [authoritarianism](../claims/authoritarianism.md)
- [ ] [web3-decentralized](../claims/web3-decentralized.md)
- [x] [web3-decentralized](../claims/web3-decentralized.md)
- [x] [environmental-footprint](../claims/environmental-footprint.md)
- [x] [is-bubble](../claims/is-bubble.md)
- [x] [narrative-economics](../concepts/narrative-economics.md)
- [x] [digital-gold](../claims/digital-gold.md)
- [ ] [new-internet](../claims/new-internet.md)
- [ ] [risk-to-state](../claims/risk-to-state.md)
- [ ] [systemic-risk](../concepts/systemic-risk.md)
- [ ] [threaten-dollar](../claims/threaten-dollar.md)
- [x] [new-internet](../claims/new-internet.md)
- [x] [risk-to-state](../claims/risk-to-state.md)
- [x] [systemic-risk](../concepts/systemic-risk.md)
- [x] [threaten-dollar](../claims/threaten-dollar.md)
- [x] [valuation-model](../concepts/valuation-model.md)
- [x] [what-type-of-asset](../claims/what-type-of-asset.md)
- [ ] [hedge-debasement](../claims/hedge-debasement.md)
- [ ] [is-better-payments](../claims/is-better-payments.md)
- [x] [hedge-debasement](../claims/hedge-debasement.md)
- [x] [is-better-payments](../claims/is-better-payments.md)
- [x] [is-collapse](../claims/is-collapse.md)
- [x] [is-disrupt-hegemony](../claims/is-disrupt-hegemony.md)
- [x] [is-hyperfinancialization](../claims/is-hyperfinancialization.md)
- [ ] [is-legal](../claims/is-legal.md)
- [x] [is-legal](../claims/is-legal.md)
- [x] [is-new-financial-system](../claims/is-new-financial-system.md)
- [x] [is-opportunity-cost](../claims/is-opportunity-cost.md)
- [ ] [is-private-money](../claims/is-private-money.md)
- [x] [is-private-money](../claims/is-private-money.md)
- [ ] [is-public-goods](../claims/is-public-goods.md)
- [ ] [is-raise-company](../claims/is-raise-company.md)
- [ ] [is-raise-nonprofit](../claims/is-raise-nonprofit.md)
- [ ] [new-internet](../claims/new-internet.md)
- [ ] [transnational-payment](../claims/transnational-payment.md)
- [ ] [web3-decentralized](../claims/web3-decentralized.md)
- [x] [new-internet](../claims/new-internet.md)
- [x] [transnational-payment](../claims/transnational-payment.md)
- [x] [web3-decentralized](../claims/web3-decentralized.md)
- [x] [web3-green](../claims/web3-green.md)