Michael RodriguezJames MaughnEnglish 1A20 May 2015 bitcoin fantasyThe Nation.DIGITAL CURRENCIESTHE FUTURETHE FUTURE OF MONEY?BY DOUGHENWOODWhat is being touted in some quarters since the future of money certainly does not seem more peaceful than its past. Bitcoin, a once obscure cybercurrency, is now all over the headlines with reports of bankruptcies, thefts and FBI blockades. If our destiny is to buy and sell bitcoin, this instability is worrying. But despite the headlines, the triumph of Bitcoin and related cyber currencies is far less likely than recent commentary would suggest. One of the causes of all this19 May 2014 13 DAN REISMAN hype? The number of people who understand what Bitcoin is seems almost immeasurably small, and this will likely introduce regulators and insurance schemes, though, and Bitcoin will lose all its anarchic appeal. Keynes once called gold “part of the apparatus of conservatism” for its appeal to rentiers who loved austerity because it preserved the value of their assets. Bitcoin serves a similar totemic purpose for today's cyber-libertarians, who love not only that it is as stateless as money, but also its power to subject the institutional banking system to "disruption" (one of that set's favorite words ). And like gold, Bitcoin is deflationary. There is a limit to the number of bitcoins that can be produced, and it becomes more difficult to produce them over time until that limit is reached. Of course, new cryptocurrencies could arise. But the existence of the limit reflects the deflationary sympathies of the libertarian mind: in a Bitcoin economy, creating money to alleviate an economic depression would be impossible. Which is not to say that only libertarians love Bitcoin. To glimpse cyber-libertarianism in its natural habitat, I ventured to a December 19 holiday party hosted by Cryptos.com, a business incubator for Bitcoin. Many had day jobs in tech or finance. . They were mostly male (but not overwhelmingly so) and mostly white. Only one person was wearing Google Glass. From national polls of unproven rigor, the typical Bitcoin enthusiast is a libertarian white male in his thirties, although the same poll finds that 39% of the fan base is somewhat left-wing. The group at the Christmas party, probably because of his business- in fact, was a little more diverse. Cryptos.com founder Nick Spanos worked with two cell phones. When I introduced myself and turned on the iPhone voice recorder, Spanos was uncooperative: “I don't talk to journalists I don't know. Turn the thing off. After he did, he told me the place was full of Bitcoin millionaires, ten of them under 21. When I asked what kind of business they were in, he said, “All kinds.” This was the end of the interview: a crypto promoter for a cryptocurrency. Another attendee, Marshall Swatt, the chief technology officer of Coinsetter, a Bitcoin trading platform for institutional investors, was more helpful. Swatt told me that after building trading platforms for established Wall Street institutions, he was looking for something more entrepreneurial. When I asked him if