[karambahh]

> IMHO, Bitcoin is secure enough for its current main use-case, which seems to be escaping Yuan / Bolivar. But I might be proven wrong. It's also interesting to note some other black swans may trigger cryptocurrency adoption in 2017 [1].

I don't follow bitcoin very closely. Could you please tell me more about escaping yuan/bolivar? It seems to me that if you have access to bitcoin, it means you have banking capabilities and access to the internet. Once you have these two, you can use paypal or similar and store EUR or USD. Volatility of USD is way lower than bitcoin?

[celticninja]

You can buy bitcoin with cash via localbitcoins.com in most countries except Germany (or at least, with a German IP address).

In China it seems the preference is to buy bitcoin mining equipment in yuan and generate bitcoin to sell, taking advantage of the cheap electricity available in China and writing off some of the capital investment via tax. Although there is significant trade on Chinese exchanges much of this is often thought to be suspect due to the lack of trading fees which means fake/self trades are available at no cost.

[litetime]

> you can use paypal [to] store EUR or USD [from yuan]

How would you do this?

If it is possible to exchange yuan to usd and keep it in paypal without a US account, I would still be very uncomfortable storing hundreds of thousands of dollars in it. It is a centralized entity that can freeze funds for any reason, be compelled to report things, make mistakes, paper trail, etc.

Being able to exchange currencies is also a step above regular banking I believe. You need access to forex markets and the associated setup and trails.

[patrickk]

> I don't follow bitcoin very closely. Could you please tell me more about escaping yuan/bolivar?

Likely means using Bitcoin to evade currency controls, which they have in China and some South American countries e.g. Argentina[1].

[1] http://www.coindesk.com/bitcoin-thriving-argentinas-black-ma...