One tends to save in crypto and convert to spend in local fiat or USD as late as possible in order to maximize their protection from debasement of the fiat currency.
Price volatility is definitely a thing in Bitcoin, Ethereum and altcoins. However there are many other cryptocurrencies whose value is designed not to fluctuate - specifically stablecoins. Ignoring Tether for the moment there are many other stablecoins that can be used to generate savings at a rate of ~50x the interest paid on USD by banks. Imagine someone in Jordan, or Cypress, or Turkey who now has access to USD equivalent on a permissionless blockchain and is able to generate real inflation-adjusted returns on stablecoins.
Regarding the volatility of non-stablecoins, those who hold believe that we are still early in the price discovery of a new class of assets and while I can’t speak for others, personally, I have a longer term investment horizon on the order of 4-5 years at a minimum. Looking back on the price of Bitcoin or Ethereum over any 4 year time horizon, the valuation has grown much faster than any traditional asset class.
> Ignoring Tether for the moment there are many other stablecoins that can be used to generate savings at a rate of ~50x the interest paid on USD by banks.
There's a reason we don't have huge return on investment on most assets.
There's not way that 50:1 ratio can ever possibly work at a large scale. Unless, you know, it's a scam.
Unless the stablecoins are preferred over traditional fiat USD for some use cases.
For example with stablecoin cryptocurrencies I can move an arbitrary amount to another party with no risk of censorship, no permission required, on an arbitrary Saturday morning at 3am if I wish - all in about 10 minutes. This is impossible with USD fiat.
Because of this utility, there is significant demand for stablecoins by traders and institutional investors who prefer stables over fiat and are willing to pay a premium for this utility.
Also my 50x claim on interest paid on savings is based on a typical US bank paying 0.1% APY.
50x 0.1% = 5% which is lower than many stablecoin savings products offer today.
What makes you so certain that a 5% APY on stablecoins is unsustainable at scale or a scam?