[mrb]

«its only valid use cases were illicit transactions and speculation»

Crytocurrencies have many valid use cases. For one, they are the only system that allows sending money truly anywhere in the world, to anyone, anytime, and near-instantly. No other system accomplishes this. My most poignant example was being able to send money to a then-homeless unbanked friend, on a sunday, and he even converted it to cash in hands within 1 hour as he was near a bitcoin ATM. In such an emergency, no other system would have worked. We briefly considered Western Union but he was banned from them due to previous financial issues. So the permissionless aspect of Bitcoin was another benefit.

It's a little puzzling that you were an early adopter, and yet did not appreciate the qualities. Perhaps you think crypto isn't useful to you personally, therefore it has no use cases for anyone else.