[eliasmacpherson]

A voice of reason in a world gone mad! He would have to clarify the amount of risk he wants to take and how much time he wants to spend on it. A friend has very successfully invested in bitcoin (1000%+ return), but I am very sure he has the price up on his smartphone 24/7 and can sell very quickly.

I don't know how much downside it has, as a long term gamble, because there's an upper limit on the amount of currency. If it does take off with the general public, the longer you can hold the more it will be worth.

"Hard limit of about 21 million Bitcoins" say you bought 1 million bitcoin at $1 and bitcoin becomes a replacement for paypal?

[ChuckMcM]

Well the downside is that that loses all value. That can occur for a number of reasons but the two most widely speculated on are a global response (something like the G8 deciding that they won't allow trading it) or a technical defect (which invalidates some part of either the transaction train or the currency itself).

But that said, its also very volatile as a currency and that makes for a lot of speculation and rapid market changes. Not for the faint of heart and certainly not a place for any money you might actually need a year from now.