Excitement among tech startup people is a lot higher than the regular people out there who might use their products. I think they're overestimating how many crypto users there are right now. Netagio was another that closed due to lack of interest from actual customers.
Exchanges must be a bitch to run and make money from. Only a small hard core would use it multiple times a week. The rest might make one trade on occasion and that's only a fraction of a per cent for the owners. You gotta spend vast amounts on security and pleasing The Man let alone gain the trust of your customers.
It would be a worry if an established exchange shut down for lack of interest. This is another example of VC money going up in smoke without having gained traction.
BTC exchanges have high volume of BTC exchanging hands but BTC market places do not. It shows that BTC is being used predominantly for speculation/trading... And of course hoarding.
I cannot see how the BTC economy can thrive at this point if the people use the currency to mostly hoard or speculate. Which of course we all are guilty of.
Agree and nothing really surprising in this statement. Bitcoin is purely speculative asset atm and until proven otherwise by really massive adoption, which we lack for now. We are here some enthusiasts at Bitcointalk, but outside world see bitcoin quite differently and what counts are hard facts (development) not just purely speculative news who is gonna adopt Bitcoin next.