I was just wondering: Lets say we hit 2030 and price is around that $500,000 prediction. Fees insanely high at $600,000. Only dollar billionaires (or trillionaires at that point) are using the bitcoin blockchain anymore.
In this scenario, who would be the bitcoin developers?
I imagine that whoever is still developing bitcoin publicly will be extremely hated by the rest of 99.999999% of population that cannot afford 6 figure fees and got left behind with was once was supposed to be "internet money for the people". These guys sure don't look like illuminati trilionaires:
Will any of the current developers still be around? I wouldn't be able to defend with a straight face a coin that is only used by some insanely rich weirdos. I guess they will continue developing it anonymously?
Well I imagine by 2030, or near 2030, at this rate maybe not version 1.0 but BTC will be near "completion", definitely no more exciting features to be added, but all software needs a certain maintenance.
Well we can estimate given that BTC trades 1/100th of its market cap daily. So @ $500k per BTC thus a $10 trillion market cap, thus $100 billion transacted daily. Given 144 blocks per day, that is $600 million per block.
Let's assume that whales will put complex settlement transactions on the blockchain with many inputs and outputs so perhaps only 100 transactions per block. Presuming that whales are willing to pay 0.1% fee for security (i.e. $600,000 per block), that means a minimum transaction fee of $6000. If whales are willing to pay more for security, say 1%, then minimum transaction fee of $60,000.
However, I think whales will end up demanding a kickback from miners for their transaction fees, so that miners can jack up fees on non-whales. Whales can make this demand because they can refuse to send their transactions to miners which won't deal. Yet non-whales can't make a credible threat, because miners who generally offered lower fees would end up losing hashrate relative to those miners who didn't defect from the fee market. Thus I think you will probably see miners colluding to extract the maximum fees that gouge non-whales.
So perhaps 10% fees so $600,000 per transaction. You'll pay it because you have no choice, whereas the whales will have exempted themselves from the fee. So in other words, we will be paying the fees for the whales, eventually the millionaires paying exorbitant fees in order to transact unregulated.
You'll of course be able to avoid that exorbitant fees by going through a regulated option as I explained previously.
So the bottom line is the whales will be free from regulation and we will not. We remain slaves.
Well in that case I will be able to cash out. Anyone with at least 2 BTC will be able to make that one-time-only transaction and cash out. I was just worried that I couldn't even make that one-time-only transaction to send the coins into an exchange and dump for dollars. Being a dollar millionaire sure beats not being able to do anything with your BTC because the fees are insanely high. There's just no point in having money in an unregulated blockchain when you can't do nothing with it.
Also, can't whales find cheaper ways to move their billions? I think if I was a billionaire, I would still be a bit pissed off at having to pay $600,000 for a transaction.
They will have 0 alternatives even in 2030?
In this scenario, who would be the bitcoin developers?
I imagine that whoever is still developing bitcoin publicly will be extremely hated by the rest of 99.999999% of population that cannot afford 6 figure fees and got left behind with was once was supposed to be "internet money for the people". These guys sure don't look like illuminati trilionaires:
Will any of the current developers still be around? I wouldn't be able to defend with a straight face a coin that is only used by some insanely rich weirdos. I guess they will continue developing it anonymously?
Well I imagine by 2030, or near 2030, at this rate maybe not version 1.0 but BTC will be near "completion", definitely no more exciting features to be added, but all software needs a certain maintenance.
So let me get this straight.
Even people holding millions of dollars worth of bitcoin, will see their bitcoins trapped because transaction fees will be worth millions of dollars? What fees are we talking about by 2030? (at supposedly around $500k price)
Even people holding millions of dollars worth of bitcoin, will see their bitcoins trapped because transaction fees will be worth millions of dollars? What fees are we talking about by 2030? (at supposedly around $500k price)
Well we can estimate given that BTC trades 1/100th of its market cap daily. So @ $500k per BTC thus a $10 trillion market cap, thus $100 billion transacted daily. Given 144 blocks per day, that is $600 million per block.
Let's assume that whales will put complex settlement transactions on the blockchain with many inputs and outputs so perhaps only 100 transactions per block. Presuming that whales are willing to pay 0.1% fee for security (i.e. $600,000 per block), that means a minimum transaction fee of $6000. If whales are willing to pay more for security, say 1%, then minimum transaction fee of $60,000.
However, I think whales will end up demanding a kickback from miners for their transaction fees, so that miners can jack up fees on non-whales. Whales can make this demand because they can refuse to send their transactions to miners which won't deal. Yet non-whales can't make a credible threat, because miners who generally offered lower fees would end up losing hashrate relative to those miners who didn't defect from the fee market. Thus I think you will probably see miners colluding to extract the maximum fees that gouge non-whales.
So perhaps 10% fees so $600,000 per transaction. You'll pay it because you have no choice, whereas the whales will have exempted themselves from the fee. So in other words, we will be paying the fees for the whales, eventually the millionaires paying exorbitant fees in order to transact unregulated.
You'll of course be able to avoid that exorbitant fees by going through a regulated option as I explained previously.
So the bottom line is the whales will be free from regulation and we will not. We remain slaves.
Well in that case I will be able to cash out. Anyone with at least 2 BTC will be able to make that one-time-only transaction and cash out. I was just worried that I couldn't even make that one-time-only transaction to send the coins into an exchange and dump for dollars. Being a dollar millionaire sure beats not being able to do anything with your BTC because the fees are insanely high. There's just no point in having money in an unregulated blockchain when you can't do nothing with it.
Also, can't whales find cheaper ways to move their billions? I think if I was a billionaire, I would still be a bit pissed off at having to pay $600,000 for a transaction.
They will have 0 alternatives even in 2030?