Jan 1, 2017. Price of Bitcoin: $974
Nov 21, 2017. Price of Bitcoin: $8200
One of the bigger economic waves of 2017 has been Bitcoin and its growth. It’s evolved from a very polarizing economic issue into a slightly polarizing topic with a strong core base and an almost solid network effect advantage. I don’t make a pro-bitcoin argument here but I attempt to clarify a few questions about the process of buying bitcoin.
The pro-Bitcoin community (tech enthusiasts, some financial experts, Silicon Valley, some government folks, some folks in academia etc) consensus is that bitcoin remains a store of value in the sense in which gold acts as a store of value and it combines the advantages of gold (fixed supply and fixed inflation) with some advantages of cash (high portability and fungibility). There is still a community split on how effectively bitcoin can be used as a payment system.
Big Point:
You can buy Bitcoin in almost every country in the world — including Nigeria.
Is it too late to buy bitcoin?
The short answer is no.
- The sentiment around this concern is usually around “missed growth”. It’s often wrongly evaluated. There is a lot of potential for growth (in adoption and in value). Less than 1 percent of the global population owns bitcoin and bitcoin’s total valuation is less than 1% of the total valuation of gold yet interest and steam is on the rise.
- There is also the concern about being able to cough out $8000. You can buy fractions of bitcoin in whatever currency you want. For instance, you can buy as little as ~ 0.0033 Bitcoin for N10, 000.
Will Bitcoin continue to grow?
Hard problems: predicting the future ;)
Goes without saying, this still belongs to the high-risk pile of securities. There are significant dangers with pouring your money and you should evaluate your risk tolerance and not pour more than you can afford to lose.
Risks:
- Hacks: there was a famous hack that led to the loss of almost a million coins (7% of total bitcoins in circulation) on an exchange called MtGox and led to bankruptcy in 2014. Bitcoin’s price tanked by about 30%)
- Volatility: Bitcoin is given to erratic price swings
- Buhari and Emefiele can come and go and vex now and say eez a crime
- Scams: bitcoin is the gateway to exposing yourself to knowledge about and vulnerability to all sorts of scams. If you’re positively disposed, just buy bitcoin and forget about everything else. Don’t listen to MMM, AbjCoin, Swiss Gold, Most ICOs, Phishing etc. (Am I spoiling market for someone? Oops!)
A decision to buy or invest in bitcoin should be as a result of due diligence and willingness to hold for a long time but your rationale to not buy should NOT be from fear of “is it too late?”
Where can I buy Bitcoin in Nigeria
Reliable Vendors:
- LocalBitcoins.com
- Bitkoin
- Tanjalo
- Paxful
- A Handful of others
More Reading: Bullish Insights on Bitcoin
- Aleph’s Bitcoin Primer https://medium.com/@aleph/bitcoin-primer-eli5-5d30a9a19bc
- Marc Andreessen’s 2014 Article on Bitcoin’s potential: https://dealbook.nytimes.com/2014/01/21/why-bitcoin-matters/
- MotherBoard’s Bitcoin and Ethereum Primer https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/mbjk5x/the-motherboard-bitcoin-and-ethereum-primer
