Nobody knows the usefulness of the True King of All Coins the Bitcoin!

 If a trader were trading in bitcoins with us, I would dismiss him on the spot for two reasons. One, it is against our rules. Two, it's stupid. " These words spoke Jamie Dimon, the CEO of JPMorgan Chase, at a Barclays conference in September. Furthermore, Dimon bitcoin called 'a scam', in which only by  murderers, drug dealers and people in North Korea, Ecuador and Venezuela  should be invested.

When Dimon spoke these words, the bitcoin stood at $ 4,200 per unit. Two months later, the virtual 'currency' is above $ 8,000. And  as is the case with banks, JPMorgan is now considering facilitating  clients if they would like to trade in the bitcointime contracts, which  will be traded from the end of the year via the Chicago Mercantile  Exchange (CME). That is what the Wall Street Journal wrote earlier this week.

And why not? Finally, JPMorgan has a brokerage department that already offers customers access to the CME. It is a very small effort to offer bitcoinfutures. The  only difference is that - given the enormous volatility of the bitcoin -  the monitoring of the margin obligations requires extra attention. With futures, the gains and losses are calculated on a daily basis, so  the original deposit when opening a contract (initial margin in jargon)  will be relatively high.
Heilstaten

But, as the financial blogger of Bloomberg View, Matt Levine, already pointed out, what if Dimon is right? That bitcoin is really a scam and is only suitable for murderers, drug dealers and residents of socialist states? And that the value then goes to zero?

That scenario is not unthinkable. Bitcoin  has no intrinsic value, does not function like money, and there is no  reason to assume that ordinary people will ever need that currency for  something in their lives. At least, no one I ask can have made it clear to me. Usually a complicated story is started about the innovative character  of blockchain technology - and I am, not hindered by any technical  insight, immediately prepared to believe, but why bitcoin itself is of  any use, even the largest bitcoinfans can not explain.

And some do not even attempt. "It's a hype. A new toy for the people ', says Hans van den Boogaard, director at CryptoAcademy. His company provides training on how to make money in trade with cryptocurrencies, but he has no opinion on the real value. 'If you come here to get an answer to the question of why you should have bitcoins, then you are at the wrong address'.
Cowboy world

According to Van den Boogaard, all those different cryptocurrencies are 'a cowboy world'. That illustrated a story on the website Follow the Money last weekend. There was reported a meeting of OneCoin, one of the many  cryptocurrencies, and based on that story that coin looks suspiciously  like an old-fashioned pyramid scheme.

A  small part of the demand for bitcoins comes from the corner of people  who do not trust the money system or the banks, is the experience of Van  den Boogaard. Bitcoins can not be 'reprinted', as the central banks have been fighting the financial crisis in the last ten years. There is a maximum number available and more can not be. This makes bitcoin look like gold, the traditional category where investors come out who no longer trust the system. Bitcoin also derives the name 'virtual gold' from this.

Although there is a small difference between the two investments. Gold is more tangible and at the time of a real armageddon - where  investors like that a little bit - gold could be used relatively well as  a means of exchange, but if the electricity fails, it becomes a  complicated story with bitcoin.
gold

But apparently diversification is also important in that world. On Thursday, Bloomberg news agency published a story about the Old Mutual Gold Fund. That  relatively small fund - $ 220 million under management - until recently  only invested in gold-related shares, but plans to invest 5% of assets  under management in bitcoins. "The bitcoin clears the way for the reintroduction of gold as the  money of the world," says fund manager Ned Naylor-Leyland against  Bloomberg.

The same opinion is also attached to Mike Novogratz. This hedge fund manager wants to raise $ 500 million to invest in bitcoins. According to him, we are going to a digital world and bitcoin is the digital gold, he told Bloomberg. According to the news agency, he is in good company, because this year alone 84 funds have been started for cryptocurrencies.

But coming back to the question what happens if Dimon is right and the bitcoin goes towards zero. If JPMorgan has actually let its customers trade in cryptocurrencies and those customers see their wins