CRYPTOCURRENCIES by Michael Ballanger


TRADING SYSTEMS


FX


The Truth Behind Bitcoin’s ‘Success’


In the year 301 AD, the Roman unit of barter was the denarius, which had originally been 95% pure silver when introduced by Augustus at the end of the first century BC but by the time of Diocletian’s rule, it had moved to 50,000 denarii to a pound of gold. Ten year later, it took 120,000 denarii to buy a pound of gold and by 337, that figure was 20,000,000.


What had occurred in a mere 400 years was that a slow


and agonizing erosion in the purchasing power of the Roman currency


accelerated to full


fiat disintegration and that complete and total disregard for the denarius was attributed as one of the underlying causes of the Fall of the Roman Empire. Nothing was more evident in the underlying rot permeating Roman society, economics and national security than the refusal by the Barbarian armies to accept anything but gold as payment for their leaving the Roman legions


alone. Rejection of the currency of the Roman Empire was complete and irreversible.


One of the omens of impending inflationary spirals is the tendency of those individuals controlling large swaths of wealth to reject any form of “savings” in the form of bank deposits or interest-bearing certificates. They choose instead to jettison cash or cash-equivalent instruments because of a loss of faith in the ability of local


FX TRADER MAGAZINE January - March 2018 51


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