Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey revealed his surprising vision for the future of cryptocurrency, stating in an interview with the Times published Wednesday that Bitcoin will be the last remaining global currency in a decade. The executive projected its reign would probably happen in 10 years but could come sooner.
“The world ultimately will have a single currency, the internet will have a single currency. I personally believe that it will be Bitcoin,” Dorsey said.
The bold prediction isn’t entirely surprising coming from Dorsey, who endorsed Bitcoin during its meteoric rise (and subsequent fall). His mobile payment company Square, rival to Venmo, recently started letting users buy, sell, and track Bitcoin directly from the app.
It first accepted Bitcoin as a form of payment in 2014, well before the cryptocurrency gained mainstream recognition. Square also released an illustrated online children’s story called “My First Bitcoin,” jokingly written by the currency’s mysterious creator.
Dorsey previously called blockchain, the driving technology behind Bitcoin, the “next big unlock” that can be applied to finances and more.
“There are so many problems we can help solve [with blockchain] that are not just related to finance, but finance is an obvious one,” he told the Verge.
While his statements reflect his past support for the cryptocurrency, they seem overly optimistic. Bitcoin (and every other digital coin) has had a bumpy history, defined by periods of impossible growth and turbulent decline. To say the leading cryptocurrency is volatile would be an understatement. Toward the end of last year, Bitcoin’s value narrowly missed the $20,000 milestone. Within months, it sank below $8,000. Bitcoin is often described as a rollercoaster, climbing and falling uncontrollably, but it’s proven to be more like a pinwheel, shifting direction with even the slightest bit of pressure.
If Bitcoin is truly going to become the one coin to rule them all, it will need to overcome the latest wave of potential setbacks. Over the last few weeks, social networks including Facebook, Google, and even Twitter have banned Bitcoin ads to discourage scammers. Not to mention, researchers recently found child porn encoded in the blockchain, which could potentially make owning Bitcoin illegal.
On face value, these compiling issues seem insurmountable. Then again, few technologies have proven critics wrong as consistently as Bitcoin.
