Is bitcoin money? And what that means

Peter K. Hazlett and William Luther

The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, 2020, vol. 77, issue C, 144-149

Abstract: In a recent article, Yermack (2015) argues that bitcoin is not money because it functions poorly as a medium of exchange, unit of account, and store of value. We offer a more conventional view. We maintain that the standard approach classifies an item as money if and only if it functions as a commonly-accepted medium of exchange. Then, we show that the demand for bitcoin is comparable to the demand for many government-issued monies. Finally, we argue that bitcoin is money—though perhaps only over a relatively small domain at present.

Keywords: Bitcoin; Medium of exchange; Money; Store of value; Unit of account (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: E40 E41 E42 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (16)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:quaeco:v:77:y:2020:i:c:p:144-149

DOI: 10.1016/j.qref.2019.10.003

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