Patri Friedman

2/ Obviously some users can hedge via futures, but if you're stashing money b/c you live in a current/potential kleptocracy (the Holocaust scenario) the CBOE is not an option.

3/ As speculators we expect everyone to just join the hodl club, but that exemplifies the immaturity of the tech/us. Most users don't want to be speculators, so if using and speculating are commingled, that's bad for actual use & ultimately for our investment.

4/ A club that won't let anyone in who doesn't want to gamble is going to end up being a club of gamblers, not the world new financial system. A good StableCoin is one possible answer.

5/ Making one, however, without centralization or counterparty risk, is...non-trivial. But deeply fascinating if you're into monetarism & cryptoeconomics! Looking forward to continued community speculation on the topic.

IMO any coin will be stable as soon it gets sufficient adoption. The dollar is stable even with QE because of the world adoption and demand. BRL is less stable in world terms b/c it's used solely in Brazil, but it's relatively stable inside Brazil despite inflationary policies.

Certainly a coin at full adoption will have more stable value. However, I question whether a (non-stablecoin) cryptocurrency will ever be as stable as USD. Won't demand shift among altcoins far more than among fiats (which each have a locked-in market)?

Perhaps demand shift among alts could be dampened by a “basket of alts” coin, in analogy to a “basket of metals” dampening demand shift betw say gold & silver.

I like it! The issue for backing a token w/ one or more commodity/fiat is the counterparty risk (who holds the reserves?). But a stablecoin contract that securely holds and automatedly trades altcoins would be a trustless reserve.