Sergey Guriev: In undemocratic countries, cryptocurrencies are needed to evade ‘Big Brother’.

Western countries will displace cryptocurrencies with central-bank digital assets, according to Sergey Guriev, the former chief economist of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and a professor of economics at Sciences Po. Forbes reports.

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In his view, there is no productive use for cryptocurrencies in the West due to their inefficiency, volatility, and the large energy consumption required for mining.

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Guriev believes that over time crypto assets will become less anonymous in Western countries, \”because governments need money and they will not allow crypto enthusiasts to evade taxes\”.

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In non-democratic countries, an important property of cryptocurrencies is to help \”evade Big Brother,\” the economist said:

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\”The anonymity of payments in non-democratic countries may support the transit of democracy. In this sense we are perhaps globally in the West, and cryptocurrency is a weightless version of gold.\”

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Earlier Guriev said that cash would be fully replaced by a digital form of money in the future, but it will not be Bitcoin.

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