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13 posts on "bitcoin"
May 28, 2024

Do Exchange‑Traded Products Improve Bitcoin Trading? 

Decorative photo: Close-up financial trading chart on digital LCD display of BTC bitcoin.

Spot bitcoin exchange-traded products (ETPs) began trading in the U.S. on January 11, 2024. For investors, these ETPs purport improved liquidity and price efficiency, and more convenient access to bitcoin trading compared to other means of trading bitcoin in spot markets. Proponents also cite bitcoin holdings as a portfolio diversification opportunity due to historically low correlation with traditional financial securities. Others argue that bitcoin remains a speculative asset and that ETPs increase its interconnections with the traditional financial system. In this post, we examine the initial performance, trading costs, and price efficiency of spot bitcoin ETPs in the U.S. 

Posted at 7:00 am in Cryptocurrencies, Nonbank (NBFI) | Permalink
December 18, 2023

Hey, Economist! Outgoing Advisor Antoine Martin Reflects on How His New York Fed Perch Has Shaped His Work

Portrait of Antoine Martin

Antoine Martin, an economist and financial stability advisor in the New York Fed’s Research and Statistics Group, will soon take up a new post at the Swiss National Bank (SNB), as head of its third department covering money markets/foreign exchange (FX). In that role, Martin, who is originally from Switzerland, also becomes one of three members of that central bank’s rate-setting governing board. Readers of Liberty Street Economics will be familiar with his byline, as he has written more than sixty posts presenting new research findings and policy analysis, all with an eye for breaking down the most complicated topics in clear terms. He took a few questions from publications editor Anna Snider about his experiences and future plans as he prepares to move on.

August 16, 2023

What Makes Cryptocurrencies Different?

Decorative photo: B for Bitcoin symbol on dark blue background with 0s and 1s floating and lines connected to dots to imply network.

Permissionless blockchains, which support the most popular cryptocurrency networks like Bitcoin and Ethereum, have shown that it is possible to transfer value without relying on centralized trusted third parties, something that is new and remarkable (although perhaps most clearly useful for less developed financial markets). What makes permissionless blockchains able to transfer value without relying on a small number of trusted third parties is the combination of several components that all need to work together. The components themselves are not particularly new, but the combination of these components is more than the sum of its parts. In this post, we provide a high-level overview of these components and how they interact, taking Bitcoin as an example.

February 8, 2023

Is There a Bitcoin–Macro Disconnect?

Decorative image: Bitcoin shape formed by binaries data of 0 and 1.

Cryptocurrencies’ market capitalization has grown rapidly in recent years. This blog post analyzes the role of macro factors as possible drivers of cryptocurrency prices. We take a high-frequency perspective, and we focus on Bitcoin since its market capitalization dwarfs that of all other cryptocurrencies combined. The key finding is that, unlike other asset classes, Bitcoin has not responded significantly to U.S. macro and monetary policy news. This disconnect is puzzling, as unexpected changes in discount rates should, in principle, affect the price of Bitcoin.

April 30, 2021

Hey, Economist! What’s the Case for Central Bank Digital Currencies?

Since the launch of Bitcoin and other first-generation cryptocurrencies, there has been extensive experimentation in the digital currency space. So far, however, digital currencies have yet to gain much ground as a means of payment. Is there a vacuum in the landscape of digital money and payments that central banks are naturally positioned to fill? In this post, Michael Lee and Antoine Martin, economists in the New York Fed’s Money and Payment Studies function, answer some questions regarding the concept of central bank digital currencies (CBDCs).

Posted at 7:00 am | Permalink
August 12, 2020
June 18, 2020

Bitcoin Is Not a New Type of Money

Bitcoin, and more generally, cryptocurrencies, are often described as a new type of money. In this post, we argue that this is a misconception. Bitcoin may be money, but it is not a new type of money. To see what is truly new about Bitcoin, it is useful to make a distinction between “money,” the asset that is being exchanged, and the “exchange mechanism,” that is, the method or process through which the asset is transferred. Doing so reveals that monies with properties similar to Bitcoin have existed for centuries. However, the ability to make electronic exchanges without a trusted party—a defining characteristic of Bitcoin—is radically new. Bitcoin is not a new class of money, it is a new type of exchange mechanism, and this type of exchange mechanism can support a variety of forms of money as well as other types of assets.

March 25, 2019

Deciphering Americans’ Views on Cryptocurrencies

Having witnessed the dramatic rise and fall in the value of cryptocurrencies over the past year, we wanted to learn more about what motivates people to participate in this market. To find out, we included a special set of questions in the May 2018 Survey of Consumer Expectations, a project of the New York Fed’s Center for Microeconomic Data. This blog post summarizes the results of that survey, shedding light on U.S. consumers’ depth of participation in cryptocurrencies and their motives for entering this new market.

February 9, 2018

Hey, Economist! What Do Cryptocurrencies Have to Do with Trust?

Bitcoin and other “cryptocurrencies” have been much in the news lately, in part because of their wild gyrations in value. Michael Lee and Antoine Martin, economists in the New York Fed’s Money and Payment Studies function, have been following cryptocurrencies and agreed to answer some questions about digital money.

March 23, 2016

Is Bitcoin Really Frictionless?

Bitcoin is the most popular virtual currency yet developed.

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