Bitcoin [BTC] has no intrinsic value, says Roger Ver on a debate with Litecoin [LTC]’s Charlie Lee

In a recent debate, the CEO of Bitcoin.com, Roger Ver spoke to Charlie Lee, the creator of Litecoin [LTC] on various aspects of Bitcoin [BTC]. The debate covered various topics out of which Bitcoin [BTC] and its intrinsic value were one among the discussions.

The debate started off by Charlie Lee speaking about the four important aspects which gave Bitcoin an intrinsic value. The censorship resistance, transaction immutability, cost of production, and a fixed money supply were the four important factors. Charlie spoke about the intrinsic value of Bitcoin where he stated that “Bitcoin has value intrinsically, this make Bitcoin sound money and sound money is valuable”.

He further spoke about Bitcoin being censorship resistant where he stated:

“It gives you something that cannot be blocked from spending”. Charlie further added that transaction immutability allows us to make transactions which cannot be reversed or taken away. Cost of production would not allow counterfeiting and “cause something to create another one”

Furthermore, Lee said that fixed money supply allowed Bitcoin to not be devalued. He added:

“You have a new form of money that cannot be blocked from spending, cannot be reversed or taken away, cannot be counterfeited and cannot be devalued. These four properties of Bitcoin make it very valuable”

Roger had a different opinion and argued against Bitcoin’s intrinsic value. According to him, the value of Bitcoin was only in the mind of the of the person who uses the coin and it would have no value if there were no human being in the world gave it that value. He added,

“There is no such thing as an intrinsic value, the value was in the mind of the beholder and not in the object itself”

Roger argued against Charlie’s statement about the cost of production of Bitcoin and accused him of promoting Karl Marx’s labor theory of value. He stated that the cost of production had nothing to do with the value. He stated:

“If I go and spend an hour making mud pies that do not give it value because I spent an hour making them or if I spend an hour making apple pies, the apple pies are valuable not because of spent an hour in making them but because people enjoy apple pie and people don’t enjoy mud pie. So even if I spent an hour making apple pies or mud pies, the apple pies have value and the mud pies don’t have value”

According to Roger, the cost of production had no correlation with Bitcoins value. It was rather the supply which was limited and it helped the price of Bitcoin because prices were set by the forces of supply and demand. If the supply increases and the demand decreases the same then the price declines whereas if the demand increases and the supply decreases then the price increases.

They ended the debate by disagreeing on the definition of intrinsic value. According to Roger, Charlie’s stance on the economics of Bitcoin was completely wrong.