Salmon believes that Bitcoin’s volatility and rise to prominence makes users think they’ll make more money by sitting on the currency rather than spending it. He brings up the example of the original pair of Alpaca socks bought for bitcoin – that person is probably upset he sold all those bitcoins for some socks. While the original sock purchase is lost in the veil of time, it should be noted that someone paid 10,000 BTC for a pizza in 2009. That pizza would be worth $7,280,000 today. The potential for profit from sitting on the currency, then, will discourage growth argues Salmon.

Ben Horowitz’s Bitcoin Bet | TechCrunch Saturday, February 8, 2014 @ 4:53pm