2.2.2. Cryptocurrency Volatility

For any cryptocurrency that is getting newly established as a paymen<sup>t</sup> method, the "fair" established value must be stable for consumers to be comfortable purchasing with the digital currency. As BTC is a newly available asset, the price discovery mechanism requires that the group of buyers and sellers exchanging the currency come to an agreed-upon value for the underlying asset (Pagnottoni and Dimpfl 2019). As the value of a BTCUSD in November 2016 was roughly \$740, the currency was far from stable at the time. Seeing prices as high as \$1200 in 2013, \$15,000 in 2020, and as low as \$355 in 2016 for BTCUSD, a true concern for consumers is to make a purchase with an asset that has varied so much in value. However, there are many cases of money being just as volatile. One famous example being the Zimbabwe hyperinflation, where the currency experienced 80 billion percent inflation in a single month.
