1. Are cryptocurrencies with fixed supplies a good thing or a bad thing?

This is a hot topic for debate, and crypto companies have taken different approaches when creating their own assets.

The world’s biggest cryptocurrency, Bitcoin, has a fixed supply of 21 million — and last April, it was confirmed that 80 percent of this total had already been mined. Although newly minted Bitcoins aren’t going to be around forever, as the number available is going to decrease over time, there’s still a long way to go before they will all enter circulation. In fact, as things stand, the supply of new coins won’t be fully exhausted until 2140.

Those in favor of fixed supplies, as seen in Bitcoin, say that this creates digital scarcity. Lower supply can mean higher demand, thereby increasing prices. They also say that this sets crypto aside from the global financial system, in which central banks can effectively print more money through a strategy known as quantitative easing, which can lead to inflation and mean the dollar in your pocket isn’t worth as much as it used to be.

But in terms of cryptocurrencies achieving mainstream adoption, some opponents argue that fixed supplies actually stop people from spending, meaning that digital assets are speculative investments that people hoard. As this Bloomberg article argues, depreciation is impossible when an asset is finite, and this creates the risk of crypto owners waiting to get their goods cheaper. When it comes to conventional currencies, inflation is something that disincentivizes consumers from holding onto their cash — the longer it’s in their wallet, the less purchasing power it has.