비트코인은 디지털 금이 될 수 있을까요?
사람들이 비트코인을 디지털 금이라고 부르는 데는 이유가 있습니다. 금과 비트코인은 쓰임새가 완전히 같진 않지만, 둘 다 가치 저장 수단이라는 역할로 자주 비교됩니다. 쉽게 말해, 시간이 지나도 가치가 크게 무너지지 않도록 ‘가치를 담아두는 그릇’으로 바라보는 시각이 있다는 뜻입니다.
There is a reason people call Bitcoin digital gold. Gold and Bitcoin do not share identical use cases, but they are frequently compared regarding their function as a store of value. Simply put, some view them as a vessel that preserves value so it does not erode significantly over time.
What is a Store of Value
A store of value is a mechanism that shifts purchasing power from the present to the future. For instance, if you hold a value of 1 million won now and can maintain similar purchasing power a year later, you have effectively stored value. Conversely, if that same 1 million won buys significantly less a year later, value has effectively leaked away during that period.
This leads many to consider inflation. When prices rise, the quantity of goods purchasable with the same amount of money falls. Eventually, holding merely cash feels like a loss, and people naturally seek assets that preserve value over long durations (real estate, equities, gold, Bitcoin). It is useful to understand the attention Bitcoin receives in this context.
Bitcoin’s Scarcity
A primary reason gold holds value is scarcity. Gold is not an infinite resource extracted from the ground. It costs capital to mine, and increasing supply is difficult. Because sudden supply explosions are unlikely, it has historically been accepted as an asset that preserves value over long periods.
Bitcoin is intentionally designed to mimic this structure. The critical factor is that the total quantity is fixed. Bitcoin has a hard issuance limit. Essentially, it is an asset designed so no party can arbitrarily decide to produce more. This characteristic gives people an impression similar to gold. The logic is that if demand rises but supply cannot increase arbitrarily, value is not easily diluted.
Acquisition Cost Called Mining
Gold is not only scarce; the fact that extraction incurs cost is also crucial. To obtain gold, one must explore, excavate, refine, and transport. Costs arise during this process, and this expense acts as a brake preventing gold’s supply from increasing easily.
Bitcoin also undergoes a process called mining. Here, mining does not involve digging the earth but a structure where computers perform complex calculations to secure the network, issuing new Bitcoin as a reward. Real-world costs such as electricity and hardware are involved in this operation.
What does this imply? It means Bitcoin resembles gold’s production structure because it is an asset acquired by paying a definite cost, rather than simply pressing a button to print it. We cannot simplify the argument that price is determined strictly by cost, but the reality that supply does not increase for free resonates with many people in a manner similar to gold.
The Inflation Era and Bitcoin
In an inflationary environment, it feels like the value of money is being chipped away gradually. The key point here is the perception that the purchasing power one worked hard to earn seems to decay naturally over time. Consequently, people seek assets that endure better than the rate at which value is diluted.
In this scenario, Bitcoin presents a strong proposition: a digital asset where supply cannot be increased arbitrarily. This message appeals to those anxious about inflation. Gold has fulfilled that role for centuries, and Bitcoin can be viewed as an experiment to implement that role within a digital environment.
Reading this far, the question "So is Bitcoin as safe as gold?" naturally arises. To state the conclusion first, digital gold does not mean Bitcoin and gold are identical; it is a metaphor indicating that specific characteristics (scarcity, supply constraints, expectations of value storage) resemble one another.
Gold has been historically recognized as a store of value for a long time and typically exhibits relatively low volatility. Bitcoin, by contrast, is still in a maturation phase where price volatility is high. While the concept of a store of value is straightforward, assuming the price is always stable is problematic.
Conclusion
There are two primary reasons Bitcoin is compared to gold. First, it possesses scarcity through a limited supply. Second, it has an acquisition cost via the mining process, meaning supply does not increase without cost. As the sensation that money’s purchasing power decreases due to inflation intensifies, interest in assets with these characteristics grows.
The simplest perspective to understand Bitcoin is to view it as a value storage experiment with limited supply emerging in the digital age. Just as gold has served that role historically, we can observe a process where social consensus is forming on whether Bitcoin can also fulfill this function.
