Austrians Who Say Bitcoin is Impossible Because of the Regression Theorem

by Stephan Kinsella on July 8, 2025

I always saw the promise in BTC, from the beginning. Even spoke at one of the first conference, in 2013. ¹ But I wrongly assumed that the state would realize this and if when it became a threat, it would ban it. ² So I didn’t buy because I was too confident in the state’s competence. As I tweeted here, “A friend: “It seems counterintuitive to me that the fed and other regulators seem mostly indifferent to the existential threat that bitcoin represents to the world reserve currency status of USD.” Me: for one, they are stupid, for another, they don’t care about the future–short term thinking. It’s why I was wrong in 2013 or so and wrongly assumed the FedGov was smart and evil and competent and would ban BTC as soon as it became a threat (stephankinsella.com/2025/07/austri). They are just evil and stupid. They have short time preference because they dont “own” the state so they don’t care that BTC is a threat in 10 years. (See Hoppe’s Democracy.)” But I never bought into the flawed “it’s impossible because regression theorem” argument.

Most austro-libertarians are for sound money and for this reason are also pro-bitcoin (BTC), or at least are ambivalent and admit they do not fully understand it—such as Hoppe, who has features pro-bitcoin speakers at the PFS several times:

PFP215 | Stephan Kinsella, Nobody Owns Bitcoin (PFS 2019)

Some others, especially initially, argued that it was “impossible” because bitcoin “violates the regression theorem” or something. Work in progress—

Not yet sorted/classified

Laura Davidson and Walter E. Block, “Bitcoin, the Regression Theorem, and the Emergence of a New Medium of Exchange,” Q. J. Austrian Econ. 18, no. 3 (2015): 311–38
Walter Block, Regression Theorem and Bitcoin, Mises Wire (12/29/2013)

Bitcoin Does Not Violate Regression Theorem

For arguments that Bitcoin can be money and does not violate the regression theorem:

Robert P. Murphy, Bitcoin and the Theory of Money, Mises Wire (04/29/2020)
Konrad Graf, Bitcoins, the regression theorem, and that curious but unthreatening empirical world February 27, 2013
“Bitcoin does NOT violate Mises’ Regression Theorem” (27 July 2010)
Bitcoin and the Regression Theorem of Money Economics 12/07/2012 By Aristippus
Peter Šurda, “I, Broken Economist”: An Analysis of Gary North’s economics of Bitcoin, 7 December 2013
The Book Of Satoshi: The Collected Writings of Bitcoin Creator Satoshi Nakamoto: Satoshi, ch. 59: “Bitcoin does NOT violate Mises’ Regression Theorem.Posted by xc, July 27, 2010, 02:09:27 AM “The Money Regression and Emergence of Money from the Barter Economy”…; also here

Bitcoin Violates Regression Theorem/Cannot Be Money

I’ve lost track of all those who made the argument that it is impossible for various reasons, but here are a few who have expressed skepticism:

Robert Wenzel, Murray Rothbard: Bitcoin is a Crank Scheme December 20, 2013
Gary North: Bitcoins: The Road to Investment Hell Is Paved With Good Intentions. December 03, 2013; Showdown: Bitcoins vs. Greenbacks and/or Precious Metals, December 10, 2013; “I, Broken Pencil”: An Economic Analysis of Bitcoins, December 06, 2013
Huerta de Soto: Jesús Huerta de Soto dice: “BITCOIN no es DINERO”; tweet; From the LeRoux article (below): “As Jesús Huerta de Soto in a personal email writes, «The possibilities the bitcoin becomes money are null and Mises’ regression theorem explains why: money is an evolutionary, organically formed institution that cannot be created ex novo.» “
Chris LeRoux, “Why bitcoin can never be money,” Procesos de Mercado: Revista Europea de Economía Política Vol. XI, n.º 1 (pdf), Primavera 2014, pp. 249 a 271 (docs). As I wrote on Facebook back in 2017:
- “Someone sent me a draft paper in April 2014, “Why Bitcoin Can Never Be Money” — by one “Chris LeRoux”, who is the pro-IP guy who used to call himself Sid Non-vicious LeRoux. I only skimmed the paper, but it purports to be an “Austrian” “proof” of why it’s simply impossible for bitcoin to be money! It’s just impossible! Apparently it was published later … Love this quote: “Bitcoin is counterfeiting, inflation, theft conducted by fraud, misrepresentation through complication, just like the fiat federal reserve system,” … (The Bitcoin price on the day I received the manuscript, 4/3/2014, was about $400; lately it’s been between $3500 and $4500…”
Steve Forbes, Bitcoin: Whatever It Is, It’s Not Money! April 16, 2013
Frank Shostak, “What Is the Optimal Growth Rate for the Money Supply?“, Mises Wire (June 2, 2025); The Bitcoin money myth 15 April 13
Michael S. Milano, “Privacy and Fungibility: The Forgotten Virtues of Sound Money,” Mises Wire (07/05/2025).
Peter Schiff: see Peter Schiff’s Future Bitcoin Tweets
Kevin Dowd, Bitcoin Will Bite the Dust featuring Kevin Dowd (youtube, Cato) (Nov. 17, 2014); Dowd, Kevin, & Hutchinson, M., Bitcoin Will Bite the Dust. The Cato journal, 35(2) (2015): 357-382; Kevin Dowd, Bitcoin Will Still Bite the Dust (Updated Sep 14, 2021; Published Jan 13, 2019)
Sam Bostaph seems skeptical in this 2017 interchange
See also Jeffrey A. Tucker, “What Gave Bitcoin Its Value?“, FEE.org (August 27, 2014), and other pieces by Tucker on Bitcoin at his FEE archives, including It’s Total Madness in Bitcoin Land (Nov. 2, 2017), A Beginner’s Guide to Bitcoin Chaos (Nov. 13, 2017), Fed Official Decries Bitcoin as “Not Backed” (Dec. 1, 2017), In Defense of Bitcoin Hoarding (Dec. 6, 2017), What Really Matters about Bitcoin (Dec. 7, 2017), “How to Live Like a Bitcoin Millionaire” (Dec. 11, 2017), Bitcoin Mining Is Costly, Just Like Gold Mining (Dec. 19, 2017); his Bitcoin Magazine archives, namely Busting Ten Myths About El Salvador And Bitcoin (Sep. 20, 2021) and Op Ed: Is There a Future for Banking in a Cryptocurrency-Dominated World? (Oct. 11, 2017); and his Laissez Faire Books archives here and here, also in Liberty.me: Freedom Is a Do-It-Yourself Project (Liberty.me, 2013), to-wit: “Is Bitcoin Real or Not?”, “Bitcoin for Beginners,” “Should Bitcoin Be Regulated Like Dollars?”, “Bumps on the Bitcoin Road,” “Sailor Tales from the Bitcoin Seas,” “What Bitcoin Is Teaching Us,” and “Bitcoin’s Moment” (see also Jeffrey A. Tucker on Intellectual Property). Not that I agree with his more recent big-blocker perspective, e.g. “What Happened to Bitcoin?,” Brownstone (April 14, 2024), What Broke Libertarianism?, Brownstone (Sep. 10, 2024), Bitcoin Core vs. Bitcoin Cash/Jeffrey Tucker vs. Trace Mayer (Jan. 25, 2018), or his foreword to Steve Patterson, Hijacking Bitcoin: The Hidden History of BTC.On this, see my comments in Am I a Bitcoin Maximalist? and Bier’s The Blocksize War vs. Ver’s Hijacking Bitcoin; Miguel Vidal’s Foreword.