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Monopoly without a monopolist: An economic analysis of the bitcoin payment system

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  • Huberman, Gur
  • Leshno, Jacob D.
  • Moallemi, Ciamac

Abstract

Owned by nobody and controlled by an almost immutable protocol the Bitcoin payment system is a platform with two main constituencies: users and profit seeking miners who maintain the system's infrastructure. The paper seeks to understand the economics of the system: How does the system raise revenue to pay for its infrastructure? How are usage fees determined? How much infrastructure is deployed? What are the implications of changing parameters in the protocol? A simplified economic model that captures the system's properties answers these questions. Transaction fees and infrastructure level are determined in an equilibrium of a congestion queueing game derived from the system's limited throughput. The system eliminates dead-weight loss from monopoly, but introduces other inefficiencies and requires congestion to raise revenue and fund infrastructure. We explore the future potential of such systems and provide design suggestions.

Suggested Citation

  • Huberman, Gur & Leshno, Jacob D. & Moallemi, Ciamac, 2017. "Monopoly without a monopolist: An economic analysis of the bitcoin payment system," Bank of Finland Research Discussion Papers 27/2017, Bank of Finland.
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:bofrdp:rdp2017_027
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Makarov, Igor & Schoar, Antoinette, 2018. "Trading and Arbitrage in Cryptocurrency Markets," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 118909, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    2. Rico-Peña, Juan Jesús & Arguedas-Sanz, Raquel & López-Martin, Carmen, 2023. "Models used to characterise blockchain features. A systematic literature review and bibliometric analysis," Technovation, Elsevier, vol. 123(C).
    3. Bonaparte, Yosef & Bernile, Gennaro, 2023. "A new “Wall Street Darling?” effects of regulation sentiment in cryptocurrency markets," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 52(C).

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D40 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure, Pricing, and Design - - - General
    • D20 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - General
    • L10 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - General
    • L50 - Industrial Organization - - Regulation and Industrial Policy - - - General

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