比特幣狂熱的背後大綱

As the price of bitcoin hit $10,000, the cryptocurrency’s supporters took to Twitter last week to boast of their triumph. “You, a Wall St trader: spent years in school learning the minutia of finance, 10 years of 100-hour work weeks, never see your family, super excited about your 10 per cent returns this year,” one enthusiast wrote. “Me: a Bitcoiner: read some books, s*** posted on Twitter, ate some steaks, enjoying 900 per cent returns.”
隨着比特幣價格突破1萬美元，這一加密貨幣的支持者們上上週開始在Twitter上炫耀自己的勝利。“你，一名華爾街交易員：數年寒窗苦讀金融理論，10年每週工作100小時，沒時間陪家人，對今年10%的回報感到超級興奮；”一位比特幣發燒友寫道，“我：一個比特幣玩家：讀點書，灌灌水，吃着牛排，就獲得了900%的回報。”

This trolling social media comment perfectly captures the mutual disdain between professional financiers, who have mostly watched bitcoin’s rise with a mixture of puzzlement and horror, and the hardcore of true believers who view owning cryptocurrencies as a disruptive act of financial iconoclasm.
這一找罵的社交媒體評論完美地展現了專業金融家與比特幣的核心虔誠信徒之間的相互鄙視，前者很大程度上對比特幣的崛起感到困惑和恐懼，而後者將擁有加密貨幣視爲一種金融領域破除偶像崇拜的顛覆性的行爲。

Those who are trying to explain bitcoin’s popularity and behaviour through the spectacles of mainstream finance are committing a simple analytical error: they are attempting to apply fact-based analysis to an asset that is impervious to it.
那些試圖透過主流金融的濾鏡來解釋比特幣的流行和走勢的人士，正在犯一個簡單分析法錯誤：他們試圖將基於事實的分析應用於一種不受現實影響的資產。

Bitcoin is a faith-based financial asset for a populist era.
比特幣是民粹主義時代一種基於信仰的金融資產。

Speculative manias have occurred throughout history. The study of bubbles has greater value in informing us about the state of the societies in which they occurred than any lasting financial lesson. The Tulip bubble in the Netherlands occurred during the Dutch Golden Age, when the country was the world’s leading economic and social power, and the ability of an investment to defy gravity was easy to believe.
人類歷史上經常出現各種投機狂熱。對泡沫的研究比任何持久的金融教訓都具有更大的價值，它可以讓我們知曉出現泡沫的那些社會的狀態。荷蘭的鬱金香泡沫發生在荷蘭的黃金時代，當時的荷蘭是世界領先的經濟和社會強國，人們很容易相信一種投資能夠一直上漲。

Bitcoin’s price is not being driven by anything resembling conventional financial logic, but in part by the same forces that have delivered the political shocks of the past two years. Like populist politics, belief in cryptocurrencies and “trustless networks” have chimed with a collapse in confidence in traditional forms of authority and a disdain for experts. Unwavering belief in bitcoin’s story is powered by the crowd-fuelled authority of the internet.
比特幣的價格並非由任何類似傳統金融邏輯的東西所驅動，而是在一定程度上由導致過去兩年發生的政治衝擊的種種力量所驅動。像民粹主義政治一樣，對加密貨幣和“不可靠網絡”的信心伴隨着對傳統權威形式的信心崩潰和對專家的蔑視。衆多網民支撐起互聯網的權威，這種權威支撐起對比特幣故事毫不動搖的信心。

Financial professionals who fail to comprehend why someone would risk their wealth investing in bitcoin when it appears to them so obviously to be a bubble can be compared with the political analysts who believed it was impossible the UK would vote to leave the EU.
那些無法理解爲什麼有人會冒險拿自己的財富投資比特幣（在他們看來顯然是一個泡沫）的金融專業人士，就像曾認爲英國不可能投票退出歐盟的政治分析人士一樣。

The global financial crisis severely discredited the banking system. In the world of investment there has been a breakdown in confidence that expert professional investors and advisers know what they are doing. The rise of passive investment is occurring at a time of criticism of years of excessive fees and poor performance of the mutual funds that millions are relying on to fund their retirement.
全球金融危機嚴重破壞了銀行體系的信用。在投資領域，對於專家級專業投資者和顧問知道自己在做什麼的信心已經崩潰。被動投資的興起是在對多年來的高額佣金以及共同基金業績不佳的批評中出現的，數百萬人依靠這些基金提供退休金。

When an expert such as Jamie Dimon, the head of the largest bank in the US, warns that bitcoin is dangerous, crypto true believers regard such warnings with the same disdain directed at experts ahead of the UK referendum.
當美國最大銀行的負責人傑米?戴蒙(Jamie Dimon)等金融專家警告比特幣危險時，比特幣的真正信徒抱以鄙視，就像人們在英國退歐公投前鄙視進行預測的專家一樣。

Like bitter political spats on Twitter, any criticism of bitcoin is greeted by this cohort as inherently corrupt in its motivations, while any alternative opinions are used as evidence that merely confirms existing beliefs.
像Twitter上激烈的政治口角一樣，對比特幣的任何批評都被比特幣忠實信徒視爲內在動機存不純，而任何其他的觀點都被用作證據，進一步支撐了現存的信心。

Sceptical financial professionals appear to similarly underestimate what can be seen as a millenarianism devotion that inures them to the conventional psychology of investment: the fear of losing money.
持懷疑態度的金融專業人士似乎同樣低估了一種可以被視爲“千年主義”的信仰，這種信仰讓他們適應了一種傳統的投資心理：對賠錢的恐懼。

The most dedicated of bitcoin supporters — those who refer to themselves as HODL-ers, or those who will hold on whatever happens to the price — see their survival of previous crashes in its value as a point of pride. The devout hold the value and future of bitcoin is a matter of faith, a Manichean battle between believers and sceptics.
最堅定的比特幣支持者（自稱“HODL-ers”，即那些無論價格漲跌都堅定持有的人士）把他們挺過了之前的幣值崩盤看作一種驕傲。這些虔誠的信徒將比特幣的價值和未來視爲一種信仰，一種信徒和懷疑論者之間的摩尼教式鬥爭。

To this most extreme acolyte there is noble glory in the act of owning bitcoin, even if it results in a debilitating loss.
對這羣最極端的支持者而言，擁有比特幣是至高無上的榮耀，即使它導致慘重損失。

Vast amounts of attention will inevitably be devoted to the wild swings in the value of bitcoin in the coming weeks.
在未來幾周，大量注意力將不可避免地投向比特幣價值的劇烈波動。

Decades from now — whether bitcoin still exists or not — it may be that its significance is seen less as a financial asset and more as a speculative barometer of the political forces that are shaping our times.
幾十年後——無論比特幣是否仍存在——比特幣作爲衡量塑造我們時代的政治力量的投機指標的意義，或許將超過它作爲一種金融資產的意義。