Here's a few scenarios.
- Solar flare or cyber attack knocks out internet
- China or USA ban (temporarily)
- Large Chinese dealer or Mt gox/ Bitstamp folds up owing 10's of Millions (most probable scenario in my opinion)
- China and USA start war mongering over the Japanese/ Chinese disputed Islands
- Meltdown of financial markets run to PHYSICAL assets (gold silver)
- Governments start to introduce their own Crypto outlawing completely private Crypto's
There are others but those immediately come to mind.
Yep, someone was prescient there. As for the other possibilities:
1. My best understanding is that the risk from solar flares is somewhat exaggerated. And a really bad one would knock out satellites in geostationary orbit, giving us about 30 minutes warning before it struck earth. Assuming they are on the ball, this should give major utilities and internet outfits time to shut things down and greatly limit the resulting scope of damage... assuming they don't stand around aimlessly when the satellite shutdowns start happening. EMP attacks and cyber warfare are realistic possibilities, but almost certainly wouldn't take out the entire internet, so distributed blockchains should be fine.
2. (Most) Governments won't flatly ban crypto, and even if they did they would thrive on the black markets.
3. Warmongering creates fear, motivating people to safeguard their assets. This would drive people away from at-risk investments (such as in companies that would be in trouble if international trade shut down in the example given above), towards safe havens like gold and bitcoin.
4. A financial market meltdown will cause people to flee AWAY from fiat currency, not TO precious metals in particular. If your fiat becomes worthless, you still need a way to buy and sell things. Which would you rather have at that point, a lump of gold in your pocket or a couple bitcoins in your online wallet? With each passing day the usability of BTC in everyday transactions grows. Gold? Try cashing that at Walmart or spending it online.
5. Government-backed crypto. Ecuador will be showing us what a stupid idea this is. Does anyone really think this stands any chance of acceptance? Really? It combines the disadvantages (such as they are) of crypto with the disadvantages of fiat. Lose-lose.