Money and Capital Market (ECO/FNC 214)

Note: Write your answer on a computer word processor program (e.g. MS Word, Open   Office, Google Docs), and submit through email.

  1. (50 points)

At the beginning of the last year, the price of a Bitcoin was below $1,000. It hit $5,000 in October, then doubled by late November. And on Thursday, less than two weeks later, the price of a single Bitcoin rose above $20,000 on some exchanges, according to Coinmarketcap. The latest price spike has been credited to signs that Wall Street companies plan on bringing their financial heft into the market. At the current cost, the value of all Bitcoin in circulation is about $300 billion. To get a sense of how big that is, all the shares of Goldman Sachs are worth about $90 billion. (Source: “Bitcoin’s Price Has Soared. What Comes Next?” By Nathaniel Popper, NY Times, DEC. 7, 2017)

Question:

Are those cryptocurrencies (e.g. bitcoin, ethereum, dogecoin etc.) money? Why? Why not? Justify your answer with evidences from clearly stated sources.

2.(50 points)

Introduce yourself and explain why you decide to invest your time and money for studying at CSI.