> Crypto can be either a currency or a volatile investment, not both. The gold standard famously linked the price of gold with our currency, and it forms part of the reason the Federal Reserve didn't act to stop the Great Depression - they couldn't just print more gold to increase the money supply (to grossly oversimplify)!
Uhm, why can't it be both? You describe as if there is one ominous "crypto" with a single set of static rules. There are many different tokens/coins/etc, some are "store of value", some are "stable coins", and some are "volatile investments". Crypto can and is all of them at once.
I was a bit sloppy and I apologise, but if you take a given cryptocurrency, it's not possible for it to be a volatile investment and a stable, useful currency at the same time, those are completely at odds.
If you take Bitcoin as an example, it's too volatile to be used as currency, and most vendors accepting Bitcoin price items for sale in dollars, and convert the Bitcoin to dollars rather than holding them. It's not actually used as a currency.
Stablecoins could conceivably be used as currency but then they're not a volatile investment. Except if they become volatile UST-style and thus become useless for any purpose.
Uhm, why can't it be both? You describe as if there is one ominous "crypto" with a single set of static rules. There are many different tokens/coins/etc, some are "store of value", some are "stable coins", and some are "volatile investments". Crypto can and is all of them at once.