On May 22, 2010, a man named Laszlo Hanyecz paid 10,000 BTC for two pizzas. At the time, Bitcoin was an experiment. That transaction proved something powerful: digital money could be used to buy real things. But fast forward to 2025, and here we are, Bitcoin is worth over $100,000, yet most people still treat it like digital gold, not digital cash.
This irony isn't lost on those of us who believe in Bitcoin’s original vision. As someone who’s followed this space for years, I keep asking: what will it really take for Bitcoin to become a medium of exchange?
First, it's volatility. No one wants to spend Bitcoin when its price can swing 10% in a day. Imagine buying a laptop for 0.001 BTC, only to realize you could’ve bought two if you waited a week. This psychological “fear of regret” keeps people from spending.
Then there's the matter of scalability. Bitcoin’s base layer simply can’t handle mass adoption. But I’m optimistic here, the rise of the Lightning Network shows that ultra-fast, low-cost BTC payments are possible. What’s missing is mass integration at the point-of-sale level.
Regulatory clarity is another must. In many regions, every Bitcoin transaction triggers capital gains tax. That alone makes daily usage impractical. Until tax treatment becomes more payment-friendly, Bitcoin will remain a speculative asset.
But here’s the deeper issue: mindset. We say we want Bitcoin to be money, yet we HODL it like treasure. Until we start treating it as something to use, not just keep, the transformation won’t happen.
Bitcoin already proved it can store value. Now, it needs infrastructure, policy shifts, and most of all, a cultural push to make it usable like the dollar or euro. The pizza was just the beginning. The real economy starts when we stop fearing the spend.