To understand and decide whether bitcoin is a good store of value, let's consider other classes of assets such as real estate and commodities.

Consider real estate.

I remember hearing folks talk about property being a good store of value and something that has that ability to stand the test of time. In some ways that is probably true.

Real estate has not only been able to hold its value but is also an instrument that has proven to deliver returns through generating rental income or appreciate in value steadily over time.

Within Asia, real estate has not only demonstrated resilience through the up and down cycles, but also been a beneficiary of the economic prosperity of the regional economic titans such as China, Japan, Korea, as well as Southeast Asia. A rising tide lifts all boats. That trend still holds true to a certain extent today. Property is still pretty much the go-to choice for many investors flushed with cash and those in search of a relatively safe-haven especially during a recession.

People continue to trade and invest in real estate because fundamentally, they know that a roof over the head is a basic foundation of life at least based on Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Residential property is also somewhat a good proxy to the overall global economic cycle. A resilient jobs economy encourages home ownership, driving up property values.

Although its initial investment outlay can be high, real estate is also relatively liquid. Liquidity in valuation, is a metric that tends to be overlooked. In layman terms, this loosely translates to how easy it is for an asset to change hands.

You can list your second-hand car for a million dollars on Carousell, but at the end of the day, it's still worth nothing if it can't be sold. The price of a share in a company is only as real as how much others are willing to pay for it, not how much you want to sell it for. Furthermore, liquidity is also driven by the availability of buyers and sellers, and also shaped by the perception of the broader market.

All things considered, we can assume that property, as an asset class, remains still highly regarded amongst investors as the go-to asset class for investment.

Now let's consider lab-grown diamonds.

"A diamond is valuable only because people say it is, not because of its clarity or cut."

Jewelers and advertising companies around the world have done an extremely successful job in positioning the diamond at the apex of all precious stones.

But the raw material for diamond is carbon - one of the most commonly available elements found on earth, ranked many times above gold, silver and platinum.

Yet despite being available in relatively large quantities, consumers continue to pay absurd amounts of money for a small rock mounted on a ring or co-joined in a necklace.

To add to the paradox, lab-grown diamonds are significantly cheaper than their natural counterparts, even though they share the exact same properties and make. In fact, according to this website:

"If you buy a lab-created diamond, you’d have a beautiful stone, yet no jeweler will buy it back."

So, what can we learn about the value of bitcoin from real estate and precious stones?

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There's much talk of late about bitcoin being a store of value. I know very little about the world of bitcoin and cryptocurrencies - only limited to the banter that I read on Twitter and the news.

Is bitcoin a good store of value? Only time will tell.

Just like property, gold and other precious stones, it is considered a safe haven only as much as others see it.

In this case, the erosion in value (and faith) of the dollar could be one of the key catalysts behind the value of bitcoin.

Investors buy bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies because they have lost faith in fiat currency.

Traders of bitcoin expect that one day, the guy over the counter of a McDonalds or convenience store will accept a bitcoin or cryptocurrency-equivalent as a valid form of payment in exchange for goods and services.

Far out as it might sound, but for a billionaire or any large investor sitting on heaps of cash, this translates to a possible devaluation of their cash holdings. i.e. cash as we know it today, might one day be no longer king if crypto-currencies were to take over.

I think that crypto-exchanges were created largely because of this phenomenon.

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Crypto-currency platforms are only viable and commercial if there is a sizeable market for trading. This implies that there has to be a significantly large pool of investors willing to kickstart the initiative and make the market so to speak.

This is similar to early stock exchanges which were created to provide an avenue for companies to raise capital, and also an alternative gateway for investors looking to put their money to work.

While people are comfortable with buying and selling shares, there is still a huge inertia is driving a paradigm shift in financial markets to accept bitcoin, inertia likened to re-inventing the wheel.

There's a reason why successive versions of Microsoft Windows in its early days were so slow and buggy. We can blame the limitations of hardware and software but the reality is that having to re-write a software for the world from scratch is simply too lengthy and costly.

Why demolish and re-build something that is already selling even with some occasional bugs and flaws? Far easier it is to patch the errors than to re-invent the wheel.

So our existing financial system is not perfect. Market players are rigging interest rates, manipulating currencies and stocks, and laundering money. But the reality is that the paper currency since its inception a thousand years ago still works as a go-to medium for the exchange of goods and services.

To revamp today's highly complex financial system using bitcoin or any crypto-alternative would simply take too much work involving several iterations of monetary reforms, even an astronomical "reset" on the global system, sending us all back to the barter economy.

Just as how asset values move in cycle with the economy, bitcoin will probably follow the same trajectory.

However we belittle cash, there are many commodities and asset classes out there which still serve as good alternatives to what we define as a "store of value". Bitcoin is only but just one of them.