It's actually more complicated. With previous bubble spikes bitcoin price starts rising first then search term follows but search term then peaks before the price peaks.
I know everyone is going to say it is, but what if it's not a bubble... What if the huge demand and very limited supply is the driving factor behind the current price? I mean, even if you don't like bitcoin, there are a thousand more coins and there might be something in there for everyone... but you typically need to buy bitcoin first before you can get most of those coins.
Generally, huge demand and limited supply are necessary for any bubble to get going. I can see no way that the Bitcoin price is not a bubble.
It's rise in price is none-the-less astonishing, and is somewhat a testament to the soundness of the security model.
The whole system does require new money coming in all the time to maintain current price levels, as miners need to sell their bitcoin to get paid. It's less than a zero sum situation, as some of that money coming in goes directly to paying for the mining costs.
Since the overall awareness of Bitcoin is relatively low, in terms of actually knowing what it is, and how to get some, this bubble could run a long time, as there is a lot of money in the world, in need of investing.
> huge demand and limited supply are necessary for any bubble to get going
Does that mean gold is in a bubble? I mean, who are we to say either way? Bitcoin is arguably more useful than gold and it's supply is known with great precision. You could say that Gold is more speculative in a way since somebody could be sitting on a stockpile that is equal to half of the known supply.
> The whole system does require new money coming in all the time to maintain current price levels
That's only true for the next few years, then no new coins are created.
You can't see how it's not a bubble but frankly, I have trouble seeing how we can say it's in a bubble. Maybe it is, but I don't think anybody knows how to evaluate bitcoin... it's not like anything we've seen before.
When IBM started selling computers, their roadmap didn't include home computers because they didn't think that anyone would ever want a computer in their home. We understand the implications of bitcoin now about as much as IBM understood the impact of computers back then.
