Many have heard of Peak Oil. Some have heard about Peak Silver. But how many have considered Peak Steem?
(Note that everything in this post assumes that we don’t have a repeat of that weird SBD situation a few months ago that temporarily caused Steem’s inflation rate to accelerate.)
@fyrstikken’s chart shows yearly Steem production topping in 2023 and slowly declining after that. 2023 is only four years away, but by then crypto will likely be much more mainstream than it is now. Bitcoin’s impending 2024 halving might have lead story status. Some wags will also note that Steem’s creation numbers have started falling. So is 2023 the year of Peak Steem?
Yes, and no.
For most of us, it will represent Peak Steem during our lifetimes. But after 2037 when Steem’s annual inflation rate stabilizes at 0.95%, the amount of Steem created per year starts rising again, forever.
As I showed yesterday, the billionth Steem won’t come into existence until (probably) 50 years from now in 2069. But with Steem’s inflation rate stabilized at 0.95%, that means that only about 9.5 million Steem would be produced the following year, a long way from 2023’s output of 28.5 million Steem. In order for 28.5 million Steem to be produced in a year in an environment of 0.95% annual inflation, the prior year would need to have three billion Steem in existence (3,000,000,000 x 0.0095 = 28,500,000).
And that won’t happen until a bit more than 116 years after the one billionth Steem (1.0095^116=2.99456332).
So Steem won’t pass its 2023 peak production again until 2186 or 2187. Given nanobot cell repair and other life extension technologies, some of us might even live to see it. 🤔
But by then, Steem will be the solar system’s de facto currency and our descendants will be using more than the three decimals that we’re accustomed to because 0.001 Steem will represent huge value.
