Value is always, and in all cases, subjective. So what makes Bitcoin users subjectively value Bitcoin? Because it's truly decentralized. Its decentralization is what makes it scarce, neutral and uncensorable. There are no insiders, founders or companies to attack. It's also digital, so it can be transferred at the speed of light.
This decentralization made early users speculate that it could be worth something for its unique properties. That jumpstarts the network effect. More people using it means even more people will start to value it. This is a positive feedback loop.
The incentives are obvious. The feedback loop will continue toward global adoption. But you seem very skeptical, so tell me, what is going to break this feedback loop? What is going to kill Bitcoin?
Nothing will kill Bitcoin, just like nothing killed beanie babies. They both will exist for a long time.
But the world is finite, there is a limited number of people who have a limited amount of money with to speculate. Maybe the Bitcoin pumpers will convince some of that money to move away from other speculative investments and into Bitcoin and the price will go up, but there is a limit that will be hit eventually, then you have to deal with the reality of a negative cashflow asset.
Are you ignoring scarcity? Beanie Babies can be made and remade, and fixed, and resold, and counterfeit, etc. There’s no law that prevents the manufacturers from just pumping out millions of beanie babies.
Bitcoin on the other hand is a finite resource. It stops at 21 million. It can never go higher than that. New shitcoins are birthed everyday, but they are not Bitcoin.
There is no law that prevents 51% of the node operators from forking the Bitcoin code. Even if there was, scarcity isn't the same thing as value. My kids art work is incredibly scarce compared to Bitcoin. I can copyright it so that no one can copy the only original that I own. But that doesn't mean it is going to go up in value.
You are not informed. Forking is not the issue. There have been forks before. Rewriting the chain history (which is extremely difficult by the way) is the issue.
This decentralization made early users speculate that it could be worth something for its unique properties. That jumpstarts the network effect. More people using it means even more people will start to value it. This is a positive feedback loop.
The incentives are obvious. The feedback loop will continue toward global adoption. But you seem very skeptical, so tell me, what is going to break this feedback loop? What is going to kill Bitcoin?