In February of 2014, the largest and oldest bitcoin bank, MtGox, disappeared. It was really odd – one day they just . . . vanished! Hundreds of thousands of bitcoins disappeared along with it, totaling more than 450 million dollars. Many friends seized the opportunity to run to me and say, “Aha! Don’t you see? Your bitcoin banks are failing! We told you it was a big scam!”

But bank failure is a good thing. It’s better than being bailed out. Can you imagine if the government came in and said, “These bitcoin banks are too big to fail! We need to bail them out with taxpayer money!” It’s easy to see why that would be a bad idea. It would only encourage more corruption in bitcoin banking.

Yet, during the 2008 financial crisis, that’s exactly what happened. Many people were screaming about scams happening in the biggest banks in the world. Banks were participating in all kinds of fraud with the U.S. Dollar. Lots of politicians said, “These banks are too big to fail! We need to bail them out!” And they did. All the banks were bailed out, with money stolen from the American people. Today, many people look back and realize that we shouldn’t have bailed out the banks. No bank is too big to fail.

So MtGox failing is a good thing. Sure it’s painful, but it’s also a relief! Bitcoin users have known about the scams at MtGox for many months before the collapse, and were very vocal about warning people. It’s nice to know that the gang of crooks has collapsed their own organization.

But what if the gang comes back?

Well, they probably will. Any gang of crooks that has stolen that much money is sure to generate more scams. But it will be much harder for them to trick people because there is a new market for security in bitcoins. People who use bitcoins are now extremely cautious about any kind of bank, because they remember what happened at MtGox.

There is a new market for security in bitcoins, but it is still developing. Bitcoin is still a brand new currency, and will go through many more bumps in the road. More scams will probably happen, and more banks will fail, until a company finds a way to create true safety and security in a bitcoin bank. Any company that succeeds in creating real safety and security will find themselves sustainably rich, for a long time to come.