I think it is enough to post something like "last year people earned X% on BitUSD"... not changing... true... past performance is no guarantee of future performance.
Totally true, but that still leaves us nothing to market in our first year, and is exactly why we need the subsidy in the beginning.
i don't think that 5% p.a. would be enough to attract investors seeking return into holding bitUSD for a while. feels like we are fooling ourselves with regards to how much a fair compensation should be for exposure to systemic BTS risk. Even without BTS price volatility, my guess is 100%+ yield p.a. at current, initial stage.
most Western banks USD deposits yielding 0% are insured. For Argentina, or Russia perhaps, there is significant risk of local currency depreciation versus USD, and USD deposits can be seized by governments. Thus people prefer to hold cash USD, or local banks pay them 10% p.a. return on USD deposits. bitUSD could be an alternative, but yield should be priced fairly compared with BTS expected return.
As BM stated before - not everyone is seeking return. Some want to diversify away from banks, some want to do business. ratailers holding small amounts of bitUSD would be a plus. Perhaps demand could be substantial in the remittance market due to fast and cheap transfers, bitUSD price stability versus USD, while the exposure to BTS systemic risk by each transacting party is very brief and comparably small (as opposed to investors seeking return). here the local gateways, perhaps even private brokers (localbitcoins idea), would be key.
However, anyone thinking about marketing BTS platform to professional FX traders, please go and visit an FX trading desk first and see at what speed and what high tech is employed by leading brokers and exchanges. 10 seconds is like eternity there - BTSX isn't likely to get traction in there in the near future imo... also not sure, why someone with trading account in a bank should trade bitGOOG or bitGold instead of highly liquid Google or Gold CFD at 10 USD per trade... I am not saying bitAssets won't get even more accurately priced, gain liquidity in the future, and allow for smaller market participants without proper banking access to do all things they want at low cost. just think that the status quo with professional traders and electronic trading via exchanges, platforms like bloomberg etc. is not yet to be doubted.