JWT Intelligence Trend Strategist, Will Palley reports from the "Contagious" magazine Now/Next/Why conference in New York City and discusses the next big thing: alternative currency. 

At Contagious magazine’s Now/Next/Why daylong conference in New York yesterday, the emergence of alternative currencies was a hot topic. The dramatic rise and fall of Bitcoin has highlighted the fact that consumer confidence is shifting away from traditional institutions like governments and central banks in favor of smaller, more independent alternatives. According to a recent study by Contagious, 21% of Americans and 15% of Britons would be comfortable with abandoning traditional sovereign currencies for currencies not tied to a major banking institution. (more...)