It's important to note that a nation's official currency has intrinsic value simply because the nation's economic output is, by law, required to be expressed in terms of it, and each and every transaction involving the state, whether it's paying for goods and services or paying salaries owed to state employees, are expressed in terms of the official currency.

So, it's hard to hand-waive around the fact that an official currency, unlike a so-called cryptocurrency, does have intrinsic value because by definition certain units of account do buy you certain goods and even the work of full-time employees.