A Bitcoin Transaction Takes Thousands of Times More Energy Than a Credit Card Swipe

Pekelo said:
Only if the dollar valuation is high enough. At current valuation try to pay for a 10 million bucks purchase with bitcoin and see what happens...
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Well right Bitcoin is fairly new and not well adopted yet. Heck it might even fall on its face, who knows.

Supposedly the recent run-up was due to Chinese trying to evade CNY capital controls. I wouldn't think you'd be able to reasonably move more than $10K without raising red flags. But that's true for any currency.
 
stevegee58 said:
What "price"? You mean the exchange rate against the USD? And has nothing to do with Bitcoin itself.
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Sure it does. Since bitcoin itself has not much value, you have to measure its fame value somehow, and that is what the dollar at the exchanges does.

Anyhow, you are not going to win an argument on bitcoin against me. Just because it is more resilient than it first was thought, its fundamental problems still exist and so does the competition and government regulations.

So enjoy the ride while it lasts, but don't dream about the world without issuing entities. You are basically holding Tesla shares and dreaming of profitable mass EV production....
 
Pekelo said:
Sure it does. Since bitcoin itself has not much value, you have to measure its fame value somehow, and that is what the dollar at the exchanges does.

Anyhow, you are not going to win an argument on bitcoin against me. Just because it is more resilient than it first was thought, its fundamental problems still exist and so does the competition and government regulations.

So enjoy the ride while it lasts, but don't dream about the world without issuing entities. You are basically holding Tesla shares and dreaming of profitable mass EV production....
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My "imagine a world..." comment was strictly a Gedanken experiment. I might be a libertarian but certainly no fanatic. :D

The "value" of Bitcoin is certainly debatable. A government-issued currency's value is based on perceived GDP growth among other things (I'm no economist).
The value of Bitcoin is its qualities of anonymity and disintermediation.
 
vanzandt said:
This guy did a $4 million deal.
https://thenextweb.com/money/2017/01/27/bitcoin-buyer-house-profit/
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Actually, normal bitcoin purchases don't work like this, unless the seller doesn't mind to hold bitcoins. The currency movement risk is measured in seconds not in days...

For everyone who makes good money there is always someone who lost good money.

By the way the original topic of this thread is the incredibly energy wasting mining process that helps only a very limited number of real transactions. :) I could look up the numbers, but I am too lazy, but IIRC it was like $8 per transaction a few years ago...
 
The new ASIC-based mining hardware is fantastically more efficient than back when Bitcoin was mined on CPUs, the graphics cards (GPUs) and then FPGAs.
 
stevegee58 said:
The value of Bitcoin is its qualities of anonymity and disintermediation.
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It is not really anonymous. The practical value of its usage is mostly criminal activities such as:

1. Avoiding taxation and government currency transfer regulations.
2. Perfect for blackmailing.
3. Hiding money in divorce or when being sued.
4. Online purchases for illegal items.

For those crypto currencies are PERFECT! Maybe that is why it is resilient, there is just too much need for such things...

Mind you almost any other crypto could take over the role of bitcoin in a heart beat, and that is why it is not unique...

But I am proselytizing again! :)
 
Getting back to the original topic, I will do the math because it is rather easy:

Number of daily bitcoin transactions: ~300K
Number of new coins mined daily: ~1800
Current price: ~1200

Assuming all currently mined BTC is sold right away:

(1200 x 1800) / 300000 = $7.2 per transaction cost

Hm, I was pretty close in my previous post.

https://blockchain.info/charts/n-transactions
 
Pekelo said:
It is not really anonymous. The practical value of its usage is mostly criminal activities such as:

1. Avoiding taxation and government currency transfer regulations.
2. Perfect for blackmailing.
3. Hiding money in divorce or when being sued.
4. Online purchases for illegal items.

For those crypto currencies are PERFECT! Maybe that is why it is resilient, there is just too much need for such things...

Mind you almost any other crypto could take over the role of bitcoin in a heart beat, and that is why it is not unique...

But I am proselytizing again! :)
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Of course I'll never change your mind :)D) but every activity you listed can be easily carried out with USD, gold and silver.
Well, OK, except #4. But who buys anything illegal online?
 
Pekelo said:
Getting back to the original topic, I will do the math because it is rather easy:

Number of daily bitcoin transactions: ~300K
Number of new coins mined daily: ~1800
Current price: ~1200

Assuming all currently mined BTC is sold right away:

(1200 x 1800) / 300000 = $7.2 per transaction cost

Hm, I was pretty close in my previous post.

https://blockchain.info/charts/n-transactions
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You're confusing mining cost with the Bitcoin reward for solving blocks (as I explained earlier).
When all the Bitcoin is mined, miners will be paid with fees.
 
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