Bitcoin thread anyone?
- Thread starter COB
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Here is a better live chart. Overnight it already crashed from 147 to 124, but bounced back to 135.... There were 4 crashes like that in the last 4 weeks, they all recovered quickly...
http://www.bitcoinbullbear.com/
If you change it to D1 period (that is daily) then you can see the parabolic raise.
Now if the government wants to crash it and they play it smart, instead of outlawing it, they could just make it very volatile and people start to loose faith in BTC. How would they do it?
Well, who has unlimited money supply? The government. So first they buy a shitload of BTC slowly then they start to dump it on the market in big chunks. Repeat and rinse. Once people start to get confused by the volatility and lose money, that's all they need to abandon the idea..
I think it is going to take quite a while before this happens because BTC is in full mania mode right now and people expect it to recover.
One more thing. As long as it is such a good investment, it can not play its role as a currency because users HORDE it instead of USE it....Why would you pay with BTC if tomorrow it will worth 20% more???
http://www.bitcoinbullbear.com/
If you change it to D1 period (that is daily) then you can see the parabolic raise.
Now if the government wants to crash it and they play it smart, instead of outlawing it, they could just make it very volatile and people start to loose faith in BTC. How would they do it?
Well, who has unlimited money supply? The government. So first they buy a shitload of BTC slowly then they start to dump it on the market in big chunks. Repeat and rinse. Once people start to get confused by the volatility and lose money, that's all they need to abandon the idea..
I think it is going to take quite a while before this happens because BTC is in full mania mode right now and people expect it to recover.
One more thing. As long as it is such a good investment, it can not play its role as a currency because users HORDE it instead of USE it....Why would you pay with BTC if tomorrow it will worth 20% more???
Where would you rather have 100K, in a bank with a government insurance or on a harddrive on a computer connected to the internet? If your house burns down or your computer gets stolen, bye bye 100K. Cloud server? Just how much do you trust a 3rd party?
And keep in mind that most people are NOT tech savvy. And the goal is universal usage. So there will be plenty of loss due to damage, viruses and thief....
As for value preservation? What if BTC is $20 a year from now?
3) It's a deflating currency - only 21 million coins will be minted,
And there are copycat currencies and competition makes everything cheaper....Litecoin's popularity will put a dump on BTC...
But this is why Bitcoin is a legitimate business model and why it has "stuck". It beats fiat, gold, and other tangibles, in some key, areas,
You know the virtual currencies of the late 90s had all this, and they never took off? Why? They didn't caught on. Bitcoin did, but there is no good explanation why it excelled where others failed. It is the flavour of the month, if you ask me. Also maybe the giving it away and the ability to mine helped, but once those options don't exit anymore it is the same as the failed virtual currencies...
I guess the answer to that - did Linux work?
Don't even get me started on Linux, I never swore so much when I was tinkering with it. It is still not for the masses, although it came a long way... And it has taken forever... Maybe Bitcoin will be respectable and stable in 5 years
Mining is possible.
Not for the average user. Not anymore....
The second way to profit is to get in early on copy-cats.
Now you are talking. I got aware of LTC a month ago when it was at 26 cents. It is 4.5$ right now...
How is this any different than Tulip Bulbs? There's a cap on the level "coins" available,
That's no difference. You see it is not really the lack of availability that makes a mania, but people's respond to it. It can be Chia pet, cabbage baby, Pokemon, whatever....
For a guy who doesn't believe in conspiracy theories, that's quite a conspiracy theory. Bitcoin transactional volume is substantial. I checked tonight. Today and yesterday, there was in the low millions USD worth of Bitcoin changing hands, on a daily basis. Tens of thousands of Bitcoins. That's a lot of money changing hands, undetected and totally outside the normal channels of financial control.
As to the theory it could be an elaborate Government psychop to discredit and undermine faith in virtual currencies. These coins are being minted and protected primarily by the miners. It's a distributed network with millions of nodes (miners). Little guys and small commercial outfits are mining this stuff, and selling it, or sitting on it. So maybe the Government is driving up the price? Maybe? Who cares. The idea is still sound. At 5 or 10 USD per BTC, it's still has value. The value is in the scarcity. Not whether the Government buys it or not. That's why people are investing money to mine it. Because the supply is capped, at increasing difficulty.
Why would it be conspiracy theory? It is just common sense. And not even my idea, people talk about these on forums.
Would you spend 100 BTC overnight if by the next morning it is worth 20% more just like last night happened? Then you overpaid....
When BTC appreciates 50% in 2-3 days, only a moron spends it...
You misread my theory, I said exactly the opposite. It could have been an experience and they just wanted to see how it goes and if people like the idea. By the way nothing prevents any government to issue virtual currencies if they wish to do so.
First, it is not rare (a rare currency is useless as a tool of value exchange), second, its value coming from people believing in it, not from its scarcity. I didn't say the government is driving up the price, quite to the contrary. But if you want to short it, first you have to have it.
If large volume shorting is possible just by borrowing it (I am not sure but I doubt) then the government could crash it in any minute...
Let's record this runup for future reference: (daily chart)
20 days ago BTC was under $50. So if you used it as a currency, well, you do the math and your merchant is thanking you (assuming they kept it)...
This is really off-base. Bitcoin is LIGHT YEARS ahead of fiat when it comes to portability. Users transact millions of dollars a day - moving hundreds of thousands of dollars around the globe, in a single, secure, no-cost transaction! That kind of portability is invaluable in todays world where any transaction over ten grand is subject to all kinds of scrutiny, and permissions, and in most countries, getting your money OUT is a nightmare! We just went through Greece, and Cyprus, and people question the utility of portable money??
As for it's second feature - PRIVACY. From what I can tell, this stuff is really private. It's PGP. New accounts can be made at any time (old ones destroyed). There is no paper trail. People value privacy. Not everyone wants the NSA and FBI keeping databases on their net worth. The Government no longer knows how much money you have, and where it is. Are you telling me thats worth nothing to you?
Scarcity is obvious. All the examples listed above can easily be manufactured ( supply gluts). IPO's, cabbage patch dolls, chia pets. They dont have privacy, portability, nor were they scarce (supply cap).
Relative to an elastic money supply, yes, Bitcoins are rare.
Bitcoins inherent value comes from it's:
1) transferability
2) privacy
3) safety
4) scarcity (deflationary nature).
In those departments, Bitcoin is way above fiat, and in some cases, precious metals.
I wouldn't underestimate the value of this. Try living in Russia, or Africa, or China where you can't get money out.
As to your question: if I had 100K in a FDIC insured account, I'd leave it. If I had 1 million in a 100K FDIC insured account, in this day and age, I'd put most of it into real estate, cash, some precious metals, probably around 200K in bitcoin. If I needed to GTFO.