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Bitcoin Surges Past $400

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Re: Bitcoin Surges Past $400

#181

Post by gesman »

dragontamer wrote: post #176
gesman wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Two reasons. 1. US markets are priming for a temporary rise till approx. end of spring / mid-year 2016. 2. Gold is no longer safe bet in the light of a large scale government defaults and rather drastic domino effort that will follow. For how long do you think Fed are going to kick the can down the road?

> 2. Gold is no longer safe bet in the light of a large scale government defaults and rather drastic domino effort that will follow. That makes no sense what so ever.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_6102

In case of drastic economic downturn this is a possibility along with currency devaluation.

Back then there were no bitcoin in existence. Today it is.

Re: Bitcoin Surges Past $400

#182

Post by hackerboos »

corin_ wrote: post #118
TimSchumann wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ranked in order of my preference. https://www.coinbase.com/global - Initial setup can be slow, as with identity verification, but once you're set up buying is relatively painless. Withdrawing can sometimes be slow, expect to wait 2 to 5 business days after purchasing before you can withdraw. Shadiness Level - Just shady enough it might work. 4.5 stars would cupcake again. (They're a YC company too, so you'd be helpin…

At least in the UK and France, localbitcoins.com let's sellers/buyers use alternatives to meeting with cash, for example direct bank transfer, or some apps we have (like Barclays PingIt in the UK) - the coins go into the site's escrow and the seller releases them once money comes in - which is usually instantly, unlike in America I guess. Not sure how prices or UI compares to other options, but certainly no shadiness…

America has ACH transfers, Canada as interac.

Problem with all of these is that they can be reversed.

Re: Bitcoin Surges Past $400

#183

Post by dragontamer »

gesman wrote: post #181
dragontamer wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 2. Gold is no longer safe bet in the light of a large scale government defaults and rather drastic domino effort that will follow. That makes no sense what so ever.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_6102 In case of drastic economic downturn this is a possibility along with currency devaluation. Back then there were no bitcoin in existence. Today it is.

If you're worried the evil gov'mt is gonna steal your gold, then why won't they just steal your BTC too?

There's a reason why Swiss safety deposit boxes of gold exist. You gotta pull that crap out of the country. Hell, if the US Government just declared ownership of the BTC Network through subpeonas, they can effectively 51% attack it and double-spend all the BTC they want anyway.

So no, your hyperbole does not convince me.

Re: Bitcoin Surges Past $400

#184

Post by jsprogrammer »

maaku wrote: post #168
dragonwriter wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Many times in the past bitcoin companies have been hacked, embezzled or otherwise lost user funds. There is no recourse. Many times, other companies have had that happen, and there is all kinds of recourse. To the extent bitcoin companies are special, its because people participating in the bitcoin craze have been willing to entrust large amounts of value with companies that don't have the basic characteristics tha…

What do you do when the money is gone? With other payment technology you can get court orders to freeze funds, or judgments against current holders. Bitcoin, on the other hand, is irrevocable and pseudo-anonymous. In July 2011 the owner of MyBitcoin.com web wallet allegedly walked away with 50,000 btc of customer funds. We know where those funds are. You can see them on any block explorer. But it is not possible to f…

>But it is not possible to freeze or confiscate those funds.

That is just a limitation of the Bitcoin protocol. One could build a protocol where communities could agree to freeze (not accept) or greatly devalue those funds.

Re: Bitcoin Surges Past $400

#185

Post by maxerickson »

jsprogrammer wrote: post #184
maaku wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you do when the money is gone? With other payment technology you can get court orders to freeze funds, or judgments against current holders. Bitcoin, on the other hand, is irrevocable and pseudo-anonymous. In July 2011 the owner of MyBitcoin.com web wallet allegedly walked away with 50,000 btc of customer funds. We know where those funds are. You can see them on any block explorer. But it is not possible to f…

>But it is not possible to freeze or confiscate those funds. That is just a limitation of the Bitcoin protocol. One could build a protocol where communities could agree to freeze (not accept) or greatly devalue those funds.

Miners could conspire to mostly freeze certain bitcoin.

It wouldn't even have to be done in a way that was visible on the bitcoin network, they would just have to agree to not include transactions from whatever addresses.

A strong majority could probably refuse to acknowledge blocks including the blocked addresses, which would be a real freeze (rather than the hassle freeze obtained by not including the address in blocks produced by the conspiracy).

Re: Bitcoin Surges Past $400

#186

Post by StavrosK »

Advaith wrote: post #133
StavrosK wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Electrum is great, but not very easy to use (since it's desktop). Get Electrum, Mycelium or Breadwallet, depending on your platform. I've heard good things about GreenAddress, and I recommend a ledger hardware wallet. You can use the ledger with Electrum and Mycelium, so you can spend coins from desktop or mobile. I've also imported my Mycelium wallet onto my second ledger, just so I can move coins from the desktop.

Ledger is pretty good for the price tag it has. It is simlple yet effective. Trezor is a worthy mention since it can be used anywhere(even on an infected computer) whereas you need to setup the ledger on a secure host.

> whereas you need to setup the ledger on a secure host

Hmm, really? Why? The ledger sets up its own private key as well.

Re: Bitcoin Surges Past $400

#187

Post by dragonwriter »

gohrt wrote: post #174
dragonwriter wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no FDIC providing government backed insurance for most commodities, or for non-bank accounts in fiat currency (e.g., those you'd have with a typical brokerage), so I'm not sure bitcoin is really fundamentally different than most commodities as a speculative investment So for a speculative trader, I dont e that holding keys if any more essential than physically holding goods is for physical commodities; you ob…

There's a qualitative difference between "I own stock that might become worthless" and "I own a security that someone could just take from me because they notice my deed just sitting somewhere unprotected." If someone steals my Schwab account contents for Schwab's servers, I can call on the government for help; and the stock market bookkeeping system has the technical ability restore my shares to me. If someone gets…

> If someone steals my Schwab account contents for Schwab's servers, I can call on the government for help

If someone steals your bitcoin from an exchange, you can call on the government for help, too. If the exchange itself is completely insolvent, that may not be effective recourse, and that risk is certainly greater for the kind of firms people have been dealing with in the bitcoin space, which often aren't held by their customers to the same standards that customers of similar services for commodities other than bitcoin would hold companies to.

That's my point: the lack of recourse isn't essential to bitcoin (yes, holding the keys is like holding cash, and not holding the keys is giving something up just like not holding cash is -- but we deal with other businesses with accounts denominated in national currencies without holding all the cash ourselves all the time, and have recourse available for losses.) The lack of accountability is because the firms people choose to do business with are, compared to the firms that people do other financial business with, shady fly-by-night operators.

Re: Bitcoin Surges Past $400

#188

Post by jsprogrammer »

maxerickson wrote: post #185
jsprogrammer wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>But it is not possible to freeze or confiscate those funds. That is just a limitation of the Bitcoin protocol. One could build a protocol where communities could agree to freeze (not accept) or greatly devalue those funds.

Miners could conspire to mostly freeze certain bitcoin. It wouldn't even have to be done in a way that was visible on the bitcoin network, they would just have to agree to not include transactions from whatever addresses. A strong majority could probably refuse to acknowledge blocks including the blocked addresses, which would be a real freeze (rather than the hassle freeze obtained by not including the address in bl…

You'd need >50% of the miners to do that. It is precisely what I mean by building a protocol.

Of course, without strong consensus (and a real algorithm/protocol) such attempts will likely just result in fractured blockchains (basically the state at the moment, with many competing implementations of the same basic idea).

Re: Bitcoin Surges Past $400

#189

Post by xacaxulu »

I slowly bought about 25 BTC since January. Honestly this is very exciting right now and I've basically been daytrading for the last few days. I'm no expert by any stretch of the imagination, but it's been enjoyable to set alerts for different price points then buy/sell as necessary. I like the liquidity and 0 government involvement/taxation - something I couldn't do with stock/options/CDs etc.

Re: Bitcoin Surges Past $400

#190

Post by blantonl »

xacaxulu wrote: post #189

I slowly bought about 25 BTC since January. Honestly this is very exciting right now and I've basically been daytrading for the last few days. I'm no expert by any stretch of the imagination, but it's been enjoyable to set alerts for different price points then buy/sell as necessary. I like the liquidity and 0 government involvement/taxation - something I couldn't do with stock/options/CDs etc.

If you convert BTC to $$ or your local currency, expect a tax situation.
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