Bitcoin Surges Past $7,000 to Extend Record Rally

Post by branchless » Fri, Nov 03, 2017, 3:03 AM UTC

baddox wrote: post #318

slg wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Bitcoin's value is given by the trust people put in it. Just like with the fiat currencies as a matter of fact Except fiat currencies also have that fiat behind them that gives them value. If you want to do business with the US government, you do it in USD. If you are one of the millions employed by the US government, you are paid in USD. If you manipulate USD, you have to answer to the US government. Those things a…

I think it’s a bit of a stretch to attribute much of USD’s value to business deals with the US government. That must be a tiny effect. I’d say most of the value comes from the fact that US workers have to pay taxes in USD even if they earned income in some other currency or asset.

Post by kgwgk » Fri, Nov 03, 2017, 7:39 AM UTC

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #419

kgwgk wrote: post #306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, it is. If you keep the money physically it yields exactly zero and nobody is using it. If you lend the money (to a bank or someone else) you get some interest (or not, in some countries interest rates are negative) AND there is someone else who can use that money. Bank deposits are fundamentally different from “hoarding” gold or bitcoins.

Sure, but the banks don’t thank us much for the pleasure. Money, gold, bitcoins aren’t themselves stores of value, merely IOUs. To really store value (I.e. production), you need things like grain silos.

Post by baddox » Fri, Nov 03, 2017, 9:24 AM UTC

phamilton wrote: post #328

baddox wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it’s a bit of a stretch to attribute much of USD’s value to business deals with the US government. That must be a tiny effect. I’d say most of the value comes from the fact that US workers have to pay taxes in USD even if they earned income in some other currency or asset.

> pay taxes in USD basically, citizens dealing with the US government. I think it's the same category.

Post by tome » Fri, Nov 03, 2017, 1:58 PM UTC

RoboTeddy wrote: post #348

tome wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

0.1% per day ? Are you sure? That's a 3.5% fee per year ! That's astonishingly high for any sort of custodian's fee.

oh it's 0.1% of new payments per day. if you wanna compare it to all stored value instead (about $100bn), then the "electricity safety fee" comes out to ~0.001% per day. (these comparisons are just meant to help put the electricity costs roughly in scale against the benefits they help provide)

Post by ForHackernews » Fri, Nov 03, 2017, 9:07 PM UTC

splintercell wrote: post #412

ForHackernews wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the possibility of near-instantaneous money transfers. Maybe the possibility . In actual fact, don't bitcoin transaction confirmations sometimes take >24 hours?

I can even make a bitcoin tx take more than a month by not attaching any tx fee to it. Attach a higher fee, and it will get cleared in 10 mins, attach a lower fee, and it would take time.