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Bitcoin hits $10,000

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Re: Bitcoin hits $10,000

#121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bitcoin might turn out to be one of the markets where free market dynamics work well. Whose job is it? Anyone who has a stake in trusting and maintaining bitcoin's value. So the rich are incentivized to safeguard the poor in some sense here.

Rubbish

Well so far it has none of the taxpayer-subsidized funding as the US currency and banks have--which are very expensive to fund. The 2008 crisis was estimated to cost around $9,000-35,000 per US citizen, even by the Fed itself! For just that one incident...

Re: Bitcoin hits $10,000

#122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is nonsense. This is being driven by speculation / minuscule interest rates / greed. Very little of the demand for btc in the past year is due to lack of faith in institutions.

Sure, that's how it started. But as the adoption increases and price skyrockets, more people will understand the value of the concept of decentralization.

Yes, this exactly. I've been trying to point this out as much as possible. The key to future success is adoption, and the precursor to adoption is awareness and interest.

Re: Bitcoin hits $10,000

#123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gold is used in electronics. It's actually a good conductor. Bitcoin is not even good for transactions, its supposed primary purpose, right now.

It’s good for anonymous worldwide transactions. It has proven itself there and there will always be some demand for that.

not really. transparent blockchain

Re: Bitcoin hits $10,000

#124
post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would Satoshi's life be at risk?

It's theorised they have ~1m bitcoins, at 10k each that's a 10 billion net-worth. Presumably that's enough for people to want to hunt them down and coerce them into giving up private keys https://bitslog.wordpress.com/2013/04/17/the-well-deserved-f...

There are plenty of billionaires in the world. Are they kidnapped with great frequency?

Re: Bitcoin hits $10,000

#125
I'd love to force disclaimers on bitcoin ownership prior to commenters trying to convince us how decentralized currency will change the world and hit $1M eventually.

It's called talking your book, which isn't illegal, but wildly disingenuous. FOMO is why the number keeps going up, these other reasons are window dressing for utter nonsense.

Re: Bitcoin hits $10,000

#126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tether hyperinflation. Edit: I should clarify. Bitfinex printed 95 million worth of tether in the last two days , and used it to buy btc. When your prices are denominated in Monopoly money, the sky is the limit.

This is the story that's missing here. When one of the major exchanges is starting to look insolvent and USDT is getting scarier and scarier by the day, a flight from USDT into Bitcoin is not surprising...

Tether is being issued because institutional money is coming in through USDT.

https://www.reddit.com/r/BitcoinMarkets/comments/7fsfwl/dail...

Re: Bitcoin hits $10,000

#127
post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Ordinary people globally understand why a decentralized asset is the ultimate safe haven." Ordinary people have never heard of bitcoin. I have relatives working in finance who don't understand bitcoin.

I'm not convinced this is true anymore. My only information source is anecdotal, but I've been amazed at how many non technical people I've talked to lately that know about Bitcoin. Many are even buying little bits on coinbase. Their knowledge doesn't run deep, but it certainly exceeds levels of "never heard of it."

Are you in a major city in North America, Japan, South Korea, China, or Europe?

If so, I don't think you have a truly representative sample.

On the other hand, I still think governments are going to ban it once they understand it. But for now: :D

Re: Bitcoin hits $10,000

#128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is nonsense. This is being driven by speculation / minuscule interest rates / greed. Very little of the demand for btc in the past year is due to lack of faith in institutions.

Let me try to make the case for why Bitcoin could be a useful beyond greed. I can't really think of many reasons why you would use crypto to pay for a coffee or a sandwich if you live in the West (or frankly, even most developing nations). On the other hand, I can definitely see the utility in a censorship-resistant digital medium to store wealth. To me, this latter use case has much, much more potential to serve the…

There is absolutely nothing that would prevent a government outlawing and criminalizing bitcoin at any point in time. With one stroke of a pen government can outlaw owning bitcoins or performing any transactions in bitcoins. I'd say this is bound to happen eventually with certainty because no government would be willing to lose control on currency (especially ability to pull it out of thin air) and thereby the power they exert on economy as well as other nations. You can count on this. So all those scenarios you mentioned are meaningless because any capital you have in bitcoins is bound to evaporate overnight and reduced to zero at the whim of the government.

See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_currency_law_in_the_Un...

Congress may have the power to prohibit virtual currencies (VCs) under its power “[t]o regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States”[64] and under its exclusive constitutional power “to coin Money” and “regulate the Value thereof.”[64] In a November 2014 decision, the Court upheld the power of regulators to prosecute a defendant who “designed, created and minted coins called ‘Liberty Dollars,’ coins ‘in resemblance or in similitude’ [or made to look like] of U.S. coins."[65] Although the defendant did not pass the Liberty Dollars currency as a counterfeit, the currency were in close enough “resemblance of coins of the United States or of foreign countries” and consequentially fell under the authority of 18 U.S.C.A. § 486.123 The Court has not decided if § 486 includes the power to prohibit VCs, but if a Court decides that the purpose and intent of VC resembles United States or foreign currency it may fall under § 486. The Stamp Payment Act of 1862 prohibits anyone from “mak[ing], issu[ing], circulat[ing], or pay[ing] out any note, check, memorandum, token, or other obligation for a less sum than $1, intended to circulate as money or to be received or used in lieu of lawful money of the United States.”[66] The Court has not decided if Congress has the power to prohibit VCs under this Act or any other existing regulation or statute.

Re: Bitcoin hits $10,000

#129
post #113
post #41

Be careful. There is evidence that certain parties are issuing fake dollars called USDT / Tether from which they buy cryptocoins (incl. BTC) to artificially increase the price: https://mobile.twitter.com/bitfinexed (One of the people monitoring the situation) https://np.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/7g5yml/my_investigation... (Some more info) Make sure you are able to get out on time if needed. Investigate and decide for…

The Friedman memo showed they were 1-1 cash/usdt back in September, and they've stated clearly it's institutional money coming in. In fact, that's exactly what I would expect for large buyers trying to spread their purchases across exchanges who don't use USD directly. "I agree that if no one was able to get fiat in or out of Tether and USDT were still being issued that would be a huge problem. As it stands, however,…

And he also said the following:

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DPr4aSpX4AEut2d?format=jpg

Re: Bitcoin hits $10,000

#130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You wrote and I quote "other than looking good as jewelry it has no other real intrinsic value."

It's considered to be beautiful because it's expensive and valued. The causation is in the other direction than most people think when it comes to gold and beauty. It's the same with expensive paintings. A painting is considered to be beautiful (some are actually ugly) and have some deep meaning only after it's sold for a lot of money.

This is an interesting topic.

I too thought most of this "throw paint onto a canvas and charge rich suckers thousands of dollars" is bullshit. But after seeing some Picassos IIRC, I realized, yes there is a method to the madness.

Even if the painting wasn't displayed in a fancy museum, I think I would still have thought it was "special".

But those "artists" that pour paint onto the canvas - complete bullshit.

If a five year old can do it - it's not art except to the parents of those "artists"

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