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Bitcoin hits $10,000

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Re: Bitcoin hits $10,000

#191

Post by HeavenBanned »

dpweb wrote: post #163
wintom wrote: post #17

“Rosenstreich at online trading firm Swissquote said bitcoin’s surge harks to the surprises of the U.K. referendum on European Union membership and President Trump’s election. “We have underestimated the populist movements,” he said. “There is growing unease on how central banks and governments are managing fiat currencies. Ordinary people globally understand why a decentralized asset is the ultimate safe haven.”” Th…

`100k puts the market at cap at a trillion, it’s not that crazy if you remember that Gold is several times that`. Similar things heard during every irrational bubble. I believe people often trot out the 'actual worthlessness' of fiat currency, to support a misguided idea that btc must be the democratic antidote which will free countless millions from the financial enslavement of the global financial machine. Currency…

Freedom fighters always pick the wrong battles. They get sidetracked. See the identity politics during the last elections. Forgot about working class? Yeah, Trump is now President.

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/20/opinion/sunday/the-end-of...

Re: Bitcoin hits $10,000

#192

Post by alexbeloi »

bobbygoodlatte wrote: post #60
narrator wrote: post #4

7 years ago: The first bitcoin article on HN with comments! https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1532670 One of the posters says the feds will shut it down. I also thought this too. This remains one of the most enduring mysteries of Bitcoin to me. Why has the government taken such a hands off approach?

I think one big reason is that regulators don't want the US to miss out on a large wave of value creation. If Bitcoin becomes a mainstream currency, it could be a very good thing for the US. If US citizens own a large amount of the BTC in circulation that could lead to more investment in the US economy and a larger tax base. Beyond Bitcoin, if crypto tokens begin to supplant public stocks (which I'm not saying they w…

>I think one big reason is that regulators don't want the US to miss out on a large wave of value creation.

There is no value created, it is just redistributed through rent-seeking. The US might hope that the redistribution goes in its favor if, as you say, more early adopters are in US rather than abroad.

The global effect of rent-seeking is that money gets pulled out of productive enterprises and into non-producing assets, lowering GDP.

Whether or not the easy access to money laundering channels makes up for the lost GDP or makes it worse, I am curious to see.

Re: Bitcoin hits $10,000

#193

Post by wils1245 »

acchow wrote: post #46
wintom wrote: post #17

“Rosenstreich at online trading firm Swissquote said bitcoin’s surge harks to the surprises of the U.K. referendum on European Union membership and President Trump’s election. “We have underestimated the populist movements,” he said. “There is growing unease on how central banks and governments are managing fiat currencies. Ordinary people globally understand why a decentralized asset is the ultimate safe haven.”” Th…

"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.

At this point the arguments for or against the idea of cryptocurrency are pretty irrelevant. Bitfinex has injected millions of dollars of fake money into the ecosystem, users are reporting an ability to withdraw money from it on Reddit, and their Twitter account's last message was reports of a DDoS two days ago with no updates.

https://twitter.com/bitfinex https://www.reddit.com/r/bitfinex/comments/7fx9z9/bitfinex_w...

Perhaps Bitcoin will recover from this fraud or another cryptocurrency will take the lead in the space, but we are headed for a crash.

Re: Bitcoin hits $10,000

#194

Post by lojack »

acchow wrote: post #124
Torn wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

Much easier to steal a private key than liquidate a billion dollars from many banks and other illiquid sources. Especially when most of those transactions can be reversed, or otherwise raise immediate red flags.

Re: Bitcoin hits $10,000

#196

Post by dustinmoris »

baddox wrote: post #184
dustinmoris wrote: post #176

Unlike gold a BTC has absolutely no use beyond whatever its current use is. The only way for a BTC to be ever in demand is if enough people trust each other that nobody will start selling it in large mass and therefore entirely flooring the value of it. However trust is not exactly a great foundation for a currency's value. Gold has at least has some useful applications outside of banking. For a start it looks beauti…

What percentage of the value of gold do you think is due to its “inherent” value in jewelry or electronics? I’d wager it’s incredibly tiny, and I don’t understand your argument that gold is a reasonable store of value only because it has some tiny bit of “inherent” value.

It has a lot with it to do, because a lot of today's asset value is based on pure emotions of investors and their feelings and if something is actually physical, which you can see, hold in your hands, which has a very shiny appearance, is being worn by rich people around their necks and is used in the most sophisticated electronics (which itself is required for the world to function nowadays) influences one's feelings a lot - so yes, the fact that gold has these attributes plays a huge role IMHO.

On the other hand a BTC is literally just a made up hashsum which is not only extremely volatile on the markets, but could also very easily just physically disappear through loss, theft or just malfunction.

Re: Bitcoin hits $10,000

#197

Post by jeremyt »

dustinmoris wrote: post #176

Unlike gold a BTC has absolutely no use beyond whatever its current use is. The only way for a BTC to be ever in demand is if enough people trust each other that nobody will start selling it in large mass and therefore entirely flooring the value of it. However trust is not exactly a great foundation for a currency's value. Gold has at least has some useful applications outside of banking. For a start it looks beauti…

This is basically all of the worst arguments against Bitcoin collected and thrown together in the same comment.

First of all, the industrial and jewelry value of gold is so far below the current market price, that if suddenly everybody decided that gold was only worth its utility value people holding gold would lose almost everything. The difference between 95% and 100% is really negligible.

Secondly, on power consumption, the whole "one transaction requires more energy than a house" is basically sophistry. Even if this number wasn't overstated, it's stated in a way that assumes that this is static, that buying a coffee costs a house worth of energy.

No matter whether you are a Bitcoin person or a Bitcoin cash person, the number of transactions per unit of energy in no way will stay the same. If you are a Bitcoin person, you will see the lightning network, which will increase transaction throughput by several orders of magnitude, and if you are a Bitcoin cash person, the block size will increase continuously, shoving more and more transactions per block.

Thirdly, the claim that you can't convert Bitcoin into cash is simply stunning. I use Gemini as an exchange daily, and I've witnessed $1 million being liquidated into US dollars in a couple of hours without much slippage.

Finally, I would ignore the final paragraph because this person has shown that he knows absolutely nothing about Bitcoin or cryptocurrency.

Re: Bitcoin hits $10,000

#198

Post by seanmcdirmid »

gregschlom wrote: post #100
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You mean the USA government? Because they have no legal basis to take action. Rule of law is weird like that.

I'm not sure I understand your comment. There seems to be plenty of anti money-laundering laws that would provide a legal basis.

You can prosecute people for money laundering, that is very different from banning bitcoin.

Re: Bitcoin hits $10,000

#199

Post by quickthrower2 »

blhack wrote: post #80
quickthrower2 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does a government stop it? And if they could, could they also stop illegal file sharing in a similar way?

Make it illegal and pursue legal action against anybody who allows you to ACH them money. Hilariously, this is the type of censorship that bitcoin solves.

That won't shut down Bitcoin, because there are other countries with internet.

Re: Bitcoin hits $10,000

#200

Post by shitgoose »

wils1245 wrote: post #193
acchow wrote: 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.

At this point the arguments for or against the idea of cryptocurrency are pretty irrelevant. Bitfinex has injected millions of dollars of fake money into the ecosystem, users are reporting an ability to withdraw money from it on Reddit, and their Twitter account's last message was reports of a DDoS two days ago with no updates. https://twitter.com/bitfinex https://www.reddit.com/r/bitfinex/comments/7fx9z9/bitfinex_w.…

"Bitfinex has injected millions of dollars of fake money into the ecosystem"

please, explain what money is "fake" and what "injected" and "ecosystem" mean.

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