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Bitcoin’s Price Was Artificially Inflated Last Year, Researchers Say

nytimes.com

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Re: Bitcoin’s Price Was Artificially Inflated Last Year, Researchers Say

#141

Post by isostatic »

grosjona wrote: post #120
Retric wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't exactly delete a physical transaction with real money, so that provides zero new benefit.

The Fed can inflate away the value of those transactions anytime they want and not only do you have zero control over this process, it is not even possible to predict it. The complexity of the financial instruments used by the Fed is intentional and serves to obscure the fact that they are essentially giving free money to large banks and corporations. Corporations are not getting bigger because they're more efficient…

Which is why the US dollar is always falling compared to other currencies?

Deflating currencies are terrible things for economies

Re: Bitcoin’s Price Was Artificially Inflated Last Year, Researchers Say

#142

Post by the_gastropod »

grosjona wrote: post #120
Retric wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't exactly delete a physical transaction with real money, so that provides zero new benefit.

The Fed can inflate away the value of those transactions anytime they want and not only do you have zero control over this process, it is not even possible to predict it. The complexity of the financial instruments used by the Fed is intentional and serves to obscure the fact that they are essentially giving free money to large banks and corporations. Corporations are not getting bigger because they're more efficient…

> The Fed can inflate away the value of those transactions anytime they want and not only do you have zero control over this process, it is not even possible to predict it.

Be real. Between USD and BTC, one has lost 70% of its value over the past ~7 months.

Re: Bitcoin’s Price Was Artificially Inflated Last Year, Researchers Say

#143

Post by [deleted] »

gowld wrote: post #70
ceejayoz wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You can just print money, that's the business model. That is not Tether's stated business model. To issue 1 USDT, Tether is supposed to take in 1 USD from someone, and hold it safely in an account. Their stated business model is taking a 10 basis point or $20 fee (whichever one is higher) when someone buys USDT with USD. https://tether.to/fees/ The likely fraudulent business model would be printing USDT that aren't…

> Done right, they might even make enough money with such fraudulent trading to eventually have the cash reserves they claim to have. This is the long-term history of sucessful organized crime: Obtain $X illegally, use that as seed investment for a legitimate business that generates $X legally, and then (if necessary) repay the original $X. Casino, Waste hauling business, and governments are often owned by organized…

[deleted]

Re: Bitcoin’s Price Was Artificially Inflated Last Year, Researchers Say

#144

Post by craigc »

FireBeyond wrote: post #137
craigc wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ahhhh. Okay that makes more sense. Although at the time they did have accounting and audits. The last audit was September 2017, I believe.

And into a bank that has no US dealings or holdings, because Wells Fargo dropped them, and there are challenges with them using a US banks. A bank that, through 2017, raised no questions when they were supposedly depositing multiple hundred million dollars, _multiple_ times a week.

I agree that there are dubious actions surrounding Tether, but I still want to see proof.

I think the bank argument is a little weak since banks are the exact group that crypto currencies are disrupting and stand to lose the most if crypto currencies succeed. If I were a bank I wouldn’t want to be involved with any company that makes it easier for people to trade US dollars for crypto currencies either.

Re: Bitcoin’s Price Was Artificially Inflated Last Year, Researchers Say

#145

Post by craigc »

Nursie wrote: post #131
craigc wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Clearly we do not agree so it is not worth continuing to argue. Honestly, I just want this whole thing resolved one way or the other. I have no personal ties to Tether, and do not care if they are backed 1:1 with USD. I agree with you they should have an audit done to prove definitively one way or the other that they are backed by USD to put this entire thing to rest. As it is now, it keeps coming back up every few m…

Do you not think that perhaps the media should keep coming back to the possibility of multi-billion dollar fraud like this?

Valid point, but there are also billions of dollars created out of thin air by the Federal Reserve to pump up the stock market, and perhaps that deserves some media attention as well.

https://suremoneyinvestor.com/2017/08/how-the-feds-money-pri...

Re: Bitcoin’s Price Was Artificially Inflated Last Year, Researchers Say

#146

Post by ethbro »

SilasX wrote: post #139
ethbro wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At USD$6.5B for a 51% attack (scraped off a website)... ... that's a smidge over 1% of the US military budget.

Doesn't mean it's easy to get approval to spend that "smidge" on an attack.

"smidge over 1%"

It's not easy, but it's not impossible (to parent's bombastic assertion).

I believe the Manhattan project spent something like 0.55% of the US military budget (against ~2013USD$900b yearly budgets, which seemed the peak in 1942-45).

http://www.dictionary.com/browse/smidge

Re: Bitcoin’s Price Was Artificially Inflated Last Year, Researchers Say

#147

Post by binarymax »

Retric wrote: post #105
kgwgk wrote: post #28

Today Matt Levine talks about this paper in his daily column: https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-06-13/judge-rul... "of these two explanations— 1) Bitcoin’s rapid and sustained rise is due to the fact that it satisfies a real economic need in an elegant way, and people have responded to that; or 2) Bitcoin’s rapid and sustained rise is due to a magical fountain of fake dollars that everyone just decided to…

Fraud seems to be easier than you might think. For comparison Bitcoin is about the size Madoff was dealing with. Bitcoin is still loose change in terms of the global economy.

Too bad it isn't also loose change in terms of global energy use :(

Re: Bitcoin’s Price Was Artificially Inflated Last Year, Researchers Say

#148

Post by davnicwil »

ComradeTaco wrote: post #124
captainbland wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In either of these situations it seems like hodling until victory pays off. The real loser is, well, the planet as the network continues to consume more and more power.

Bitcoin could go the way of any number of other cyptos; back to zero. In any case, nobody uses Bitcoin as a currency because it's logistically harder for 99.9% of people, and nobody uses it as a store of value because its insanely volitale. Bitcoin is really just a speculative asset.

Nobody uses Linux as an operating system because it's logistically harder for 99.9% of people. It's still incredibly important and foundational, and will continue to be, even supposing this never changes, even if that same 99.9% of people never know what it is.

Nobody used the Internet in its early days because it was logistically hard for 99.9% of people. However it made completely new things possible and over time, companies figured out how to make it not logistically hard to use for the majority of people, who enjoyed these new possibilities without having to worry about the complexity of the system underneath.

Re: Bitcoin’s Price Was Artificially Inflated Last Year, Researchers Say

#149

Post by sbov »

Bucephalus355 wrote: post #134
john_moscow wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd say there's a simpler explanation. Bitcoin has a limited predictable supply, so its price is mostly a function of the demand. And demand correlates with expectations, that typically follow the hype cycle [0]. I'm not sure how much someone managed to single-handedly manipulate the price, but the plain old human psychology, FOMO and the positive feedback loop for media writing about bitcoin demand definitely played…

Whenever some kind of good has a truly limited supply, that can fuel the most massive of bubbles by making the “bubble” look rational at first. The bubble hides itself under the guise of being about “supply and demand”. The one thing that leaps to mind is the Japanese real estate speculation in the 1980’s. Everyone claimed, very logically, that Japan is a mountainous island with very limited space, so real estate wou…

> Curiously, at the height of the housing crisis homes were about 5.5 times the median national income. In San Francisco right now (another place where supply looks limited by the water) homes there are 17.2 times the median national income.

You're comparing national home prices in Japan vs national income in Japan. Then you're comparing local prices in SF to national income in the USA. You're then comparing these comparisons to show SF is super inflated.

This makes no sense.

Re: Bitcoin’s Price Was Artificially Inflated Last Year, Researchers Say

#150

Post by bena »

fatjokes wrote: post #125
spiorf wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the internet, and those weapons can't fire down here. Try, instead, to delete a two week old transaction from the bitcoin blockchain. You will find that even with military-sized funding, you can't. That's what is backing up bitcoin's value

Heh, reminds me of the time Anonymous tried to fight the Mexican drug cartels, thinking "this is the internet, and those weapons can't fire down here." The cartels found one poster in a local internet cafe. They did their cartel thing. I didn't hear any more about that fight.

Something everyone forgets. If you can reach something, that something can reach you.
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