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Cryptocurrencies: looking beyond the hype

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Re: Cryptocurrencies: looking beyond the hype

#61

Post by stale2002 »

tootie wrote: post #38
viach wrote: post #13

> it is hard to identify a specific economic problem which they currently solve It is hard to identify such a problem till you believe you can withdraw your money from a bank anytime. Visiting a bank and getting an answer "please come tomorrow" for several weeks changes a person's view on cryptocurrencies and problems they could solve, imo.

Imagine trying to pay for something with crypto and having the seller deride it as fake money that they refuse to accept. That is illegal with officially minted currency.

That's not true at all.

You are absolutely allowed to put up a sign are your store that says "we only accept bottle caps as payment".

Legal tender is only regarding DEBTS. It does not force you to accept pennies at your grocery store.

You can turn down USD for payment all you like.

Re: Cryptocurrencies: looking beyond the hype

#62

Post by segmondy »

I hate to be the one, but the reason I can't embrace crypto? The wealth distribution is even worse than fiat currency. It's horrible.

it's no long about the 1% it's more about the .0001%.

How many women have crypto? How many colored folks have crypto? How many people in all of Africa have crypto?

I've had conversations where some don't believe this is a problem. I'm not convinced. You can come up with a new XYZ crypto and the issue is that the distribution never gets to be fair. The haves end up always having much more than the havenots.

Re: Cryptocurrencies: looking beyond the hype

#63

Post by Lazlo_Nibble »

Sir_Substance wrote: post #49
brokensegue wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Transferring money internationally without additional costs. nope > Portfolio optimization nope. i still await an explanation using MPT that shows why someone should hold non-zero cryptoassets. It's like saying I should hold euros because it stabilizes my portfolio. Euros are not a productive asset dude.

>> Transferring money internationally without additional costs. >nope It costs between $70 and $90 to send $1AUD from Australia to Iceland. Bitcoin transaction fees have _never_ been that high, and they're currently somewhere around $1AUD. $50-$70 of that fee is taken out of the transaction instead of charged seperately, which means it may be impossible to pay a bill accurately via SWIFT. I tried to pay for a tent vi…

SWIFT charges pennies (well, eurocents) per message. The fees you’re referring to are imposed by the institutions on either end of the transaction.

Re: Cryptocurrencies: looking beyond the hype

#65

Post by brokensegue »

Sir_Substance wrote: post #49
brokensegue wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Transferring money internationally without additional costs. nope > Portfolio optimization nope. i still await an explanation using MPT that shows why someone should hold non-zero cryptoassets. It's like saying I should hold euros because it stabilizes my portfolio. Euros are not a productive asset dude.

>> Transferring money internationally without additional costs. >nope It costs between $70 and $90 to send $1AUD from Australia to Iceland. Bitcoin transaction fees have _never_ been that high, and they're currently somewhere around $1AUD. $50-$70 of that fee is taken out of the transaction instead of charged seperately, which means it may be impossible to pay a bill accurately via SWIFT. I tried to pay for a tent vi…

Sending money between countries is two things. Changing currencies and moving the cash. Bitcoin maybe saves you some money on the latter but you are going to need to do the former to do something useful no matter what and it doesn't save you anything there. Plus if you're an American suddenly this transaction has tax consequences.

Plus I don't know where you got that quote but most transfers are much cheaper than that a/i. That pairing must just be incredibly non-competitive since it's very low volume.

Why didn't you pay via a CC? Free foreign transaction fees is a common perk?

Re: Cryptocurrencies: looking beyond the hype

#66

Post by good_gnu »

segmondy wrote: post #62

I hate to be the one, but the reason I can't embrace crypto? The wealth distribution is even worse than fiat currency. It's horrible. it's no long about the 1% it's more about the .0001%. How many women have crypto? How many colored folks have crypto? How many people in all of Africa have crypto? I've had conversations where some don't believe this is a problem. I'm not convinced. You can come up with a new XYZ crypt…

I don't understand why this is a problem specifically with bitcoin. Is this not a problem with any other currency? I mean I appreciate the sentiment but how does it even matter in which currency the rich are rich and the poor are poor?

Re: Cryptocurrencies: looking beyond the hype

#67

Post by turblety »

segmondy wrote: post #62

I hate to be the one, but the reason I can't embrace crypto? The wealth distribution is even worse than fiat currency. It's horrible. it's no long about the 1% it's more about the .0001%. How many women have crypto? How many colored folks have crypto? How many people in all of Africa have crypto? I've had conversations where some don't believe this is a problem. I'm not convinced. You can come up with a new XYZ crypt…

But remember, with fiat, the government just prints money [1] whenever it likes and gives it directly to its banker friends. With bitcoin that’s impossible (well unless 51% of the minors agree)

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantitative_easing

Re: Cryptocurrencies: looking beyond the hype

#68

Post by gruez »

segmondy wrote: post #62

I hate to be the one, but the reason I can't embrace crypto? The wealth distribution is even worse than fiat currency. It's horrible. it's no long about the 1% it's more about the .0001%. How many women have crypto? How many colored folks have crypto? How many people in all of Africa have crypto? I've had conversations where some don't believe this is a problem. I'm not convinced. You can come up with a new XYZ crypt…

>How many women have crypto? How many colored folks have crypto? How many people in all of Africa have crypto?

CommunismCoin?

Re: Cryptocurrencies: looking beyond the hype

#69

Post by drdeca »

drngdds wrote: post #43
4n0nym00s3 wrote: post #3

How about currency monopoly? Hyper inflation? Debt slavery for all mankind?

>How about currency monopoly? Hyper inflation? Not real problems in most countries. >Debt slavery for all mankind? How does crypto stop people from borrowing lots of money?

Well, I haven't seen any banking (borrowing and lending) systems built on top of a cryptocurrency yet,

But that is probably largely because there isn't a good enough reputation system or other way to encourage the payment of debts that is compatible with the cryptocurrency ecosystem yet, I think.

Or, alternatively, they exist and are used, but I haven't noticed them yet.

Re: Cryptocurrencies: looking beyond the hype

#70

Post by brokensegue »

kgwgk wrote: post #19
hendzen wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if you accept that they are uncorrelated textbook Markowitz would give you a very small allocation to crypto since the volatility is so high.

Only if the expected return is enough to make it optimal.

lotto tickets are uncorrelated with most of my assets but i don't hold them for the reasons you cited. the OP's argument about correlation is mostly bunk since the real debate is about expected upside which is the whole argument to begin with.

if bitcoin is a store of value like gold then don't hold it in your portfolio for the same reasons you don't hold gold (it just sits there). if it's a currency then don't hold it for the same reason you don't hold cash (it just sits there).

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