Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Bitcoin is a Cult

adamcaudill.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 232 posts

Re: Bitcoin is a Cult

#11

Post by stryk »

askmike wrote: post #8
prostoalex wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> BTC would exist without the cultists as long as Russian or Saudi assets need to be transfered without too much oversight Liquidity, though.

Exactly: No crypto in it's current state is liquid enough for any serious moving of money. Slipping, fees (and potential hedging costs) will eat you if you need to to move serious money. As such it only works for entities who don't have vast amounts of capital, eg. people who can't afford an army of tax lawyers to create complex legal tax evasion schemes to pay less tax than the rest of us.

If I'm moving stolen money (or magic math coins or whatever) I don't give a damn about the fees - it's 100% profit either way. It costs money to have it laundered, whether that goes to a shady lawyer(s) or a Bitcoin processor who cares, it doesn't matter it's all profit for the thief.

Re: Bitcoin is a Cult

#13

Post by JumpCrisscross »

stryk wrote: post #11
askmike wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly: No crypto in it's current state is liquid enough for any serious moving of money. Slipping, fees (and potential hedging costs) will eat you if you need to to move serious money. As such it only works for entities who don't have vast amounts of capital, eg. people who can't afford an army of tax lawyers to create complex legal tax evasion schemes to pay less tax than the rest of us.

If I'm moving stolen money (or magic math coins or whatever) I don't give a damn about the fees - it's 100% profit either way. It costs money to have it laundered, whether that goes to a shady lawyer(s) or a Bitcoin processor who cares, it doesn't matter it's all profit for the thief.

> I don't give a damn about the fees - it's 100% profit either way

If I worked in your criminal enterprise, I'd could tell your deputies "look at this chump, throwing money away. I'll hire trucks to haul cash and boost our profits by 20%. Help me 'replace' the leader and I'll split those gains with you."

Re: Bitcoin is a Cult

#14

Post by eksemplar »

maym86 wrote: post #6

I don't disagree but isn't this true for the popularization of any technology. First it's just the nerds then come the less informed masses who don't fully understand the details along with the people trying to make money out of that fact.

I think crypto is different in the way it actually doesn’t do anything. Bitcoin has been around for 9 years and you have never been able to use bitcoin as a currency fewer places than you can now.

Re: Bitcoin is a Cult

#15

Post by omeid2 »

zhte415 wrote: post #10
daturkel wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have any sources for your claim that Bitcoin is used for large Russian/Saudi assets? It seems like the volume of BTC traded for illicit purposes is large in aggregate, but I'm not sure I've seen evidence of individual transfers being big. There are many ways that bad or unscrupulous actors can transfer money now that are actually less risky than Bitcoin.

I'm not commenting on the use of Bitcoin for Russian/Saudi interests, simply some information on Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing. Money Laundering tends to be smallish sums deposited over time, resulting in large amounts. You can't wash 100MM in one go. Terrosist Financing tends to be a very large number of small transactions from multiple global sources in a very short space of time into one account/wallet/…

I have zero interest in Bitcoin, but the idea that terrorists finance happens through cryptocurrency is very naive. Terrorism is sponsored on the ground, with goods, not money that you have to convert to some other money first, and then buy things you need.

Re: Bitcoin is a Cult

#16

Post by zeth___ »

Iv wrote: post #3

Bitcoin is a tool for tax evasion and money exchange on criminal assets. It turns out that also some geeks like to use it to bypass banks incompetence on international funds transfers but tax evasion is the use that drives BTC's value. The cult is just a small visible part of it but is a pretty minor aspect of it. BTC would exist without the cultists as long as Russian or Saudi assets need to be transfered without to…

A rather odd tool for tax evasion that has a record of the evaded tax for all eternity.

It is vastly easier to launder money through regular channels than through a method that by it's definition records every transaction.

Re: Bitcoin is a Cult

#18

Post by JumpCrisscross »

shobith wrote: post #9

Any network-effect driven product is a cult.

> Any network-effect driven product is a cult

"The term cult usually refers to a social group defined by its religious, spiritual, or philosophical beliefs, or its common interest in a particular personality, object or goal" [1]. Membership connotes devotion. That is different from network effects. For example, telephones benefit from network effects. Buying a telephone does not join one onto a cult.

(Buying Bitcoin, alone, does not admit one into a cult, either. It’s the behaviour of the community around Bitcoin that exhibits cult-like tendencies.)

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cult

Re: Bitcoin is a Cult

#19

Post by ComputerGuru »

Iv wrote: post #3

Bitcoin is a tool for tax evasion and money exchange on criminal assets. It turns out that also some geeks like to use it to bypass banks incompetence on international funds transfers but tax evasion is the use that drives BTC's value. The cult is just a small visible part of it but is a pretty minor aspect of it. BTC would exist without the cultists as long as Russian or Saudi assets need to be transfered without to…

That’s media sensationalism. BTC is not remotely anonymous and is useless as a tax evasion mechanism. Your money still has to go through someone to turn into BTC, and that’s the same as any other money laundering operation. Once their books are audited, your “safe haven” is worth nothing.

Re: Bitcoin is a Cult

#20

Post by stryk »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #13
stryk wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I'm moving stolen money (or magic math coins or whatever) I don't give a damn about the fees - it's 100% profit either way. It costs money to have it laundered, whether that goes to a shady lawyer(s) or a Bitcoin processor who cares, it doesn't matter it's all profit for the thief.

> I don't give a damn about the fees - it's 100% profit either way If I worked in your criminal enterprise, I'd could tell your deputies "look at this chump, throwing money away. I'll hire trucks to haul cash and boost our profits by 20%. Help me 'replace' the leader and I'll split those gains with you."

That's not how dirty money works if you want to get away with it. You need to launder it -- put it into something legitimate and, most importantly, get something back out of it that looks legitimate enough to pass casual scrutiny -- for this service anything and anyone, legit or not, is going to take a cut (or "fee"). It's the cost of doing criminal business. And if you're in a criminal enterprise and you even talk to the other members of the ent. about how you're going to move your money you ain't gonna be in the enterprise very long. That type of dirt you do by your lonesome or you die.
Post reply on HN