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No End in Sight for Crypto Sell-Off as Bitcoin Breaches $4,250

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Re: No End in Sight for Crypto Sell-Off as Bitcoin Breaches $4,250

#191

Post by avar »

simias wrote: post #162
Hermel wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even according to the IRS's own estimates, laws like Fatca would never pass a cost/benefit test. The implementation costs of such bureaucratic monstrosities is in the range of hundreds of billions, whereas the benefit is a few orders of magnitude lower. The established banks do not complain much about it because the high fixed cost of compliance disproportionally affects small firms, thereby protecting them from bein…

So I know next to nothing about these regulations but what do you mean by "cost/benefit" exactly? Surely if these rules are meant to fight (directly or indirectly) organized crime then you can't just judge them on the amount of money saved? If you spend $10 millions to prevent $1 million to reach a terrorist organization, can't you consider it money well spent?

FATCA is about making non-US financial institutions report to the IRS et al about holdings of US citizens abroad. Worrying about terrorist cells in foreign countries made up of U.S. citizens is absurd.

Re: No End in Sight for Crypto Sell-Off as Bitcoin Breaches $4,250

#192

Post by jrp55 »

dragontamer wrote: post #72
jrp55 wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At the risk of sounding overly flippant... should we (the general non-bitcoin holding public) really care whether a 51% attack happens or not?

I don't believe it would affect USA's financial system. There are certainly a number of individuals who hold BTC who would get wiped out in such an event, but it seems like it'd be relatively isolated. It looks like some countries where BTC is more popular may take a bigger hit under such a doomsday scenario. In effect, a 51% attack would cause the attacker to scam a lot of money from people in a short period of time…

I perhaps downplayed the flippancy in my previous comment. I'm aware of the theory and impact to the cryptocurrency world of a 51% attack.

I honestly believe that the electricity usage - and therefore climate-change impact - of cryptocurrencies to far outweigh the benefits they bring.

I think that the "value... march towards zero" is a good thing because "wasting electricity perpetually" is a bad thing. I don't think we should care about the losses of people who willingly bought into a wild-west scheme.

edited: formatting

Re: No End in Sight for Crypto Sell-Off as Bitcoin Breaches $4,250

#193

Post by airstrike »

softawre wrote: post #178

Just curious, do you guys throw a bit of your retirement portfolio into BTC just to diversify? I do, I keep maybe 3% of mine in BTC just in case.

Just curious, do you guys throw a bit of your retirement portfolio into roulettes at the casino just to diversify? I do, I gamble away maybe 3% of mine just in case.

Re: No End in Sight for Crypto Sell-Off as Bitcoin Breaches $4,250

#194

Post by pbhjpbhj »

xiphias2 wrote: post #115
simias wrote: post #20

Since the article states "the trigger for the latest sell-off is unclear" I'm really curious if somebody here could venture a guess about the reasons for the sudden drop. The Bitcoin Cash fork seems suspiciously correlated but is it big enough news to cause such a turmoil? Being a cryptocurrency-skeptic I won't pretend that I don't experience a little bit of schadenfreude when I see CC crash, however if I'm trying to…

With BTC this is just normal volatility. The usual drawdowns that are happening every 1-3 years are about 75% - 95%. If the price of BTC goes under $1000 that will be something new. I can't speak of other coins as they are a very different market (and I'm a Bitcoin maximalist).

By "Bitcoin maximalist" I assume you mean you want to see it enter widespread use as currency? Any thoughts on the extreme environmental downside of BTC?

Re: No End in Sight for Crypto Sell-Off as Bitcoin Breaches $4,250

#195

Post by sneak »

simias wrote: post #20

Since the article states "the trigger for the latest sell-off is unclear" I'm really curious if somebody here could venture a guess about the reasons for the sudden drop. The Bitcoin Cash fork seems suspiciously correlated but is it big enough news to cause such a turmoil? Being a cryptocurrency-skeptic I won't pretend that I don't experience a little bit of schadenfreude when I see CC crash, however if I'm trying to…

I predicted last fall there would be a huge sell-off as short term cap gains (35%) turn into long term cap gains (15-20%) at the 12 month mark. Time to lock in the remaining profit and realize those gains.

Re: No End in Sight for Crypto Sell-Off as Bitcoin Breaches $4,250

#196

Post by airstrike »

aphextron wrote: post #5

Everything sells off this time of year. Nasdaq is down 7% on the month. It’s end of year profit-taking for tax purposes. As BTC has become completely mainstream now, this makes sense.

> Everything sells off this time of year.

Come again?

Re: No End in Sight for Crypto Sell-Off as Bitcoin Breaches $4,250

#197

Post by throwbacktictac »

wgerard wrote: post #86
na85 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Has anyone come up with a use case for blockchains yet, that isn't buying illegal drugs or money laundering? I keep seeing pie in the sky hypotheticals like "supply chain trust" from people who think farmers are etching their cucumbers with serial numbers, but I've yet to see any use case presented for a blockchain that has real utility and isn't better solved by existing processes or systems.

Personally, and by no means am I a bitcoin-enthusiast, there's a lot of value to be had by something that allows relatively frictionless international money transfer. I realize that's not necessarily a feature of blockchains, though it is a feature of cryptocurrencies (for now, at least). We had a friend who lives in a commonwealth country working for us as a contractor, and figuring out how to pay them was a pretty…

Tranferwise makes me cringe. I fell for the hype. I failed to do research and fell into the same tarpit that even a cursory glance would have revealed.

They withdrew my funds. Promised a transfer date by the following date. Three days pass and the suddenly lock me out of my account and asked for a bunch of documents to complete the transfer.

Re: No End in Sight for Crypto Sell-Off as Bitcoin Breaches $4,250

#198

Post by JulianMorrison »

zanny wrote: post #143
sct202 wrote: post #104

Is there something useful that all the custom built bitcoin mining rigs can do now that it probably is less economical to use them to mine?

Bitcoin mining has been custom ASIC dominated for years now. Almost all miners (in terms of hash power) are custom purpose built machines. So no, they really can only do sha256 hashing on payloads of comparable size to bitcoin blocks.

Which might make them harshly powerful password crackers for anyone daft enough to use SHA256 as a password.

Re: No End in Sight for Crypto Sell-Off as Bitcoin Breaches $4,250

#200

Post by throwaway5752 »

simias wrote: post #20

Since the article states "the trigger for the latest sell-off is unclear" I'm really curious if somebody here could venture a guess about the reasons for the sudden drop. The Bitcoin Cash fork seems suspiciously correlated but is it big enough news to cause such a turmoil? Being a cryptocurrency-skeptic I won't pretend that I don't experience a little bit of schadenfreude when I see CC crash, however if I'm trying to…

"somebody here could venture a guess about the reasons for the sudden drop"

It has no inherent value, is a poor currency substitute, it is a poor store of value, and is on a long term trajectory to zero. People are realizing this and liquidating large/low basis cost positions.

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