Can we talk for a minute about that first graph in the article? "Bitcoin Activity By Category" supposedly lists percentages on the Y axis, but they included the percent sign on the label, making the range go from 0% to 1% instead of from 0 to 1 like they intended. Bloomberg should know better!
Bitcoin's Rally Masks Uncomfortable Fact: Almost Nobody Uses It
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Re: Bitcoin's Rally Masks Uncomfortable Fact: Almost Nobody Uses It
#22I'd just like to go on record saying I use it as a payment method for developer services for developers locked out of the western world's banking system.
Of course most of these devs will take any of the top N cryptos.
As a very early bitcoin adopter who made and lost and made and lost a fortune; I can say that bitcoin and crypto is still "ahead of schedule" for realistic-optimistic timelines of adoption.
I still believe cryptocurrency will continue to grow and eventually eat gold; but I am less convinced that it will eat fiat.
Re: Bitcoin's Rally Masks Uncomfortable Fact: Almost Nobody Uses It
#23People trading something back and forth is a form of usage. they are using it. The author just doesn't like what they are using it for.
Like Pokemon cards?
It's fun. But does not carry any value.
You can't buy a car or toilet paper with your precious Pokemon cards.
Re: Bitcoin's Rally Masks Uncomfortable Fact: Almost Nobody Uses It
#24The instability and the high fees make it useless for generic payment. The lighting network was supposed to fix latter problem.
As soon as the bitcoin price becomes stable it will be useful. As soon as it is useful it will swiftly rise in value and become unstable again. We have already seen several iterations of this cycle. Who knows when this will end.
Re: Bitcoin's Rally Masks Uncomfortable Fact: Almost Nobody Uses It
#25[deleted]
Re: Bitcoin's Rally Masks Uncomfortable Fact: Almost Nobody Uses It
#26Earlier quoted context omitted.
For the sake of this discussion, let’s just focus on bitcoin as an investment vehicle. Rarity does not confer value. My toenail clippings are limited in quantity, but valueless. There has to be some sort of underlying demand before rarity gets to play a factor in the pricing equation. So for bitcoin, what has been the underlying value proposition to justify purchasing? A large part of it was that bitcoin is the futur…
"My toenail clippings are limited in quantity, but valueless." Indistinguishable from other toe-nail clippings, for which supply is not limited. Not easy to transport internationally quickly.
I can come up with myriad examples of verifiably limited items that are valueless, I don’t think there’s any point in litigating that issue.
And bitcoin is easy to move internationally, but that’s just begging the question. Why would anyone want to move bitcoin? Presumably because it’s valuable, but now we have a circular dependency; bitcoin is valuable because you can move it internationally, and people want to move it internationally because it’s valuable and can be converted into currencies in which people can actually buy goods and services.
Re: Bitcoin's Rally Masks Uncomfortable Fact: Almost Nobody Uses It
#27Earlier quoted context omitted.
"My toenail clippings are limited in quantity, but valueless." Indistinguishable from other toe-nail clippings, for which supply is not limited. Not easy to transport internationally quickly.
Bitcoin is indistinguishable from any of its various forks. Cryptocurrency tokens as a class are not rare.
Real diamonds are indistinguishable from artificial diamonds, but nonetheless the market treats them as a different product, even with the risk that some criminal might try to substitute them. Bitcoin is in a better position, with no risk of accepting a forked coin unless you want to. It might be all human irrationality all the way down, but if so it's the kind of irrationality that's been around forever.
Re: Bitcoin's Rally Masks Uncomfortable Fact: Almost Nobody Uses It
#28Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you can answer that for gold & silver, then there is a point in talking about this. If not, the answer is "It's a secure, easily transferable, deflationary store of value. Examples of it being used - Venezuela. Gold is not an option due to crime. The local currency is not an option due to massive inflation.
> If you can answer that for gold & silver, then there is a point in talking about this. You've had an answer for gold and silver and you've just said it's a store of value because it's a store of value. That's circular logic.
Obviously "people keep buying it" is enough for the price to go up. People keep buying for the reasons already mentioned. I don't have much else to add to the conversation.
Re: Bitcoin's Rally Masks Uncomfortable Fact: Almost Nobody Uses It
#29There is a lot of work done in analyzing holding patterns. Would probably be interesting to see comparison to usage and price of gold as a store of value. For me, buying and holding seems to be legitimate usage. I guess that would count as "speculating". What else should you do with a store of value that you expect to appreciate in price because it has inflation going to 0?
Comparing to gold as a "buy & hold" store of value is only viable as a future possibility. Bitcoin has been too volatile to qualify as a store of value. If that changes, so too might its legitimacy for this use. But for the average investor/institution looking for a non-sovereign store of value, a year of stability isn't going to be sufficient. Maybe 5 years would convince, but then that puts bitcoin's legitimacy as a store of value at least 5 years out, and every time an exchange collapses or fraud or theft is revealed that sends the market into chaos, the clock is reset.
Re: Bitcoin's Rally Masks Uncomfortable Fact: Almost Nobody Uses It
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
Bitcoin is indistinguishable from any of its various forks. Cryptocurrency tokens as a class are not rare.
True, I've been saying the same for a long time. However, forks are extremely susceptible to 50% attacks, the more so the more computing power concentrates on bitcoin. Anyway, the prices of all main cryptocurrencies go up and down together with very similar trends, so I guess the crypto inflation is already factored in the current price.
So bitcoin is more valuable than its hard forks because there’s more hashing power.
Ok, that makes sense. So why is there more hashing power on bitcoin than the hard forks? Oh, because bitcoin is more valuable and so the mining reward is higher once converted to fiat? Well, that seems like a problem.