Are pixie fairies behind Bitcoin's latest bubble? • Hacker News Board

Re: Are pixie fairies behind Bitcoin's latest bubble?

#111

Post by crasl » Wed, Nov 25, 2020, 8:16 AM UTC

arcticbull wrote: post #89

seppel wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> People who believe (in varying degrees) that 1 USDT == 1 USD. I totally get that part. But then what? With USD I can buy, e.g, a house or a yacht. With USDT I can buy what? I guess only other crypto currencies. So what is the endgame here?

Since many exchanges use USDT and USD interchangeably, the endgame is for arbitrage bots to bid up the exchange rate between BTC:USD at legitimate exchanges to match BTC:USDT at Bitfinex. This allows Bitfinex to transfer the BTC they bought with Tethers to legitimate exchanges, sell them for USD, and transfer the USD back to themselves. They could care less about anything beyond that.

That's what I believe too, but once thing I don't understand is you would think by doing so they would depress the price on USD exchanges, and eventually cause the price to decouple between USD and USDT, but that doesn't seem to be happening this time.

Re: Are pixie fairies behind Bitcoin's latest bubble?

#112

Post by alethiophile » Wed, Nov 25, 2020, 11:58 PM UTC

shermanmccoy wrote: post #108

alethiophile wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If arbitrage bots try to arbitrage between BTC-USDT and BTC-USD markets, and the USDT markets are the ones pushing the price up, then it's the arbitrage bots that would end up holding huge amounts of USDT. So what are they doing with it? They should mostly be trying to maintain equal holdings to handle arbitrage, so they would have to sell it on USDT-USD markets (or redeem it from Tether, if that's actually possible)…

I think the ponzi continues to work for now, the arbitrageurs can cash out, while the illusion that tethers are backed prevails. So indeed if no one does redeem these USDT as I keep reading could the arbitrageurs just slowly buy the cross to USD over a period of time after the trade? Alternatively USDT seems to be a proxy-currency to move across exchanges and networks, so it may indeed be transferred off to other pai…

Arbitrage isn't magic. The only way arbitrage can push BTC-USD prices up to match BTC-USDT is if the arbitrageurs are selling a proportional amount of USDT for USD. Either they're redeeming them with Tether, which some claim isn't actually possible (?), or they're selling them on USDT-USD markets. Since those markets still trade around $1, it's safe to assume there is not some massive imbalance for selling USDT over buying it.

Tether might be shady in all kinds of ways -- their operation has a lot of red flags to it. But it basically can't be responsible for massive BTC rises all on its own, because the rises happen even at pure USD markets, and that can only happen when a lot of real USD actually got injected.

Re: Are pixie fairies behind Bitcoin's latest bubble?

#113

Post by alethiophile » Thu, Nov 26, 2020, 12:01 AM UTC

raziel2701 wrote: post #109

alethiophile wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Now, arbitrage bots will look at this in crease in btc-usdt, and be mandated to buy btc with USD so that BTC-USDT and BTC-USD are in parity. This is the bit that doesn't make sense. Arbitrage bots trying to push BTC-USD up to match BTC-USDT will end up holding a lot of USDT. So what do they do with it? You can't just magically make USD markets go up; that needs actual USD to enter the system (as part of the arbitra…

Someone in this whole scheme is leveraged to the tits on tether, and newly minted tether is needed as an asset to back the old tether. And as long as nobody actually tests the convertibility of the currency too strongly, this can hold up.

But if arbitrage bots were pushing the BTCUSD price up to match BTCUSDT, they'd have giant piles of USDT. And they'd have to convert it back in large quantities, or else they'd go broke.

The world where no one tests the peg too hard is incompatible with the world where Tether caused huge BTC runups all on its own.

Re: Are pixie fairies behind Bitcoin's latest bubble?

#114

Post by shermanmccoy » Thu, Nov 26, 2020, 12:34 AM UTC

alethiophile wrote: post #112

shermanmccoy wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the ponzi continues to work for now, the arbitrageurs can cash out, while the illusion that tethers are backed prevails. So indeed if no one does redeem these USDT as I keep reading could the arbitrageurs just slowly buy the cross to USD over a period of time after the trade? Alternatively USDT seems to be a proxy-currency to move across exchanges and networks, so it may indeed be transferred off to other pai…

Arbitrage isn't magic. The only way arbitrage can push BTC-USD prices up to match BTC-USDT is if the arbitrageurs are selling a proportional amount of USDT for USD. Either they're redeeming them with Tether, which some claim isn't actually possible (?), or they're selling them on USDT-USD markets. Since those markets still trade around $1, it's safe to assume there is not some massive imbalance for selling USDT over…

>they're selling them on USDT-USD markets.

My hypothesis is they get dripfed onto these markets so as not to spook them. Or just transferred off to collateralize other trades - hey it's free money to them, why not set up another trade elsewhere while they are in?

It is not safe to assume anything based off market price action. You seem to be assuming there is some essential relationship between volume traded and price. These are market prices, they can be totally irrational, especially if there is some fake news (Tether is fully backed) behind them.

Re: Are pixie fairies behind Bitcoin's latest bubble?

#115

Post by darawk » Sat, Nov 28, 2020, 9:08 AM UTC

35fbe7d3d5b9 wrote: post #86

darawk wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because their banks keep shutting down their accounts. They've been playing whack-a-mole with regulators for a long time, and they probably view the NYAG's request as a backdoor way to find out where and how they're banking in order to shut them down.

So nobody knows if Tether is backed because: * it isn't and Tether wants to keep people in the dark * it is, but a hammer is ready to fall that probably involves OFAC freezing funds Any other options I'm missing? Because neither of those look good.

People have been saying this for years now. Not only has nothing materialized, but the price has barely ever deviated from the 1:1 peg.