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Bitcoin Price Hits All-Time High of $19,786, Topping 2017 Record

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Re: Bitcoin Price Hits All-Time High of $19,786, Topping 2017 Record

#121

Post by arcticbull »

sjwalter wrote: post #115
arcticbull wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Inflation has a specific definition with reference to the cost of a set basket of goods and rent. An increase in the price of assets and assets alone as a result of an increase in money supply is not inflation.

You are talking specifically about consumer price inflation, which is as you state a well-specified concept based on a (hilariously disconnected from reality) weighted basket of goods and how the basket's price changes over time. Inflation as a concept itself is much broader than this. The comment you're replying to is referring to asset price inflation, which has been happening hardcore. You seem to be saying since…

I’m saying CPI inflation (which is what people mean when they say inflation) has not gone up. I suggest that to prevent confusion among the readers that folks using a nonstandard (or at least non-colloquial) definition of inflation should make that clear.

Re: Bitcoin Price Hits All-Time High of $19,786, Topping 2017 Record

#122

Post by brian_cloutier »

paulgb wrote: post #81
jeffreyrogers wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think most people would agree that finance is too large in most developed countries, but it is also important. It's not like the large companies that pay investment banks to help them with their IPOs or with issuing bonds just want to waste money.

Also, it's not like the functions that banks currently do would become unnecessary in a Bitcoin maximalist world. It's an apples to oranges comparison.

I think both of you are misunderstanding what centimeter is trying to say. They didn't suggest that Bitcoin will replace traditional finance, or that traditional finance is a waste.

Re: Bitcoin Price Hits All-Time High of $19,786, Topping 2017 Record

#123

Post by paulgb »

brian_cloutier wrote: post #98
arcticbull wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Energy consumption in the classical model is substantially lower because if you scaled up Bitcoin to the size of Visa alone it would exceed the amount of energy generated on earth a few times over and the amount of ewaste generated on earth too. This is a classic pro Bitcoin argument that’s trivially falsifiable. The fact folks here think their transactions in the online economy should heat their homes is so bananas…

You're making two mistakes. The first is that scaling Bitcoin up to the size of visa is not particularly possible. You might be able to match visa's throughput by greatly increasing the block interval (e.x. one block every week) but the protocol cannot reasonably scale past a couple hundred transactions per second without taking a massive hit to transaction latency. So, in this sense the question of how much energy B…

Energy use in equilibrium is proportional to the value of the block rewards plus transaction rewards. In a world where Bitcoin replaces gold or visa, it would be significantly worse for the environment than it is today, since the value of each unit would have to increase to satisfy the demand.

Re: Bitcoin Price Hits All-Time High of $19,786, Topping 2017 Record

#124

Post by leppr »

lambdadmitry wrote: post #102
X6S1x6Okd1st wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More on ramps and institutional investors buying in seems to be a big part of it.

This "institutional investors" meme is a bit like God: no one can prove it, but it gives its believers all the hope. There is no evidence of that happening on massive scale and no reason for them to do so.

https://www.coindesk.com/investment-giant-alliancebernstein-...

American institutions are definitely going in. It's a solid ponzi, why would they shun that one when they went in all the others?

Re: Bitcoin Price Hits All-Time High of $19,786, Topping 2017 Record

#125

Post by kainaloo »

globular-toast wrote: post #3

Looks like it won't break the $20k threshold again. Back down it goes... I knew this was about to happen again when, just like last time, I heard regular "non-techy" people talk about it at work.

This is probabyl not going to age well. It's very likely that BTC will break 30k in Q1 2021.

Re: Bitcoin Price Hits All-Time High of $19,786, Topping 2017 Record

#126

Post by nostrademons »

arcticbull wrote: post #55
nostrademons wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's probably more reflective of inflation and the dollar losing value, which is the natural consequence of dropping interest rates to zero and pumping $6T more into the economy. TSLA has gone from $191 to $576 since June, GOOG from $1394->$1761, AMZN $2478->$3143, ZM $262->$466. Where I'm at restaurant meals have gone from about $13/plate to $20/plate, and houses have gone from ~$1.6M -> $2.1M. BTC's rise isn't all…

Inflation has a specific definition with reference to the cost of a set basket of goods and rent. An increase in the price of assets and assets alone as a result of an increase in money supply is not inflation.

That's the definition of the CPI. The definition of inflation that an individual cares about is "the rise in prices of the goods that I want to buy". Asset purchases, housing, and food are my biggest expenses. YMMV.

I gave some examples of consumer goods inflating in my post - restaurant meals are up about 40%, housing up about 18%, groceries have also been up about 20% since the pandemic started. Also have friends that own or work in non-tech businesses (one owns a packaging factory, another sells hot tubs) that say that supply chains are in shambles and all of their producer prices are going up, significantly. You'll see that in consumer prices eventually, but it takes time to work its way through the economy.

Re: Bitcoin Price Hits All-Time High of $19,786, Topping 2017 Record

#127

Post by arcticbull »

crispyambulance wrote: post #75
arcticbull wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Volatility is its principal feature in the financial world.

Yeah, but does that necessarily HAVE TO apply to "currency"?

Not in my opinion haha but it’s not really a currency.

Re: Bitcoin Price Hits All-Time High of $19,786, Topping 2017 Record

#128

Post by lawn »

jasonlaramburu wrote: post #110
lawn wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Naturally you don't verify the blockchain yourself, but use a light wallet that uses very little data. And you don't use BTC as the fees are way too expensive. This is what people are doing in Venezuela for example.

OK but are there any secure BTC or alt coin wallets (even light wallets) that will work on feature phones or SMS? Very few people in in remote villages can afford even the most basic Android smartphone. What incentive would they have to switch from M-PESA (or Alipay/wechatpay in Asia) that is already secure, cheap and widely accepted. Cryptocurrency is a fascinating technology and social experiment but so far has no…

Not that I know of.

The real use-case is transferring to and from places that you cannot normally do. Smartphones are prevalent in Venezuela for example, but it's basically impossible to send money in or out unless you use cryptocurrencies.

The charity eatBCH uses this to give food to Venezuelans for example: https://eatbch.org/. I think that's a pretty unique use case.

Re: Bitcoin Price Hits All-Time High of $19,786, Topping 2017 Record

#129

Post by mdoms »

anythingdude321 wrote: post #65
arcticbull wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is not a single use case better solved by cryptocurrencies or blockchain than by a classical solution. Name one, I’ll wait. When there is I’ll eat my, err, hat.

there are many problems better solved by bitcoin than classical solutions. one example is as a bank account in a low trust society with high inflation (there are many such countries). creating a bitcoin wallet is extraordinarily easy and once you've acquired the bitcoin it's uncensorable and unconfiscatable. this is better than the classical solution, right?

The US government literally just confiscated a billion dollar wallet just a few days ago.

Re: Bitcoin Price Hits All-Time High of $19,786, Topping 2017 Record

#130

Post by noxer »

anotheraccount9 wrote: post #13

Cryptocurrency is still a misunderstood concept for many ppl in the financial world. As use and integration increases, btc will likely stabilise. Meanwhile, we get interesting volatility.

It can not stabilize the block reward pays for the mining the fees are almost irrelevant. block reward halves every 4 year so the price has to double at least every 4 year. if it does not it will become lucrative to do double spends at some point. Its designed to crash some day because there is no endless doubling at constant time.
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