Bitcoin is a disaster • Hacker News Board

Re: Bitcoin is a disaster

#81

Post by baby » Thu, Dec 31, 2020, 11:02 PM UTC

oblio wrote: post #67

baby wrote: post #31

That’s nonsense. Bitcoin is as good a store of value as gold due to one unique feature: scarcity. Actually, it’s even less power consuming than the gold industry and is much more transparent. I wouldn’t really advise bitcoin for anything else, like day to day transactions, although I and many of my friends have used bitcoin to transact on dark markets and it works. The only argument I’ve heard about gold being better…

> Gold is good for nothing useful imo, but is used in jewlery and other because it has value (not the other way around, as in gold has value because people make jewelry with it). You do know that gold has super low reactivity and it's a very good conductor, right? :-)

How often is it used for that use case? Does gold have a high value due to this? No. I would even say that we might see more use industrially if people weren’t inflating its price by using it as a store of value.

Re: Bitcoin is a disaster

#82

Post by brokencode » Thu, Dec 31, 2020, 11:02 PM UTC

ant6n wrote: post #48

keithwhor wrote: post #24

Related: the current rise of Bitcoin prices has been peculiar to me, and seems to be a bit of a canary in an inflationary coal mine. We've injected trillions of dollars of fiat into the economy this year. It feels like the sky-high valuations of technology companies and Bitcoin are "shock absorbers" of sorts, or early signals of inflation-yet-to-come. If we assume the market is efficiently pricing these assets (like…

But then what would one invest in? The stock market may just as easily crash.

But a stock represents ownership of a real company that (hopefully) will make profits that can be distributed as a dividend or be used to grow the company and increase the value.

A Bitcoin is totally speculative and has virtually no useful purpose in the real world yet. You can’t actually buy stuff with it from stores, due to its niche status, high fees, slow transactions, and wild price fluctuations.

Looking at it that way, it’s clear that a stock is a much safer investment than a Bitcoin.

Re: Bitcoin is a disaster

#83

Post by hobby-coder-guy » Thu, Dec 31, 2020, 11:02 PM UTC

whatever1 wrote: post #60

keithwhor wrote: post #24

Related: the current rise of Bitcoin prices has been peculiar to me, and seems to be a bit of a canary in an inflationary coal mine. We've injected trillions of dollars of fiat into the economy this year. It feels like the sky-high valuations of technology companies and Bitcoin are "shock absorbers" of sorts, or early signals of inflation-yet-to-come. If we assume the market is efficiently pricing these assets (like…

Why coca-cola would 3ple their prices in 2021? The loans are cheap, the wages are stagnant, energy and raw materials are cheap. I really don't see this scenario playing out unless the financial institutions collapse.

3ple?

Re: Bitcoin is a disaster

#84

Post by Glyptodon » Thu, Dec 31, 2020, 11:02 PM UTC

hombre_fatal wrote: post #39

Barrin92 wrote: post #3

>The scarcity of block chain space has led people to re-invent every last feature of the banks they thought they were going to be escaping. This is a pretty funny point because every time I go on twitter and see people talk about crypto, what they're essentially having is a discussion about public policy, and often they seem to try to reinvent institutions that already exist without even knowing it. From market-maker…

I don't see the irony. The point is that Bitcoin has introduced an actual "digital cash" currency without institutional/governmental middlemen. That institutions can be built on top of that, and that some people want such institutions, doesn't change the novel utility of finally having a currency that functions like digital cash. It's like saying it's ironic that people use physical USD for anonymous p2p transactions…

Ah, yes, physical currency doesn't have institutional/governmental middlemen because private regulated banks aren't the government. /s

Re: Bitcoin is a disaster

#85

Post by hombre_fatal » Thu, Dec 31, 2020, 11:02 PM UTC

oblio wrote: post #57

hombre_fatal wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see the irony. The point is that Bitcoin has introduced an actual "digital cash" currency without institutional/governmental middlemen. That institutions can be built on top of that, and that some people want such institutions, doesn't change the novel utility of finally having a currency that functions like digital cash. It's like saying it's ironic that people use physical USD for anonymous p2p transactions…

What's "digital cash" in this context? What does it offer extra compared to regular cash and online payments?

Well, take the upsides of cash (e.g. don't need to open a bank, prove residence, etc.) and now add the ability to exchange it digitally without the pointless gatekeeping of large corporations like Paypal.

Re: Bitcoin is a disaster

#86

Post by hobby-coder-guy » Thu, Dec 31, 2020, 11:03 PM UTC

ant6n wrote: post #48

keithwhor wrote: post #24

Related: the current rise of Bitcoin prices has been peculiar to me, and seems to be a bit of a canary in an inflationary coal mine. We've injected trillions of dollars of fiat into the economy this year. It feels like the sky-high valuations of technology companies and Bitcoin are "shock absorbers" of sorts, or early signals of inflation-yet-to-come. If we assume the market is efficiently pricing these assets (like…

But then what would one invest in? The stock market may just as easily crash.

Why not Tulips and Beanie babies?

Re: Bitcoin is a disaster

#87

Post by sunshinerag » Thu, Dec 31, 2020, 11:03 PM UTC

keithwhor wrote: post #24

Related: the current rise of Bitcoin prices has been peculiar to me, and seems to be a bit of a canary in an inflationary coal mine. We've injected trillions of dollars of fiat into the economy this year. It feels like the sky-high valuations of technology companies and Bitcoin are "shock absorbers" of sorts, or early signals of inflation-yet-to-come. If we assume the market is efficiently pricing these assets (like…

Your armchair analysis is on the mark. in a fiat dominated world, any market distortions caused by monetary mismanagement (money printing through QE, asset inflation) is not visible as everything in the market is priced in the same underlying asset (USD globally). Since bitcoin is outside this system it is actually holding up a mirror to the increasing worthlessness of the USD and other mismanaged fiat currencies.

Re: Bitcoin is a disaster

#88

Post by hertzrat » Thu, Dec 31, 2020, 11:03 PM UTC

keithwhor wrote: post #24

Related: the current rise of Bitcoin prices has been peculiar to me, and seems to be a bit of a canary in an inflationary coal mine. We've injected trillions of dollars of fiat into the economy this year. It feels like the sky-high valuations of technology companies and Bitcoin are "shock absorbers" of sorts, or early signals of inflation-yet-to-come. If we assume the market is efficiently pricing these assets (like…

If almost the entirety of the money ends up, in the medium run, in the hands of a few wealthy people who want to invest, it explains the lack of inflation for everything but investments

Re: Bitcoin is a disaster

#89

Post by exclusiv » Thu, Dec 31, 2020, 11:03 PM UTC

oblio wrote: post #57

hombre_fatal wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see the irony. The point is that Bitcoin has introduced an actual "digital cash" currency without institutional/governmental middlemen. That institutions can be built on top of that, and that some people want such institutions, doesn't change the novel utility of finally having a currency that functions like digital cash. It's like saying it's ironic that people use physical USD for anonymous p2p transactions…

What's "digital cash" in this context? What does it offer extra compared to regular cash and online payments?

Exactly. And barring an unlikely collapse, cash/dollar isn't going to fluctuate much at all in value. So... a feature.

At this point, bitcoin is a competitor to gold as an asset store. Maybe it will be more like a currency at some point. But there's a long way to go and a lot of forces against it for that to occur.

Re: Bitcoin is a disaster

#90

Post by smabie » Thu, Dec 31, 2020, 11:03 PM UTC

Barrin92 wrote: post #3

>The scarcity of block chain space has led people to re-invent every last feature of the banks they thought they were going to be escaping. This is a pretty funny point because every time I go on twitter and see people talk about crypto, what they're essentially having is a discussion about public policy, and often they seem to try to reinvent institutions that already exist without even knowing it. From market-maker…

I agree with you mostly, but market makers on exchanges are not middle-men, they are simply market participants like any other. Conceptually, there's no difference between a professional market maker and a individual who puts a limit order on the book.