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Tether price manipulation

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Re: Tether price manipulation

#351

Post by rednerrus »

doggosphere wrote: post #308
qeternity wrote: post #15

The problem is that in the early days of @Bitfinex'ed this was all a bit of a sideshow because there was genuinely large interest from retail and the outcome of crypto was far less certain. However three years on, crypto still does not have a "killer app" and is 99.99% used for speculation. Bitcoin's narrative has had to morph from "digital currency" to "digital gold". But in the depths of the March panic, Tether jum…

However three years on, crypto still does not have a "killer app" and is 99.99% used for speculation. The killer app is decentralized, permissionless, open source, and censorship resistant network. Bitcoin's narrative has had to morph from "digital currency" to "digital gold". Gold morphed from worthless rocks in the the ground, to coins traded by traveling merchants, to stores of value that were eventually centraliz…

The hurdle for bitcoin is finding a way for people to turn it into a currency they can use. This is where you end up with a centralized exchange layer built on top of it.

I can make a $12,000,000 transaction for $.35 but if I actually want to get the money, I have to pay 2.5% to a legit exchange or take my chances on some janky ass exchange. Why not just transfer the money via ACH and pay the small fee and save myself the headache?

Re: Tether price manipulation

#352

Post by MystK »

WMX123 wrote: post #344

To people who think Tether manipulates Bitcoin price: How do you explain Bitcoin doing so well on Coinbase when Tether is NOT ACCEPTED on Coinbase???

If BTC's price is manipulated anywhere, the market adjusts for it everywhere.

Re: Tether price manipulation

#353

Post by FireBeyond »

csomar wrote: post #201

OP gives no proof that Tether is not holding 1:1 reserves. There is, however, a good proof that they do: Tether has held the 1:1 beg pretty well recently. Bitcoin price dropped to $4.000 last year and Tether exchange rate has held pretty well. It is important to mention that USDT is still liquid despite the lack of USD on/off-ramps. People regularly sell USDT on the offline market, and can exchange to USDC on many ex…

> OP gives no proof that Tether is not holding 1:1 reserves.

I'm fairly certain that _Tether's_ lawyer said, in court, that their reserves were closer to 0.74.

Re: Tether price manipulation

#354

Post by PragmaticPulp »

Tepix wrote: post #62

I agree that USDT is fishy and it may be behind a large percentage of the gains in BTC and the other coins. However, there is also another possible explanation. When investors want to buy BTC they first to go Binance and ask for USDT in exchange for USD. Binance creates new USDT for them. Then they use the USDT to buy BTC (reverse causality). Just saying it's possible, but I believe Jacob Oracle to be right.

> When investors want to buy BTC they first to go Binance and ask for USDT in exchange for USD. Binance creates new USDT for them. Then they use the USDT to buy BTC (reverse causality).

But why sell them USDT first and then sell them BTC in exchange for the USDT?

Why not just sell them BTC directly? That's the issue.

Re: Tether price manipulation

#355

Post by agumonkey »

doggosphere wrote: post #308
qeternity wrote: post #15

The problem is that in the early days of @Bitfinex'ed this was all a bit of a sideshow because there was genuinely large interest from retail and the outcome of crypto was far less certain. However three years on, crypto still does not have a "killer app" and is 99.99% used for speculation. Bitcoin's narrative has had to morph from "digital currency" to "digital gold". But in the depths of the March panic, Tether jum…

However three years on, crypto still does not have a "killer app" and is 99.99% used for speculation. The killer app is decentralized, permissionless, open source, and censorship resistant network. Bitcoin's narrative has had to morph from "digital currency" to "digital gold". Gold morphed from worthless rocks in the the ground, to coins traded by traveling merchants, to stores of value that were eventually centraliz…

I find this a little bit too biased. The Bitcoin universe is waving between a lot of reason why to love bitcoin and it shifts often.

I stopped following the money side of it (atm and sites accepting btc) but a vast majority of btc and cryptos attention right now.. is simply better yearly returns than other kinds of possessions.

Re: Tether price manipulation

#356

Post by long »

gillesjacobs wrote: post #288
therein wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except for timing time after time. Most rallies have a corresponding Tether print right prior to them.

Is there any proof or data on Tether issuance preceding rallies? Because I have seen this claim often made on Twitter, but never with any sources. I personally dislike Tether and avoid it, but strong claims require strong evidence.

Here's an econ paper that studies that question: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/342185292_Is_Bitcoi...

Re: Tether price manipulation

#357

Post by defen »

shuntress wrote: post #47
c-fe wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So far the explanation I’ve come across goes as follows: someone creates tether. They use this tether to buy bitcoin, which drives up the prices of bitcoin. The more they buy, the more value their purchased bitcoin has. The trick seems to be that generating this tether should decrease the value of tether, however since everyone thinks its a stablecoin that is backed by usd 1:1, its value remains the same. The worst i…

I've gathered basically this same explanation but it still makes no sense. Are people trading BTC for "Land for sale on the moon" too? This sounds like exchanges handing out IOUs instead of money when their patrons try to cash out.

Let's say you think Bitcoin is going to crash (or you're a trader and just think it's going to go down). Obviously you want to sell your bitcoin, but also postulate that you don't have a connection to a real bank (KYC and all that), so you can't actually turn your Bitcoins into dollars. So you sell your Bitcoins for Tethers. Then Bitcoin goes down, and eventually you buy them back using Tethers.

Re: Tether price manipulation

#358

Post by WA »

michaelchisari wrote: post #321
ahelwer wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing is $850m isn't actually that much money. The big exchanges made on the order of several billion dollars profit during the last bubble; presumably they are also making that much in this one.

It's not about the $850m per se, it's about the deep suspicion that Tether does not have anywhere near the $23 billion in reserves they claim to.

Sounds like Wirecard and they went down 90% in a week and 99% in total within two weeks. Popcorn time.

Re: Tether price manipulation

#359

Post by PragmaticPulp »

tomtomtom777 wrote: post #17

I still don't quite understand how they can manipulate the price. The price of a USDT is 1 dollar. They give out new USDT for $1 a piece. Sure, they may be spending these dollars elsewhere, thus holding a fractional reserve. Sure this may illegal and get them in trouble. But this doesn't effect the dollar value for which these USDT's and thus Bitcoins are traded. As long as a USDT is $1, nobody is manipulating the pr…

Scams always work on the way up. Madoff operated a Ponzi scheme for 17 years before running out of money. He simply used his bank account to pay off anyone who wanted to withdraw. As long as more total money flows in than flows out of the system, it doesn't fall apart.

The entire narrative around BTC is "HODL", and the only thing people really do with it is buy and hold. Money is flowing into the system, so there's room for scams to operate undetected within those margins.

Re: Tether price manipulation

#360

Post by rednerrus »

gruez wrote: post #295
qeternity wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It is important to mention that USDT is still liquid despite the lack of USD on/off-ramps. USDT is only liquid BECAUSE there is no redemption mechanism (or at least not one that has ever been demonstrated). If Tether came and said "sure we'll redeem these fully backed Tethers for USD 24/7/365" you would quickly find yourself with a liquidity crisis.

>USDT is only liquid BECAUSE there is no redemption mechanism (or at least not one that has ever been demonstrated). For the bystanders here, I've made a reply to a comment similar to this in sibling thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25686965

If there is a USD to USDT match, where are the audits?
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