Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

techcrunch.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

681–690 of 1001 posts

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#681

Post by qqii »

JamesBarney wrote: post #618
mrb wrote: post #489

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While away on vacation, I once sent $1000 in cold hard cash, on a Sunday, to an unbanked person in Los Angeles, in less than 1 hour, thanks to bitcoin and the recipient withdrawing it for cash at a Bitcoin ATM. There is not a single alternative service in the world that would have made this possible. If people thought a little beyond their personal use cases, they would understand the utility of Bitcoin/crypto for ma…

How large is the population of people who are both unbanked but sophisticated enough to use bitcoin? 95% of the population is banked, but only 11% own bitcoin. https://www.fdic.gov/analysis/household-survey/index.html

Specifically the US population, this number is much less globally.

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#682

Post by cloudhead »

learc83 wrote: post #647
cloudhead wrote: post #579

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gold's inherent value represents less than 1% of its total value. The rest is monetary premium. Bitcoin is 100% monetary premium, ie. inter-subjective value. Another thing to consider is that people buy gold jewellery as a store of value. You don't spend $30k on a watch if you don't think it will keep its value.

>You don’t spend $30k... Yes you do. You’ll almost never get the retail value out of a piece of jewelry if you try to resell it.

Not all jewelery has a huge markup over the metal weight. If you buy a gold watch, you can always get its gold value back. Same with stones.

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#683

Post by astrolince »

BenoitEssiambre wrote: post #381

Oh noes, if this starts a trend, becomes widespread, and businesses start hoarding crypto tokens instead of investing in building stuff, it could cause a great depression pretty much the same way gold hoarding caused the economy to collapse in 1929. When people, businesses and banks start hording tokens instead of investing in building and maintaining the production capacity of consumables, the ratio of value of toke…

You can't invest everything you have, that generates bad investment decisions that doesn't generate products that the market actually demands, it destroys the economy

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#684

Post by xadhominemx »

mrb wrote: post #489
rzodkiew wrote: post #338

Bitcoin is a mystery to me. Somehow it's hailed as revolutionising the economy, by replacing currency with a worse kind of currency. It feels like this is where all the "how to get rich quick" book writers and other hustle bros went and created one giant financial pyramid, which works in quite simple way: - buy bitcoin - tell everyone around how revolutionary it is, so they buy it and what you holding increases in va…

While away on vacation, I once sent $1000 in cold hard cash, on a Sunday, to an unbanked person in Los Angeles, in less than 1 hour, thanks to bitcoin and the recipient withdrawing it for cash at a Bitcoin ATM. There is not a single alternative service in the world that would have made this possible. If people thought a little beyond their personal use cases, they would understand the utility of Bitcoin/crypto for ma…

Ok then what did they do with the Bitcoin you sent them

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#686

Post by usehackernews »

BenoitEssiambre wrote: post #381

Oh noes, if this starts a trend, becomes widespread, and businesses start hoarding crypto tokens instead of investing in building stuff, it could cause a great depression pretty much the same way gold hoarding caused the economy to collapse in 1929. When people, businesses and banks start hording tokens instead of investing in building and maintaining the production capacity of consumables, the ratio of value of toke…

All global companies with cash reserves try to maximize returns via currency and other investments and hedges.

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#687

Post by pelliphant »

fasteddie31003 wrote: post #626
pelliphant wrote: post #439

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a crypto hater, I consider bitcoin to be a pyramid scheme. And also, I think that it is a positive thing that an institution that I can influence (government) is in control of deciding how transactions work. This might also be a cultural thing, since I'm scandinavian, and "we" generally consider government regulation as something necessary.

To some aspect every asset is part pyramid scheme.

Ok, but if I rephrase it as:

I consider bitcoin to be more of a pyramid scheme then your average asset.

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#688

Post by flush »

me551ah wrote: post #638
mattm wrote: post #629

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah this confused me for a long time as well. I then realized that there is tremendous value in something that acts as a reliable store of value. For example, rich people are known to buy expensive art and then lock it away in a warehouse. Why do this? You're not getting any value out of the piece. The reason is that the sole purpose of the art piece is to be a reliable store of value. You're paying a lot for someth…

Sorry but I disagree about your analogy with an art piece. An art piece is unique, especially the antique ones made by an artist who is no longer alive. And that artpiece will always be the only one to ever exist. There are many other cryptocurrencies which can do what bitcoin can, dogecoin was made just to illustrate that point.

There are many other artists who can paint. Does not make their art equally valuable.

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#689

Post by qqii »

iagovar wrote: post #619
mrb wrote: post #489

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While away on vacation, I once sent $1000 in cold hard cash, on a Sunday, to an unbanked person in Los Angeles, in less than 1 hour, thanks to bitcoin and the recipient withdrawing it for cash at a Bitcoin ATM. There is not a single alternative service in the world that would have made this possible. If people thought a little beyond their personal use cases, they would understand the utility of Bitcoin/crypto for ma…

You can do that with SEPA? I mean, I just send money to my landlord every 1st day of the month, and I got it automated in my bank page. And every bank account I had has this.

SEPA only covers the EU and a few EU aligned countries.

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#690

Post by nprateem »

rzodkiew wrote: post #338

Bitcoin is a mystery to me. Somehow it's hailed as revolutionising the economy, by replacing currency with a worse kind of currency. It feels like this is where all the "how to get rich quick" book writers and other hustle bros went and created one giant financial pyramid, which works in quite simple way: - buy bitcoin - tell everyone around how revolutionary it is, so they buy it and what you holding increases in va…

I read an interesting book the other day on technology & economics that I'd highly recommend [1]. Tech creates efficiencies. Cryptos have potential to remove large swathes of the financial system, making things more efficient.

[1] https://www.amazon.co.uk/Price-Tomorrow-Deflation-Abundant-F...

Post reply on HN