Live data from Hacker News

$365B wiped off cryptocurrency market after Tesla stops accepting Bitcoin

cnbc.com

541–550 of 758 posts

Re: $365B wiped off cryptocurrency market after Tesla stops accepting Bitcoin

#541

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As much as they need for what? Aside of ransom payments and drugs, you don't need to buy cryptocurrency, ordinary fiat money works just fine as a medium of transfer.

This is a very privileged, first-world perspective on things. You probably have a checking account, and a debit card. If you only have cash, and want to send money to (for example) family in another country, it gets very expensive, very fast. Exchanging cash for cryptocurrency without a bank inbetween is a pain in the ass, but its a hell of a lot cheaper than, for example, Western Union.

Why not just use TransferWise? Wiring money can get expensive, I agree, but there are many P2P currency exchange platforms out there these days that cost next to nothing.

Re: $365B wiped off cryptocurrency market after Tesla stops accepting Bitcoin

#542
post #447

I own $0 crypto. Good in theory but if you look at it very closely, the whole thing is a racket that enriches a few people manipulating the market and enchants millions of speculators who want to 'get rich quick'. My gut says it's best to invest in myself and build things that are universally appealing and useful.

It's not much different from the current fiat monetary regime. Those closest to the money spigot benefit the most... cryptocurrency opens it up to individuals rather than limiting it to governments.

One big difference is that governments usually set the real returns on their fiat to -2% which is low enough to prevent it from being hoarded too much and crowding out the private markets for productive investment.

Re: $365B wiped off cryptocurrency market after Tesla stops accepting Bitcoin

#543
I still don't think the environmental damage is the scariest part of cryptocurrencies since there are likely technological solutions. As even Douglas Adams tried to warn, it's the deflation that is worrisome: https://benoitessiambre.com/specter.html

Re: $365B wiped off cryptocurrency market after Tesla stops accepting Bitcoin

#544
post #506

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Vaccinations could've been an option last May. The mRNA vaccines were designed days after receiving a full genetic sequence of the virus (in January). Those are the same two vaccines we are currently injecting people with – we just spent a long time on trials/approval/ramping up production. Far longer than necessary.

Previous attempts at mRNA vaccines had failed, due to the side effects being too serious. There was no reason to believe in May 2020 that a COVID mRNA vaccine would be any different than all the previous mRNA failures.

Can I have sources to that claim? I would like to use it.

Re: $365B wiped off cryptocurrency market after Tesla stops accepting Bitcoin

#545

I don't really buy the pump and dump take here. Even if it had been an intentional pump, no reason to trigger a selloff. Some Theses: - Elon is a quick decision maker, he could have genuinely been persuaded about energy usage post-hoc. The energy bit does run somewhat contrary to Tesla's core mission. - In line with this, tesla may be about to form a partnership or make a move with another crypto platform, both becau…

So your argument is that he is just dumb and didn’t even know how dirty bitcoin is mined, even though all of us do.

Sorry but I buy more into the pump and dump hype machine together with his CONSTANT never ending tiring relentless need to be the centre of attention in the media. Like his political equivalent Donald T used to be.

Proof: open the media every day. I can’t forget how he needed to insert himself into the whole Thai boys in a cave rescue and then needed to be focus of the media again when he called the actual proper saviours pedophiles.

Re: $365B wiped off cryptocurrency market after Tesla stops accepting Bitcoin

#546

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He's single handedly accelerated the adoption of electric cars by 10 years while advancing literal rocket science to the point where launches will be done 10x cheaper. For those of us who measure by outcomes, he's a genius.

Tesla proved rich people buy rich people things. SpaceX proved government budgets aren't scrutinized enough. Not particularly shocking.

SpaceX is saving the US government heaps of money. Sure you could argue about spending on things in the first place. Assuming though we are talking about who to award to contracts to though they have saved heaps on just giving the extra work to ULA/ Boeing and other traditional aerospace companies. They have also created a competitor that will drive down prices on all space contracts.

Re: $365B wiped off cryptocurrency market after Tesla stops accepting Bitcoin

#547

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't have a reference but rumours have it Joe Lubin alone controls close to 10%, which would be close to 50 billion today. With the usually apathetic voters/stakers, one such loud voice can sway a PoS network easily.

"With the usually apathetic voters/stakers" What makes you think eth stakers are apathetic?

all experiments with onchain voting seem to have that problem, just like with voting in real life.

read up on the DAO exploit and carbon vote. Even in a drastic situation turnout was low.

It's a permissionless industry and I suppose people can try different things, but one thing that sets apart Bitcoin from everything else - it is not a democracry.

Democracy was designed for cities of 50-60k in size, where only rich landowners got to vote and everyone else was basically peons. It doesn't scale and is not particularly great.

PoS is just another string of boneheaded attempts to make democracy great again...by marrying it with plutocracy? idk.

Would you care to vote with your measly stake if you know the insiders have over 50% anyway?

Re: $365B wiped off cryptocurrency market after Tesla stops accepting Bitcoin

#548
post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cus he's not that bright. Isn't this the elephant in the room that no one wants to consider? Why do we have to start with the assumption that Musk is a genius, then work back from that? The dude thought covid would go away last May. He thinks it's easier to make Mars habitable than it is to keep the Earth habitable. He's thought that full self driving was 6 months away for literally 4 years now. And he didn't really…

SpaceX wins lots of space contracts with the help of Musk's "Occupy Mars" marketing. Tesla sells lots of cars on the promise of self-driving in the marketing. Musk bought BTC, single-handedly pumped the price of BTC, and then sold at a huge profit. I don't think he's a genius but Musk is definitely not stupid. He's just not playing the obvious game you think he's playing.

> He's just not playing the obvious game you think he's playing.

I think I would agree with that.

Take note of that last part of his tweet[0]:

> Tesla will not be selling any Bitcoin and we intend to use it for transactions as soon as mining transitions to more sustainable energy. We are also looking at other cryptocurrencies that use Here he posed a problem that is now on people's mind. Soon he will offer a solution and people will go nuts about it. He often does that kind of thing.

[0] https://mobile.twitter.com/elonmusk/status/13926020410258432...

Re: $365B wiped off cryptocurrency market after Tesla stops accepting Bitcoin

#549

So many comments in this thread suggest Musk is an all knowing individual. "How could he miss this?" "I can't believe someone so wealthy can miss something so important!" And so on. This is a really sad view, IMHO. Wealth may provide more opportunities to learn and expand, but that doesn't mean the wealthy know everything. He should have done his research, maybe he did and decided to go that route anyway, but wealth…

It’s not unreasonable to expect a CEO to delegate adding a new payments option to people who do their due diligence?

Re: $365B wiped off cryptocurrency market after Tesla stops accepting Bitcoin

#550

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any protocol change is, by definition, a fork. If everyone says the new PoS Bitcoin is the real Bitcoin, then it is so.

But what would be incentives to using a PoS Bitcoin fork, as opposed to starting over with a fresh altcoin?

You keep the existing network effects which are massive.
Post reply on HN