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El Salvador Plans to Use Electricity Generated from Volcanoes to Mine Bitcoin

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Re: El Salvador Plans to Use Electricity Generated from Volcanoes to Mine Bitcoin

#21

Post by gjulianm »

dadoge wrote: post #4

Remittances, things like wire transfers, account for 22% of their GDP. Bitcoin will give that money back to the people with the way lower cost of transfers, esp through the Lightning Network that is planned to be widely used. Elizabeth Stark boldly said 7 yrs ago and Bitcoin is like TCP and needs an http, and then built Lightning on top of Bitcoin and this is super exciting to see. EDIT: removed “fees”, it’s just rem…

If I'm not mistaken, that 22% is not fees, but the actual wire transfers from people abroad [1,2]. IMHO, it doesn't indicate that transfers are too expensive, but that a lot of people can't find enough work or support in El Salvador and they need to rely on family/friends that emigrated. I don't know how that is going to be solved by Bitcoin.

1: https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/BX.TRF.PWKR.DT.GD.ZS?lo... 2: https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/bop/2005/05-09.pdf

Re: El Salvador Plans to Use Electricity Generated from Volcanoes to Mine Bitcoin

#22

Post by personlurking »

graderjs wrote: post #17

It just gets better and better. - ES makes BTC fiat - ES taps volcanoes to mine BTC What next? - ES uses natural wormholes to plot the future timeline and win Earth?

An attempt to answer your "what's next?" question:

"What about you guys floating $1 billion in “Volcano Bonds” (backed by future #BTC mining output) for El Salvador to pay off the IMF loan - so they can tell the IMF to beat it."

https://twitter.com/maxkeiser/status/1403023717429559299

Re: El Salvador Plans to Use Electricity Generated from Volcanoes to Mine Bitcoin

#23

Post by garydevenay »

epigen wrote: post #16
garydevenay wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the case of laundering Bitcoin— this seems to be a majorly misunderstood concept. Bitcoin transactions are completely transparent and observable by everyone who has an internet connection. Anyone (with an internet connection) can watch any wallet and observe any and all transactions. The notion of a country being a "good location for laundering bitcoins" doesn't really make sense, as Bitcoin are never in a locatio…

> this seems to be a majorly misunderstood concept. It seems you misunderstand. Illicit fiat and extortion can be used to access energy to mine Bitcoin, effectively laundering that illicit fiat.

This scenario doesn't have any particular features that make access to energy or mining bitcoin the differentiating factor. Illicit fiat and extortion can be used in order to launder illicit fiat in many ways.

The underlying problem actually lies in the fiat system, not the Bitcoin one.

Re: El Salvador Plans to Use Electricity Generated from Volcanoes to Mine Bitcoin

#24

Post by Hendrikto »

epigen wrote: post #16
garydevenay wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the case of laundering Bitcoin— this seems to be a majorly misunderstood concept. Bitcoin transactions are completely transparent and observable by everyone who has an internet connection. Anyone (with an internet connection) can watch any wallet and observe any and all transactions. The notion of a country being a "good location for laundering bitcoins" doesn't really make sense, as Bitcoin are never in a locatio…

> this seems to be a majorly misunderstood concept. It seems you misunderstand. Illicit fiat and extortion can be used to access energy to mine Bitcoin, effectively laundering that illicit fiat.

Wouldn‘t the money already need to be laundered to buy energy with it in the first place?

Re: El Salvador Plans to Use Electricity Generated from Volcanoes to Mine Bitcoin

#25

Post by numbers_guy »

garydevenay wrote: post #10
pizza234 wrote: post #2

Two questions: - will those moves make the country a good location for laundering bitcoins? - generally speaking, is there no other way of profiting from surplus electricity (which essentially, this is)?

In the case of laundering Bitcoin— this seems to be a majorly misunderstood concept. Bitcoin transactions are completely transparent and observable by everyone who has an internet connection. Anyone (with an internet connection) can watch any wallet and observe any and all transactions. The notion of a country being a "good location for laundering bitcoins" doesn't really make sense, as Bitcoin are never in a locatio…

You know how much each wallet contains but not whom it belongs to. Hypothetically, if you cannot use a western exchange you might figure out how to buy Hondurian assests, and then resell for dollars. It entirely depends on how Honduras will setup KYC laws, if any at all.

Re: El Salvador Plans to Use Electricity Generated from Volcanoes to Mine Bitcoin

#26

Post by legutierr »

garydevenay wrote: post #10
pizza234 wrote: post #2

Two questions: - will those moves make the country a good location for laundering bitcoins? - generally speaking, is there no other way of profiting from surplus electricity (which essentially, this is)?

In the case of laundering Bitcoin— this seems to be a majorly misunderstood concept. Bitcoin transactions are completely transparent and observable by everyone who has an internet connection. Anyone (with an internet connection) can watch any wallet and observe any and all transactions. The notion of a country being a "good location for laundering bitcoins" doesn't really make sense, as Bitcoin are never in a locatio…

Are lightning transactions completely transparent?

Re: El Salvador Plans to Use Electricity Generated from Volcanoes to Mine Bitcoin

#27

Post by Hendrikto »

ostenning wrote: post #18
dadoge wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2021/06/09/tech... Nah. Bitcoin is actually a lot easier to trace than paper US Dollars.

Exactly, people who claim btc is anonymous don’t know what they are talking about. You can literally trace every transaction ever made, and given nearly all on-off ramps to fiat require KYC, btc itself is not the problem. The problem comes from privacy coins like Monero, which arguably should be outlawed (if not already)

> The problem comes from privacy coins like Monero, which arguably should be outlawed (if not already)

You cannot (and should not try to) outlaw maths.

Re: El Salvador Plans to Use Electricity Generated from Volcanoes to Mine Bitcoin

#28

Post by gjulianm »

personlurking wrote: post #22
graderjs wrote: post #17

It just gets better and better. - ES makes BTC fiat - ES taps volcanoes to mine BTC What next? - ES uses natural wormholes to plot the future timeline and win Earth?

An attempt to answer your "what's next?" question: "What about you guys floating $1 billion in “Volcano Bonds” (backed by future #BTC mining output) for El Salvador to pay off the IMF loan - so they can tell the IMF to beat it." https://twitter.com/maxkeiser/status/1403023717429559299

It's a $1B loan to a country with a low debt rating. It's a risky investment already, and now you add Bitcoin with its price volatility? I don't know how that's a good idea from the investors point of view.

Re: El Salvador Plans to Use Electricity Generated from Volcanoes to Mine Bitcoin

#30

Post by epigen »

Hendrikto wrote: post #24
epigen wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> this seems to be a majorly misunderstood concept. It seems you misunderstand. Illicit fiat and extortion can be used to access energy to mine Bitcoin, effectively laundering that illicit fiat.

Wouldn‘t the money already need to be laundered to buy energy with it in the first place?

Iran doesn't need to launder money to buy electricity in their own country.
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