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

Report on Stablecoins [pdf]

home.treasury.gov

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

141–150 of 697 posts

Re: Report on Stablecoins [pdf]

#141

Post by samtheprogram »

trophycase wrote: post #133
wpietri wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. Ultimately cryptocurrencies are a negative-sum game in that they take in real money and just move that money around, while spending some on overhead. In contrast, imagine investing in, say, a new fast-food franchise joint. They money you put in there is used to acquire assets that are used to produce goods that people will pay to consume. If it's a well-run business, the value of the outputs will be more tha…

Humanity is just a negative sum game in that we take in real resources and just move those resources around and then die, all while increasing entropy of the universe.

That would be true if the human population didn’t consistently increase over time; but it has.

Re: Report on Stablecoins [pdf]

#142

Post by mmaunder »

satellite2 wrote: post #90
dexwiz wrote: post #49

All these coins are proven to be worthless. When speculation is making everyone money, the money isn't worth much. Edit: Love the immediate fear downvote. No one wants to hear their gold is really just shiny dirt.

You have to be careful with your choice of words. Especially on an engineering / science forum. The word "proven" implies a definitive certainty backed by solid theoretical foundation and a massive body of evidence. Very few things are proven in social science and economics. And most of them are simply definition. You are free to express your opinion though, but please mark it as such and make at least a small effort…

This public official laying down rules “you are free to… but please” tone has become commonplace on HN in the past few years. Anyone know the origin? Perhaps a shift in public enthusiasm for controlling speech? Did it start at universities? It seemed to just show up one day around 2018. It’s incredibly distracting.

Re: Report on Stablecoins [pdf]

#143

Post by sub7 »

From a Coinbase exec: "Tether is a ticking time bomb. Whenever it goes off, it'll be a 70-80% market correction for 2-3 years"

Crypto continues to help nobody and achieve nothing in the real world. This administration has been criminally slow in shutting it down, lobby is strong.

Re: Report on Stablecoins [pdf]

#144

Post by iskander »

NikolaNovak wrote: post #119
roenxi wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A central plank of the US dollar (all fiat currencies, really) is that if you hold on to them for long enough all the wealth you had when you first picked them up gets transferred to someone else. Compared to that baseline holding literally anything else - including crypto - has a better theoretical chance of preserving your wealth. When measured in terms of US dollars, that has the appearance of everyone who owns it…

>>You have resources, someone else has a really good idea for how to use them. Financial instruments let the situation play out sensibly (you lend them resources, get back resources + something) with easy-to-manage legal enforcement if something goes wrong. I agree with that in general; however, that's not the current premise of most cryptocurrencies - I see them more like gold in that you buy them and hold on to the…

For newer cryptocurrencies you often buy them and then either (1) stake them (earn rewards for contributing to network security) or (2) deposit them in a crypto-bank like Aave and earn yield from having your money loaned out. Increasingly people don't look to cash out to USD but rather stay within the crypto ecosystem.

I do think that BTC and its clones engender a certain dragon-cache hoarding mentality that aligns with either plans to eventually cash out at a higher price or some kind of apocalyptic vision where eventually USD is no longer used at all.

Re: Report on Stablecoins [pdf]

#145

Post by webinvest »

bradly wrote: post #57
Animats wrote: post #47

This is good. The backing of stablecoins is a very real issue. As the Treasury points out, there's a very real possibility of a run. Two stablecoins have crashed so far, SafeDollar SDO, and $TITAN. They went all the way to zero. Can Tether survive a net outflow? Probably not. They don't have the collateral. Dai is really a derivative of Etherium. Dai is backed by Etherium at 150%. So value in Dai is at risk if the pr…

Is Dai similar to Gemini's GUSD stable coin? It too is backed by Etherium. I think Gemini is paying 8 or 9% APR for holding. Where is that money coming from? Are they loaning out for a higher rate than that?

It’s spelled Ethereum.

Re: Report on Stablecoins [pdf]

#146

Post by webinvest »

Animats wrote: post #47

This is good. The backing of stablecoins is a very real issue. As the Treasury points out, there's a very real possibility of a run. Two stablecoins have crashed so far, SafeDollar SDO, and $TITAN. They went all the way to zero. Can Tether survive a net outflow? Probably not. They don't have the collateral. Dai is really a derivative of Etherium. Dai is backed by Etherium at 150%. So value in Dai is at risk if the pr…

It’s spelled Ethereum…

Re: Report on Stablecoins [pdf]

#147

Post by wizzwizz4 »

wpietri wrote: post #138
wizzwizz4 wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's the main definition of worth that is used when discussing the value of commodities in economics on the internet.

I certainly agree that worth and current market price are correlated. But I disagree that they're definitionally the same. Indeed, pretending they're equivalent is a great way to lose a lot of money. I used to work for financial traders and I got some very fat bonus checks paid for by people who confused the two during high-volatility events while our traders stayed more flexible.

I also agree that it's a bad definition.

Perhaps “worth is what people will pay for something for the sake of having it, rather than out of expectation that they can re-sell it for more”?

Re: Report on Stablecoins [pdf]

#148

Post by iskander »

Muromec wrote: post #116
whatshisface wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How can any financial instrument/currency make everybody "rich", in any real terms? By organizing economic activity in a more efficient way than our present system of centrally planned debt supplies. That's what currency is "for" - organizing real activities.

So what kinds of economic activities, besides ransom, drug sales and donations to wikileaks and others not liked by u.s. government does bitcoin facilitate? Remittances to countries under repressive economical regime or under embargo? Not saying those are good or bad, just aiming to quantify the market size.

If you cut past the gold rush and speculative bubble, the current uses are pretty mundane fintech stuff. Deposit savings, take out loans, &c.

Re: Report on Stablecoins [pdf]

#149

Post by mosdl »

nscalf wrote: post #127
dexwiz wrote: post #49

All these coins are proven to be worthless. When speculation is making everyone money, the money isn't worth much. Edit: Love the immediate fear downvote. No one wants to hear their gold is really just shiny dirt.

Amazing how many people are die hard advocates of being closed minded. The net market for crypto hits over a trillion dollars, and you still say things like this declaring they are proven to be worthless. This is posted on a report by the US government on a technology that is effectively a digital wrapper to use the US dollar easily online. How is there no worth in that? Out of curiosity, what would it take to change…

I can already use the us dollar easily online.

Re: Report on Stablecoins [pdf]

#150

Post by alonsonic »

mmaunder wrote: post #142
satellite2 wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have to be careful with your choice of words. Especially on an engineering / science forum. The word "proven" implies a definitive certainty backed by solid theoretical foundation and a massive body of evidence. Very few things are proven in social science and economics. And most of them are simply definition. You are free to express your opinion though, but please mark it as such and make at least a small effort…

This public official laying down rules “you are free to… but please” tone has become commonplace on HN in the past few years. Anyone know the origin? Perhaps a shift in public enthusiasm for controlling speech? Did it start at universities? It seemed to just show up one day around 2018. It’s incredibly distracting.

The audience of hackernews has grown and old users are trying to maintain the culture of the site. The value of this site comes from its community. Let's not turn it into reddit. I personally welcome this type of policing.
Post reply on HN