I read a post on a crypto forum yesterday:
"I dont care about your research. Pump my bags, racial slur"
That is the level of thinking of many of these folks, i fear.
Cryptocurrency scams cost owners $7.7B in 2021, driven by DeFi-based “rug pulls”
131–140 of 364 posts
Re: Cryptocurrency scams cost owners $7.7B in 2021, driven by DeFi-based “rug pulls”
#132These are not cryptocurrency scams. They are financial scams. They take place almost %100 off any blockchain. Since ~2015 there has not been a new cryptocurrency of consequence. They're all just complex financial scams with nothing to do with cryptocurrency except the name (which attracts people to fleece).
No, these scams and the $7.7B are going into the pockets of the normal group of capitalists.
Re: Cryptocurrency scams cost owners $7.7B in 2021, driven by DeFi-based “rug pulls”
#133In related news, Tether has minted $3B USDT in the last month: https://beincrypto.com/tether-mints-three-billion-usdt-past-...
Yes, and although likely a scam, here's another datapoint: Coinbase, an Y combinator unicorn, is behind Centre/Circle and the USDC stable coin. And there are now $41.5 bn USDC circulating. At one point it was billion of USDT circulating and USDC didn't exist yet. Then USDC began to took off and there were, out of memory, $5 bn USDC and $23 bn USDT. But, overall, the trajectory is clear: USDC is growing faster than US…
Issuing stablecoins isn't a scam by itself. The whole crypto ecosystem cashflow is the real scam. There is no liquidity. All it takes is a few people that panic and the whole thing falls apart, UNLESS there is someone ready to print money and prop up the market when panic sets in. That is why people need to understand what is going on with Tether. Bernie Madoff got shutdown because a whistle blower got the SEC to look at his books. If tether gets shutdown and no one is propibg up the market, it will crash hard.
Re: Cryptocurrency scams cost owners $7.7B in 2021, driven by DeFi-based “rug pulls”
#134The “I have no sympathy for the victims” comments are crass. But there is a legitimate question of how much law enforcement these crimes deserve. Arizona has a stupid motorists law [1]. If a car “becomes stranded after driving around barricades to enter a flooded stretch of roadway,” the driver “may be charged for the cost of their rescue.” A similar concept for crypto may be necessary. Law enforcement will pursue. B…
> The “I have no sympathy for the victims” comments are crass. No, they're not. They're entirely reasonable. Stop trying to shame people for expressing a common, reasonable and fair opinion that you don't like.
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Re: Cryptocurrency scams cost owners $7.7B in 2021, driven by DeFi-based “rug pulls”
#135This is my biggest complaint against cryptocurrencies in general. I'm happy with my bank's fraud protection. How can crypto users protect themselves without recreating traditional banking? Bitcoin was released ~13 years ago, and wallet/transaction security has been one of the most important requirements since then (along with scalability, but let's not go there). If trillion dollar market caps and god-knows-how-many…
your bank fraud protection doesn't prevent the bank from losing money. banks lose a lot of money to fraud and nobody is prosecuted. from my perspective, you are comparing a user experience that has nothing to do with the technology. a bank is a third party service providing custody to bearer instruments. a future financial institution will be a third party service providing custody or other protections to your crypto…
> banks lose a lot of money to fraud and nobody is prosecuted.
That's true some times, but then it works like an insurance policy to me. I like insurance, especially when it's about my life savings.
> a future financial institution will be a third party service providing custody or other protections to your crypto bearer instruments.
As you mentioned, that's a bank. There's no reason to believe that crypto-based banks will be any better than traditional ones, especially if you compare to newer fintechs.
> many people get paid back after being scammed, rug pulled, exploited
I was not aware of that, thank you. But it's still too few compare to the whole.
Re: Cryptocurrency scams cost owners $7.7B in 2021, driven by DeFi-based “rug pulls”
#136Earlier quoted context omitted.
Everyone should be worried about that, and if your suggestion is to use exchanges, that just makes them de-facto banks. Now you have a traditional banking system on top of a slow and expensive settlement layer.
Slow and expensive is relative… try transferring money internationally.
Is that really that true any more? From my podunk credit union I have used SWIFT to send overseas and it took under a minute and cost me $20. That's both faster and cheaper than Ethereum transactions. It's costlier than Bitcoin but not that much, and still faster. And that's wire transfer, the expensive bank to bank option... Western Union has been faster than Bitcoin for decades and cheaper for probably a decade now.
The huge popularity of crypto is really eroding the tx capacity advantage.
And even in the backwards US, ACH can now settle later same day and it's free. That makes BTC a lot less attractive.
Re: Cryptocurrency scams cost owners $7.7B in 2021, driven by DeFi-based “rug pulls”
#137The “I have no sympathy for the victims” comments are crass. But there is a legitimate question of how much law enforcement these crimes deserve. Arizona has a stupid motorists law [1]. If a car “becomes stranded after driving around barricades to enter a flooded stretch of roadway,” the driver “may be charged for the cost of their rescue.” A similar concept for crypto may be necessary. Law enforcement will pursue. B…
> The “I have no sympathy for the victims” comments are crass. No, they're not. They're entirely reasonable. Stop trying to shame people for expressing a common, reasonable and fair opinion that you don't like.
>Stop trying to shame people for expressing a common, reasonable and fair opinion that you don't like.
I realize the dangers of posting something remotely pro-crypto on HN, but I have to say this is a pretty rich comment. Shame is all that is doled out to the many people who have reasonable and fair opinions about cryptocurrency that you don't like (such as thinking some cryptocurrencies are reasonable or worth speculating over).
Re: Cryptocurrency scams cost owners $7.7B in 2021, driven by DeFi-based “rug pulls”
#138Earlier quoted context omitted.
Technical hacks against the protocol and implementations are fair game, and is the implicit incentive that balances the market. Social engineering and financial hacks are not fair game, and are "illicit" in the sense that crypto is obviously an international martial zone. Exhaustively brute forcing a keyspace is valid, making your username an XSS to steal funds from an insecure page/downstream app is not valid. Findi…
You obviously don't understand basic contract law. US Civil courts routinely apply the principle of equity when interpreting written contracts. Loopholes and errors are disregarded when they violate the clear intent of the agreement.
>routinely
And they routinely admit that some cases are not clear cut. But crypto has no grey zones, by design - you either have the keys, or you don't. And that is the explicit agreement code-contract signers agree to when they go out of their way to DeFi their agreements.
Obviously legal precedents and statutes are not fitted for this purpose yet, because they are reactive, not proactive.
Re: Cryptocurrency scams cost owners $7.7B in 2021, driven by DeFi-based “rug pulls”
#139Earlier quoted context omitted.
lol sure if that helps you sleep at night about the decisions you've made in your life thus far. it's not hyperbolic, there is a lot of liquidity in this multi trillion dollar market. although if you're asking this question, the next point might dilute my prior point to you, but a reality is that many people aren't seeking fiat. They don't want dollars. They want more crypto. For physical goods and services there are…
> lol sure if that helps you sleep at night about the decisions you've made in your life thus far. Why was this necessary to say at all?
because it requires introspection, its intentionally a dig at people that rationalize why someone's windfall is "not actually a windfall"
like the people who say
"$X is not that much these days" (it is and they want it)
"That billionaire doesn't really have that much money" (billionaire then sells 10% of their holdings in 3 days for billions of USD)
"What about after taxes?" (pay for an accountant, you'll see its better than you think)
and the reality is that liquidity changes faster than the culture. especially across all markets over the last 2 years. so its time to force that introspection.
Re: Cryptocurrency scams cost owners $7.7B in 2021, driven by DeFi-based “rug pulls”
#140The “I have no sympathy for the victims” comments are crass. But there is a legitimate question of how much law enforcement these crimes deserve. Arizona has a stupid motorists law [1]. If a car “becomes stranded after driving around barricades to enter a flooded stretch of roadway,” the driver “may be charged for the cost of their rescue.” A similar concept for crypto may be necessary. Law enforcement will pursue. B…
> The “I have no sympathy for the victims” comments are crass. No, they're not. They're entirely reasonable. Stop trying to shame people for expressing a common, reasonable and fair opinion that you don't like.
yes i'll be sure to have no sympathy for your grandmother the next time she gets robbed by scammers