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Tether starting to lose its peg too, after Terra did

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Re: Tether starting to lose its peg too, after Terra did

#891

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a very natural feedback mechanism to a hot stove. When former world leaders are turning up and crypto conferences and the industry remains largely unregulated, then can you really blame people for investing?

> can you really blame people for investing Yes, you can. You don't have to dig very deep into the crypto world to realize that a lot if not most of the participants have are not plain ol' honest folks making a big ol' mistake giving their hard-earned savings to a slick-talking salesman. They are conscious participants in what they know to be a get-rich quick scheme. They know it is shady, and they don't care, becaus…

> They are conscious participants in what they know to be a get-rich quick scheme.

What do you think the slick-talking salesman was peddling back in the day?

Re: Tether starting to lose its peg too, after Terra did

#892
post #455

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually hate people disavowing themselves of responsibility here. While there is definitely some shady stuff in Crypto (particularly NFTs, which seem to be 99% scams), there's a certain level of personal responsibility required here. People saw the meteoric rise of Bitcoin and got a serious case of FOMO. Everyone wanted to be on the next Bitcoin. This, ultimately, is the American Dream: to get rich by doing nothin…

> I actually hate people disavowing themselves of responsibility here. I believe that everyone should do their own research etc but there's a reason there are laws against fraud. There are a lot of people who would get taken advantage of by the unscrupulous if we just decided that it's all about personal responsibility. Yes people should not have the expectation that they will get rich quick but there is also no reas…

> and honestly I can't see how the possibly could have adequate reserves

Not even close, even now. And the earlier stuff was almost insulting. Like the claim in 2019 that they were depositing $3.5 BILLION, per WEEK, into a bank, a deposit rate that would exceed AT&T, Samsung, Alphabet (Google).

Hah. No. The bank "deputy CEO" (who was 33) in an interview noted that the Bahamas had two banking licenses. But couldn't name them. And in any case, wasn't sure which his bank had, but he knew they had one of them. "And possibly the other".

Re: Tether starting to lose its peg too, after Terra did

#893
post #836

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tether itself is shady and I have my doubts about them, but the concept is simple. You mint some coins and sell them for $1 each. Then watch the exchanges and any time the price is above $1 you mint some coins and sell them. Any time the price is below $1 you buy some coins and burn them. Doing this and only this you should always have more dollars in hand than the amount of coins in circulation.

But why is anyone else buying Tether at above $1 if the entire strategy is based on selling above $1 and buying below $1? You can't just sell something. For someone to sell something someone else needs to buy the same thing. So to be able to execute the strategy correctly, you need an anti-human or anti-robot that always executes the strategy absolutely incorrectly.

>But why is anyone else buying Tether at above $1

If I want to pay Bob $100, I will buy 100 coins, never mind whether they currently cost $0.998 or $1.002 each on my particular exchange.

So the issuer needs to constantly mint or burn tokens to match the market demand in such a way that it stays as close to $1 as possible.[1]

>For someone to sell something someone else needs to buy the same thing.

That someone is not some rando person, that someone is marketmaker whose business is in filling out the orderbook.

[1] https://www.coingecko.com/en/coins/tether – see the chart for market cap, since the tokens costs $1 it is almost the same as the chart of total number of tokens over time

Re: Tether starting to lose its peg too, after Terra did

#894
post #576

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If people cant handle the basic of investing they shouldnt do it. If its too good to be true it mostly isnt. Is it the casino foult that their customers loose money because the ambient is so inviting and screams wining?

Is it the casino foult that their customers loose money Casinos are very strictly regulated and must post the exact rules and probability of winning for all their games. If the casino lies about the rules of the game or your chances of winning, then yes it is absolutely their fault and they will be held liable.

Ever tried asking a Vegas casino manager for the is on any particular slot machine? I did about 10 years ago and was informed they were proprietary.

Re: Tether starting to lose its peg too, after Terra did

#895
post #836

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tether itself is shady and I have my doubts about them, but the concept is simple. You mint some coins and sell them for $1 each. Then watch the exchanges and any time the price is above $1 you mint some coins and sell them. Any time the price is below $1 you buy some coins and burn them. Doing this and only this you should always have more dollars in hand than the amount of coins in circulation.

>any time the price is above $1 you mint some coins and sell them What if you run out of dollars and the price is still above $1?

You don't run out of dollars in this case. Each time you mint a token and sell it, you earn at least a dollar for the treasury.

Re: Tether starting to lose its peg too, after Terra did

#896
post #570

Earlier quoted context omitted.

is that really the dream? I always thought it was just having a normal job, work 9-5 and come home to house/car/family

Back in the 50's maybe! Now everyone are just 'temporarily impoverished billionaires', which is why the whole scam continues to hold itself up.

>'temporarily impoverished billionaires'

The Steinbeck that your are (mis)quoting is from the 30's. Misquote because Steinbeck was talking about how the majority of the ""socialists"" at the time were "most of the so-called Communists I met were middle-class, middle-aged people playing a game of dreams. I remember a woman in easy circumstances saying to another even more affluent: 'After the revolution even we will have more, won't we, dear?'"

So the feeling of entitlement is much older and across political lines.

Re: Tether starting to lose its peg too, after Terra did

#897

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's multi-collateralized, so backed by crypto, but also backed by crypto that is backed by actual paper (ie. USDC counterparty risk) and is overcollateralized (so the backing is more than how much $ DAI there is by a substantial margin - ~166%). It has a number of additional clever tricks to keep the peg (burning MKR, etc.), but unlike Terra is not only clever tricks.

Lol, sounds like the mortgage backed assets before the housing crash. "Back it up with enough securities that are backed up by enough securities that are backed up by enough securities, you will turn the literal shit the eventual security is backed up by into gold".

Most financial instruments are backed by other securities, so it "sounds like" the 2008 crash because it sounds like every financial instrument.

the problem with the crash is that the risk of the junk mortgages was not adequately assessed due to market failure.

Re: Tether starting to lose its peg too, after Terra did

#898
post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah it's a tricky one. It seems obvious that "digital money" is going to be very useful in a lot of ways, and in the future is almost certain to appear. There was a very brief period when bitcoin might have been the start of such a thing. When companies were adding support for it, and people were spending 200+ bitcoin on pizza, actually doing useful things like transferring money internationally, etc. But these days…

Monero still tries to fit in this niche. The only thing it's useful for is financial crime though - if your problem is just making a payment you can do it in dollars relatively easily and safely.

The thing is, one person's crime is another's fight against tyranny/oppression.

Saying someone committed a financial crime depending on jurisdiction can be entirely different things.

And to be frank, I don't buy that financial Total Information Awareness is necessarily a good thing for a society to have.

Re: Tether starting to lose its peg too, after Terra did

#899
post #456

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Statements like this blow my mind . The entire point of Tether is that you can absolutely trust them with $100K, $1M, $10M, or whatever . It's backed, it's robust, it's tethered , and they guarantee payout. The promise is essentially the AAA security of the crypto world, the equivalent to US Treasury bonds or whatever. Meanwhile, the sentiment I keep hearing is yours: "You'd have to be absolutely nuts to trust these…

> But the entire point of Tether hinges on it being perceived as AAA. No, the entire point of Tether hinges on everyone pretending that it's AAA, and just letting the Tether money printer lift all crypto boats. Anyone paying attention knows its a fraud, but are happy to look the other way, because it's the reason BTC is $30K, instead of $600 right now. Sure, they'll lose whatever they have invested at the moment when…

> but if you can't predict when the music will stop, the smart move today is to keep playing.

The smart move while the music is playing is to sell the tickets, not buy an instrument of your own.

It's like selling spades during a gold rush.

Re: Tether starting to lose its peg too, after Terra did

#900

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We need laws protecting people for malicious actors with significant funding who target people that lack knowledge on deeply technical topics like investing.

I get reminded of the crypto.com commercial with Matt Damon that pretends as though buying Bitcoin is some grand adventure for those brave enough and looking to prove their masculinity.

both fiat and bitcoin currencies are purely memes when you really think about it.
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