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BitConnect Closes Exchange as States Warn of Unregulated Sales

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Re: BitConnect Closes Exchange as States Warn of Unregulated Sales

#131

Post by JumpCrisscross »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #121
daemin wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I got told this from a friend that studied law (but is not a lawyer). That to put a disclaimer of "I am not a lawyer" when giving opinion about legal matters is so that they will not be prohibited from practising law in the future, or prosecuted for misrepresenting or impersonating a lawyer. I guess someone that has studied law more or is an actual lawyer can weigh in on this in an unofficial capacity (because we are…

I always assumed that the "this is not legal advice" part (and similarly, "this is not medical advice") are meaningfully used by actual lawyers (or doctors), so that you can't sue them for malpractice over something they said that was tangentially related to what they do for a living.

It’s less CYA than a reminder that one should seek legal advice if the subject matter is personally relevant. I would hate for someone, who watched a YouTube video and then lost more than they could afford to BitConnect, to mis-step because they mistook my Internet comments for authoritative advice versus banter and commentary.

Re: BitConnect Closes Exchange as States Warn of Unregulated Sales

#132

Post by skrebbel »

Y_Y wrote: post #106
aiCeivi9 wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is disclosing yourself as not a lawyer enough to excuse from giving legal advice?

It's nonsense about letting people claim they thought you were their lawyer. Like the myth about cops not being allowed to lie about being cops. I am a lawyer, this is legal advice and you are now my client

Comments like these makes me sad I don't get a monthly supply of extra upvotes.

Re: BitConnect Closes Exchange as States Warn of Unregulated Sales

#133

Post by rplnt »

ce4 wrote: post #61
idbehold wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The pyramid was literally on the Bitconnect FAQ page: https://youtu.be/wK0ztRcXvNQ?t=135

Video was deleted by the user. Any other source?

Not sure, but this is what I've found:

https://bitconnect.com/images/referal_bonus.png

Re: BitConnect Closes Exchange as States Warn of Unregulated Sales

#134

Post by trophycase »

spookthesunset wrote: post #44
saalweachter wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, this being the internet, it could have started as a tongue in cheek joke and then when the money started rolling in the founders just kind of went with it. Which I think is a potential lesson for HN readers: something can be funny, but still be fraud.

No. My USDT is on them deliberately putting that crap on the site in order to weed out anybody with a functioning brain. It's kinda like Nigerian prince scammer emails are full of deliberate grammar and spelling errors. You gotta filter out the noise in your conversion funnel. Lots of crypto-coin stuff, including virtually all "name brand" crypto's, do the same thing. Most of the marketing is full of complete politic…

Email scammers lose time if they don't quickly eliminate bad targets. Ponzi schemes have no such issues.

Re: BitConnect Closes Exchange as States Warn of Unregulated Sales

#135

Post by Yizahi »

glenneroo wrote: post #120
spookthesunset wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For starters, they don't deal in USD at all. They deal in "USDT", which isn't at all USD but a token called a tether that is somehow magically supposed to be pegged so 1 USDT == 1USD that you can... well... I dunno what you can do with a tether but one thing you can't do is turn it into actual fiat money on Bitfinex. You might be able to convert it to cold hard fiat on some other exchange though, but odds are good sa…

Poloniex and Binance let you convert to/from Tether (USDT). Do you consider Poloniex or Binance to be sketchy?

You forgot Bittrex.

Re: BitConnect Closes Exchange as States Warn of Unregulated Sales

#136

Post by sitepodmatt »

mcintyre1994 wrote: post #123
Alex3917 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tether just hit a new all time high of $1.07, making the return on investment significantly better than most VC funds.

Isn't the entire point of it to be pegged 1USDT === 1USD? Obviously it fails at that by being backed by nothing like enough USD, but what does it being worth $1.07 even mean? Also, where do you sell Tethers given Bitfinex won't exchange them for USD?

You can't without difficulty, you have to convert them to BTC or ETH and send them to Coinbase or other reputable exchange then cash out in fiat, in a window where all three securities wallets at respective exchanges aren't in maintenance, network isn't blocked by cryptokittes, and you've passed all AML/KYC including possibly justifying where incoming has came from. There are a lot of people that will find cashing out to fiat very difficult hence why some are parking in Tethers even though they aware of the dubious nature, and thus tether is trading at greater than a dollar. Personally, I wouldn't want to touch tether even for a few minutes, as sod's law it would be my luck that Securities & Futures Commission of Hong Kong or Hong Kong police decide to act just at that moment I buy tethers (well technically the problem will be once it's on TV and value drops to 0).

Re: BitConnect Closes Exchange as States Warn of Unregulated Sales

#137

Post by cfontes »

toomanybeersies wrote: post #59
StavrosK wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know a few people who fell for this, despite my warnings. When you tell someone "these returns are astronomical, teams of PhDs in hedge funds cannot come anywhere close, do you think they're so dumb that they wouldn't put billions in this if it were legitimate" and they reply "yes, I do", there's no helping them.

People love to think they're smarter than those 'experts'. It's a combination of Tall Poppy Syndrome [1] and the Dunning-Kruger Effect [2] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tall_poppy_syndrome [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect

You can add to that that "experts" are pretty clueless as well, 2000 and 2008 are reminders of that. Close to none saw it coming and the ones that did where laughing stock amongst them, you have to be a pretty remarkable person to swim against National bank presidents, government officials and other high ranking people like Alan Greenspan, that was a super respected economist but also has made some of the worst mistakes in history of the world economy and still has power to swing things around I really distrust any finance specialist, but I am also aware that if any high yield information ever reaches me it's either a crime or a scheme to take my money away from me. So it's tricky.

Re: BitConnect Closes Exchange as States Warn of Unregulated Sales

#138

Post by Yizahi »

arethuza wrote: post #125
csomar wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They don't really "print" a $200million. Finex explanation is that when a user requests USDT they issue new USDT from their USD reserves.

You really believe they added $200million to their USD reserves to cover the USDT? Edit: Where would they get that USD?

With a dump truck full of unmarked dollars in small denominations in some dark Bangkok alley, provided by generous institutional investor. Obviously.

Re: BitConnect Closes Exchange as States Warn of Unregulated Sales

#139

Post by trophycase »

mcintyre1994 wrote: post #123
Alex3917 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tether just hit a new all time high of $1.07, making the return on investment significantly better than most VC funds.

Isn't the entire point of it to be pegged 1USDT === 1USD? Obviously it fails at that by being backed by nothing like enough USD, but what does it being worth $1.07 even mean? Also, where do you sell Tethers given Bitfinex won't exchange them for USD?

Buy BTC with tether, send to GDAX. Sell BTC for real USD

Re: BitConnect Closes Exchange as States Warn of Unregulated Sales

#140

Post by sitepodmatt »

trophycase wrote: post #139
mcintyre1994 wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't the entire point of it to be pegged 1USDT === 1USD? Obviously it fails at that by being backed by nothing like enough USD, but what does it being worth $1.07 even mean? Also, where do you sell Tethers given Bitfinex won't exchange them for USD?

Buy BTC with tether, send to GDAX. Sell BTC for real USD

ETH is cheaper, due to transaction fees, although spread might be a little larger.
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