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

Bitcoin breaks $200

coinbase.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

161–170 of 209 posts

Re: Bitcoin breaks $200

#161

Post by cturner »

_3u10 wrote: post #75
csomar wrote: post #36

If anything to like about Bitcoin is that it has proved that almost everyone else is wrong. * SilkRoad shutting down? Bitcoin is doomed. * Mt.gox is not paying in time or at all? Bitcoin doesn't work. * Asics? There will be a flood of new coins. And yet Bitcoin value continue to raise. If history repeats itself, we should see 1 Bitcoin levels at around $2,000. I think Bitcoin is an interesting phenomena to watch. Bei…

> And yet Bitcoin value continue to raise. If history repeats itself, we should see 1 Bitcoin levels at around $2,000. It's 2007 I have a house I bought for $300,000 which is now worth $600,000, would you like to buy my house and in two years you will make another $600,000? If there's one thing about real estate in the last 10 years it's that it's proven all those naysayers like Shiller wrong.

What strange times we live in where a leisure boat can be talked about as investment!

Re: Bitcoin breaks $200

#162

Post by wmf »

gweinberg wrote: post #141
wmf wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Miners have zero incentive to sell their bitcoins for less than the cost of producing them. Unless bills are due and the credit card is already maxed out.

I think the parent meant that miners have zero incentive to produce bitcoins if they can't sell them for at least the production costs. Even if they sunk a big pile of money into their mining rigs, if they can't sell the coins for the marginal cost of producing them, continuing to mine is just throwing good money after bad.

I was talking more about depreciation of capex than marginal cost. Almost all ASIC owners are facing losses and some of them are inventing rationalizations like the idea that they can force the price up by not selling (even though the price cannot affect the mine vs. buy tradeoff).

Re: Bitcoin breaks $200

#163

Post by reginaldjcooper »

Phlarp wrote: post #152
gwern wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There isn't any conclusive proof that the #1 address (111,111 BTC) belongs to DPR, but it is clearly linked to SR in one way or another. It's been linked to Ross/altoid's Bitcointalk posts, and has a sum consistent with the first year of SR commissions. That's all as conclusive evidence as anyone needs for it.

So what happens when you remove 1% of the currency from the market in a single day?

"I apologize, Goldfinger. It's an inspired deal!"

Re: Bitcoin breaks $200

#164

Post by jaekwon »

Phlarp wrote: post #137
jaekwon wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which ones? DPR's personal wallet is still intact.

That completely depends on how they were stored. If the FBI has his encrypted wallet file and DPR has the password to access those keys then the coins are effectively dead don't you think?

Of course not. Only he can unlock his coins, and he can use them as a bargaining chip.

Re: Bitcoin breaks $200

#165

Post by skriticos2 »

mrtron wrote: post #155
skriticos2 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People care about Bitcoin. They don't care about other variants much. This gives Bitcoin value and not the other variants. In other words, creating another blockchain is easy but convincing enough people that the variant coins are worth something is hard. Very hard.

People care about tulips. They don't care about other variants much. This gives tulips value and not the other variants. Both are true statements.

Three things:

1. Bitcoin has good utility value as a currency. You can transfer it to anywhere on the planet, it's decentralized and has a monetary base cap. Tulips are de-cetnralized at best, but are otherwise quite a bad currency.

2. The tulip mania lasted only one season. It went up, peaked and then crashed. Bitcoin is closing it's fifth season and it had several major dips of which it came out stronger than it was before. Absolutely no similarity here.

3. This is getting old. Come up with something new please, will ya?

Re: Bitcoin breaks $200

#166

Post by phaemon »

MarcusBrutus wrote: post #101

Bitcoin is fiat, it's not backed by anything of real value and doesn't have a government or a strong (and I mean national-government-kind strong) player behind it that is willing to devote actual resources to prop it up (which is what all other fiat monies have and which is why they usually stay around for a century or so, after that they either become obsolete or their value greatly diminishes due to inflation). It…

That's not what the word "fiat" means. A fiat is a decree. An order given by an authority. In currency terms, this usually means a decree given by a government that a certain currency will be used.

It makes no sense to say "Bitcoin is fiat" and then to say it doesn't have any government or strong player behind it. It's one or the other.

Re: Bitcoin breaks $200

#167

Post by mrb »

TylerE wrote: post #65
meowface wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The difference though is that Enron insiders were engaging in immoral and illegal activities. Bitcoin on the other hand is provably not a scam; it is an existing and backed commodity. Market manipulation as an insider is impossible, as there are no insiders; manipulation is only possible by attacking infrastructure or accumulating enough BTC. Future bubbles and crashes are likely, but I predict it's going to continue…

Really? What happens when the founders who mined hundreds of thousands of coins in the early days cash out?

Your fears are unfounded.

2 million coins were sold in the last 30 days: http://bitcoinity.org/markets/list?currency=ALL&span=30d and yet the price rose from $130 to $200... So a few extra "hundreds of thousands" of coins being sold would not have been able to significantly decrease the exchange rate.

Re: Bitcoin breaks $200

#168

Post by aaren »

wmf wrote: post #90
betterunix wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"convincing enough people that the variant coins are worth something is hard. Very hard." Somehow, people managed to be convinced that Bitcoin was worth something back in 2009. What makes the current situation different? Whatever convinced people that Bitcoin had any value in the first place might convince people that some new alternative you started this morning has some value.

Obviously an altcoin would have to be as much better than Bitcoin (in the ways people care about) as Bitcoin was better than the preceding stuff. A system that is decentralized and doesn't require mining could have this property.

How would coins become valued without mining? Isn't this the way that bitcoins actually become valued in terms of existing currency?

Re: Bitcoin breaks $200

#169

Post by aaren »

saalweachter wrote: post #148
gweinberg wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the parent meant that miners have zero incentive to produce bitcoins if they can't sell them for at least the production costs. Even if they sunk a big pile of money into their mining rigs, if they can't sell the coins for the marginal cost of producing them, continuing to mine is just throwing good money after bad.

Yeah, the word for businessmen who sell goods at less than the cost to produce them is "bankrupt". I don't doubt more than a few miners have lost quite a bit of money selling below cost -- probably most without realizing it -- but I have to assume they have all been weeded out by now, given the notorious fierceness of the mining world. Selling BTC below cost might help stave off bankruptcy for one billing cycle, but…

If selling under cost makes the difference between being $10000 in debt and $1000 in debt then it matters. The latter is much easier to deal with on a personal level, because individuals tend to have support networks / savings.

I'm guessing here, but I think mining is currently on the level of individuals and not corporations.

Re: Bitcoin breaks $200

#170

Post by saym »

Phlarp wrote: post #138
sktrdie wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those are all risks that come with using Bitcoin. I'm sure with time we'll see lots of improvements. For now a good way to store coins is by using paper wallets: http://www.bitaddress.org/ -you can print them yourself using any printer. Some say your keys shouldn't even be on any computer until you're ready to use them. But for the rest Bitcoin is like cash. You lose the key you lose the cash.

Most times when one person "loses" cash another person "finds" it, leaving the money supply unchanged. When a private key is lost all the coins in that wallet are lost effectively forever. If this happens with large accounts the potential for it to effect the overall economy cannot be ignored.

What would the effect be?
Post reply on HN