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

Bitcoin Fall Extends to 25% as Fears of Crackdown Linger

bloomberg.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

221–230 of 371 posts

Re: Bitcoin Fall Extends to 25% as Fears of Crackdown Linger

#221

Post by FabHK »

gfodor wrote: post #189
lkrubner wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the P/E ratio of Bitcoin? There is none. So there is no rational basis for any price. $1 is as valid as $1 million. There is no traditional way to analyze this investment and figure out its real worth. To the limited extent that Bitcoin helps Chinese citizens out-maneuver the capital controls that the Chinese government has tried to enforce, then it could be analyzed as a shadow of the Chinese currency, but s…

What's the "rational basis" for a specific value of the P/E ratio? There are many stocks that belong to companies that have no mechanisms in place nor could they be reasonably expected to introduce mechanisms to directly return profits to shareholders. These stocks have the same form of "intrinsic value" as gold or Bitcoin: whatever the hell the next person is willing to pay for it. Pretending that an underlying asse…

Glad you asked. P/E ratios can be anchored (with expected earnings growth and a risk premium) to interest rates.

Whether stocks pay dividends or not is not terribly relevant, see Modigliani-Miller.

Thus, share prices are rationally anchored to economic reality. Of course, there's a lot of estimation involved, and people can get it wrong for a while, individually or collectively.

Re: Bitcoin Fall Extends to 25% as Fears of Crackdown Linger

#222

Post by fnord77 »

komali2 wrote: post #94
vthallam wrote: post #7

The last time China explicitly banned Bitcoin, it dropped by around 45% to around $6000. It went on to $20K from there. But what's different this time is that there are first time investors in millions who joined in the last 2 months. They didn't read the white paper, they didn't invest in technology, they invested for the monster returns. So I think there will be a more sell off this time before it rebounds back to…

I love bitcoin and cryptocurrency as potential solutions to problems with gov-controlled currencies (I've used crypto to buy drugs, for example). But I'm still confused why people refer to purchasing currency as an "investment." Obviously the rates are going up now, but doesn't everyone expect them to just come back down? I don't convert my USD to Yen and call it an "investment."

it's useless as a currency while speculators are making its value so volatile. The sooner this bubble pops and the get rich people go away, the better.

Re: Bitcoin Fall Extends to 25% as Fears of Crackdown Linger

#223

Post by saalweachter »

matwood wrote: post #180
vertex-four wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The question is whether people have invested a significant amount of their life savings in bitcoin, not whether they own a significant amount of bitcoin proportional to the total market. For people who have, they may be panicking about how they'll support themselves in their later years, they may have invested in a lifestyle with the expectation that they can pay for it with Bitcoin's growth, and so on and so forth.…

The stats were not just people I know. One of the coin sites pulled them together. If 3k is a significant amount of someone's life savings, then they should not have put in BTC. Proportional to the total market is important because it puts into perspective how few people will really be impacted, and if it is something that could spread into the economy as a whole. Found the stats: https://coinspectator.com/news/12799…

> If 3k is a significant amount of someone's life savings, then they should not have put in BTC.

Is that an appeal to consequences or did you have a different point?

Re: Bitcoin Fall Extends to 25% as Fears of Crackdown Linger

#224

Post by xur17 »

slindz wrote: post #185
matthewbauer wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But what makes you think BCH is the one? You might like my soon to be released coin Bitcoin Cash Cash. Fees will be 0!

It's a collection of everybody who made Bitcoin great to begin with. Great community. I believe it's a bunch of doers and not talkers. Fees are less than a penny. System works great, like Bitcoin used to.

I'm curious, and I haven't found the answer yet - what's the scaling plan if Bitcoin Cash runs out of block room? Just keep increasing the size? Is there an upper limit before the chain increases in size too quickly to be sustainable?

Re: Bitcoin Fall Extends to 25% as Fears of Crackdown Linger

#225

Post by lsaferite »

philipov wrote: post #198
Jtsummers wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, there is actual forex investing (speculating). For instance, the value of the USD versus the Argentine Peso (ARS) is something I track (my girlfriend lives there and long term I would consider moving there, current plan is for her to move here). The USD to ARS conversion is increasingly favorable for the USD, the buying power of ARS hasn't dropped significantly (in country) but the USD is worth more ARS now tha…

I believe strongly that the word 'invest' should be used to distinguish one's activities from speculation, rather than be a superclass of it. Discourse is poisoned when people promote semantic overlap and create ambiguity, rather than using words to create meaningful distinctions. Investing is what you do when you're not merely speculating on short-term returns, but are instead focused on long-term value creation. It…

Unless you are part of an IPO or are buying newly issued stock you are also speculating on stocks when you buy them.

Note: Not a finance person, just a personal opinion.

Re: Bitcoin Fall Extends to 25% as Fears of Crackdown Linger

#226

Post by svachalek »

gfodor wrote: post #189
lkrubner wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the P/E ratio of Bitcoin? There is none. So there is no rational basis for any price. $1 is as valid as $1 million. There is no traditional way to analyze this investment and figure out its real worth. To the limited extent that Bitcoin helps Chinese citizens out-maneuver the capital controls that the Chinese government has tried to enforce, then it could be analyzed as a shadow of the Chinese currency, but s…

What's the "rational basis" for a specific value of the P/E ratio? There are many stocks that belong to companies that have no mechanisms in place nor could they be reasonably expected to introduce mechanisms to directly return profits to shareholders. These stocks have the same form of "intrinsic value" as gold or Bitcoin: whatever the hell the next person is willing to pay for it. Pretending that an underlying asse…

Even if a stock does not return dividends, it still represents a share of ownership in the company. It has a real value to anyone who might want to purchase a controlling share in the company, value in reasonable proportion to the profit or profit potential of the company.

From that perspective, taking control of Bitcoin may have a measurable monetary value but as I understand the system the value isn't in the coins, it's in the miners.

Re: Bitcoin Fall Extends to 25% as Fears of Crackdown Linger

#227

Post by klipt »

flashmob wrote: post #213
dudus wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Holy Shit, are they just trying to print out tethers out of thin air right now to pump Bitcoin? And it seems to be working, at least for now. This can't end up well.

> Holy Shit, are they just trying to print out tethers out of thin air right now to pump Bitcoin? That's the line I often see on Twitter / Reddit and usually gets a lot of upvotes, despite being irrational, with no proof to back it up. As bitcoin falls, the demand for Tethers goes up. To keep Tethers pegged to, say, $1 USD, they need issue more to meet the demand, which would be a more rational explanation why more w…

> As bitcoin falls, the demand for Tethers goes up.

Or maybe people want USD, but the exchange forces them to go through Tether to get there. So there'll be a brief demand for Tethers, then a big selloff of Tether for USD.

Re: Bitcoin Fall Extends to 25% as Fears of Crackdown Linger

#228

Post by nkkollaw »

m3kw9 wrote: post #194

So let me get this straight. Gold can be compared to bitcoins in terms of scarcity and and store of value. But bitcoin itself is in practical term a proof of concept technology that is only useful when applied properly in another block chain. While gold actually has great uses. Can i say if you are investing in bitcoin, you are basically investing in equivalent a scarce physical paper with not a whole lot of use?

Comparing gold with Bitcoin is weird. People invest in gold because its values is very stable, obviously Bitcoin's isn't :-)

Re: Bitcoin Fall Extends to 25% as Fears of Crackdown Linger

#229

Post by Retra »

halbritt wrote: post #195
perseusprime11 wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“entire near-future automated economy depends on programmable money” It also depends on banks and states signing up to that vision. We have seen zero adoption on that front. On top of that, it still does not explain the hundreds of alt coins.

Banks are rapidly trying to adopt the use of blockchain.

Successful use of blockchain is not the same as successful cryptocurrency.

Re: Bitcoin Fall Extends to 25% as Fears of Crackdown Linger

#230

Post by euyyn »

gruez wrote: post #125
bdcravens wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The suicide prevention hotline is pinned to the top of cryptocurrency subreddits Which ones? I checked r/bitcoin, r/btc, r/ethereum, r/litecoin, r/bitcoinmarkets. Only one I saw with it was r/cryptocurrency

it's a rumor/meme. supposedly during the last crash, r/bitcoin had the suicide hotline pinned, but i wasn't able to confirm that on archive.org either.

It's not a rumor, just saw it today and is why I guessed the values might have dropped.
Post reply on HN