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$130B wiped off crypto markets in 24 hours

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Re: $130B wiped off crypto markets in 24 hours

#221

Post by melenaboija »

mdavis6890 wrote: post #185
melenaboija wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What’s the difference between “investing” and investing? Maybe that will help me to better understand cryptocurrencies “investors”.

Investing is when you buy something that creates enduring, repeated value over an indefinite period of time, which you can capture without selling the asset itself. Real estate, for example, creates value (a place to live) over a long time, which you can capture either by living there yourself or renting it to someone else - without selling the house. Stock is ownership in a business which creates value over time (sh…

Agree. I personally don’t consider cryptocurrencies as currencies and the comment has few points where I disagree:

- Consider them currencies

- Describing the fact of holding positions on currencies for operational purposes as an investment

- Thinking that cryptocurrencies accomplish the second point

Re: $130B wiped off crypto markets in 24 hours

#222

Post by DarylZero »

dtech wrote: post #100
sschueller wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please explain to me how Bitcoin is a Ponzi scheme while USD after 1971 (going away from the gold standard) is not. More so explain to me how the USD is less of a Ponzi scheme when it is the super wealthy banks/institutions that are getting zero interest loans allowing them to make even more money while at the same time devaluating the currency.

Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies have ~zero inherent value, due to their non-speculation use-cases like payment being very limited or still early development (smart contracts). Unless you count BTC in black market I guess. USD has inherent value, it's the only currency where you can pay taxes in, and if you want to do business with government or government employees - who are ever only paid in USD - you must accept…

By the same logic though, many internet drug dealers only accept BTC.

"Inherent" implies independent of any individual buyer demanding it. Even if the buyer is federal govt.

Re: $130B wiped off crypto markets in 24 hours

#223

Post by ch4s3 »

dtech wrote: post #100
sschueller wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please explain to me how Bitcoin is a Ponzi scheme while USD after 1971 (going away from the gold standard) is not. More so explain to me how the USD is less of a Ponzi scheme when it is the super wealthy banks/institutions that are getting zero interest loans allowing them to make even more money while at the same time devaluating the currency.

Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies have ~zero inherent value, due to their non-speculation use-cases like payment being very limited or still early development (smart contracts). Unless you count BTC in black market I guess. USD has inherent value, it's the only currency where you can pay taxes in, and if you want to do business with government or government employees - who are ever only paid in USD - you must accept…

A Ponzi scheme is a specific type of scam where new investors are lure in with the promise of great returns and portions of their deposits are used by the scammer to pay off early investors who ask to realize some of their returns. The central scammer pockets the difference and eventually runs off with all of the deposits.

Crypto currencies if anything are a bit like distributed pump and dumps, but at that point you're just talking about asset speculation.

Re: $130B wiped off crypto markets in 24 hours

#224

Post by soared »

dandare wrote: post #63
Hokusai wrote: post #12

That's all the point of crypto-currencies, they need to go up and down to enable speculation. Pump and make it go up. Dump and it goes down. Someone is cashing the difference. A stable crypto-currency will not attract so much speculative investment.

A stable crypto-currency will not attract any investment. Crypto is useless for anything but money laundering and speculation.

I’m no crypto fan but this is just incorrect. Stablecoins exist solely to be stable, look at tether.

Re: $130B wiped off crypto markets in 24 hours

#225

Post by eli »

tobrien6 wrote: post #209
smoldesu wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the bigger issue is that Bitcoin has nothing backing it. It's value (and in turn, volatility) is driven by popular demand for the "asset", so even if there is some insane moonshot scenario where we do adopt it into the financial system, there's a very real chance that the price will collapse with little or no chance for recourse. That's the biggest issue, and it's one that's inherent to Bitcoin's nature as a…

It's backed by mathematics instead of a country. That doesn't make it better or worse, just different, and diversity is generally what people want in their portfolio.

It's not backed by mathematics any more than gold is backed by chemistry.

Re: $130B wiped off crypto markets in 24 hours

#226

Post by oldsecondhand »

msy wrote: post #92
ashtonkem wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The idea of a "currency"[0] attracting investment is kinda crazy in its own right. Normally currencies don't attract investment; you can bet on the difference between them, but you usually "invest" (buy) large amounts of it specifically to do business with the country or economic entity that issued it. You buy Euros to do business in the EU, not to "invest" in the currency itself. 0 - Which crypto currencies actually…

Betting on the difference between is done by buying and selling them. I'm no defender of cryptocurrencies but speculation and trading have been a major feature modern forex markets since their inception.

Speculating on Forex is gambling, just like speculating on crypto.

Re: $130B wiped off crypto markets in 24 hours

#227

Post by herbturbo »

LeanderK wrote: post #125

In the past, I've thought of bitcoin as worthless hype but the persistence is impressive. I mean bitcoin just doesn't represent anything and can't be used much, it can just go out in flames and nobody would step up to help those poor crypto-holders. But thinking about other things like gold. Nobody uses gold to pay and while it's used as a resources, people who invest in gold just trust gold to be valuable. Maybe cry…

Difference is that gold is useful/desirable in of itself. That's why it gained value in the first place.

Re: $130B wiped off crypto markets in 24 hours

#228

Post by elif »

rocgf wrote: post #182
elif wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

better than the cult of USD. how's that doing this year? or last year? or the year before? or ever? does it even have a THEORETICAL path to value? I'll take my currently existing and computationally reinforced and yes bubbly increase of value.

What do you mean a "theoretical path to value"? If I understand you correctly, I think you're implying that everything has to be speculative, like currencies too?

No.

I'm implying that a currency should make an effort to maintain its value to be considered a currency. The fundamentals of USD are not backed by a trade surplus or by a demand for foreign reserves, as has been the case for the majority of time since the end of the gold standard. In this context, indefinite QE unsupported by economic growth puts USD in an unprecedented position, and is exposed to runaway inflation.

Re: $130B wiped off crypto markets in 24 hours

#229

Post by lukifer »

choeger wrote: post #193
asimpletune wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I could be wrong about this, but I don't know if the energy requirements have anything to do with the price (I.e. demand) for the coin, does it? I was under the impression that the problems that you have to solve get predictably more difficult, and they're more of a function of time than price. But yes, with your point overall I agree, like in 10 years or something it doesn't seem workable without major changes. Wasn…

Isn't the difficulty tied to the hash rate?

The difficulty does readjust based on the hashrate; but the hashrate is driven by the cost/benefit analysis of hardware and electricity vs. block rewards, meaning as the asset price goes up, more miners are incentivized to join the network.

Re: $130B wiped off crypto markets in 24 hours

#230

Post by Fnoord »

Suchos wrote: post #201
Fnoord wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only for people who invested (I mean, speculated) before 2017. Those who started to speculate when BTC was 50k stepped right into the big pile of poo, and they have the choice to take their losses for current price, or to keep their assets ('HODL'). Either way, it remains speculation.

I jumped in right at 60k fully knowing it will either go to 500k or to zero. I will wait this out whatever happens.

Depending on how much you went into, aside from HODL, that's called YOLO. In general, people spread their assets. So for example, you could speculate some on the stock market, some in cryptocurrencies, etc. If you put all your savings in, and it goes to zero, I feel sorry for your children. Cause there goes their scholarship.
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