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Coinbase is launching support for the USDC stablecoin

blog.coinbase.com

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Re: Coinbase is launching support for the USDC stablecoin

#241

Post by DINKDINK »

oropolo wrote: post #235

"Digital dollars?" We already have that -- it's called the US Dollar. Only 10% of the USD money supply is in physical paper or coin form. I receive my wages electronically and pay my mortgage, car payment, insurance, student loan, and buy groceries and entertainment without ever touching printed/minted money. And I suspect I'm in the majority on this point.

Digital dollar != a programmable digital dollar. It's like bitcoin, but will all the downsides of the dollar (endlessly inflating) + all the fragility and throughput constraints and centralization risks of ethereum.

Re: Coinbase is launching support for the USDC stablecoin

#242

Post by beaner »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #190
beaner wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A system which makes no distinction between any of these use cases and treats them all the same sounds very appealing to me.

> A system which makes no distinction between any of these use cases and treats them all the same sounds very appealing to me It's a bad compromise. If you want the cheapest transfers, you batch them. (This is the logic of Lightning.) If you want the most reliable transfer, you wire it. If you want to be sneaky, you use cash. (There are other reasons to use these modes.) Batching being cheaper and slower than RTGS is…

That modern economics has programmed in accountability for slow, large payments doesn't mean the system wouldn't be better off if it changed.

Re: Coinbase is launching support for the USDC stablecoin

#243

Post by reidjs »

jf- wrote: post #138
donatj wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like cash?

Hmm. So you can’t see any differences between a flash drive and cash? If you withdrew your life savings in cash, that cash couldn’t become corrupted, unless by physical damage. Your life savings in cash would also be large enough that you wouldn’t be likely to lose it, or have the container it sits in easily stolen or accidentally smashed. You also are not very likely to forget or misplace the password to your cash.…

If I had my life savings on a flash drive I think I could keep track of it pretty well. The nice thing about crypto wallets is you can replicate the secret key indefinitely. So, even if the drive is stolen you still have a password protected backup. If the cash is stolen, well, possession is 9/10s the law ;).

Re: Coinbase is launching support for the USDC stablecoin

#244

Post by briatx »

lawn wrote: post #199
hudon wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why the hell would I buy Bitcoin to buy stuff on Amazon through a proxy site that sells my BTC for me instead of just... buying on Amazon like a normal person? BTC will be way slower and more expensive than just using my credit card... Plus Visa will refund me in the case of fraud. Like I side, speculation is the only thing you buy BTC for (moon!!!111), and the exchanges will prevent you from doing this if you are re…

> Why the hell would I buy Bitcoin to buy stuff on Amazon through a proxy site Because they give discounts up to 15%. I'm sorry it doesn't fit your narrative but there are reasons to prefer cryptocurrencies.

Like a lot of the crypto currency space purse.io is shady and likely promoting thinly veiled money laundering.

Ask yourself if the discount is worth the risk of experiences like this:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/4zczow/my_experien...

Re: Coinbase is launching support for the USDC stablecoin

#246

Post by leppr »

Permit wrote: post #11

Stablecoins seem like they would achieve most of the goals of the original cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin: - Decentralized transactions - 24/7 access - Low fees - Store of value I suppose the only drawback here is that they're issued from a centralized authority. That said, for practical purposes the vast majority of Bitcoin holders didn't mine their own coins either. Despite this, no one on Twitter[1] seemed excit…

> I suppose the only drawback here is that they're issued from a centralized authority.

That's only true for this type of "vouchers" stablecoins, where coins are redeemable for some physical asset.

There are whole other classes of stablecoins that seek to achieve price stability through decentralized means, either using other cryptocurrencies as collateral[1], or using algorithmic bond-issuance mechanisms[2]. Multicoin did an in-depth article about this back in January[3].

>Despite this, no one on Twitter seemed excited. [...] A cryptocurrency that stays the same value is not very interesting to traders and therefore most of the cryptocurrency community.

That's the thing, the "cryptocurrency community" is currently overwhelmingly comprised of loud investors and ICO marketers. The way smaller and discreet nucleus of researchers, developers and idealists, you don't see replying to Coinbase tweets and hanging out in Reddit.

There's no mainstream usecase for cryptocurrencies as they are now, so the "enthusiastic users" community you see in more established fields doesn't really exist yet.

[1] https://vimeo.com/247715549

[2] https://www.basis.io/basis_whitepaper_en.pdf

[3] https://multicoin.capital/2018/01/17/an-overview-of-stableco...

Re: Coinbase is launching support for the USDC stablecoin

#247

Post by minderasure »

jessepollak wrote: post #107

Hi all — head of engineering for the consumer product at Coinbase here (iOS, Android, coinbase.com). Happy to answer any questions that people have — also, just wanted to make a plug that we're hiring. If you're interested in building an open financial system for the world, shoot me a note at jpollak@coinbase.com. Especially interested in iOS & Android engineers!

If you actually cared about an Open Financial System you would list Dai on Coinbase. Centralized stablecoins allowing issuers to freeze and blacklist is a step backwards not forwards.

Re: Coinbase is launching support for the USDC stablecoin

#248

Post by snark42 »

a_t48 wrote: post #234
hudon wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, you misread. "et cetera" is latin for "and the rest"... I put that there because exchanges are all tied. A ban on one leads to a ban on another, depending on the severity of your crime. > There's nothing preventing you from taking your BTC to some other exchange I've already showed you that exchanges can freeze your assets, so yes they can prevent you from sending to other exchanges. > some guy that accepts BTC f…

Can’t you just do a private transfer to a fresh wallet?

You might have to tumble it first.

Re: Coinbase is launching support for the USDC stablecoin

#249

Post by SuddsMcDuff »

hudon wrote: post #215
plankers wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your original point was that _Coinbase and Gemeni_ had prevented you from exchanging your BTC for fiat currency. There's nothing preventing you from taking your BTC to some other exchange, or just some guy that accepts BTC for goods or services. That's the beauty of this whole decentralized thing.

No, you misread. "et cetera" is latin for "and the rest"... I put that there because exchanges are all tied. A ban on one leads to a ban on another, depending on the severity of your crime. > There's nothing preventing you from taking your BTC to some other exchange I've already showed you that exchanges can freeze your assets, so yes they can prevent you from sending to other exchanges. > some guy that accepts BTC f…

> "I've already showed you that exchanges can freeze your assets"

Your point is well taken, however it needs to be made clear: exchanges can only freeze those assets which you yourself have placed in their control.

Re: Coinbase is launching support for the USDC stablecoin

#250

Post by minderasure »

jdoliner wrote: post #212
anders94 wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Circle holds one dollar for every dollar minted, we do not run a fractional reserve. The CENTRE Consortium holds minters (of which Circle is one) to strict auditing requirements. While this information is regularly published, you can see all minting and burning operations (as well as all transfers and other token operations) in realtime on the Ethereum blockchain. See etherscan: https://etherscan.io/address/0xa0b8699…

Thanks for the quick answer, this all makes sense. Does this get limiting at all, in terms of wanting to mint new coins and not having the capital to do so?

That's like saying isn't it a bummer I cant just print money out of thin air to buy stuff. The whole point is to give people faith and trust in the stablecoin exactly because thie issuance process relies on locking up 1 USD.
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