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Fintech dystopia

fintechdystopia.com

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Re: Fintech dystopia

#251

Post by derangedHorse »

fireflash38 wrote: post #199
nlitened wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Expensive relative to what? When people are rescuing their hard-earned savings of 200k USD out of a third-world country, they would be happy to pay even double-digit per cent commissions, and crypto is much, much cheaper, faster and safer than all other available options. Of course, if you're a US citizen transferring 200k USD from Chase to Bank of America, crypto doesn't make any sense.

Who are these people in 3rd world countries that have 200k USD cash? You make it sound like they've scrounged to make it happen... But its far far more likely to be people either trying to wash the money or they were from less than legitimate sources. Definitely not lower class people like you seem to imply (or perhaps I'm just reading into it?)

He didn't imply he was referring to "lower class people." He's referring to people who have savings in countries with volatile currencies. Even for $100, having a stablecoin reserve can be a saving grace. Especially when trying to find asylum elsewhere.

Re: Fintech dystopia

#252

Post by Herring »

voxl wrote: post #243
jodrellblank wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> " the Hilary Clinton scandal fiascos " "Why do you see the speck in your neighbour's eye, but do not notice the plank in your own eye?"

The lack of critical thinking skills on the internet never ceases to amaze me, like you having the gall to think Hilary Clinton and Barack Obama are anywhere close to having similar controversy surrounding their political careers.

It's not a factual statement. It's like saying "your mom's a whore". Showing her tax returns won't help.

The correct response is to just ignore/abandon them, which actually pisses off narcissists more than you know.

Re: Fintech dystopia

#253

Post by nojvek »

I agree on most points with the author, but stablecoins have fundamental value to countries that are not US whose currency gets devalued faster than US dollar, or want to do cross border transaction.

USD has its own woes with inflation and trade wars so fundamentally isn't stable, compared to say gold. Other currencies have runaway inflation or much higher friction to transact.

However the promise of stablecoin is that it can be exchanged 1:1 with USD with transaction fees much lower than CC fees (on exchanges like Solana e.t.c).

Unlike fraud from FTX, USDC stablecoin buys US treasuries dollar for dollar. This generates demand for USD as well as Circle makes profit from treasury yields.

Elegant idea in a way. Fast, cross-border low fee transactions in USD.

Bitcoin now has proven itself as inflation-hedged store of value. USDC is proving itself as a way to transact on goods and services.

Obviously trust is earned as droplets but leaves in buckets.

Crypto is ripe with scams and shady exchanges.

Re: Fintech dystopia

#254

Post by BobaFloutist »

eszed wrote: post #75
CaptainFever wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Buying NSFW things.

I think the further down the supply chain of "NSFW things" you go the more closely it resembles "human misery trafficking".

I don't think they were referring to live-action "NSFW things" which is traditionally called "pornography."

Re: Fintech dystopia

#255

Post by nytesky »

throw101010 wrote: post #234
nytesky wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah who in this world has never had to reset a password? That’s what this means. That laser inscribed metal fob with you keys on it may as well be made of platinum. And I’ve never felt clear on how people trust wallet, hot or cold — at some point they connect to the internet for transactions, and all the vendors seem suspect. I really doubt most users are building their wallet from code reviewed cryptographically si…

> That laser inscribed metal fob with you keys on it Unless you manually inscribe it with a laser (good luck), that wouldn't really be a great idea unless the computer assisting you in the inscriptions is completely air-gapped. Stamping/manually engraving your seed on fire resistant stainless steel (308 is my preference) is still one of the most "air-gapped" way to do this. > at some point they connect to the interne…

I guess with QR codes the ColdCard is fairly airgapped. Nifty. Is it a trustworthy company? Is the intermediate PSBT human readable — can you confirm contents before submitting to network?

I almost feel like crypto bros are all into HODL because spending coins is just too much effort!

Re: Fintech dystopia

#256

Post by ta12653421 »

imtringued wrote: post #217
ta12653421 wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Founding banks, working in banking back office infra (central bank connectivity etc.); there are for sure places where you can get this knowledge. Also there dedicated central banking degrees in lot of countries.

Founding banks has essentially become impossible in Germany and more and more financial services have been moved under the umbrella of the banking license. It's very disturbing to me that the possibility of grass roots reform is essentially gone. You need a a two digit million amount of equity, proof of both formal academic and real life experience, you need a large team of trained professionals, easily at least 10 c…

Source: I did that in the last 5y so I know what I'm talking about :)

edit: An the process what you describe as complex etc., is actually good and robust

Re: Fintech dystopia

#257

Post by ta12653421 »

potato3732842 wrote: post #193
ta12653421 wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh well, there are some shady brokers in Cyprus which are using EU passporting regulation but which are "not really good" with KYC ;-)

Do they offer high yield savings accounts with reasonable min-balance requirements?

Not only that, they also offer you instruments which are not useful for you - on top of the "risk-free high yield" account :) LOL

Re: Fintech dystopia

#258

Post by wilkommen »

willguest wrote: post #167

> Actually improving people’s financial wellbeing, for example, will require us to pursue real, slow, piecemeal, democratic solutions. Democratic solutions are, imho, doomed to failure. In order for them to work a significant portion of "take back control" and "make my country great" brigade will need to have some kind of revelation about the direction of society as a whole. Given the amount of resources pumped into…

I think you got it in one. Eventually there will have to be a sudden "falling off the cliff", but the main question is what will happen after that. If the right ideas are in the air, it's possible that the opportunity that the crisis presents could be seized for something good, similar to the way the Great Depression created the opening for the New Deal. The progressivism movement of the 1920s laid the ideological groundwork and ensured that the right ideas were in the air when the crisis hit. The best we can do is the same - make sure that the right ideas are in the air and be ready to pounce when the crisis hits and everyone is suddenly asking "how could something like this happen?"

Re: Fintech dystopia

#259

Post by wakawaka28 »

lurk2 wrote: post #116
wakawaka28 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you're talking about, resistance to government meddling, is more of a function of the currency than the ledger. Cryptocurrencies only work because of people silly enough to buy them in exchange for actual "valuable" or official currencies (which can be imposed on some people in the world at gunpoint). If a cryptocurrency was forced on you at gunpoint, it most certainly would not be one that provided any anonymit…

> Ideally you could just have a foreign bank account that your country cannot touch. Doesn’t solve the problem as these assets can still be seized by foreign governments.

It partially solves the problem of not trusting your own government.

Re: Fintech dystopia

#260

Post by wakawaka28 »

dbdr wrote: post #168
wakawaka28 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you're talking about, resistance to government meddling, is more of a function of the currency than the ledger. Cryptocurrencies only work because of people silly enough to buy them in exchange for actual "valuable" or official currencies (which can be imposed on some people in the world at gunpoint). If a cryptocurrency was forced on you at gunpoint, it most certainly would not be one that provided any anonymit…

> you could just have a foreign bank account that your country cannot touch How easy is it from most people in the world to "just" open a bank account in another country?

Probably about as easy as it is for them to get by using Bitcoin in real life... Possible but inconvenient.
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