Earlier quoted context omitted.
The tulip derivative bubble lasted for a few months; beanie babies were a year or two at most. Bitcoin is over ten years old. Do you have any examples of a bubble which - lasted more than 5 years - recovered from previous drops in value of more than 50 %? What kind of evidence would convince you that bitcoin were different from these past bubbles?
The dot-com bubble played out over a decade. Bitcoin’s price history has only been significant for 3 years. It otherwise looked like any other penny asset.
S&P Dow Jones Indices to launch cryptocurrency indexes in 2021
381–390 of 571 posts
Re: S&P Dow Jones Indices to launch cryptocurrency indexes in 2021
#382Earlier quoted context omitted.
There have been many attempts to create ETFs for Bitcoin, most famously https://coin-etf.com/ . They've all been denied by the SEC so far. But an index like this is likely a step toward SEC acceptance.
Why? Why does having an index matter, if the SEC didn't even like single coin funds?
Re: S&P Dow Jones Indices to launch cryptocurrency indexes in 2021
#383Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I’m enjoying sitting on the sidelines and watching people “invest” in a digital “currency” that you cannot spend, does not produce cash flow, and whose values are determined by other shmucks buying it from previous shmucks. Is that any different than a stock though? You can’t spend stocks, they don’t produce cash flow (ignoring dividends), and their value is what other’s are buying and selling it for. Just as I can…
If I buy a company, I literally can choose what to do with its earnings. That’s the point of valuing businesses. You’re not buying the stock. You’re buying a portion of the business. Say you have a drywall company in town. You and the owner are good friends and the owner wants to retire but doesn’t have a family member who is interested in the enterprise. He seeks out buyers. You mention to him you’re interested but…
Re: S&P Dow Jones Indices to launch cryptocurrency indexes in 2021
#384Earlier quoted context omitted.
> This isn’t a discussion about some ECON 500-level course topic. It is. > There’s an academic argument to be had about whether or not the accounts of the event are credible, but that’s not what we’re talking about here. It is. You brought it up. You threw in conjecture. And every rebuttal is more complex than you decided to be willing to pursue. That doesn't become false by saying we aren't talking about something t…
Yeah, I’m ignorant and flowers can be planted by anyone, so great conversation. If you really want to have discussions with people maybe try not to focus on meaningless pedantry. Your side of the argument is ad hominem. I’m ignorant. OK, great, what’s your point? I should rethink tulips. Why? You don’t actually make an argument yourself; sure I spouted off some things I think are generally bad because my statements i…
Truce, one last "ad hominem" and I'll move on
> Of all the endless knowledge that humanity produces, you have to ask yourself whether or not there’s meaning in pursuing topics endlessly.
This is a verbose way of saying ignorance.
Okay moving on.
My real argument is that Tulip mania is actually the worst poster child of speculative bubbles, as the spot market was largely unaffected and for a brief period of time the futures market became very divorced. It also ended with a local bubonic plague, which means the speculators died, so we don't really know if there was merit to the future delivery or not. Also public policy played a role in the futures contracts, and for that I would have to brush off more literature to expound upon. But the idea in popular culture is quite wrong.
I personally did not comment on beanie babies and ignored it. My first inclination on that speculative bubble is that it was silly, but I didn't comment on it because I don't know if there were supply and demand conditions to support it, and such imbalances can occur in any asset class whether there is utility or not.
Regarding crypto in the light of other speculative asset price bubbles, even ignoring the utility that it does have for a broader and broader set of people, the staying power alone has defeated the bubbles you mentioned. But to counter the lowest hanging rebuttal of "but it can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent" you have to then counter in how the utility does address a wider and wider market. Its not just a payments, it is far beyond payments right now, and all of these crypto assets inherit the payments capability.
Re: S&P Dow Jones Indices to launch cryptocurrency indexes in 2021
#385Earlier quoted context omitted.
In all practical senses it is scarce. It is the protocol and consensus of the people using it that makes it scarce. If you disagree, go ahead just make your own BTC and see how "easy" it is to convince other people to use it instead of BTC or some other mainstream coin. (Some people even tried exactly that...)
You can't really know how easy it might be for me. For example, if my name was Vitalik Buterin or Elon Musk or even Donald Trump, I could trivially create my own cryptocurrency and a lot of people would use it.
Some people tried this before by branching off the bitcoin blockchain. That was called bitcoin cash, and it failed.
Bitcoins, meaning not any cryptocurrency but just actual bitcoins, are scarce and will almost certainly remain so.
Re: S&P Dow Jones Indices to launch cryptocurrency indexes in 2021
#386Earlier quoted context omitted.
> This isn’t a discussion about some ECON 500-level course topic. It is. > There’s an academic argument to be had about whether or not the accounts of the event are credible, but that’s not what we’re talking about here. It is. You brought it up. You threw in conjecture. And every rebuttal is more complex than you decided to be willing to pursue. That doesn't become false by saying we aren't talking about something t…
Yeah, I’m ignorant and flowers can be planted by anyone, so great conversation. If you really want to have discussions with people maybe try not to focus on meaningless pedantry. Your side of the argument is ad hominem. I’m ignorant. OK, great, what’s your point? I should rethink tulips. Why? You don’t actually make an argument yourself; sure I spouted off some things I think are generally bad because my statements i…
Re: S&P Dow Jones Indices to launch cryptocurrency indexes in 2021
#387Earlier quoted context omitted.
In all practical senses it is scarce. It is the protocol and consensus of the people using it that makes it scarce. If you disagree, go ahead just make your own BTC and see how "easy" it is to convince other people to use it instead of BTC or some other mainstream coin. (Some people even tried exactly that...)
You can't really know how easy it might be for me. For example, if my name was Vitalik Buterin or Elon Musk or even Donald Trump, I could trivially create my own cryptocurrency and a lot of people would use it.
Re: S&P Dow Jones Indices to launch cryptocurrency indexes in 2021
#388Earlier quoted context omitted.
In all practical senses it is scarce. It is the protocol and consensus of the people using it that makes it scarce. If you disagree, go ahead just make your own BTC and see how "easy" it is to convince other people to use it instead of BTC or some other mainstream coin. (Some people even tried exactly that...)
You can't really know how easy it might be for me. For example, if my name was Vitalik Buterin or Elon Musk or even Donald Trump, I could trivially create my own cryptocurrency and a lot of people would use it.
Re: S&P Dow Jones Indices to launch cryptocurrency indexes in 2021
#389Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I’m enjoying sitting on the sidelines and watching people “invest” in a digital “currency” that you cannot spend, does not produce cash flow, and whose values are determined by other shmucks buying it from previous shmucks. Is that any different than a stock though? You can’t spend stocks, they don’t produce cash flow (ignoring dividends), and their value is what other’s are buying and selling it for. Just as I can…
If I buy a company, I literally can choose what to do with its earnings. That’s the point of valuing businesses. You’re not buying the stock. You’re buying a portion of the business. Say you have a drywall company in town. You and the owner are good friends and the owner wants to retire but doesn’t have a family member who is interested in the enterprise. He seeks out buyers. You mention to him you’re interested but…
If you invest in large companies on the public stock market, it's about the same as investing in cryptocurrency.
Re: S&P Dow Jones Indices to launch cryptocurrency indexes in 2021
#390Earlier quoted context omitted.
It can be trivially changed in the sense that it's a computer program that simulates money. No amount of consensus can increase the gold supply.
Technological advances can increase the gold supply. Asteroid mining, extracting it from sea water, mining lower quality deposits, etc. There still has to be consensus on using gold as money, if there isn't it will lose its monetary premium to something that has better monetary properties.
This is a great point. The choice to value gold as currency over other rare metals is 'a cultural property of the community' and yet not 'trivial' to change, just as Bitcoin's consensus isn't.