It’s easier and cheaper to use bank wires than Bitcoin • Hacker News Board

Re: It’s easier and cheaper to use bank wires than Bitcoin

#41

Post by _xhok » Thu, Sep 29, 2016, 4:45 PM UTC

Incidentally, if you're like me, and know nothing about stocks, but still want to get rich off companies you believe will succeed, I highly recommend Robinhood. It's like stock trading for chimpanzees. Install an app, fill out a brief profile, click a big shiny button to deposit money, select your stock, and click another big shiny button to buy.

I don't have any affiliation with them. I just always thought trading stocks was schleppily difficult, and was delighted to discover it was not so. I believe some company will do well; I'm not interested in understanding spreadsheets or hiring anyone; here's my money; how do I buy shares? What is the Uber-like, magic-button product here? Robinhood, it turns out.

https://www.robinhood.com/

Re: It’s easier and cheaper to use bank wires than Bitcoin

#42

Post by shawnb576 » Thu, Sep 29, 2016, 4:45 PM UTC

You can't separate the currency from the ecosystem for anything but academic purposes. The ecosystem is a mess. A commonly cited benefit of crypto-currencies is that they'll eliminate friction and fees in the system, and I think this is only because the systems don't exist. People want security, verifiability, and reversibility when dealing with money. There has to exist companies to do this whether they are Citibank or Coinbase, and they're going to charge money.

So you can take the Gov't control out of the equation, but I still have yet to hear a scenario that crypto-currrency itself makes better than fiat - it's always about the cost, complexity, and regulation of the services on top. Eventually, those will reappear because people and business want them.

Re: It’s easier and cheaper to use bank wires than Bitcoin

#43

Post by nicky0 » Thu, Sep 29, 2016, 4:45 PM UTC

zajd wrote: post #28

jstanley wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The difference is it's perfectly possible to use Bitcoin on your own without dealing with intermediaries. But you can't send cash over the internet.

I find it amusing that you consider the internet "on your own" like there isn't a gigantic investment being made into that infrastructure that even enables bitcoin in the first place. Do people who are in to Bitcoin think intermediaries solely exist to extract value from transactions? There's actually a service being provided.

The internet (at least theoretically) a neutral infrastructure though. Bitcoin is just an application like email, the web or IM.

Re: It’s easier and cheaper to use bank wires than Bitcoin

#44

Post by NoNotTheDuo » Thu, Sep 29, 2016, 4:46 PM UTC

dragontamer wrote: post #8

compil3r wrote: post #5

Bitcoin was never intended to reduce the cost of Banks, but rather supply an alternative.

The number of people saying BTC is cheaper than Paypal continues to be huge.

If you are able to receive BTC and pay for your costs with BTC, it's cheaper by quite a bit. The last transaction I sent using BTC cost me $.09.

If you have to exchange BTC to USD to pay for your costs, then sure, it's going to cost more than PayPal.

Re: It’s easier and cheaper to use bank wires than Bitcoin

#45

Post by loeg » Thu, Sep 29, 2016, 4:46 PM UTC

juliangoldsmith wrote: post #19

nicky0 wrote: post #3

Interesting article. But none of the problems described are actually with bitcoin. I see criticisms of CoinBase, WB21, TradeZero, Bitpay. All the problems were due to issues with exchanges & intermediaries and with handling USD. It seems the actual bitcoin part worked fine.

Seems like this guy should have had some idea what he was doing before he trusted $6k to it. He's also bitching about an overall 4% fee, which isn't a whole lot.

4% is a huge fee on $5k.

Re: It’s easier and cheaper to use bank wires than Bitcoin

#46

Post by dom96 » Thu, Sep 29, 2016, 4:46 PM UTC

_xhok wrote: post #41

Incidentally, if you're like me, and know nothing about stocks, but still want to get rich off companies you believe will succeed, I highly recommend Robinhood. It's like stock trading for chimpanzees. Install an app, fill out a brief profile, click a big shiny button to deposit money, select your stock, and click another big shiny button to buy. I don't have any affiliation with them. I just always thought trading s…

I would love to use it. Unfortunately it's only available in the US (and Australia?). If there are any alternatives that work in the UK and/or Switzerland then please let me know.

Re: It’s easier and cheaper to use bank wires than Bitcoin

#47

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Sep 29, 2016, 4:47 PM UTC

zajd wrote: post #22

uobytx wrote: post #12

I don't think USD -> Bitcoin -> USD is really the way to go on this. If you are trading in USD, why would you move it into bitcoin and back again? You already had it in USD. If you need to buy some groceries in the US, you wouldn't trade your USD for CAD (Canada money), then bring CAD to a grocery store that also accepts USD. You would only bring CAD if you already had CAD.

Because one of the espoused values of Bitcoin is the ease of transferring it across international borders.

[deleted]

Re: It’s easier and cheaper to use bank wires than Bitcoin

#48

Post by alex-yo » Thu, Sep 29, 2016, 4:47 PM UTC

Or rather "The Disaster That Is Bitcoin Services Around Bitcoin". I'm wondering if there would be the same kind of article that dollars is very bad, because bank wants some money for wireing them e.g. to Europe, and the exchange rate between dollar and euro could change overnight.

Re: It’s easier and cheaper to use bank wires than Bitcoin

#49

Post by loeg » Thu, Sep 29, 2016, 4:47 PM UTC

_xhok wrote: post #41

Incidentally, if you're like me, and know nothing about stocks, but still want to get rich off companies you believe will succeed, I highly recommend Robinhood. It's like stock trading for chimpanzees. Install an app, fill out a brief profile, click a big shiny button to deposit money, select your stock, and click another big shiny button to buy. I don't have any affiliation with them. I just always thought trading s…

And if you love the simplicity and lack of informed investment Robinhood represents, you'll love slot machines too. Put money in, pull lever, boom.

If you don't know enough to stock pick, buy the index.

Re: It’s easier and cheaper to use bank wires than Bitcoin

#50

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Sep 29, 2016, 4:47 PM UTC

zajd wrote: post #28

jstanley wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The difference is it's perfectly possible to use Bitcoin on your own without dealing with intermediaries. But you can't send cash over the internet.

I find it amusing that you consider the internet "on your own" like there isn't a gigantic investment being made into that infrastructure that even enables bitcoin in the first place. Do people who are in to Bitcoin think intermediaries solely exist to extract value from transactions? There's actually a service being provided.

[deleted]