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What if Bitcoin went to zero?

economist.com

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Re: What if Bitcoin went to zero?

#61

Post by HeyZuess »

tomp wrote: post #37
hirako2000 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's actually possible. If taxes due get assigned and tracked to particular bitcoin fractions, and since taxes incur interest, we could be in a situation one day where you would get paid to accept ownership of btc. It would be surreal, but if the IRS is given hope that it's a way to get people scared of btc, and that the KYC data all these exchanges have allow accurate enough accounting and tracking, they would do it…

Hm.. if BTC is negative, then you’d be paying negative taxes on it (IRS paying you, or equivalently you paying less tax on e.g. income). A lot of people want that, so they’d want BTC, bringing it back into positive.

> if BTC is negative, then you’d be paying negative taxes on it

Nouriel Roubini implies that carbon tax could mean a negative value. Contrary to income tax, a carbon tax wouldn't be a "negative" tax.

Re: What if Bitcoin went to zero?

#63

Post by junon »

agumonkey wrote: post #57
junon wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> distributed supply chain management This is already its own industry. Lots of big companies have bought into the blockchain aspect of it. Unfortunately I can't give you any names. I just know a few select friends of mine quite literally never shut up about it. I just know it exists.

and based on your info, do you think: 1) it's 90% fad ? 2) it does improve the existing ? 3) do you think the broad principles can reach other parts of society (I do, but I'm not connected to anybody in the industry.. I should though)

I don't really know, to be honest. I haven't done much research on it. But I know the types of people that talk about it have little authority on the subject, so by that metric I'm not a fan.

But I could be wrong.

Re: What if Bitcoin went to zero?

#64

Post by nroets »

boublepop wrote: post #54

To me the most fascinating thing about Bitcoin is perfectly displayed in this comment thread. People act like simply because it’s computers and algorithms that it’s beyond the reach of law. Imagine that mentality in other fields. Like “there’s no way we can make laws against murder, because people can just sail to international waters and kill their victim and then come back” Bitcoin only has value due to people and…

Bitcoin is most popular in countries with high inflation and countries with capital controls. That coincides with bad policies, mismanagement or even oppression.

As a citizen of such a country, I can see the attraction of Bitcoin. Bitcoin offers hard-working people a way out. (South Africa has relaxed it's capital controls to the point where I never considered buying Bitcoin. But there are some millionaires here who are not allowed to take all their money out)

Re: What if Bitcoin went to zero?

#65

Post by shapefrog »

nroets wrote: post #64
boublepop wrote: post #54

To me the most fascinating thing about Bitcoin is perfectly displayed in this comment thread. People act like simply because it’s computers and algorithms that it’s beyond the reach of law. Imagine that mentality in other fields. Like “there’s no way we can make laws against murder, because people can just sail to international waters and kill their victim and then come back” Bitcoin only has value due to people and…

Bitcoin is most popular in countries with high inflation and countries with capital controls. That coincides with bad policies, mismanagement or even oppression. As a citizen of such a country, I can see the attraction of Bitcoin. Bitcoin offers hard-working people a way out. (South Africa has relaxed it's capital controls to the point where I never considered buying Bitcoin. But there are some millionaires here who…

> Bitcoin is most popular in countries with high inflation and countries with capital controls. That coincides with bad policies, mismanagement or even oppression.

Source please?

I would have guessed; by market cap the majority is held in the US and Europe. I would have guessed: by transaction volume, the majority in the US and Europe.

Re: What if Bitcoin went to zero?

#66

Post by nroets »

shapefrog wrote: post #65
nroets wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bitcoin is most popular in countries with high inflation and countries with capital controls. That coincides with bad policies, mismanagement or even oppression. As a citizen of such a country, I can see the attraction of Bitcoin. Bitcoin offers hard-working people a way out. (South Africa has relaxed it's capital controls to the point where I never considered buying Bitcoin. But there are some millionaires here who…

> Bitcoin is most popular in countries with high inflation and countries with capital controls. That coincides with bad policies, mismanagement or even oppression. Source please? I would have guessed; by market cap the majority is held in the US and Europe. I would have guessed: by transaction volume, the majority in the US and Europe.

China dominates Bitcoin mining and the latest crypto exchanges are either run by Chinese or are headquartered in Hong Kong.

China has capital controls and little press freedom.

Note that the US and Europe has highly evolved capital markets. They may have deep, liquid markets, but it does not reflect the relative popularity of Bitcoin.

Re: What if Bitcoin went to zero?

#67

Post by hirako2000 »

tomp wrote: post #37
hirako2000 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's actually possible. If taxes due get assigned and tracked to particular bitcoin fractions, and since taxes incur interest, we could be in a situation one day where you would get paid to accept ownership of btc. It would be surreal, but if the IRS is given hope that it's a way to get people scared of btc, and that the KYC data all these exchanges have allow accurate enough accounting and tracking, they would do it…

Hm.. if BTC is negative, then you’d be paying negative taxes on it (IRS paying you, or equivalently you paying less tax on e.g. income). A lot of people want that, so they’d want BTC, bringing it back into positive.

afaik the IRS doesn't pay you on losses. It does balance your revenue and business expenses, but interestingly regulations on crypto investments make them a category on their own. So if you have 0 overall revenue in a year, but earned say 100k from salaried/contract labor employment, but lost 100k on BTC because it reached zero, you still owe the IRS taxes on your 100k revenue. Taxes are so absurd when looking a them more closely. Corporate entities get to offset expenses, only the net profit incur corporate tax on profit; but human entities have all their expenses ignored from the equation. So, buy BTC, and that's the same as gambling or have a serious drug addiction in term of expenses, make a profit and you end up having to pay the crypto tax, and also having to cover the cost of tracking all the transactions that may have occurred between btc and other tokens if you were adventurous and loved experimenting with the overall digital token market.

Re: What if Bitcoin went to zero?

#68

Post by helloworld11 »

goblin89 wrote: post #53
helloworld11 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sorry, what? In many, possibly most jurisdictions, and certainly in the United States, there is nothing in the law that specifically stops you from having made a perfectly legal, legitimate fortune by holding bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies and then cashing them out into fiat through the same formal banks that any other investor uses with no worries about dodging KYC as long as they followed reporting requireme…

How is the system supposed to be able to tell whether a cryptocurrency holder engaged in laundering money? I recall reading the evidence is easy to completely erase with a few conversions across coins/exchanges/tumblers. This would never be possible in the traditional financial system—except if you use cash, which in large transactions is considered itself a red flag for that reason.

Again, are you kidding? Aside from what you say about untraceability not being entirely true due to the much smaller overall ecosystem and finance pool of crypto, concealing dirty capital and assets also happens far, far more enormously in normal finance.. In the world of non-crypto banking, literally hundreds of billions of dollars of assets are regularly moved, labeled, washed and rewashed in ways that make it extremely difficult or costly to know about the dirty origins of much of that money, which is invested worldwide in all sorts of seemingly legitimate ways. This extremely common occurrence is positively global and doesn't even always require physical cash. More often than not it's purely electronic. I know that many people on this site hate cryptocurrency at any opportunity, but come on.. At least use better arguments.

Re: What if Bitcoin went to zero?

#69

Post by goblin89 »

helloworld11 wrote: post #68
goblin89 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is the system supposed to be able to tell whether a cryptocurrency holder engaged in laundering money? I recall reading the evidence is easy to completely erase with a few conversions across coins/exchanges/tumblers. This would never be possible in the traditional financial system—except if you use cash, which in large transactions is considered itself a red flag for that reason.

Again, are you kidding? Aside from what you say about untraceability not being entirely true due to the much smaller overall ecosystem and finance pool of crypto, concealing dirty capital and assets also happens far, far more enormously in normal finance.. In the world of non-crypto banking, literally hundreds of billions of dollars of assets are regularly moved, labeled, washed and rewashed in ways that make it extr…

> what you say about untraceability not being entirely true

Oh, OK. I have no idea, just true coin anonymity is something I regularly see cryptocurrency advocates brag about on HN. Some imply it's as easy as changing to Monero and back, others point to tumblers, etc.

> literally hundreds of billions of dollars of assets are regularly moved, labeled, washed and rewashed in ways that make it extremely difficult or costly to know about

Costly but possible, if one follows the money and studies the paperwork. Stories about shady manipulations and laundering do hit the news from time to time.

Re: What if Bitcoin went to zero?

#70

Post by panarky »

boublepop wrote: post #54

To me the most fascinating thing about Bitcoin is perfectly displayed in this comment thread. People act like simply because it’s computers and algorithms that it’s beyond the reach of law. Imagine that mentality in other fields. Like “there’s no way we can make laws against murder, because people can just sail to international waters and kill their victim and then come back” Bitcoin only has value due to people and…

It's even more difficult to buy a cup of coffee with a Treasury bond or a kilogram of gold, yet Treasury bonds and kilograms of gold somehow retain value even without this essential capability.
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