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Spot Bitcoin ETF receives official approval from the SEC

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Re: Spot Bitcoin ETF receives official approval from the SEC

#951
post #239

The only thing I am concerned about is "paper bitcoin" and rehypothecation. Is there anything published about how ETF entities might prove they have custody of the amount of bitcoin they claim (in other words, proof of reserves)?

With ETFs, you don't need to be concerned with reserves. I can buy the ETF, go to the market-makers, and ask them to exchange the ETF for either bitcoin, or a cash equivalent. If they can't deliver, they're in trouble. There's a two way arb in ETFs which keeps the price tracking accurate: - if the ETF trades higher than bitcoin on crypto exchanges: the market makers can simply buy bitcoin on exchange, sell the ETF on…

> If they can't deliver, they're in trouble

How are you protected against losing your investment if they can not deliver?

> Price tracking

Does Bitcoin support a high enough frequency of transactions for long enough to make this possible for years into the future? Does it not become too hard to mine at some point?

Re: Spot Bitcoin ETF receives official approval from the SEC

#952

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except Bitcoin market is zero sum. No value is being created.

The value is transacting independence from monopolies, with interdependence to a distributed network. The value is immutability –not something censor-horny commies value, I'll give you that.

The whole thing is basically parasitic in nature, and would de without and banking system behind it. The value is hiding money, the motivation is mostly committing crime, fraud, etc. The majority is owned by conservative people willing to send us back into feudalism.

Censorship seems to be a property of any system, see the US. To this day, they are so stupid they censor nipples.

Re: Spot Bitcoin ETF receives official approval from the SEC

#953

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, it's been 15 years. The question is more like: Are OK with government control? Reminder - regulators reviewed SVB reports and found them adequate. Then apparently people found it's insolvent. Does it look adequate? Do you like a system if bank can become insolvent if people withdraw their money? That's presumably one of most competent countries in the world.

> The question is more like: Are OK with government control? I simply doubt that my opinion, or even that of the majority of the public, would change the outcome of what the government decides to do. They seem to be on a pro-KYC/AML/FINRA/IRS path regardless of public opinion.

People who lived under totalitarian/authoritarian regimes often thought their opinions do not matter and everything is already decided.

But, not all people, and many such regimes have crumbled.

Somehow you found energy to spread FUD on this forum, but you don't have energy to form an opinion and defend it. Sad.

Re: Spot Bitcoin ETF receives official approval from the SEC

#954

The strong anti-Bitcoin sentiment on HN is still amusing. It goes way back - 13 years or more. Having read many of these negative comments, I think part of this sentiment boils down to the commenter seeing no point to Bitcoin. Just this thread has examples. It must be more than a little annoying to feel very strongly that Bitcoin is pointless, but to also notice that it's still here. Year after year. If that shoe wer…

> Bitcoin also doesn't need the approval of any person, police force, legislative body, military, or government.

That's only a good thing in dictatorships, not in democracies.

=> I really don't care. It's not a pro in my life and my continent ( Europe)

Additionally, Bitcoin is super duper easy to track

Re: Spot Bitcoin ETF receives official approval from the SEC

#955
post #786

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> they would have lost WWI without leaving the gold standard (other I mainly meant their attempts to get back on the gold standard in the 1920s. Unlike e.g. France and the other European countries which didn't really have a choice and had to devalute. It put Britain industry and economy at a disadvantage during the 20s (on the brightside Britain didn't suffer from the Great Depression as much..). e.g. between 1910 an…

Getting off the gold standard with the banking holiday was the original sin. Bitcoin has and will continue to undo this, with or without the permission of luddites.

> permission of luddites

Right. Like sticking to the nonsense that was the gold standard.

Inherently deflationary virtual token make an objective horrible currency. Believing otherwise puts you on part with the flat earth people.

Re: Spot Bitcoin ETF receives official approval from the SEC

#956
post #786

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> they would have lost WWI without leaving the gold standard (other I mainly meant their attempts to get back on the gold standard in the 1920s. Unlike e.g. France and the other European countries which didn't really have a choice and had to devalute. It put Britain industry and economy at a disadvantage during the 20s (on the brightside Britain didn't suffer from the Great Depression as much..). e.g. between 1910 an…

Which shows that it was the impact of pretending their currency hadn't been devalued that dragged them through a prolonged depression. Had they simply priced gold at its true value in pounds, they would have gotten through it as quickly as France.

Well yes that's why the gold standard doesn't make a lot of sense.

> priced gold at its true value

Which is determined how and by whom? If you let the market do it's that basically (while not technically) Fiat...

Re: Spot Bitcoin ETF receives official approval from the SEC

#957
post #766

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> pay directly for some products and services as long as the other party will accept it. You can but generally you don't want to. Besides the technical issues it's a very volatile asset which means that you don't want to hold it for any extended period of time (IF you're only using it to pay for stuff).

To the contrary, as long as you can hold through the volatility window of about 4 years, you are better off holding Bitcoin. The price of a house used to be 100 bitcoin, then 10, now it's 5. Wait 10 years and it'll be 0.5. Meanwhile, hold dollars and the price keeps going up. You are defacto forced to put your saving in an investment vehicle to keep up with inflation, taking on risk.

> You are defacto forced to put your saving in an investment vehicle to keep up with inflation, taking on risk.

Yes. You got it. That's how you get economic growth. Instead of stagnation and deflation when you hoard gold or bitcoin. It's not exactly fair from the individual people perspective but for the society as whole it's objective the superior option.

> To the contrary

I know that reading comprehension is hard (even if the "IF" was in very big letters..). If your income is in $ and you buy stuff priced in $ AND you don't want to use crypto as an investment instrument but only for buying/selling good holding it for extended periods of time is not smart (same applies to foreign currencies in general they are just not as volatile).

Re: Spot Bitcoin ETF receives official approval from the SEC

#958
post #756

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would you expect anyone to waste time making any substantive arguments against silly claims like "Bitcoin is money"..

"Money is any item or verifiable record that is generally accepted as payment for goods and services and repayment of debts, such as taxes, in a particular country or socio-economic context.[1][2][3] The primary functions which distinguish money are: medium of exchange, a unit of account, a store of value and sometimes, a standard of deferred payment." I have purchased items and payed off loans using BTC. So have mil…

> I have purchased items and payed off loans using BTC. So have millions of other people. You calling it not money doesn't make it so. Sorry.

I can exchange grain or aluminum for other goods and services and pay back my debts in them if the other party agrees. Does that those commodities money? If you think so and then yeah you're right about bitcoin too. Otherwise, it's not. Sorry.

Re: Spot Bitcoin ETF receives official approval from the SEC

#959
post #558
post #531

My prediction is that Bitcoin will become fully institutionalized within twenty years, to the point that the “Bitcoin” held by investors are entirely disconnected from the theoretical blockchain. A similar thing happened with stocks. Not so long ago they used to be physical pieces of paper. You could trade shares peer-to-peer and even anonymously by handing over the share certificate to someone in person. For dividen…

The possibility of change exists, but one of the hardest promises Bitcoin makes is that you can't change the rules mid-game like what happened with stocks. That is one of the most attractive things about this asset class - if the US regulators want to change how a crypto is traded ... tough biscuits. They have to convince the market participants, globally, to trade the new way. The bar might be orders of magnitude hi…

> the hardest promises Bitcoin makes is that you can't change the rules mid-game

Except that it can with an update

Re: Spot Bitcoin ETF receives official approval from the SEC

#960
post #636

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That doesn’t sound like a “hard promise”

Wasn't that on Ethereum? My impression is that it has very different governance/promises.

Governance on ethereum is the same as bitcoin, regardless of what bitcoin maxis want you to believe
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