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Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

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Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#971

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You will never be able to price anything in Bitcoin, ever. It's volatile because deflationary currencies are inherently volatile. The future of finance is in some future crypto that provides for economic-growth-based inflation/deflation of the money supply. The Fed does this manually, and that's what keeps USD more-or-less stable.

There are already multiple stable coins that exist that are pegged to the dollar.

Pegging to the dollar is not really its own currency then.

...and yes, Tether is far more used than Bitcoin for non-speculative trading.

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#972
post #587

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Internet is not required [1] to sync a full Bitcoin node. There have also been numerous proof-of-concepts for transmitting Bitcoin transactions via radio. [1] https://blockstream.com/satellite/

Very nice initiative, but for first time users you still need to download 300GB+ of blockchain

You never need to download 300gb, starting with 3gb snapshot is just as secure.

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#973
post #207

honest question: why would tesla, a responsible company, gamble so much money on a "product" which is literally worthless? (is it because so much of their income is generated from selling credits?)

I'm no crypto bull, but I don't think it's obvious at all that Bitcoin (or other crypto) is "literally worthless".

from my (admittedly meagar) understanding bitcoin is not backed up by any solid assets. Its value is solely dependent on what someone is willing to pay for it at any given time. It's a gamble that someone will be a bigger fool then you and buy your cryptocurrency. Someone will get hurt eventually.

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#974
post #882

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It happens periodically: tulips, Beanie Babies, etc.

True, and that's a legitimate argument - that bitcoin is simply the largest bubble in human history. But I think this argument is very unlikely, it's been over 10 years since the introduction of Bitcoin, and it's already gone through a period of euphoria and crash, only to sustain itself and break through its previous highs. Bubbles don't tend to do this, nor do they last this long.

Maybe Bitcoin works as a decentralized bubble, it pops somewhere and it can comeback again.

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#975
post #909

Earlier quoted context omitted.

or it is a hedge against a market downturn as gold is "not cool" to buy from Tesla and cash should be invested if not used.

Bitcoin dropped 55% in March 2020 vs S&P500 dropping 35%. You'd lose more with this hedge than without.

Tesla dropped even more (180->72) and since then it is hyped even more even so it still doesn't make profit from it's core business.

And since then lot of people hyped the bitcoin.

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#976
post #358
post #313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Graeme I've got the perfect article for you [1]. [1]: https://vijayboyapati.medium.com/the-bullish-case-for-bitcoi... Please let me know what you think

Thanks. It didn’t seem very focussed. One of the major thesis is that all currencies follow four steps to adoption as a medium of exchange. For this they cite Jevons’ and his discussion of gold. And indeed, Jevons said gold followed those four steps. But I looked at the source text and saw Jevons said gold was an exception to the rule in that it developed as a currency late in the cycle. “ The use of esteemed article…

I’ve looked elsewhere and “the four stages of the currencycycle” seems to be a talking point in bitcoin world. And it appears to be nonsense taken from a misread of Jevons.

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#977

Oh noes, if this starts a trend, becomes widespread, and businesses start hoarding crypto tokens instead of investing in building stuff, it could cause a great depression pretty much the same way gold hoarding caused the economy to collapse in 1929. When people, businesses and banks start hording tokens instead of investing in building and maintaining the production capacity of consumables, the ratio of value of toke…

The problem with raising the fundamental issues with Bitcoin on HN is that you end up debating the history of hard currencies and their various and well-studied failures with a bunch of folks that believe the opposite, running over the same old ground over and over again.

A deflationary currency system of any kind, if it absorbs a significant amount of the world economy's assets, is going to be a disaster and at this point all we can do is hope it won't happen.

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#978

Bitcoin is a mystery to me. Somehow it's hailed as revolutionising the economy, by replacing currency with a worse kind of currency. It feels like this is where all the "how to get rich quick" book writers and other hustle bros went and created one giant financial pyramid, which works in quite simple way: - buy bitcoin - tell everyone around how revolutionary it is, so they buy it and what you holding increases in va…

"Getting rid of currency altogether" - please explain this nonsense

Dude thinks we're gonna live in some Star Trek utopia where one needs money anymore because everything is provided and we all work just for the personal pleasure of discovering new things. Except.... they never explain how they got to that "utopia" in Star Trek and there's a good reason ha ha.

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#979
post #489

Bitcoin is a mystery to me. Somehow it's hailed as revolutionising the economy, by replacing currency with a worse kind of currency. It feels like this is where all the "how to get rich quick" book writers and other hustle bros went and created one giant financial pyramid, which works in quite simple way: - buy bitcoin - tell everyone around how revolutionary it is, so they buy it and what you holding increases in va…

While away on vacation, I once sent $1000 in cold hard cash, on a Sunday, to an unbanked person in Los Angeles, in less than 1 hour, thanks to bitcoin and the recipient withdrawing it for cash at a Bitcoin ATM. There is not a single alternative service in the world that would have made this possible. If people thought a little beyond their personal use cases, they would understand the utility of Bitcoin/crypto for ma…

What was the cost though? I send money to unbanked instantly with no fees.

Re: Tesla buys $1.5B in Bitcoin, may accept it as payment in the future

#980

I don't understand all the Crypto hate on this site. Since when have hackers become the luddites to new ways of finance?

I just don't see crypto as any better than current fiat system I use. Including horrible players like PayPal... I trust my bank more than I trust any online wallet or exchange... And on other hand I know that I might be able to fix issues with my bank account. Not so much with lost keys or miss typed destination address and so on... Actually, bit-flips of addresses could be wonderful unrecoverable mess...
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