Crypto Currency Thread (Vol.2)
Discussion
ERIKM400 said:
BTC is not citizen banking. BTC is governed by the white paper and the principles of a true free market economy.
Can you explain why a government controlled fiat money, backed by nothing, that is continuously manipulated, taxed, inflated and debased driving it's value and purchasing power ever lower in a futile attempt to cover for infinitely increasing debts is preferable?
There is no need to convert BTC back to fiat to make payments. BTC was developed for peer to peer transactions. The things that are currently standing in the way are price volatility (which is decreasing and will continue to do so), adoption (which is progressively increasing) and scalability (for which solutions are being developed and already exist).
BTC transactions are trustless, censorship resistant, pseudo anonymous, require no middle man and are avialable to anyone with an internet connection.
Yes, that means it can be used for "illegal transactions" (definition depends on what your government considers illegal). But most criminal transactions are using good old cash fiat money for this, which nobody is trying to ban.
On the other hand there are some big benefits to this: you can make instant payments, even of large sums of money, to anyone, anywhere in the world, without incurring large costs, without anyone blocking your payment, even to people who have no access to the banking system. Try paying someone in Nigeria 50£ using your bank and see what happens.
The most important use case for BTC is store of value in a world where all currencies are losing value at an alarming rate and protect the individual from this. Not illegal transactions, tax evasion, money laundering,...
The main reason governments are scared of BTC and try to ban or limit it's use is because it threatens to undermine their failing monetary system.
Solid answer...won't pierce the delusion that money only has value if the government says it does.Can you explain why a government controlled fiat money, backed by nothing, that is continuously manipulated, taxed, inflated and debased driving it's value and purchasing power ever lower in a futile attempt to cover for infinitely increasing debts is preferable?
There is no need to convert BTC back to fiat to make payments. BTC was developed for peer to peer transactions. The things that are currently standing in the way are price volatility (which is decreasing and will continue to do so), adoption (which is progressively increasing) and scalability (for which solutions are being developed and already exist).
BTC transactions are trustless, censorship resistant, pseudo anonymous, require no middle man and are avialable to anyone with an internet connection.
Yes, that means it can be used for "illegal transactions" (definition depends on what your government considers illegal). But most criminal transactions are using good old cash fiat money for this, which nobody is trying to ban.
On the other hand there are some big benefits to this: you can make instant payments, even of large sums of money, to anyone, anywhere in the world, without incurring large costs, without anyone blocking your payment, even to people who have no access to the banking system. Try paying someone in Nigeria 50£ using your bank and see what happens.
The most important use case for BTC is store of value in a world where all currencies are losing value at an alarming rate and protect the individual from this. Not illegal transactions, tax evasion, money laundering,...
The main reason governments are scared of BTC and try to ban or limit it's use is because it threatens to undermine their failing monetary system.
The bitcoin is a scam mentality persists against all odds! Funny, when I could literally photocopy a fiver and pass it off as real, wheras a satoshi is impossible to fake.
ERIKM400 said:
Then please tell me what the other scarce digital assets are?
Or why BTC isn't?
Well this is all my personal opinion, but as it's a human coding creation, I don't believe it can be unique? I accept it has a secure blockchain and seemingly rock solid security and as all Bitcoin is on the ledger and this gives a value/trust element to users of the system.Or why BTC isn't?
"The network effect" I hear of often, check the various posts from below, it's seemingly the mass adoption that has secured Bitcoin it's position.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/sfnyb0/w...
https://casebitcoin.com/critiques/bitcoin-can-be-c...
[i]"Crypto currencies are not scarce, but bitcoins on the bitcoin network are. Anyone can indeed clone the open-source bitcoin codebase at any time, and launch their own coin, but they can't clone the acceptance, name recognition, and security that only the bitcoin network enjoys. People have been cloning bitcoin since 2011, yet no clone has come close to matching bitcoin's marketcap and network effect.
As an internet protocol for money and a store-of-value, bitcoin enjoys extremely strong network effects. The lock-in created by thousands of businesses, and millions of users & investors, who have a vested interest in bitcoin specifically is extremely difficult to overcome. This is akin to what we've seen with base-level internet protocols over the past 50 years. Foundational technologies like tcp/ip and smtp have dominated for decades, despite their technical flaws and emergence of countless competitors. They are simply too ingrained in the internet ecosystem to unseat, and developers and businesses choose to build on top of them instead. Bitcoin is proving similar."[/i]
So it perhaps has a uniquely large and dedicated/ingrained following and the benefits that brings, but is not the only digitally scarce asset? Even it's scarcity was pre-set by the creator and so to me that's a created/decided scarcity?
dimots said:
Bitcoin is a self regulating protocol for value transfer which requires no intermediary. It is impossible to be scammed by bitcoin in my opinion. Can you please explain how it might happen?
You really don't help yourself by being wilfully obtuse. Of course you can't be scammed by bitcoin but you can be scammed by the thousands of dodgy players who inhabit the crypto currency space. Hackers, unscrupulous exchanges and scam artists are just a few of the pitfalls that abound in this space as it's unregulated and quite a complicated concept for the average person, therefore easily exploited. Millions of dollars of crypto have been stolen, this is a fact.I get that you are a big fan of crypto but your constant talking up of it's merits while blindly denying it's many problems makes you lose a lot of credibility.
Guvernator said:
You really don't help yourself by being wilfully obtuse. Of course you can't be scammed by bitcoin but you can be scammed by the thousands of dodgy players who inhabit the crypto currency space. Hackers, unscrupulous exchanges and scam artists are just a few of the pitfalls that abound in this space as it's unregulated and quite a complicated concept for the average person, therefore easily exploited. Millions of dollars of crypto have been stolen, this is a fact.
I get that you are a big fan of crypto but your constant talking up of it's merits while blindly denying it's many problems makes you lose a lot of credibility.
I don't care about my 'credibility' I've been right since day one and haven't changed a bit so do one I get that you are a big fan of crypto but your constant talking up of it's merits while blindly denying it's many problems makes you lose a lot of credibility.
ERIKM400 said:
BTC is not citizen banking. BTC is governed by the white paper and the principles of a true free market economy.
Can you explain why a government controlled fiat money, backed by nothing, that is continuously manipulated, taxed, inflated and debased driving it's value and purchasing power ever lower in a futile attempt to cover for infinitely increasing debts is preferable?
There is no need to convert BTC back to fiat to make payments. BTC was developed for peer to peer transactions. The things that are currently standing in the way are price volatility (which is decreasing and will continue to do so), adoption (which is progressively increasing) and scalability (for which solutions are being developed and already exist).
BTC transactions are trustless, censorship resistant, pseudo anonymous, require no middle man and are avialable to anyone with an internet connection.
Yes, that means it can be used for "illegal transactions" (definition depends on what your government considers illegal). But most criminal transactions are using good old cash fiat money for this, which nobody is trying to ban.
On the other hand there are some big benefits to this: you can make instant payments, even of large sums of money, to anyone, anywhere in the world, without incurring large costs, without anyone blocking your payment, even to people who have no access to the banking system. Try paying someone in Nigeria 50£ using your bank and see what happens.
The most important use case for BTC is store of value in a world where all currencies are losing value at an alarming rate and protect the individual from this. Not illegal transactions, tax evasion, money laundering,...
The main reason governments are scared of BTC and try to ban or limit it's use is because it threatens to undermine their failing monetary system.
This isn't worth replying to, it's all been covered before. Bitcoin is a terrible store of value (too volatile, as you say), has totally failed as a currency (nobody prices anything in Bitcoin, they price in Dollars or Pounds, payments are not made in Bitcoin but converted to FIAT as the seller doesn't want to hold Bitcoin, see point about it being a terrible store of value), and the fantastic utopia you want to believe in where anyone can do anything seamlessly across borders ignores all the practical real politik/real world reasons why we don't already have such things. It is very useful for governments to float/manipulate their currencies, the Euro is a great example of what happens when that can't occur and while it is great for going on holiday with, it only survives thanks to billions of Euros being loaned to Greece when they were not able to devalue their currency to levels it needed to be. Can you explain why a government controlled fiat money, backed by nothing, that is continuously manipulated, taxed, inflated and debased driving it's value and purchasing power ever lower in a futile attempt to cover for infinitely increasing debts is preferable?
There is no need to convert BTC back to fiat to make payments. BTC was developed for peer to peer transactions. The things that are currently standing in the way are price volatility (which is decreasing and will continue to do so), adoption (which is progressively increasing) and scalability (for which solutions are being developed and already exist).
BTC transactions are trustless, censorship resistant, pseudo anonymous, require no middle man and are avialable to anyone with an internet connection.
Yes, that means it can be used for "illegal transactions" (definition depends on what your government considers illegal). But most criminal transactions are using good old cash fiat money for this, which nobody is trying to ban.
On the other hand there are some big benefits to this: you can make instant payments, even of large sums of money, to anyone, anywhere in the world, without incurring large costs, without anyone blocking your payment, even to people who have no access to the banking system. Try paying someone in Nigeria 50£ using your bank and see what happens.
The most important use case for BTC is store of value in a world where all currencies are losing value at an alarming rate and protect the individual from this. Not illegal transactions, tax evasion, money laundering,...
The main reason governments are scared of BTC and try to ban or limit it's use is because it threatens to undermine their failing monetary system.
Even your example about sending £50 to someone in Nigeria is wrong, they have a very well developed payment system relying on mobile phone numbers instead of bank accounts, and so it would be perfectly possible to send them £50. Move over, if they have an internet connection to receive Bitcoin, why wouldn't they have a bank account?! The whole reason they developed payment via mobile number is that you can do it without even an internet connection, using a very basic mobile signal.
dimots said:
I don't care about my 'credibility' I've been right since day one and haven't changed a bit so do one
Lol. You can't even decide what use case it has, and in over 10 years it certainly hasn't gained mass adoption, it certainly hasn't become some unregulated utopia avoiding government oversight, and fewer vendors are accepting it as a form of payment than they did 5 years ago.
Great success with your predictions...
dimots said:
Bitcoin is a self regulating protocol for value transfer which requires no intermediary. It is impossible to be scammed by bitcoin in my opinion. Can you please explain how it might happen?
Core devs turn out to be NSA employees and change the client code, thus nicking all your coins.HTH.
ETA: for a reference on how this sort of thing has occurred previously, look at how they compromised Tor.
dimots said:
I don't care about my 'credibility' I've been right since day one and haven't changed a bit so do one
What have to been right about? A couple of coins have gone up in value due to lots of people piling in because they've seen an opportunity to make money. Thousands of other alt coins have been a total flop. The underlying technology still hasn't been widely adopted and no one knows if it will be or if it does, whether it will be in it's current form. The game hasn't fully played out yet and you are declaring yourself the victor because you've made a bit of money on crypto, mostly due to other people's greed or FOMO.As for your other thoughts on crypto, while some of your points on the future of currency are interesting and I certainly think digital currency has it's merits, your hyperbole makes you sound like one of those conspiracy theory sociopaths, wishing for the end of the world\total collapse of the economy and society, just so you can say you were right.
Some people on this thread seem to be totally closed to the idea of crypto currency, mostly those in the finance sector and I can understand how a disruptive influence like digital currency might spook certain people, however espousing internet chat room fed propaganda about the failure of fiat currency and how crypto will be the saviour of mankind isn't the answer either. I suspect the truth of where crypto will end up lies somewhere in between those two extremes.
dimots said:
I don't care about my 'credibility' I've been right since day one and haven't changed a bit so do one
You'll be right imo when everyone is still using it when it no longer goes 'up' and is 'just' boring old money to make low cost transfers direct to one another.You've been right because your bitcoin has made you more fiat than having fiat did? So the promise of more fiat is lurking behind the anti fiat Bitcoin ethos?
You feel comfortable buying a Bitcoin now for £50K when you might have bought one for £100 or something years ago, I think the only way someone can feel comfortable doing that is the unerring belief it'll go up more, if you were ignorant of Bitcoins existence and so didn't buy in at the cheaper prices then it's very hard to think the £50K Bitcoin will do anything like what the £100 one did, it just feels way too expensive.
The early adoption and it's success makes me feel that's clouded your judgement, and no doubt you think my and others non adoption to date makes it cloud ours! I think I can just live without it, it's too risky and sod's law the time I buy it it does what I fear and declines and doesn't recover in a reasonable timeline and you think the risk is in not having it and whatever it drops by (if it does) in the short term it#s only a matter of time before it recovers and surpasses the all time high again, because that's what it's always done. It's faith vs lack of faith thing as I see it.
Scootersp said:
You'll be right imo when everyone is still using it when it no longer goes 'up' and is 'just' boring old money to make low cost transfers direct to one another.
You've been right because your bitcoin has made you more fiat than having fiat did? So the promise of more fiat is lurking behind the anti fiat Bitcoin ethos?
You feel comfortable buying a Bitcoin now for £50K when you might have bought one for £100 or something years ago, I think the only way someone can feel comfortable doing that is the unerring belief it'll go up more, if you were ignorant of Bitcoins existence and so didn't buy in at the cheaper prices then it's very hard to think the £50K Bitcoin will do anything like what the £100 one did, it just feels way too expensive.
The early adoption and it's success makes me feel that's clouded your judgement, and no doubt you think my and others non adoption to date makes it cloud ours! I think I can just live without it, it's too risky and sod's law the time I buy it it does what I fear and declines and doesn't recover in a reasonable timeline and you think the risk is in not having it and whatever it drops by (if it does) in the short term it#s only a matter of time before it recovers and surpasses the all time high again, because that's what it's always done. It's faith vs lack of faith thing as I see it.
I use bitcoin every day. I am not 'buying a bitcoin for £50k', I save in bitcoin. I transferred all my company cash to bitcoin years ago and I hold as little cash as possible. My firm belief is that bitcoin will always appreciate against fiat. I would rather hold bitcoin myself than hold IOUs backed by debt in a bank.You've been right because your bitcoin has made you more fiat than having fiat did? So the promise of more fiat is lurking behind the anti fiat Bitcoin ethos?
You feel comfortable buying a Bitcoin now for £50K when you might have bought one for £100 or something years ago, I think the only way someone can feel comfortable doing that is the unerring belief it'll go up more, if you were ignorant of Bitcoins existence and so didn't buy in at the cheaper prices then it's very hard to think the £50K Bitcoin will do anything like what the £100 one did, it just feels way too expensive.
The early adoption and it's success makes me feel that's clouded your judgement, and no doubt you think my and others non adoption to date makes it cloud ours! I think I can just live without it, it's too risky and sod's law the time I buy it it does what I fear and declines and doesn't recover in a reasonable timeline and you think the risk is in not having it and whatever it drops by (if it does) in the short term it#s only a matter of time before it recovers and surpasses the all time high again, because that's what it's always done. It's faith vs lack of faith thing as I see it.
Condi said:
This isn't worth replying to, it's all been covered before. Bitcoin is a terrible store of value (too volatile, as you say), has totally failed as a currency (nobody prices anything in Bitcoin, they price in Dollars or Pounds, payments are not made in Bitcoin but converted to FIAT as the seller doesn't want to hold Bitcoin, see point about it being a terrible store of value), and the fantastic utopia you want to believe in where anyone can do anything seamlessly across borders ignores all the practical real politik/real world reasons why we don't already have such things. It is very useful for governments to float/manipulate their currencies, the Euro is a great example of what happens when that can't occur and while it is great for going on holiday with, it only survives thanks to billions of Euros being loaned to Greece when they were not able to devalue their currency to levels it needed to be.
Even your example about sending £50 to someone in Nigeria is wrong, they have a very well developed payment system relying on mobile phone numbers instead of bank accounts, and so it would be perfectly possible to send them £50. Move over, if they have an internet connection to receive Bitcoin, why wouldn't they have a bank account?! The whole reason they developed payment via mobile number is that you can do it without even an internet connection, using a very basic mobile signal.
Wrong on every account.Even your example about sending £50 to someone in Nigeria is wrong, they have a very well developed payment system relying on mobile phone numbers instead of bank accounts, and so it would be perfectly possible to send them £50. Move over, if they have an internet connection to receive Bitcoin, why wouldn't they have a bank account?! The whole reason they developed payment via mobile number is that you can do it without even an internet connection, using a very basic mobile signal.
Could you please answer the question I asked you?
Scootersp said:
Well this is all my personal opinion, but as it's a human coding creation, I don't believe it can be unique? I accept it has a secure blockchain and seemingly rock solid security and as all Bitcoin is on the ledger and this gives a value/trust element to users of the system.
"The network effect" I hear of often, check the various posts from below, it's seemingly the mass adoption that has secured Bitcoin it's position.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/sfnyb0/w...
https://casebitcoin.com/critiques/bitcoin-can-be-c...
[i]"Crypto currencies are not scarce, but bitcoins on the bitcoin network are. Anyone can indeed clone the open-source bitcoin codebase at any time, and launch their own coin, but they can't clone the acceptance, name recognition, and security that only the bitcoin network enjoys. People have been cloning bitcoin since 2011, yet no clone has come close to matching bitcoin's marketcap and network effect.
As an internet protocol for money and a store-of-value, bitcoin enjoys extremely strong network effects. The lock-in created by thousands of businesses, and millions of users & investors, who have a vested interest in bitcoin specifically is extremely difficult to overcome. This is akin to what we've seen with base-level internet protocols over the past 50 years. Foundational technologies like tcp/ip and smtp have dominated for decades, despite their technical flaws and emergence of countless competitors. They are simply too ingrained in the internet ecosystem to unseat, and developers and businesses choose to build on top of them instead. Bitcoin is proving similar."[/i]
So it perhaps has a uniquely large and dedicated/ingrained following and the benefits that brings, but is not the only digitally scarce asset? Even it's scarcity was pre-set by the creator and so to me that's a created/decided scarcity?
So what you are saying is that people have been trying for 16 years to come up with something that equals or is better than BTC, but nobody has managed?"The network effect" I hear of often, check the various posts from below, it's seemingly the mass adoption that has secured Bitcoin it's position.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/sfnyb0/w...
https://casebitcoin.com/critiques/bitcoin-can-be-c...
[i]"Crypto currencies are not scarce, but bitcoins on the bitcoin network are. Anyone can indeed clone the open-source bitcoin codebase at any time, and launch their own coin, but they can't clone the acceptance, name recognition, and security that only the bitcoin network enjoys. People have been cloning bitcoin since 2011, yet no clone has come close to matching bitcoin's marketcap and network effect.
As an internet protocol for money and a store-of-value, bitcoin enjoys extremely strong network effects. The lock-in created by thousands of businesses, and millions of users & investors, who have a vested interest in bitcoin specifically is extremely difficult to overcome. This is akin to what we've seen with base-level internet protocols over the past 50 years. Foundational technologies like tcp/ip and smtp have dominated for decades, despite their technical flaws and emergence of countless competitors. They are simply too ingrained in the internet ecosystem to unseat, and developers and businesses choose to build on top of them instead. Bitcoin is proving similar."[/i]
So it perhaps has a uniquely large and dedicated/ingrained following and the benefits that brings, but is not the only digitally scarce asset? Even it's scarcity was pre-set by the creator and so to me that's a created/decided scarcity?
Which kind of proves the point that BTC is the only truly scarce digital asset, no?
The pre-set scarcity by Satoshi (21 million) is one of the strong features of BTC because this means it can not be inflated. Ever.
And please provide some examples of other scarce digital assets.
ERIKM400 said:
Wrong on every account.
Not at all, incredibly correct on every account as it happens. If you disagree feel free to say why, just saying I'm wrong when what I've posted are indisputable facts makes it look like you have no argument other than you don't like what has been written. As for why it is important to have freely appreciating and depreciating currencies then it allows a country's economy to become more attractive to investors when it needs to be. You've clearly ignored my example of the Euro, and that currency is only shared across a relatively small number of largely similar countries. Clearly a single world currency is never going to work.
Just because you don't like inflation and debt doesn't mean its a bad thing.
ERIKM400 said:
So what you are saying is that people have been trying for 16 years to come up with something that equals or is better than BTC, but nobody has managed?
Which kind of proves the point that BTC is the only truly scarce digital asset, no?
The pre-set scarcity by Satoshi (21 million) is one of the strong features of BTC because this means it can not be inflated. Ever.
And please provide some examples of other scarce digital assets.
What I interpreted from those links is that the tech is the same, and other scarce digital assets have(?)/could be made and made even more scarce (I don't know specific examples), but they would not be better and so people stay with Bitcoin, it's the preferred one, it has the network, is uniquely popular, but not actually unique? So you might be say it's the only viable scarce digital asset? Which kind of proves the point that BTC is the only truly scarce digital asset, no?
The pre-set scarcity by Satoshi (21 million) is one of the strong features of BTC because this means it can not be inflated. Ever.
And please provide some examples of other scarce digital assets.
"Pre-set scarcity by Satoshi" I have a problem with pre-set/determined scarcity, the scarcity being a decision? When you create things you can play around with scarcity, alter the supply as you wish try and encourage demand due to the rarity, If he'd set 1 million would the bitcoin price today be where it is, it would have been over 20 times as scarce?
It's perhaps scarce now but Satoshi, they say might have mined up to nearly 1/20th of all the Bitcoin at a low low fiat input price, perhaps he deserves it for his genius but I don't think the answer to fiat is something that you don't have work to gain, you just buy and wait? Bitcoin can work as a stable transacting platform, but the fluctuating price and upward trend certainty vibe for all, cannot work forever, it has to have a limit.
I am happy to watch from the sidelines and see others play their cards as they see them, if they keep winning so be it, the courage of their convictions to go for it, is like mine not too, no one horse wins all the races, I sit this out as it just never feels right to move in. Just like I suspect you'd never move into metals regardless of the future price action there, you'll stick to your crypto almost come what may?
Guvernator said:
What have to been right about? A couple of coins have gone up in value due to lots of people piling in because they've seen an opportunity to make money. Thousands of other alt coins have been a total flop. The underlying technology still hasn't been widely adopted and no one knows if it will be or if it does, whether it will be in it's current form. The game hasn't fully played out yet and you are declaring yourself the victor because you've made a bit of money on crypto, mostly due to other people's greed or FOMO.
As for your other thoughts on crypto, while some of your points on the future of currency are interesting and I certainly think digital currency has it's merits, your hyperbole makes you sound like one of those conspiracy theory sociopaths, wishing for the end of the world\total collapse of the economy and society, just so you can say you were right.
Some people on this thread seem to be totally closed to the idea of crypto currency, mostly those in the finance sector and I can understand how a disruptive influence like digital currency might spook certain people, however espousing internet chat room fed propaganda about the failure of fiat currency and how crypto will be the saviour of mankind isn't the answer either. I suspect the truth of where crypto will end up lies somewhere in between those two extremes.
I work in traditional finance, whilst I think some of the arguments for BTC make a lot of sense (a lot). Pointing out it has It has 3challenges doesn't mean you are offended against its existence. As you say, DLT and is in early days and the value to remove friction from the system is colossal and that does threaten the hegemony of traditional finance (rightly so). However, there are 3 massive issues to be resolved.As for your other thoughts on crypto, while some of your points on the future of currency are interesting and I certainly think digital currency has it's merits, your hyperbole makes you sound like one of those conspiracy theory sociopaths, wishing for the end of the world\total collapse of the economy and society, just so you can say you were right.
Some people on this thread seem to be totally closed to the idea of crypto currency, mostly those in the finance sector and I can understand how a disruptive influence like digital currency might spook certain people, however espousing internet chat room fed propaganda about the failure of fiat currency and how crypto will be the saviour of mankind isn't the answer either. I suspect the truth of where crypto will end up lies somewhere in between those two extremes.
1. Price Vol, its not a store of value; its too volatile. ETFs are not a justification for widespread adoption. They are delta flat, its market risk characteristics mean its a speculative asset that can be hedged BUT not a store of value for financial institutions (and that's many hundreds of trillions business).
2. Its anonymity and ability to be used to get around AML, sanction abuse (and no amount of democracy arguments is going to usurp that) etc; means it has little regulatory support for adoption. in fact, Global political fracturing sets it back further as everyone knows who is going long it and why.
3. It challenges system hegemony. See second point. It operates outside system control, it may well be democratic, but no one in major Western economies is ever going to cede economic control. It maybe allowed to run in parallel, but they aren't letting it run loose in size. There is simply too much existing debt in the system. its 300% of global GDP, the system MUST persist. IF it fails, everything fails and the only hedge then is cans of Spam, Duracells and 5.56mm because the power went out.
Now, 3 is arguably anti-democratic. But its a fact. I think a lot of people pointing out observations aren't against BTC per-se, just not quite convinced its going to usurp FIAT (for all its failings).
OoopsVoss said:
I work in traditional finance, whilst I think some of the arguments for BTC make a lot of sense (a lot). Pointing out it has It has 3challenges doesn't mean you are offended against its existence. As you say, DLT and is in early days and the value to remove friction from the system is colossal and that does threaten the hegemony of traditional finance (rightly so). However, there are 3 massive issues to be resolved.
1. Price Vol, its not a store of value; its too volatile. ETFs are not a justification for widespread adoption. They are delta flat, its market risk characteristics mean its a speculative asset that can be hedged BUT not a store of value for financial institutions (and that's many hundreds of trillions business).
2. Its anonymity and ability to be used to get around AML, sanction abuse (and no amount of democracy arguments is going to usurp that) etc; means it has little regulatory support for adoption. in fact, Global political fracturing sets it back further as everyone knows who is going long it and why.
3. It challenges system hegemony. See second point. It operates outside system control, it may well be democratic, but no one in major Western economies is ever going to cede economic control. It maybe allowed to run in parallel, but they aren't letting it run loose in size. There is simply too much existing debt in the system. its 300% of global GDP, the system MUST persist. IF it fails, everything fails and the only hedge then is cans of Spam, Duracells and 5.56mm because the power went out.
Now, 3 is arguably anti-democratic. But its a fact. I think a lot of people pointing out observations aren't against BTC per-se, just not quite convinced its going to usurp FIAT (for all its failings).
Indeed. I've said from the very beginning it either gets regulated out of existence or gets regulated into more mainstream finance and at which point it loses a lot of it's original USPs, for example the AML/KYC side, and if that happens then why is it better than what we already have? 1. Price Vol, its not a store of value; its too volatile. ETFs are not a justification for widespread adoption. They are delta flat, its market risk characteristics mean its a speculative asset that can be hedged BUT not a store of value for financial institutions (and that's many hundreds of trillions business).
2. Its anonymity and ability to be used to get around AML, sanction abuse (and no amount of democracy arguments is going to usurp that) etc; means it has little regulatory support for adoption. in fact, Global political fracturing sets it back further as everyone knows who is going long it and why.
3. It challenges system hegemony. See second point. It operates outside system control, it may well be democratic, but no one in major Western economies is ever going to cede economic control. It maybe allowed to run in parallel, but they aren't letting it run loose in size. There is simply too much existing debt in the system. its 300% of global GDP, the system MUST persist. IF it fails, everything fails and the only hedge then is cans of Spam, Duracells and 5.56mm because the power went out.
Now, 3 is arguably anti-democratic. But its a fact. I think a lot of people pointing out observations aren't against BTC per-se, just not quite convinced its going to usurp FIAT (for all its failings).
The other thing you have to remember is that everyone who is long Bitcoin is talking their own book; the only way their investment maintains it's value is with more buyers coming in, and so it's hugely in their interests to be positive and sell the benefits (real or otherwise), in the hope of catching some passing traffic. As everyone is doing it to make a quick buck and it has no utility beside an "investment"/gambling opportunity then if it doesn't go up in value it doesn't do anything useful at all.
Bitcoin devotees have a lot of crossover with conspiracy theories and preppers for reason 3. If you are worried about hedging against a wholesale collapse of the world reserve currencies and the entire worldwide economy then Bitcoin isn't going to be the answer!
Edited by Condi on Thursday 11th April 20:32
Condi said:
Indeed. I've said from the very beginning it either gets regulated out of existence or gets regulated into more mainstream finance and at which point it loses a lot of it's original USPs, for example the AML/KYC side, and if that happens then why is it better than what we already have?
The other thing you have to remember is that everyone who is long Bitcoin is talking their own book; the only way their investment maintains it's value is with more buyers coming in, and so it's hugely in their interests to be positive and sell the benefits (real or otherwise), in the hope of catching some passing traffic. As everyone is doing it to make a quick buck and it has no utility beside an "investment"/gambling opportunity then if it doesn't go up in value it doesn't do anything useful at all.
Bitcoin devotees have a lot of crossover with conspiracy theories and preppers for reason 3. If you are worried about hedging against a wholesale collapse of the world reserve currencies and the entire worldwide economy then Bitcoin isn't going to be the answer!
Anyone who is a BTC devotee, I can kinda respect the belief and ideal. I'm not sure they were at the sharp end of the GFC and Sept 2008. A lot of people who control the global system were and they looked over the abyss; it wasn't good. A $700bn bank nearly took everyone out. That's not even G-SIB today. That's actually a strong argument for decentralised finance, but that wasnt the response. BASLE3 pushed the opposite. V-max. It made what could (maybe) be a containable private sector problem a Sovereign one (looked at US debt numbers lately?). If you have no banking sector you can't move money, the lights go out. The institutions we need to move money cease to exist because banks utility value (as movers of money), is usurped by their actual form and function that is maturity transformation and leverage extension. The utility is completely secondary. That is why SVB depositors got saved and CS got rolled into UBS. I don't want to sound mad conspiracy theorist, but do you think a bank can function on account provision / transfers or its actually doing something else to allow that to happen? If they don't make a margin call on a borrow, do people know how fast that kills them?The other thing you have to remember is that everyone who is long Bitcoin is talking their own book; the only way their investment maintains it's value is with more buyers coming in, and so it's hugely in their interests to be positive and sell the benefits (real or otherwise), in the hope of catching some passing traffic. As everyone is doing it to make a quick buck and it has no utility beside an "investment"/gambling opportunity then if it doesn't go up in value it doesn't do anything useful at all.
Bitcoin devotees have a lot of crossover with conspiracy theories and preppers for reason 3. If you are worried about hedging against a wholesale collapse of the world reserve currencies and the entire worldwide economy then Bitcoin isn't going to be the answer!
Edited by Condi on Thursday 11th April 20:32
OoopsVoss said:
Condi said:
Indeed. I've said from the very beginning it either gets regulated out of existence or gets regulated into more mainstream finance and at which point it loses a lot of it's original USPs, for example the AML/KYC side, and if that happens then why is it better than what we already have?
The other thing you have to remember is that everyone who is long Bitcoin is talking their own book; the only way their investment maintains it's value is with more buyers coming in, and so it's hugely in their interests to be positive and sell the benefits (real or otherwise), in the hope of catching some passing traffic. As everyone is doing it to make a quick buck and it has no utility beside an "investment"/gambling opportunity then if it doesn't go up in value it doesn't do anything useful at all.
Bitcoin devotees have a lot of crossover with conspiracy theories and preppers for reason 3. If you are worried about hedging against a wholesale collapse of the world reserve currencies and the entire worldwide economy then Bitcoin isn't going to be the answer!
Anyone who is a BTC devotee, I can kinda respect the belief and ideal. I'm not sure they were at the sharp end of the GFC and Sept 2008. A lot of people who control the global system were and they looked over the abyss; it wasn't good. A $700bn bank nearly took everyone out. That's not even G-SIB today. That's actually a strong argument for decentralised finance, but that wasnt the response. BASLE3 pushed the opposite. V-max. It made what could (maybe) be a containable private sector problem a Sovereign one (looked at US debt numbers lately?). If you have no banking sector you can't move money, the lights go out. The institutions we need to move money cease to exist because banks utility value (as movers of money), is usurped by their actual form and function that is maturity transformation and leverage extension. The utility is completely secondary. That is why SVB depositors got saved and CS got rolled into UBS. I don't want to sound mad conspiracy theorist, but do you think a bank can function on account provision / transfers or its actually doing something else to allow that to happen? If they don't make a margin call on a borrow, do people know how fast that kills them?The other thing you have to remember is that everyone who is long Bitcoin is talking their own book; the only way their investment maintains it's value is with more buyers coming in, and so it's hugely in their interests to be positive and sell the benefits (real or otherwise), in the hope of catching some passing traffic. As everyone is doing it to make a quick buck and it has no utility beside an "investment"/gambling opportunity then if it doesn't go up in value it doesn't do anything useful at all.
Bitcoin devotees have a lot of crossover with conspiracy theories and preppers for reason 3. If you are worried about hedging against a wholesale collapse of the world reserve currencies and the entire worldwide economy then Bitcoin isn't going to be the answer!
Edited by Condi on Thursday 11th April 20:32
disclaimer: I may be employed by one of the listed...
Bitcoin devotees know that the taxpayer bailed the banks out by printing money and now we are still bailing them out through inflation which is a stealth tax that primarily affects the poorest.
Bitcoin devotees know that saying 'Inflation isn't necessarily bad' in a massively inflationary environment ENTIRELY CREATED by central banks is ridiculous. The poorest are being hurt by the game-playing and posturing of an elite who actually don't know what they are doing!
Bitcoin devotees know that Andrew Bailey is a moron, that Janet Yellen is a moron. They have both made so many mistakes you can use them as a perfect example of why regulation and policymaking is bad and ineffective. Do you really trust that these people know what they are doing, or perhaps you simply share their delusion?
Bitcoin removes idiots like Andrew Bailey from the wheelhouse. You don't have any political or financial influence. You don't have any human error, accounting slipups, fraud, hacks. It's a perfect record, it's not owned by anyone but it can be owned by everyone. It's simply mathematical economics.
You don't get it? Fine...I think you're dumb, I think you're missing out on the biggest opportunity in history, but you do you.
Bitcoin devotees know that saying 'Inflation isn't necessarily bad' in a massively inflationary environment ENTIRELY CREATED by central banks is ridiculous. The poorest are being hurt by the game-playing and posturing of an elite who actually don't know what they are doing!
Bitcoin devotees know that Andrew Bailey is a moron, that Janet Yellen is a moron. They have both made so many mistakes you can use them as a perfect example of why regulation and policymaking is bad and ineffective. Do you really trust that these people know what they are doing, or perhaps you simply share their delusion?
Bitcoin removes idiots like Andrew Bailey from the wheelhouse. You don't have any political or financial influence. You don't have any human error, accounting slipups, fraud, hacks. It's a perfect record, it's not owned by anyone but it can be owned by everyone. It's simply mathematical economics.
You don't get it? Fine...I think you're dumb, I think you're missing out on the biggest opportunity in history, but you do you.
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