Bitcoin and other forms of digital currency

[cladner]

anyone who says they understand crypto is  lying.  no one knows what is going on here and no one knows how this will be 5-10 years from now.

every advisor who told a client to not invest in btc has cost their clients the fortune of a lifetime up until now.

my take after watching my wife make thousands without taping a box  and getting drawn in, as time goes on and I have dabbled in crypto and thought about how it is being used around the world, i think the term cryptocurrency really is confusing the lay public as to what bitcoin,eth lite coin are.  i have come to the conclusion that these assets are like harddrives of wealth that can be very easily transported without anyone knowing or having to pay a fee and then the wealth can be converted to either a currency or another form of blockchain basically anywhere in the world.   this type of system is something the ultra rich people want in countries with corrupt governments/banks, unstable currency, high inflation.   the fact is that the number of people who are buying and selling btc, eth etc is still extremely small.  in fact, less than 4% of people who own bitcoin actually own more than 1.  most people have fractions.  the supply is limited.  the majority of people holding are very disciplined throwing out HODL (holding on for dear life) like its a gang greeting.  this strategy has worked well and with such a limited supply of bitcoin, as long as owners don't want to sell, the price will continue to rise  because there will ALWAYS be rich people looking to move money around without prying eyes noticing.  many of these owners have ridden out multiple booms and busts and are not giving bitcoin up because they see it as their path to riches which so far is working.  the system is not something that can easily be clamped down on by governments and some governments are embracing and profiting from  bitcoin.  

i do not believe there is any real risk from bitcoin futures for shorting the market because the margin requirements and intrinsic volatility of bitcoin will call you out sooner or later and the actual holders of bitcoin are not willing to sell.  the futures have reduced the intraday price swings dampening trading opportunities at least for btc though ltc has been a great trade lately. these little bumps will do nothing to the high conviction nutjob long term holders who own the vast vast majority of bitcoin.   i think there will be a sideways trade until recent low conviction sellers get shaken out by 20-40% price drop or some other event drives bitcoin price up.  the next really big leg up in bitcoin will be when the stock market (which is certainly also in a bubble) has its inevitable correction and all low conviction stock holders/financial advisers  flashing back to Feb-March 2009 (if they weren't in 5th grade )  go looking for a non-correlated asset.    gdax.com is an easy way to get started without having to put a ton of money in.  bitcoin "crypto" investing is somewhere between gambling in vegas and investing in the stock market.  as long as you can tolerate volatility, don't need the money you put in, and are patient, there is still potential for great reward.

probably one of the smartest guys on wall street - Tom Lee - who has been calling S&P price targets accurately going back to 2013 - has been dead right on this and  many other things.  ignore his advice at your own cost.

last week one of the biggest bank bears of bitcoin and crypto in genearal, UBS, along with barclays and credit suisse revealed its plan to use ETHERIUM as a means of interbank transfers. https://www.coindesk.com/ubs-launch-live-ethereum-platform-barclays-credit-suisse/

eventually the banks will have to buy eth and btc from regular folk who had the foresight to invest in it.

i haven't really dabbled in the other coins or ICOs.  btc, eth and ltc have been doing fine for my family..

Edited December 14, 2017 by cladner

[crayxlp]

everyone is entitled to his/her opinion. In yours you are just mentioning the "good aspects" of bitcoin (as that is the only crypto you are talking about). I think that you are terribly wrong (in the long term, not just speculating for a few months increase/decrease movement).. .. why are these crypto-projects called "currencies"? obviously the very first thing was as a supplement to an ordinary cash / money issued by the national bank. But Bitcoin off-the-chart development (20 % down one day, the 2nd day 40 % increase] simply disqualifies BITCOIN as a widely used form of transaction. I give you an example: lets say that some super duped item costs 10 Bitcoins on Monday - who would pay 10 BTC for it while speculating "mmmm.. but tomorrow it could be just 6 BTC or even less.. "

and that is not just the least of the issues. The problem lays also in the slowness of transacations when you want to convert BTC to some widely convertable, legitable currency  - be it USD, CAD, EUR.. it takes sometimes tens of hrs to deal with it and process it.. I have no idea and couldnt find out what "exchange rate" will be used - the one when you started the transaction or the one when it was written off from the ledger?

therefore esp.  BTC  is now not an "alternate currency" but a kind of "DIGITAL GOLD/DIAMOND", where it truly serves it its uniqueness, scarcity and other things like that. One of the things that ppl just "coming out of the dark ages" dont realize is, that the price of BTC is so high - because there is such a demand from total "id--ots" who just heard the TV news and immediately start thinking, this is the life saver.. without any futher digging up any details how it works, what are the costs for stock exchanges and stuff like that.. 

I see much better fitting in IOTA. That truly makes sense. Bitcoin will never be used for a day-to-day transactions like paying for a coffee cup.. it might not lose its investment value due to the "the first one and scarcity", but even its protocol is old and outdated. It would become a "collectible item" - if anyone sane chose to see it as that.

Edited December 14, 2017 by crayxlp
grammar

[Guest TabbyBoy]

I've been very surprised (pleasantly) with the huge increase in value of Ethereum, Litecoin, Ripple and Lumens (I own all 4) over the last week or so. However, I'm now very nervous, do I cash in half now while they are at an ATH or be greedy and wait a bit longer and risk a crash? Remember me looking at EOS a few months ago? I decided not to take the plunge and that's gone 10x already even though it didn't excite me at the time and doesn't really do very much. We have to be careful as crypto values are only based on speculation more than function right now. Now that it's slowly becoming mainstream, this is when Joe Public buys in and the bubble inflates a little more. It has to be a bubble as most is not backed by anything tangible or of value. It will get to the point where only the most widely adopted crypto will survive, 99% will disappear and take peoples' fortunes with them!

If you have say, a spare $1000, read up as much as you can over Xmas, take a punt snd check what that $1000 would be worth 6 months from now. No doubt you'll be very surprised... either way!

Edited December 15, 2017 by TabbyBoy

[TANV]

17 minutes ago, TabbyBoy said:

I've been very surprised (pleasantly) with the huge increase in value of Ethereum, Litecoin, Ripple and Lumens (I own all 4) over the last week or so.However, I'm now very nervous, do I cash in half now while they are at an ATH or be greedy and wait a bit longer and risk a crash? Remember me looking at EOS a few months ago? I decided not to take the plunge and that's gone 10x already even though it doesn't do very much. We have to be careful as crypto values are only based on speculation more than function right now. Now that it's slowly becoming mainstream, this is when Joe Public buys in and the bubble inflates a little more. It has to be a bubble as most is not backed by anything tangible or of value. It will get to the point where only the most widely adopted crypto will survive, 99% will disappear and take peoples' fortunes with them!

If you have say, a spare $1000, read up as much as you can over Xmas, take a punt snd check what that $1000 would be worth 6 months from now. No doubt you'll be very surprised... either way!

I've been looking at this and I"m a bit wary myself. What are your takes on Iconomi? My friends think I'm crazy for considering this...

[Fenix_2k1]

19 minutes ago, TabbyBoy said:

I've been very surprised (pleasantly) with the huge increase in value of Ethereum, Litecoin, Ripple and Lumens (I own all 4) over the last week or so. However, I'm now very nervous, do I cash in half now while they are at an ATH or be greedy and wait a bit longer and risk a crash? Remember me looking at EOS a few months ago? I decided not to take the plunge and that's gone 10x already even though it didn't excite me at the time and doesn't really do very much. We have to be careful as crypto values are only based on speculation more than function right now. Now that it's slowly becoming mainstream, this is when Joe Public buys in and the bubble inflates a little more. It has to be a bubble as most is not backed by anything tangible or of value. It will get to the point where only the most widely adopted crypto will survive, 99% will disappear and take peoples' fortunes with them!

If you have say, a spare $1000, read up as much as you can over Xmas, take a punt snd check what that $1000 would be worth 6 months from now. No doubt you'll be very surprised... either way!

I'm getting tempted but my problem is I still don't understand enough. So I think OK, go educate myself, however how do I know the site or video is a trustworthy source of information. From what I can see Bitcoin, Litecoin, Ethereum and Ripple have done very well but are they hitting a peak? which then leads into looking for a new cryptocurrency that is a: legitimate and b: has a good chance of being picked up in the mainstream. 

[cladner]

35 minutes ago, TabbyBoy said:

I've been very surprised (pleasantly) with the huge increase in value of Ethereum, Litecoin, Ripple and Lumens (I own all 4) over the last week or so. However, I'm now very nervous, do I cash in half now while they are at an ATH

so far selling has been the wrong decision.  think about the bitcoins you sold at $1200.  i would encourage you to hold.  actual number of people putting money to work in  this area is still very very low but is growing.  there are so many barriers also when you first getting started with buy/sell limits , account transfer limits that there is a constraint of inflow which helps fan the upward momentum.  see how big a pile you can build before the burst and buy a blue  bentley.

[Guest TabbyBoy]

1 hour ago, cladner said:

so far selling has been the wrong decision.  think about the bitcoins you sold at $1200.  i would encourage you to hold.  actual number of people putting money to work in  this area is still very very low but is growing.  there are so many barriers also when you first getting started with buy/sell limits , account transfer limits that there is a constraint of inflow which helps fan the upward momentum.  see how big a pile you can build before the burst and buy a blue  bentley.

Buying at the wrong time has been too. At the time, I (and many others) thought BTC couldn't rise any further, but it's now gone up 5x and then some. However, I bought ETH at £13 (with some of the BTC profit) last year and I now face the same dilemma. I have a feeling that I will cash in half of my ETH and half of my LTC soon, leaving some as USD to buy back after a possible drop. The crypo market cap is now matching that of some developed countries and growth just can't be sustained forever unless there's global FIAT devaluation or inflation. I am to get out well before this happens, the question is when?

I'm not a Bentley person, I have my eye on a supercharged Jaguar F-Pace. BTW... pronounced JAG-U-ARE not JAG-WAH ;-)

[Guest TabbyBoy]

19 hours ago, justapilgrim said:

Waiting for account to he verified so I can buy Ripple. It's gone up 250% since I opened account and have been waiting

It's now worth 3x since 4 days ago! You can buy from me in £ using PayPal F&F. The price right now is £0.5873 as per Coingecko ;-) How much would you like? $1,000? $10,000? more? I do a lot of my trading in the community via PayPal F&F and Bank Transfer with trusted members, all I need is their wallet address and I then provide proof of delivery via an exchange or blockchain snapshot. This avoids the exchange's "house advantage" and fees. By the time you've read this post, the GBP XRP price will probably have changed.

Even if you do buy now, you should still do well as it's being adopted more and more by banks every day.

[Sauromosis]

1 minute ago, TabbyBoy said:

It's now worth 3x since 4 days ago! You can buy from me in £ using PayPal F&F. The price right now is £0.5873 as per Coingecko ;-) How much would you like? $1,000? $10,000? more? I do a lot of my trading in the community via PayPal F&F and Bank Transfer with trusted members, all I need is their wallet address and I then provide proof of delivery via an exchange or blockchain snapshot. This avoids the exchange's "house advantage" and fees. By the time you've read this post, the GBP XRP price will probably have changed.

Even if you do buy now, you should still do well as it's being adopted more and more by banks every day.

See my PM

[Guest TabbyBoy]

20 hours ago, cladner said:

anyone who says they understand crypto is lying. 

I admit that I still have a lot to learn as do all of us. However, what I say is true according to my experience and must not be taken as formal financial advice. It's here to stay in some forms or another and there is still plenty of time to get in early before it all skyrockets and then comes down with a bang. Enjoy the ride, I certainly do!

Edited December 15, 2017 by TabbyBoy

[crayxlp]

On 15. 12. 2017 at 5:07 PM, TabbyBoy said:

I've been very surprised (pleasantly) with the huge increase in value of Ethereum, Litecoin, Ripple and Lumens (I own all 4) over the last week or so. However, I'm now very nervous, do I cash in half now while they are at an ATH or be greedy and wait a bit longer and risk a crash? Remember me looking at EOS a few months ago? I decided not to take the plunge and that's gone 10x already even though it didn't excite me at the time and doesn't really do very much. We have to be careful as crypto values are only based on speculation more than function right now. Now that it's slowly becoming mainstream, this is when Joe Public buys in and the bubble inflates a little more. It has to be a bubble as most is not backed by anything tangible or of value. It will get to the point where only the most widely adopted crypto will survive, 99% will disappear and take peoples' fortunes with them!

If you have say, a spare $1000, read up as much as you can over Xmas, take a punt snd check what that $1000 would be worth 6 months from now. No doubt you'll be very surprised... either way!

I apologize, if you took that somewhat personally. I just tend to spit out whats on my tongue.. anyways, Im totally confident that ppl who got BTC below 1000 USD per unit surely could feel like the Kings of the World (given, that they are not greedy and sell asap). As for the novices who just hear the TV news in some bar and think that this could be a really great idea where to put money from their bank.. sadly, none of them is probably much intelligent otherwise they would either do it a long time ago - or try to look it up. I liked these two articles. I find them interesting. I dont say they have to be 100 % accurate, but its a nice reading. 

https://theoutline.com/post/2592/bitcoin-is-none-of-the-things-it-was-supposed-to-be
https://www.wired.com/story/bitcoin-global-warming/

[crayxlp]

from the above mentioned links this one (at the top) is truly quite to the point - given the problems while trading / cashing / converting BTC during this weekend December 15-17, 2017

"After nearly nine years in existence, the closest thing to the kind of Bitcoin-powered payments Nakamoto envisioned is on dark-web markets: the websites like Valhalla or the now-defunct Silk Road that can only be accessed through the anonymizing network Tor. Bitcoin is the default currency on the dark web — but the speculators driving the current bubble are making it difficult to use Bitcoin for actual transactions. “**** you Bitcoin,” one buyer commented on the dark-web subreddit. “Went to do a direct deal today with a vendor, realized my $250 purchase would end up costing me $315 or so with fees and would still take probably 24 hours to get to him.” “I personally think there needs to be a grand movement on markets and vendors... to move to an alternative crypto, one that is not so god damn volatile and that can actually be viable,” wrote another. 

[Legojona]

Seeing a lot of posts here from people that heard things here and there. Most of your sources are from journalists and in most cases they are not really up to understanding the technology. It is easy to be jubilant or pessimistic about blockchain, but you can only really make a judgement if you know what it really is. I have been in the space since 2013 and I have formed the following opinion:

1. Blockchain technology will be the technology that replaces the internet as the main technology to transfer our most valuable resource: information. Everything will eventually run on this decentralized network of nodes that offers much more security than all these lonely servers and "clouds".
2. Bitcoin is the first proof-of-concept of using a digital currency to incentiveze people to contribute to create the largest crowd computing network ever.
3. Bitcoin will not be a currency (mean of exchange), but will be a great way to store large amounts of value.
4. Means of exchange coins will be coins like Litecoin that are fast and secure.
5. The next type of internet will be run on blockchain application platforms like Ethereum and Lisk.
6. Investing without knowledge is madness. There are tons of projects in the space that are promising (I'm not going to give advice), but many have no solid business case. The ones that succeed will be even more profitable as an investment than buying Google or Amazon after their IPO.
7. MONEY: There is a huge redistribution of money towards new groups of people by people with old money that try to buy a share in this new space. I have started in 2013 with an investment of $250 and do not have to work anymore.

The best article on the future of blockchain is this article, I think: https://hackernoon.com/what-will-bitcoin-look-like-in-twenty-years-7e75481a798c?source=user_profile---------7----------------

Edited December 18, 2017 by Legojona
typo

[Guest TabbyBoy]

5 hours ago, Legojona said:

Seeing a lot of posts here from people that heard things here and there. Most of your sources are from journalists and in most cases they are not really up to understanding the technology. It is easy to be jubilant or pessimistic about blockchain, but you can only really make a judgement if you know what it really is. I have been in the space since 2013 and I have formed the following opinion:

1. Blockchain technology will be the technology that replaces the internet as the main technology to transfer our most valuable resource: information. Everything will eventually run on this decentralized network of nodes that offers much more security than all these lonely servers and "clouds".
2. Bitcoin is the first proof-of-concept of using a digital currency to incentiveze people to contribute to create the largest crowd computing network ever.
3. Bitcoin will not be a currency (mean of exchange), but will be a great way to store large amounts of value.
4. Means of exchange coins will be coins like Litecoin that are fast and secure.
5. The next type of internet will be run on blockchain application platforms like Ethereum and Lisk.
6. Investing without knowledge is madness. There are tons of projects in the space that are promising (I'm not going to give advice), but many have no solid business case. The ones that succeed will be even more profitable as an investment than buying Google or Amazon after their IPO.
7. MONEY: There is a huge redistribution of money towards new groups of people by people with old money that try to buy a share in this new space. I have started in 2013 with an investment of $250 and do not have to work anymore.

The best article on the future of blockchain is this article, I think: https://hackernoon.com/what-will-bitcoin-look-like-in-twenty-years-7e75481a798c?source=user_profile---------7----------------

I agree in the most part and Internet v2 should make great of use out of which ever blockchain it adopts. I invested £1000 also back in 2013 and bought just over 10 BTC and sold them all along the way, reinvesting most of it into ETH and LTC which have performed brilliantly. I've also not had to work since I took a bung back nearly 2 years ago, I've not spent a penny of the bung as crypto has sustained me up until now. I must admit, it's the most enjoyable investment I've ever had and what I'm riding on now has cost me nothing so, I'll just HODL. It goes to show that you don't have to work hard for a living if you're prepared to take a calculated risk. To be honest, I think LEGO is a more risky investment right now if you take into account the competition, the work involved and the much lower rewards. If any of you want to poo-poo the idea of investing in crypto, check the prices of coins that interest you now and look at the prices again in 6 month's time.

[Guest TabbyBoy]

On 15/12/2017 at 4:26 PM, TANV said:

I've been looking at this and I"m a bit wary myself. What are your takes on Iconomi? My friends think I'm crazy for considering this...

Sorry about the late reply. I bought into Iconomi at £1.32 before it went up to around £4 and should've bailed then as it's continued to fall and not recover much. I think one of their problems is not buying back and burning the amount of tokens that they said they would. I've not heard much more about their plans either. However,  it's just reached £1.59 today so I can make a little profit if selling now, but I only have 1015 ICN tokens so I may as well HODL.

Don't just buy ICN only, it's best to diversify and spread risk. In a year from now, your friends may think you're a genius, not crazy! ;-)

[bigboy61]

There are just so many cryptos out there. It's hard to find one that looks like it has any future. A lot of them sound cool, but, in reality, most will fail. When you do find one you want to invest in, it's so hard to actually invest in it. I have tried to invest in a few and it is so hard. I have nothing to show for it. If you don't have BTC or ETH, then it difficult to acquire any of them. I guess this could be a reason to do it (since it will scare off most people).

Edited December 18, 2017 by bigboy61

[bigboy61]

Is anyone expecting the crypto market to have a correction soon? It's seems like its been blown up so much it is unsustainable. If they all start tending down, 80% of people won't want to ride it out and unload everything and thus crash the whole crypto market 

[Shewie]

If people will start pulling the money away from markets and exchanges bitfinex will probably suffer with fulfilling the money withdraw request caused by USDT (Tether printed supply) it might be even worse than correction.
Every december year after year in crypto was a month of bubble bursts and deep correction, (Profit realisation) from January it should start climbing as usual if nothing happens unexpected.

Edited December 20, 2017 by Shewie

[cladner]

bitcoin cash just surged to $9500 from a little over $3000 earlier today (over 200%).  best part of this is you were given a FREE bitcoin cash with every bitcoin you had on August 1 this year.  what a great day its turning into  

Edited December 20, 2017 by cladner

[Shewie]

2 minutes ago, cladner said:

bitcoin cash just surged to $9500 from a little over $3000.  you were given a free bitcoin cash with every bitcoin you had during the fork.  what a great day its turning into  

cost for 1BCH is 3.5k USD not 9500? lol

[cladner]

3 minutes ago, Shewie said:

cost for 1BCH is 3.5k USD not 9500? lol

https://www.gdax.com/trade/BCH-USD

check out the tradebook.

maybe their just playing with us.  hodl.

Edited December 20, 2017 by cladner

[bigboy61]

1 minute ago, cladner said:

https://www.gdax.com/trade/BCH-USD

Wow. I should have bought BCC when it tanked earlier this year (after the rush to unload it). I knew I should have capitalized on that!

[Shewie]

Just now, cladner said:

https://www.gdax.com/trade/BCH-USD

flash crash. go and see coinmarketcap.com
when the bubble is on the market check multiple markets to verify the information.

https://poloniex.com/exchange#usdt_bch
https://www.bitfinex.com/t/BCH:USD

[cladner]

9 minutes ago, Shewie said:

flash crash. go and see coinmarketcap.com
when the bubble is on the market check multiple markets to verify the information.

https://poloniex.com/exchange#usdt_bch
https://www.bitfinex.com/t/BCH:USD

flash melt up more like.    yeah i don't know wtf gdax is doing.  probably a trial run to give all the cryptoholics a stiffee.  

[justapilgrim]

It spiked because it was listed on Coinbase yesterday. Now to see if all the coinbase users (finally get access to their BCC) are buying or selling.

There will be other cryptos added. Likely spike in all those once listed. xRP IOTA NEO all prime candidates