Bitcoin Forum

About 5.5 billion troy ounces of gold exist right now in purified form on planet Earth.  At $1,200 USD per oz, that's $6.6 trillion USD as a market capitalisation.

If you split the same market capitalization among Bitcoin, the price of a single Bitcoin would be $314,286 USD.

That's a lot of room left to grow yet for gold market capitalization parity.

What do you think the maximum price or market cap will be for Bitcoin, and why?

I think we're doing it wrong. I think there will be a time when paper won't be able to buy bitcoin, thus making Bitcoin a global currency. And if we have a global currency, I bet we'll have a global government.

And, what if, what if, this global goverment would endorse bitcoin in such way buying or selling is permitted only with bitcoins?

lol cash out already ;D

There is no maximum possible value because the value is described by the quantity theory: PQ=MV.  Since PQ have no maximum value, i.e. economic growth has no fundamental upper bound, neither does MV.  In practice, the economy is limited by energy supply, but it is always theoretically possible to increase the energy supply through changes in technology.

there's not much more room for bitcoin to go.  Next level is regulation and mainstream (which defeats the purpose of its existence anyway), which is a huge step forward.  40% of americans already know what it is.  Ask someone on the street if they think bitcoin is a big deal.  Answer is NO.

So the dilemna with bitcoin is that for its price to skyrocket it has to abandon its roots.  Basically, bitcoin is kind of like a joke right now.

Less than 150,000 Americans own more than one Bitcoin. Not much more room for growth...  ::)

40% of Americans know what it is, or they have heard of it?  These are very different statements.

It's basically the same thing.

"The same thing?" yeah right.  Hearing about bitcoin and knowing about bitcoin are definitely NOT the same thing. This reminds me of some guy who looked over my shoulder while I was standing in line showing my buddy some charts on my phone. Here's how the conversation went down:

- Random guy  "oh, you do TA?"
- Me               "Not really, I just kinda watch the price."
- My buddy       "yeah, he makes bitcoins!"
- Random guy    "oh yeah? I heard about that, what's the price at?"
- Me                "Thousand bucks"
- Random guy  <blood draining from his face> "... and how much you make per day?"
- Me               "Only one or two"
- Random guy   "..."

at the end of that, the look in his face, I will never forget. I seriously thought he was gonna stab me and try to steal my bitcoins. Lesson learned, I don't mention bitcoin in public anymore.

Total world money supply is ~70 Trillion 2013 USD.   21 million BTC.

70,000,000,000,000  divided by 21,000,000  = 3.33 Million USD per coin.

Max value of BTC is 3.3 million USD each.  If it were to entirely replace all fiat on the planet..

Yes and no. If bitcoin is on the whole more useful than fiat, then it could be worth even more. But global bitcoin domination won't happen any time soon if ever. I'm much more comfortable settling for a 100k max for now. I realize the potential is much, much higher going purely by its usefulness compared to alternatives, but there will be resistance along the way. Powerful resistance which we haven't begun to see yet.

shitthatneverhappend.txt

whateverdude.getfucked

Yes, yes - mark of the beast argument.  LOL.  I did think about this too.

Before that happens, I think I'll be switching to Zerocoins. Money laundering will be going nuts.

I guess all the more reason for Governments to intervene and try to shutdown a truly anonymous cryptocurrency.

Everyone in the future world will only have two personas: Public and Secret.  Why? Because Private won't be private anymore.

Source of 70 trillion world wide? I know that the worlds GDP is near that number and the monetary base is much lower. The USD has a monetary base at maybe 3-4 trillion. The Euro has 2 billions.

Electric,

How does it feel to be so obtuse as to have sold all your coins dirt cheap and now know that you could have been a millionaire but instead are a pitiful troll on a bitcoin forum?

Sting much? Or do you just tell yourself that since bitcoin has to sell out to prosper that you were better than that all along?

Bwahahahahahahahahahaa.

Shmadz wins.

Funny story! 

I have a similar one.  Bitcoin came up in a conversation with a young twenty-something guy at my local gym.  He's got a bit of a stock trader / young-tycoon personality.  He mentioned that he started looking seriously into bitcoin in the summer because he thought he could trade it profitably.  He then casually asked what the price is now. 

I said "about $1,000" (the price at this time in November).

You should have seen the look on his face!  I swear I heard the "bu...bump" his heart made when his brain processed the math. 


And EM: there is a world of difference between hearing about bitcoin and knowing about bitcoin.  I heard about bitcoin in 2009; I wish I knew about it a lot sooner. 

Would you guys stop it with the world domination gdp pipe dream.

The moon.   ;D
I was thinking total USD/21million but that thinking is wrong.
Your thought on total amount of gold is also wrong because bitcoin is more
than just a commodity.  Bitcoin allows for so much more then gold.  I am going to say
BTC will easily have a total market cap more than gold+silver.

M2 to M3ish money supply.  Current US M3 is around 12 trillion they don't publish it any more,  Euro is around 15 Trillion (USD), China around 15 trillion (USD).  The rest of the world is ~30 Trillion.  There are a few sources out and about on the web where they try to estimate M2 and M3 World Money supply, its hard to do because of fixed exchange rates (CNY) and hyperinflation scenarios (Zimbabwe).  It's in that 50-100 trillion range.  

~  means appoximately.

No.

At least take a look at the Merrill Lynch analysis:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=359687.0

The methology isn't very detailed, but it's logical. Also, it's a lot better than saying "X is worth gazillions, therefore bitcoin will also eventually be worth gazillions"

That valuation is nonsense, they just looked at what the price of bitcoin was at the time and choose figures to get something close to that number. They can't come out and value it at $100,000 when it's $1,000. David Woo or whatever his name was would get laughed out of the office.

Who laughs last laughs best.

When I initially discovered bitcoin it was somewhere in the cents, before bitcointalk with satoshi still around. So right, I could have been a millionaire.
Though when I got around to playing around with it, around the time I registered at the forum it already was past the 2011 peak. I couldn't have been a millionaire after that, so what do you know.

At least I could have had the chance, and I never put anything in besides the coins I mined on my PC, so in a sense I got something for nothing, have you?

Dude you are pathetic. And no, you didn't get something for nothing, you are forgetting electricity and wear and tear. Why aren't you rich if you discovered it that early? Why aren't you busy cruising the caribbean or traveling the world instead of trolling a forum? Even if you are poor in spite of opportunities, at least get a fucking life.

Well if I'd be doing that I would have cashed out too wouldn't I? That's the point everybody has to cash out at some point. And I know one thing: If I had the coins form back then and would plan on keeping them I wouldn't be busy cheering up uP UP on the forum either. So what's more pathetic, a missed opportunity or no opportunity at all?

I think we all know the answer. Ask yourself why I am still around? Well what has become out of this little experiment has become amusing, it's own little drama. If it weren't for figures like Bruce Wagner, pirateat40 and DPR I would have left a long time ago. Things keep happening, and once in a while I buy back a little and dump it on the next sucker for a higher price, I continue to make a little cash, and if Bitcoin goes to zero tomorrow for whatever reason I still have made my share off people like you.

We're just here because we are so rich that we don't have to work anymore. I take 5 minutes between beach and other pleasures to troll some bear on here while setting some orders. Why you are here, I honestly have no idea, you don't even trade.

I do trade. And you ain't rich if you haven't sold.

This actually is what I plan to be doing about a year from now if things continue as they have. Will be interesting to see how many old faces are still preaching doom and gloom by then.

Or if not you'd be one of the subjects of my amusement. In a way you already are.
Both of you. ;D

you can sell a little to cover your expenses. there is absolutely no point in cashing out from an appreciating asset into an asset on the brink of collapse.

glad that you are amuzed. at least that you can do since it's free ;)

The question is how large are your expenses or better yet if they are in tune with somebody claiming to be "rich"...

let's just say that my expenses can't keep up with the way bitcoin is appreciating in value. rich is relative, to some only top-10 forbes is rich. to me, doing only what *you* want is rich enough.

Well do you cover your expenses with your profits or not?

I don't understand many posters' (like EM) fixation on selling all of their bitcoins.  Just like you don't have to invest $100,000 (you can start with 50 bucks!), you don't have to sell out all your bitcoins in order to benefit.  

I think it is generally agreed that if you believe in the long term prospects of bitcoin, it is wise to follow a disciplined divestment strategy such as Risto's SSS plan (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=345065.0).  This way you can both extract money to enjoy your life as the price rises, while mathematically ensuring that you retain a sufficient amount of bitcoins should bitcoin become a major global currency.  

Even those who purchased this summer have already re-couped more than their initial cash investments following this simple plan (while still retaining most of their coins).  Now they can more-easily emotionally detach from the price swings and enjoy the ride.

What will be the total world money supply after 130 years mean when all bitcoin would be mined? Bitcoin is fixed but paper money they just can print according to the singature of few leaders, SO just think what will be the price of Bitcoin, I am not thinking about Bitcoin price i started to think about what will be the price in $ of one Satoshi? may be 100$ or may be 1000$ i dont know how many ZEROs i need to put beside 1$..............
Good Luck

Yes, this all-or-nothing attitude leads to "nothing" in almost all cases. I prefer to keep a healthy balance at all times, and anybody who witnessed at least once how rapidly bitcoin grows, and who can also add 2 and 2, would do the same.

No, everybody doesn't. My bitcoin wallet will never go to 0.

+1 wanted to make this calculation. GDP was slightly higher according to wikipedia.

I never said you must sell all of them.

Then even if one didn't learn about bitcoin till this summer, one should have recouped more than his initial cash investment by now and still have plenty of bitcoins left (using the SSS plan I referenced earlier in this thread).  

I noticed you've had your forum account since August 14, 2011, EM.  What divestment strategy did you follow?  Would you recommend it for new users?

Looks like he is trying to destroy bitcoin. :-)

The best strategy is to forget some on an old laptop and discover them before you throw it away.

Almost worked for me. I had some coins in 2010 long before I took BTC seriously. I stopped caring, forgot about BTC, and later sold the laptop on Craigslist. I wonder if that guy ever got the coins. Unencrypted wallet, too.

There is truth in that.  If you are always watching the fiat value of your bitcoins, you could be tempted into selling too many too early.  

If you don't think you have the self-control to stick to the SSS plan, then a more secure variation on EM's suggestion would be to store some bitcoins on a laminated paper wallet (with a TrueCrypt back-up!) and just forget about it for a few years.  

What if Bitcoin became the "world economy" but in the sense that you could use it in every country in the world, side by side with that given country's fiat?

You travel to singapore, you can convert to Singapore money or you can use bitcoin.

London?  Bitcoin. 

Bitcoin is used by everyone, everywhere as the "alternative" currency that is now global.

Would it really need to *replace* fiat to attain that market cap and per-coin value? 

If it were to become *the* world currency, even if fiat currencies remained ... could it match the market cap while remaining side-by-side with fiat?

-Burger-

If you convert all fiat paper wealth as of this moment into USD, divide the entire world's fiat paper wealth by 21 Million(Bitcoins), then each Bitcoin becomes worth about $22million USD.

The total amount of fiat varies greatly depending on who you ask.  Calculations performed with crap inputs yield crap outputs.

Maybe the world economy today supports a value of $3.33M/BTC, but the world economy where bitcoin is used might support a higher number like $4M, thus my nickname.

The real potential of bitcoin comes when we expand into space, cultivate alien planets, and implement bitcoin on their networks. If we estimate the GDP of the entire galaxy in USD as 8.2 * 10^20 USD, then the value of each bitcoin would be $39,047,619,047,619.04

You forgot to add what the Fed adds daily in your equation. In fact, I believe a majority of countries also inflate their currency, ergo Bitcoin will forever be chasing an ever expanding bubble (not sure if no pun intended).

Nope didn't forget, see the 2013, that means 2013 USD equivalent.  Not some future USD value, that value of USD in 2013.

We Can't actually Predict possiblity of maximum because its Infinite
but recently what we can predict is In 2014 Minimum MarkerCap of Bitcoin will be 26 Billion +
Lets dont go more far then that Bitcoin Maximum Value could be in Trillions of Dollars or it could cover alll the GDP of whole world then just think.

wow is that true? Thats only about 0,05% of USA population (if population is 300 mil (im not from usa))

Even more than that, because some bitcoins are lost, so you should divide by 20m, not 21m. :)

I totally agree with you, all this is very silly. It has the causality reversed. Governments decide the currency, not the other way around. There is no reason whatsoever for total bitcoin supply value to match total global money supply/assets/GDP/whatever.

It can still go to 7 digits though.