Bitcoin Forum

Even though we still have a few months to go until the end of 2014, chances are that this year might turn out to be the worst for BTC. By this I mean the first year so far that BTC will end up in negative territory, 2011, 2012, 2013 all ended with huge upward movements, yet this year we have fallen from January high of $900-$1000 to what we have know $475.

What does this signal in your opinion? This year has seen many breakthroughs and positive news, yet we are down more than 50% this year - unprecedented event in the history of BTC, since all the previous years ended with high gains. Does this mean that 2015 will be a huge year or is it just a small detour along the way?

What do you cryptoheads think about this phenomenon ?

Cheers,
Jay

It could very well turn out to be the worst in terms of price per BTC, but it is still one of the best in the development of all the possibilities that bitcoin brings to the table. All the advances will still lead to long term gains, i am very confident.

September 4, 2013
1 BTC = $123

September 4, 2014
1 BTC = $475

That's an increase of $352 (286%) over 1 year.

It'll be interesting to see what happens in the remaining 4 months.

Still 118 days until the end of the year. Enough for a newbie signed up today becomes a member, for example.
Many things can happen. The last rally from 200's - 100's took less than 118 days, for example.

Let the battle ends to call it a loss.

In terms of price action alone, yes
But I think 2014 has been a momentous year in terms of mainstreaming btc and most importantly highlighting the limitless possibilities of blockchain technology

Nation state fiat scrip has no true value, it's deteriorating funny-money - a depreciating asset in a depreciating world. The fiat exchange price merely indicates the collective piss-poor pattern recognition skills of humanity, and their lack of respect for mathematics.

Seriously though, look around you. People are stupid, stunningly stupid and obedient. How do you think the world got to be in such a sorry state?

Anyway, just give it time. The wise future-human holds and waits for the game to play itself out in the way the laws of the universe dictate it must.

   This has been a great year for BTC. imo.
   If the price had stayed at around $1000 then I wouldn't have bought any.
   

What ever happened with "once we get retailer adoption = to the moon".  We have global online company's offering it as payment but no moon shot.  Is that because of miners/hoarders or because merchants are directly cashing out to fiat?

BTC price has not been upto the expectations this year but that doesn't mean it's worst. These are the buying times and as per predictions I still hope price will be rise up to 800 by the end of this year.

Probably both.

Anyway, I believe that many cryptoheads expect to see the same scenario from 2013, a huge rise at the end of the year , October, November and into December. The thing is BTC price has so far followed no patterns and while everybody and their brother are expecting to see prices triple up before Christmas, that just might not happen. The again who knows, it's a coin toss anyway. However I believe that from 2016 on we will see important price movements, but until then this year and possibly 2015 the price will prick around 400-700 USD.

Just my 2 satoshis,
Jay

Thoughout the last 2 years we've been witnessing the groth of Bitcoin's popularity. Now it is all over the place, maybe this is the reason?
Anyhow, 2014 is still not over. Maybe smth wil change.

Worst year is not really saying much. Crypto currency hasn't only been around for a few years. Just because the end of last year had a huge spike, doesn't predict that it will happen again around the same time. Personally, I don't think we'll see that much of an epic rise again. For the same effect, btc price will have to rise to at least the $4k range from current levels for it to be comparable to last year. I don't see that happening any time in the next few years.

2014 was dubbed year of multisig, however I still haven't found a reliable multisig app or software wallet.  I believe 2014 has been the year an industry was born.  I think Andeas made  a comment regarding this a month or 2 ago in one of his talks.  Development this year in  the crypto industry is unprecedented.   We went from having some professionals participating here and there in this wild west environment to the environment itself  becoming professional. 
I argue this is the best year for bitcoin and we should expect all this work to payoff soon in the price.

I am not worried at all.... Only reason for this, was big merchants coming in {Lots of new things to buy}, and hoarder spending coins. Then you have a "floading" or over supply of coins on exchange, pushing the price down.

As soon as the demand for BTC increase, when the hoarders stop spending and the "over supply" are reduced, the market will correct it self, and the price will skyrocket again.

To speed up this process, all of us, must help, even the merchants, to get more people to adopt the currency, to stimulate demand.

As soon as there is a bigger demand for the coins, than there is a supply of it.. you will not believe, how the price will go up.

So start, getting more people to adopt the currency, and see what happens.  ;D

I dont think the measurement of bad or good is depending the price movements. It is for speculators who are sensitive to the price level. I think 2014 is good year. Many big companies are accepting BTC payment. More people get to know what is BTC.

If I look at adoption and development, I say 2014 is best year for Bitcoin so far. The last year price from sept 4 is increase, but I do not expect the price to rise to over 1k this year, so we will see probably longest price drop so far, but it mean very little to me comparing obvious Bitcoin success so far

I don't think there is anything to worry about here. This drop in price is probably even healthy for the Bitcoin ecosystem. Not all of early adopters are hoarders, a lot of people have probably been cashing out, especially after the Gox scare. Imagine a college kid who accumulated 50 BTC worth nothing in 2010 see the price of 1 BTC go up to $1000 in 2013. That's okay though because these guys are helping in redistributing the coins and further increase the reach of BTC. This downward trend will likely not last for very long, I believe we will see a trend reversal before the end of 2015.

Price wise it is looking grim (although we still have 4 months left) but the amount of VC funding and development has been incredible. I won't make judgement until we are closer to years end. It has only been a bad year for those who bought on the high. I always stop buying once a rally begins.

The majority of retailers starting to accept bitcoin are only doing so with the intention of immediately cashing out to fiat.  This inevitably has a downward pressure effect on the price of bitcoin.

Fixed that for you.

In terms of price for bitcoin it's not looking too good at all and could be one of the worst years regarding that. As for how far bitcoin has reached and how many are now accepting bitcoin as a form of payment I feel that has done really well for 2014 as there seems to be more and more companies jumping in and wanting to accept bitcoin in some form whether it be for payments or just as donations.

I'm not sure that 2014 is a worst year. You know wny? Something bad can happen in a few years later =D
But anyway, we should be strong and someday we will see the result of our powerfull will

Thanks...That was my point.

so, btc has a great year (only?) because you have bought few coins?  ::)

I don't see how it's been worse since we've seen a lot of adoption, but maybe if all you wanted was the price to keep going up then maybe. There's still four months left yet.

Well, the good thing is, transaction volume has gone UP. {So people are using the currency more}

If they convert to fiat, all the time, it will have the exact affect, I described in my previous post. {Over supply of BTC on the exchange}

Only way to rectify that, would be for people to buy more coins, while the price is still low and to get more people to buy BTC  ;D

Yep. This guy gets it.

Two images to help illustrate the point:

https://www.technologyreview.com/sites/default/files/images/graphiti_redux_x860.png

https://i.imgur.com/az6rWrh.png

It's only a matter of time, in some months bitcoin will rise again but no one can predict if it will be in this year on in the 2015.

The eventual rise in bitcoin that has raised its value to $1k+ was a serious pump.These days bitcoin is making its usual peak and that what it should be always.More volatility leads to failure

Agreed here. Bitcoin is such an unpredictable thing.

True that, adoption has sparked right up

Yep. Adoption happens irrespective of current price. If a technology is useful, it will come into use. Bitcoin is useful, plain and simple.

Price follows adoption, not the other way around. Consider, dear reader, the implications of what I just told you...

no, the best year  ;)

Previous two major rally were caused by the technology shift: From CPU to GPU and GPU to ASIC, both of them increased the hash power by at least 100 times thus made many users without new miner no option but to purchase directly from the market

Now the technology has all shifted to ASIC, there is no further technology can increase the efficiency by that amount, it will only improve gradually over time, thus the exchange rate will not get that kind of push, but a slow and steady rise

For mass adoption, the security of bitcoin must improve dramatically, which is still very difficult for average Joe

Agree with you, I hope 2015 will be a good year for BTC holders.  I suffered heavy loss this year.

https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3900/14788509267_8c29675dba_c.jpg
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=747502.msg8445665#msg8445665

2014 is a great year for BTC price and fundamentals; as long as we dont dip below the last low of ~$50 then we are still pointing up. I know $51 price now would seem like the sky is falling but really, technically that is possible (I think its pretty unlikely though).
Ofc the nature of the market has changed a lot this year, so the price could stabilize below the last high. But since adoption levels are still in their infancy (IMHO the main upward pressure creator) I think weve more head room above and so I think there is still time for a new higher high price. IMO!


http://static.incrediblecharts.com/images/png_images/bul%20trend%20hh%20hl.png

Do you think 2015 will be any better? #fail

Boring year, that is for sure.

I got in early enough to be quite satisfied with the value of my holdings.

If you read the news section you can see that the adoption process is happening quietly behind the scenes. It will be a while longer, but we are well on the way to seeing btc as a ubiquitous method of $transfer if not THE favoured method. Wait a few more years.

I don't know why people are so impatient. Bitcoin already gave more than 10,000% gains in 2013. Why don't you wait until the end of 2014 before complaining about the returns? The Apple stock took almost 15 years to reach $700 from $20. Yet, the investors were overjoyed with the returns. Bitcoin investors need not wait for 15 years. But what about 3 years?

in terms of adoption, it's by far the best year for bitcoin.. i mean, we have a list of 10 really big companies that adopted bitcoin. in terms of price, no. so it just depends on your perspective.

I agree with you on this one... Current value worth anywhere from 200 to 400 USD/coin.

Are you looking at it from an economical point of view, merely a price-oriented one? Then until now yes, it doesn't look necessarily good. Also we've seen the fall of Mt. Gox - which may be a veyr bad thing or a very good thing in the long term. All in all I guess there have been many good and even great developments in the ecosystem when it comes to Bitcoin, so I wouldn't say it was a bad year per se. Also, it may still turn out great! :)

I agree with DH.  This year is no worse than last when we were all worried about the drop from the 250 to 100.  Too early to close the books on the year.  However, even if BTC ends at this level it will still be a year of consolidation.  There are threats to bitcoin but it seems to keep chugging along.

we're talking about 2014 though, so we'd have to compare prices on january 1 to whatever it'll be on december 31. if i recall correctly, we started the year out in the 900's.

I would say this year was pretty boring, but i can't call it bad.  We didn't experience any dramatical price drops, so the year was okay.

Yes, we can all agree how important it is to evaluate Bitcoin's performance by selecting the correct arbitrary start and end dates, which should naturally be based on the position of the earth on its revolution around the sun.

After all, one should always measure new technologies like Bitcoin by finding the oldest and least relevant technology one can think of (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_calendars), and applying it without thought or reason.

/sarcasm

Really, guys? I expect more intelligence from my fellow Bitcoiners. You disappoint me.

Forget the dates. Dates don't matter - study the patterns.

https://i.imgur.com/az6rWrh.png

Its simple big companies are accepting btc but instead of holding they sell which in return doesn't increase the price of btc. So unless big companies don't hold the btc there will be this negative effect going on :/

Its just a timing issue we dont have to break everything down by years necessarily. Why not break it down by months, days or 10 year periods?

On the basis of what? This thread is starting to veer off to speculation with these kinds of posts.

for reward you mean a rise of the price?

most people just throw out random predictions without backing it up by anything.

i dont think anyone can predict the real "value" of bitcoin at this point, as we are in a far to early stage...

From $123 it went up to $1200. So, expecting $475 will go up to $4700 too. Buy time ? ;)

I dislike the 'you are here' charts.  The reality is that no one knows what is going to happen.  While there are some patterns, they never lead to accurate predictions.  And more often than not, patterns and TA is manipulated to support a trader's pre-determined mindset.

Having said that, I remain bullish for the rest of this year

So what you are saying is that there is a conspiracy by "big companies" to keep the price of bitcoin down? That's way far out there in the lala land - but then again in this crazy day and age nothing is impossible.

More reasonable argument would be that the "big companies" don't hold btc because of its volatility, I mean it's not as if they are getting swiss francs - they are dealing with an financial instrument that can go 50% down or up in a matter of days if not hours. It is only reasonable that they behave in such a manner - it's called minimizing risk.

To sum it up: Your conspiracy theory about "big companies" is flawed. This has been circulating on the net for months now, and people just repeat this claim without any proof whatsoever.

Answer me one question please: If you were CEO of Amazon and you started accepting BTC as a form of payment, would you hoard it or would you change it into USD, EUR, Sterling, Swiss Franc, Gold, Silver etc ?

That's great.
Spetember 5,2014
1BTC=$488.
It is increasing and I hope end of the year it will reach $550.

BTC gained allot of new merchants, bigger companies are starting to acknowledge it "even PayPal is saying relatively good things" so IMO it's not a bad year for BTC. Price is volatile indeed but it was less than ~1/4 this price last year.

My opinion is that the price will not change radically in the last few months of 2014. As much as I would want BTC to be 2,000 USD in December, I have a strong feeling that is not going to happen - exactly because many people are expecting to see the pattern from the last year October - December spike. Majority of this kind will wait until January or February of 2015 and then will slowly give up - so quite a few weak hands will be leaving the ship. Which is exactly what the smart btc players want - to get more time to accumulate btc at these prices (400-600 USD).

2016 should be a year when we reach the long waited milestone of 3,000 USD and possibly 5,000 USD. And realistically 2020 is the date for 10,000 USD in my book. It might come sooner it might come later but that's the rough timeframe. 100,000 USD and all that talk is possible but most of us will not see it in our lifetimes, next generations will see btc at $ 1 mil for sure, in a 100 years it might even be worth multiple millions. And people will still be mining BTC in a century from now ! Maybe on Mars :)

Big companies will never "hoard" BTC to stimulate the price. They need to pay for things like we do, on a monthly basis. {Electricity Bill / Transport cost / Salaries etc} So do not expect them to hoard BTC

The answer is simple = Get more people {general consumers} to adopt BTC - That would push the price up, because demand for it is higher.

The single biggest thing, to do, would be to get gold investors, to re-invest a small % of their gold investments, into BTC {That will cause a mayor spike in the price, in the short run} But what is happening is the opposite... We have BTC buying gold. {Because gold is seen, as a safe investment} And that is just as bad as, merchants, exchanging BTC directly to dollars.

Being impatient is a bad thing, and it's very common in Bitcoin.
Exactly why would it be the worst year, because the price is not moving? Is Bitcoin meant to be used to meant to be held for future gains?
Looking at development, infrastructure and adoption in 2014, this is the best year.

This won't be the worst year, people only wants to get rich quick but we need these periods of consolidation to rise again in the future.

I think it was a pretty awesome year so far. A lot of things are in motion and a lot of adoption/developments happened.

It was bad only for short-term speculators, but I couldn't care about those.

Crypto is not a get rich scheme.

Best price is the lowest price so you can buy. You have a week before the surge

2014 is not worst year for BTC, because :
-Some big company accept bitcoin
-More merchant accept bitcoin
-More people know & want to use bitcoin
-More bitcoin service opened
-And i have buy some original games with bitcoin  ;D

So, i think 2014 is good year for BTC

In 2014 Bitcoin has improved in user adoption, wallet safety, education, public awareness, network security and Bitcoin companies have received more investment from venture capital than any other year. I call that a good year.

1 year = 12 months. BTC price is still ~4x higher than last year at the same time.

uhm...for me this is the wrong way to see the situation

We are talking here about 2014 specifically. Not the last 12 months or whatever. Is it that hard to comprehend. The discussion is about the year 2014. Capish?

it will come up again

I absolutely agree. 2014 was a great year. Besides the China ban and the MtGox disaster we had lots of good news.
One thin I realized is that good news do not push the price higher but bad news do.
Be prepared for up and down swings!

You guys have about 3 weeks left to keep saying this, keep that in mind

I must admit I've been pretty disappointing with the price overal this year but I don't really sweat it as I'm in in for the long haul. I think all we would really need is one big merchant accepting it to push up the price. Whether that will be this year or next is irrelevant though. Just have a little patience and I'm sure we'll be rewarded.

Still 116 days until the end of the year.
Many things can happen. Prices can rise back too.

The leap of 2013 and the 1000$ price tag make the world pay attention to the BTC and 2014 starts the real change of accepting and developing the currency in many places.
I think it could be a better year in terms of reaching the purpose and spread the news.. but we wont know it until 2015  ::)

Lot's of time left in 2014 still and bitcoin price is notorious for sitting around relatively stable for months at a time and then rocketing off (up or down).

If you discount the huge mainstream media hype that happened last year, temporarily and artificially inflating the price to $1000, you would be able to make the case for a continuing upward trend over the life of BTC.

Some of you guys are just too greedy, imo.. Why expect something to go up by insane gains every year? It's actually healthier for bitcoin to consolidate around a certain price range before a next major leg up. This would make future holders more confident that they aren't buying something that has little buying support and could collapse any moment once momentum goes away.

The worst year of btc will be many years from now, when the S curve will be on its end, now it's time to grow.

Indeed.  I have made a post on this here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=755905.60

TLDR: Even amazing investments can go through decades of poor performance

nah, in 2011 Bitcoin was having a quick death (from $30 to $2), and in 2012 a slow death.

Worst year if you are a short term speculator.

Big players selling so they can buy lower. No big deal (unless you are weak).

(talking out of my ass)

From the beginning of 2014 to now, it is bad. But adoption is rising, that is more important.

2011 was way worse, and yet you still had people saying "oh no dont buy even at 2, it will go to 0.1". Lol, idiots.

Nah, 2011 was still more bullish than 2014.

Jan 2011 = $0.55
Sep 2011 = $3.25

~500% gain

Jan 2014 = $815 average
Sep 2014 = $480

~40% loss

Something will trigger bullers again, its a matter of time.

We surely can't say definitely whether 2014 was a bad year or a good year for Bitcoin before it actually has ended! Until now things aren't looking that good if it comes to the price, but the ecosystem grew very well, it seems!

People will eventually stop being clueless morons and buy.

i don't think so, the peaks of 2014 is simply already passed, was at january, now we are still in the decline phase, was a good year but was too short maybe

Its a very good year, we have more posibilities to get sub 1000 BTC.

Exactly!
Price of Bitcoin is always going up and down, all the time (not just this year).
So, when price is down, like now, it's perfect time to buy and keep.
When price is up, sell and earn profit!
You loose only when you decide to sell in panic, for low price.

Your concept of "the worst year" its fundamentally flawed.
In fact, you're taking two arbitrary points in time and comparing the exchange rate of BTC vs the USD.
Just because theses points in time happen to be January 1st and December 31st doesn't add any fundamentally important information.

There have been longer time spans between a high and the next and there have been shorter ones.

They're not being clueless morons.  The consumer public literally has *no* reason to use Bitcoin right now.   Zero incentive.   Someone in the Bitcoin space needs to make the killer app.  The service that incentivizes the public to participate.   Until the public has incentive to use Bitcoin (outside of privacy), they will not begin buying.  And the price is not going to go up until demand goes up.   So the only people that need to stop being clueless morons, is us.  Merchants adopt because they have incentive.   We need to make something that will attract consumers.

-B-

It's all human psychology. People tend to categories financial performance in calendar years. If the calendar year performance to date is very good it creates more bullishness as it did in 2013, but as it looks weak like right now it increases bearish sentiment.

Investors also frequently 'review' their trades at the end of the year more so than any other period. So, I wouldn't call those points completely arbitrary.

Its simple big companies are accepting btc but instead of holding they sell which in return doesn't increase the price of btc. So unless big companies don't hold the btc there will be this negative effect going on.

Before every storm there comes a blackout. So wait for the bitcoin storm which is coming. Maybe that storm will make the whole world stunned.

Well then, what points in time would you suggest we use instead of years and months?

The year started at $733 (ignoring the artificial MtSux) Still a good chance of ending above that level

We still have 4 months ahead of us which is 33% of the year. A little early to call it over, isn't it? It will again finish at all time high but that won't last forever. On the other side the block reward halfing in 2016 means anotehr significant UP in price

We could also say that the dollar price went up 100%  ;D

it's still 4 month left
that's quite a long time
anything can happen in that period

I would say bitcoin awareness and adoption has increased quite a bit in 2014.  :)

In the end of last year everyone was expecting 2014 to be huge for Bitcoin. Which it has been in my opinion. A lot of positive things have been going on. Numerous large companies have started accepting Bitcoin payments. A lot promising new Bitcoin startups have been launched. I think many people are focusing too much of the BTC/USD or BTC/CNY price. In my opinion this is not the indicator whether Bitcoin has been doing well. What is for sure is that the market cap is growing and sooner or later the value will get higher too.

None. Period.
If you look at Bitcoin as it is right now, in its current state of growing awareness, a growing economy with capital pouring into it, its long lasting history of reliability, with thousands upon thousands of smart people wrapping their heads around it and finding new, exiting ways to put this piece of technology to good use, and you still see 2014 as a "bad year for Bitcoin", there's probably nothing in this world that will ever satisfy your need for instant gratification.

If, on the other hand, you're able to read the signs, I doubt that anyone in their right mind would see 2014 as anything but the year when Bitcoin really took of. :)

I corrected myself previously. The proper title should have been "2014: The Worst Year for Bitcoin Price". I agree that 2014 was an important year for BTC in numerous aspects, but not price wise.

I am still wondering are we experiencing a delay and the price will correct to its proper levels - like $1000 + soon, or is it going to prick around $400-$600 for another year ?

How is market cap growing , if you don't mind elaborating ? BTC market cap was cca 13 billion dollars in January, today it is around 6 billion USD. And you are claiming that the market cap is growing ?!

Guys that 1200 price was a bubble dont you get it.. media hype + mt gox + silk road shutdown + senate anouncment .BITCOIN itself is NOT a bubble ..but and here is a BIG BUT thats not to say there will not be any price bubbles. And i am afraid that last November was one.. but at each bubble we get a hole new wave of adoption so we may have a another bubble 1600 which settles at a new low of 800 then again and again.. or we may from now on get a agonisingly slow price rise. Who knows.. but its not bad news trust me. FOR some reason people think from 1200 we should just keep rising no wayyyy we need much more adoption and with all these peice of shit altcoins camoflouging the real deal makes it even slower for adoption.

2014 could be the best year for bitcoin, with the great news of the last months we can aim to the highest ATH in few months.

The price is completely irrelevant at this level. I think you are on the wrong page. This year (as mpkomara said) so much has been done in "...user adoption, wallet safety, education, public awareness, network security and Bitcoin companies have received more investment from venture capital than any other year. I call that a good year."

We've had a lot of adoption from companies that accept bitcoin and then probably dump it for fiat. That is both good and bad - good that they accept it, bad that they have nothing to use it for so they dump it.

For us it is good because we need bitcoin to be more widely accepted.

The stage will eventually come when BTC will be not only accepted but considered a currency - something that these companies will use to buy their merchandise with and keep the BTC in circulation. So it's kind of like a volleyball game, as long as the ball is in play the value of BTC will go up and up.

We're just not there yet. So actually it's a great year for BTC. It's getting popular, and it's also cheap enough to buy in abundance!

The adoption is still low and the potential growth is huge for bitcoin but the process is really slow and maybe we couldn't see a new bubble in 2014.

If this is the worst year for btc then we haven't done too bad. I think people need to not really look at the price compared to last year because it's a good chance the high of 1000 usd or whatever it was was faked/ artificially inflated by the mt gox shenanigans. Give it time and have some patience and I'm sure we'll see a rise soon enough.

I'd argue that Bitcoin has been overvalued for a long time, and 2014 has majorly been a catchup game where BTC infrastructure and BTC valuation have begun to equalize in more realistic terms than we've seen previously. I'd further argue that we've seen this slow decline over the course of 2014 because of speculators overvaluing BTC's future instead of what it exists as today. You're correct to point out that we've seen a lot of progress in the market, however a more useful discussion might be of events that could cause a price surge like the one we saw around the end of 2013 (which more or less looks like a massive pump and dump in hindsight).

What events are likely in the future that will increase BTC's trading value?

We don't need another pump and dump fiasco.

Yes. 2014 is the year money has started flowing into bitcoin enterprises.
We can expect some to flow into bitcoin as well in the future.

I think it was a somewhat good year so far. A lot of things are in motion and a lot of adoption/developments happened.

It was bad only for short-term speculators, but I couldn't care about those.

If it wasn't for the $1000 "bubble" from the end of last year, we wouldn't be having the exciting year of bitcoin adoption that we are seeing this year.

Will this coming 2015 a lot better year for btc?

I personally doubt that it would have made too much of a difference if we had only had the $100 "bubble" in early 2013.
The signal to entrepreneurs and venture capital would have been the same: "so, this Bitcoin thing is really taking of, better hop on the bandwagon."
If anything, the $1000 "bubble" was just the icing on the cake ;)

Think further into the future! By the time most people forget their brain wallets, bitcoin will be a-booming!

There is still Sept., Octo., Nov. and Dec. left, so we still have four months left till 2015.
Time will tell and drawing a conclusion now is still too early

Given that this whole thread is about price, this really should be in the speculation forum...

But well, here's my story for this year.  I bought 20 BTC when the price was $650.  Looking at the current price...ouch.  But I'm playing the long game here, and am not sad about this?  Why?  I haven't sold.  So far it's only a paper loss.  I'm playing the long game here and I'm fairly confident that the price will go back up eventually.  I just don't know when that will be. 

Remember last year?  The price started going up towards the end of August and didn't stop until around December, when it crashed.  Well...it's only a little after that time now.  Give it time, we've still got four months left in the year.  The price may go back up. 

Also, here's another way of looking at things: sure, from a market value perspective, it's a bummer.  But think of it from another perspective: utility, and usage.  How many transactions are going on now versus a year ago?  I haven't crunched the numbers but since it takes my computer a lot longer now to catch up when I turn it on in the morning than it did then, I'm betting a lot more.  Which could ultimately be why the price is going now.  It's good news in disguise: people are buying stuff, merchants are cashing out, but unfortunately, them cashing out puts downward pressure on the price unless everyone buying stuff immediately turns around and buys another bitcoin to make up for their purchase.  No doubt some people are doing that, I would to be sure, but I doubt everyone is doing that.

Too early to draw a conclusion, but we can only hope for a recovery.  :)

I moved a lot over into BTSX so no worries here, but I always ask... What is the sort of news we will hear that will make BTC explode again ?  I think it will be news unrelated to BTC perhaps.

with the video from PayPal I am hoping it gets better

Maybe Satoshi Nakamoto is planning something we dont know. I surely hope so.

We have 3 more months to answer these speculation. My guess is bitcoin will be on a stable phase at $450-470 up to the end of the year.

Hope it will not drop by $30 again

I was kinda hopig it should start blowing up now that paypal will allow bitcoin acceptance on ebay with merchant and etc..

The worst year for bitcoin was every year prior to it's existence.  Now it's all gravy man, just gravy.

Yes there isn't a worst year for bitcoins because every year since its birth the adoption is spreading more and more.

Yep it sure will:

https://i.imgur.com/MaNLV4F.png

Not that bad. We are still at $470 right. A bad year is below $300. Still, we are still in September.

It is only September of 2014. Its not the end of the year still. Keep your hopes up. :)

Maybe.. The bitcoin dropped the biggest this year.

I'm quite sure the value will rise in nov-dec. At least above $550 for my prediction.

I am biding my time and patiently waiting for the next financial crash, don't worry, Bitcoin will go up to $1000 again :D

I would gladly take one bad year....(so you call it)... ..to rid the market of the ass hole that was mtgox...
BTC -e. You should be next to go...

Even the Mt Gox robbery, which affected more than 8% of all the coins in circulation could not bring down the exchange rate of Bitcoin to $300. That was the bottom line. For all practical purposes, I don't think that the exchange rate will dip any further. Since the prices have remained stable for 7-8 months now, short term holders are offloading their stake. Once that is over, the rate will recover.

I agree. I can't see any reason why bitcoin would crash now unless something catastrophic is found or happens. I think the only way is up now for bitcoin and am excited for the future.

my speculation, until the end of the year the price of bitcoin will be stable and not more than $ 480,  :-\
called The Worst Year for BTC? i do not think so, bitcoin has pretty much increased,
beginning in 2014 bitcoin price just $ 370

Guys guys... 2014 isnt over yet.. So chill.

Exactly. Will be fun to look back at this thread during XMAS when we are far up from 400 territory. Saying BTC was at its worst in 2014 without seeing the entire year conclude is underrating BTC's potential.

Price wise, yes it hasn't been a great year for BTC.

But adoption wise, exposure, and underlying technology wise, BTC has made some strides.

I mean Overstock, Newegg, Virgin, Expedia, Dell, Wikipedia, and now the United Way etc all starting to accept it as payment method.

Circle, COIN ETF, Bitcoin ATMs, over 2 million Coinbase wallets, Second Market ETF BIT, millions invested in to Bitcoin related startups and companies.

Price wise, you can say it's been disappointing since we started 2014 in the $700-$800s and now are a now little more than half that.

Big picture wise, we're still setting up for the long haul.

It was a great year in terms of adopting BTC. As for the price..the year is not over..waiting for octomber:D

This is absolutely the best year for bitcoin. The market become more supportive due to the adoption, from companies like new egg etc. This integration will help make bitcoin more main stream and contribute to the adoption rate.
November/ December are the months.

All depends on the ETF, if it will be accepted in 2014 then we will see a new ATH.

A year ago I never thought I would be able to:

-- buy the world's most powerful laptop from dell with btc...

-- book a flight with expedia...

-- see Bank of America take time out from pillaging the public to report on btc...
https://ciphrex.com/archive/bofa-bitcoin.pdf

-- see bank of england step away from the money printing presses to put out, not one, but 2 reports on btc today...
http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/publications/Pages/quarterlybulletin/2014/qb14q3prereleasedigitalcurrenciesbitcoin.aspx


As far as I'm concerned.... 2014 has been a GREAT year for btc and I'm sticking to my original $2,000-$9,800 price target for btc in 2014:
http://prisonorfreedom.com/currency-analysis-7-bitcoin-price-prediction-for-2014/

Enjoy!
Tai Zen

bitcoin going up, don't worry! hold!

Agree with this. A lot more goes into the idea of success than just price point. Having big merchants start accepting BTC along with well known people like Branson get on board certain moves things more into the mainstream.

I agree. In terms of the potential uses for bitoin, it has been a great year. The same is true regarding investment in bitcoin related infrastructure.

I am not so sure about your price predictions though. If the price is increasing too rapidly then people will not want to spend their bitcoin which would hurt it over the long term

not the worst year.maybe it's a good sight.

And with Braintree, Paypal and Breadwallet.. Everything is amazing.

I'm sure there'll be worse years or times than this. Imagine of the price goes up to thousands then crashes back down for whatever reasons.

Yes, looking for a course  here http://www.bitcoincours.com or http://mining-profit.com, you know that the price actually falls. But I think that next year the rate will stabilize and grow up to a rate of $ 1,500. Objective reasons for the collapse of Bitcoin is not.

its been mentioned before but lets highlight it again
in short
buy 10,000 coins in september 2009 and sell them in september 2010 = $599 profit (well under a cent each 2009 to 6c each 2010)
buy 10,000 coins in september 2010 and sell them in september 2011 = $53,700 profit (6c each 2010 to $5.43 each 2011)
buy 10,000 coins in september 2011 and sell them in september 2012 = $68,100 profit ($5.43 each 2011 to $12.24 each 2012)
buy 10,000 coins in september 2012 and sell them in september 2013 = $1,104,100 profit ($12.24 each 2012 to $12265 each 2013)
buy 10,000 coins in september 2013 and sell them in september 2014 = $2,623,500 profit ($122.65 each 2013 to $385 each 2014)

easily explained, buy 10k coins in 2013=$1,226,500. sell for $3,850,000 = $2,623,500

so based on a 10k coin purchase 2014 is the most profitable year based on FIAT not percent

This argument will stop working from November onwards, lmao.

Nov 30 2013 - $1163

Nov 30 2014 - $163  ;D

This logic is flawed. You would need to use much more resources to purchase 10k bitcoin in 2013 then you would have had to purchase 10k coins in 2009. The only fair way to measure the return of an investment is to measure by percentage return, not the total return based on a fixed number of units.

Also your returns are misleading. You have someone selling the bitcoin for a different price then they buy at. In order for this to be an accurate comparison you would need to have the price be the same for a specific time frame

Oh come on, bitcoin won't drop to $163 by December :P.

哈哈

Still have 3 months to go, it is too early to say.

Call me an optimist but even with the forever downward trend i think btc will end up significantly higher than where it is right now. And even if it doesn't, I also don't really care.

Best news of year - PayPal announces Bitcoin partnership - http://www.coindesk.com/paypal-announces-first-partnerships-bitcoin-space/

Probably yes , looks like majority investor are changing to invest at altcoin
, looks like stellar .. even bitcoin price goes down , their price still up and up more
cannot wait for btc price in under $400 , so the majority bought many BTC and it will raise again :v

Following that statement, I would call you a realist.

Year's not over folks!  (Tips cap to Paypal)

Year's not over.  Still got 3 months to make something miraculous happen!

Come on Amazon.  Come on Google.  Need another major player to light the moon rocket.

have some faith in BTC, still have almost 3 months to go, no worries. more and more people is getting to know and adopt it.

We just got another major player (http://www.wired.com/2014/09/square-bitcoin/). 

I don't think bitcoin has the necessary infrastructure to handle Amazon yet.  The amount of volume that Amazon does - even if bitcoin captured 0.1% of their orders, which is unlikely, it'd be a massive amount of orders.  For a player the size of Amazon to adopt bitcoin, they'd need one of two things: either a proper hedging platform so that they could hedge away the massive price fluctuations of bitcoin, or a widespread enough bitcoin adoptions that they could hold bitcoin directly and pay their suppliers with bitcoin instead of dollars.  I'd prefer option two, personally, but we're many years away from THAT widespread an adoption of bitcoin.

It takes time to build the infrastructure. Paypal has teamed up with 3 major BTC payment processors. That will help the infrastructure and adoption. Slowly we are getting there.

Right now, there is not yet any feedback about this.. Let us just wait..

Considering what happened this 2014. The apple breadwallet, breadtree and paypal, 2014 is a great year for btc. Not even great, I think the best yet.

i think this year is psychedelic!

more and more company announced partnership with bitcoin. IMO, it will be a happy ending of BTC.

Better things will come next year. :D

In my opinion... It's the year of making it's stand on world stage against all Odd...

Gloomy. I would say. Anyway let's look on the long term basis. I'm just waiting for the day when i can pay btc using paypal

i think everything will be fine with the price , everyone worrys too much

Bitcoin price is not indicative of the success or failure of Bitcoin the currency or protocol.

2014 is easily the best year for Bitcoin. For bitcoin, not really. The amount of people worried about the price not constantly going up is just proof that people purely care about their USD profits rather than the success of bitcoin. Quit caring about USD profit in the short term.

I hope this year and beyond is good for btc,Id hate it see it Fall so Much :(

^ This, feverishly agreed.

Well, 2011 went from ~$31 to ~$2 in a few months..  How is '14 "worse" (using your definition as price being the only factor)?

2014 will be the worst year for miners and investors that jumped in because they saw everyone around them 'getting rich quick'.

BitBlitz's investing rule #437:  Once everyone is telling you you're an idiot for not investing-- it is time to ask how everyone makes profits on the same investment...

It may not have been the best year so far for price per BTC, but it has definitely been the best year so far in terms of new BTC businesses, as well as our ability to now use BTC at 10  times as many retailers as we were able to before 2014

It is the best year for adoption.

No time in bitcoin history has anyone lost any money if they held for 1 year at any buy in point.  This will be really interesting when we start hitting september/october.

We are already towards the end of September... And there is no recovery in sight.

I think he means 12 month period. If that is the case, then the price in Dec last year was over 1,100, we have to rise a lot to beat that.

13-Nov-13. That is the day bitcoin crossed $400.... and that too with a $45 jump.
By Nov-Dec we will know whether such a 12 month period exists.

Careful with such drastic pronouncements, BTC may yet surprise us all
Three months left to go in 2014, and that's a long, long time to go

btc is still stable so no problem
I am more worried if btc continues to break new highs without building any support.

In my opinion, it's not the worst. Actually it's showing the signs of resilience, it's here to stay.

I dunno why people worry so much about the price. We've got the rest of our lives to see it grow in value and adoption. One thing I'm sure of is this wont be the worst year we've had so if you guys get annoyed by the price fluctuations and get out as soon as you can.

Not true.. 2014 probably might be the best year to date.

Unfortunately it appears that the one year anniversary of the nov 2013 bubble will not hold true to this. I really do not see a catalyst that would cause the price of bitcoin to skyrocket significantly higher in the near term.

I second that. We are already in October - the peak was in November , right now BTC is under 400 USD and chances are very slim that it will move outside 350-600 USD levels that we have seen for most of the year.

As the Hero Member pointed out - no year in BTC history ended with a loss - if you held for 12 months. Only a few weeks to go until we are in November and face the moment of truth. The talk about 10,000 USD in a year or 100,000 in a couple of years was premature - we might get there but it will take years maybe even a decade - for 10,000 USD and several decades for 100,000 USD. Of course by then a cup of coffee will cost you a few thousands dollars :)

bitcoin did already surprise us at launch, it was on a killing streak with his 1200 dollars peak, the bubble of this year already happened

haha yea three months seems forever in the world of BTC

Bitcoin ETF = new capital for starters.

In December 2013 BTC price Rising to $1000 then in February Slide to under $300 , in April up again to $400 , and now BTC reaching $300 ..
From that's Data , we can take that in world Btc anythink can happen in only few weeks , iff my predict was right , in december 2014 BTC price going to $600 or even Higher :)
Have a talent to predict price? Join us in Sparkprofit , you got right in your predict they'ill give you a reward .. Interested?
get on here ...
Under my Refferal : Sparkprofit.com (https://sparkprofit.com/intro?by=KdxgMF)
Not in my Refferal : Sparkprofit.com (https://sparkprofit.com)
Enjoy :D

And then the question will become, what exactly is so important about the number 12, or the number 365, or the number 8,670 (hours) that we should place such emphasis on it as a determination of bitcoin's usefulness or value?

Answer: Nothing! There is absolutely no good reason to use the time it takes Earth to completely orbit Sol as an investment metric. It's sheer nonsense, the shallowest of logic.

Everyone was saying it would be 1000 before September.

Nothing close happened.

Patience young boy patience

IMO 2014 was a damn good year for BTC

oui oui senior 2014 was good for coining up

Only if you did it at the right time, which would probably be now.  I've made a pretty massive paper loss on the value of my bitcoins, but I'm not selling as I'm hoping this downward trend will reverse itself one of these days.

Patience, Patience, Patience !!!

yea that'll get you, when playing the bear market its easier to sleep at night holding fiat. But when in Cyprus do as the Cypriots

Sure it's been a disappointing year price-wise, but Bitcoin is still going strong and growing daily, but the price isn't everything.

Price is the easiest measurable metric, which is why everybody seems to be obsessed about it.  :)

Check back in 85 years to see where Bitcoin lands on the 21st Century list...

http://investorplace.com/2014/06/best-investments-of-20th-century/#.VC1_W_ldWKI (http://investorplace.com/2014/06/best-investments-of-20th-century/#.VC1_W_ldWKI)

Price is going down day by day worried about the future will its value increase again?

Worst year? are you talking price or adoption?
Because as far as price goes, sure its one of the larger declines, its like been a really slow bubble pop year =P
But last I checked the price is still above the most recent bubble($266) and definitely above its lowest of $0.

Adoption has been quite impressive though, more vendors jumping on board, services popping up like wildfire, governments taking it seriously, etc...

The way I see it, we are entering its more mature growth cycle. Its quite similar to the .com bubble. There was huge hype around the .com bubble which ultimately lead to a massive round of losses... but shortly after is when innovation & real value was being created for the web, now ".com's" are worth more than they ever were - meaning what was once just a hype driven bubble, has steadily grown into something used by everyone, everywhere, everyday...

We are at that very beginning of perhaps, but true & real innovation for crypto... is my guess.
So, the above is what bitcoin always has going on for it 'behind the scenes'

The only thing that will cause it to go super high in any short / midterm will be the complete implosion of major world fiat currencies, primarily USD. Once it gets inflated into the sky, at incredible rates, people will be 'cashing out of USD / other fiat' into some other form of safe haven. Bitcoin has become part of that 'safe haven' realm in such occasions. The secondary effect of this failure, will be more people seeking other ways to transact outside of USD ... bitcoin fits the bill for this really well.

Basically, what it comes down to.
For there to be true demand behind bitcoin's price ... the critical mass has to WANT to use it as an alternate currency. What will get us there quicker is us in the community who actually give a shit about what Bitcoin offers the world, actually getting off our asses and 'spreading the good word' about it. What will get us there REALLY FUCKING FAST, will be world monetary systems failing every day.

So, either the community decides to take action, which some have(hence is part of the reason why bitcoin is used as much as it is today and responsible for a decent chunk of its price point) and spread the word OR the community continues to sit back and wait for the demise of major world currencies. Of course, theres doing both =) ... which I imagine some of us are!

Price wise, it hasn't been great at all. But as far as adoption and growth, I think it's been very positive. The long term trend for bitcoin continues to look positive.

Guess it depends on what side of the fence you sit on. If you sit on Bitcoin just hoping its price point skyrockets, then yes price sucks for you. But, if you hoping price goes down so you can stock pile more.... price has been awesome for you this year..

Or not, lol.

I am talking strictly in terms of BTC price. You pointed out the April 2013 bubble - it went to 260-270 USD , that's the last major support for BTC price wise. We are around 370 USD at the moment and have been there for days. As long as the price stays above the support of 270 USD or maybe psychologically important 300 USD - we are still good. On the off chance that I falls down below 300 USD - we are fucked and could see it go back under 100 USD. I hope it will not happen, and for me this is a long term play - not a short speculation, however many new investors bought in January-March period and the losses are substantial for a lot of people at the moment.

Quite substantial :(

Honey badger don't care http://randallshoneybadger.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/Honey+Badger.+thumb+down+Honey+badger+don+t+care_468520_3448837.jpg

Honeybadger don't give a shit :)

I keep hearing people say this, and it's completely false. It simply wasn't the case in 2011. If you bought in near the peak ($32), then it took between 17 and 20 months before you broke even. Take a look at the Mt. Gox chart for yourself (will probably need to zoom out): https://bitcoinwisdom.com/markets/mtgox/btcusd

Let's say you do use months. Here's something I posted elsewhere on the forum, slightly revised:

A comparison to 2011

It took us 20 months following the 2011 $32 high for that price to be surpassed. Giving the investors back then the benefit of the doubt, let's assume that most of them didn't go all in at $32. Say they averaged at around $16. Even if that was the case, it actually still took 18 months just for them to get back above THAT level after it dropped below it.  So, then, let's use an even more optimistic estimate for them. Say they dollar cost averaged down in equal amounts from $32 to $2 (June 2011 to November 2011). Their break even exchange rate might have been about $10.  Even then, they'd still have had to wait around 13 months after the $32 peak just to break even.

Putting that into today's context, with our ATH on Bitstamp of 1163, the relative to 2011, the bottom this time around would've been around $73, and we've only actually gotten down to the $340 range! This brings me to another key difference regarding this time around.

The fact that we haven't even gotten close to such a relative low of $73, that's actually a double edged sword. Even while people haven't lost as much money on the way down up to this point as they would have if it had dropped to $73, they also haven't had the opportunity to buy in as low, to accelerate their process of breaking even -- assuming that it still, in the long term, goes back up.

This time around, say you dollar cost averaged in, by buying in with the same amount of dollars, at equal intervals, all the way down from $1163 to $338.  Your break even point might now be around $655. In a relative sense, that break even point is much closer to it's related high of $1163 than, say, the aforementioned $10 was to $32 back in 2011. Back then, it would've been like having your break even exchange rate at around $18, not $10. Keep in mind that that even a price of $18 wasn't crossed again for 19 months out from the high of $32.

So, we're currently only 10 months out from the current ATH. Say the same sort of situation comes to pass as 2011. Could you really hold out eight more months just to break even?

October 3, 2013
1 BTC = $103

October 3, 2014
1 BTC = $375

I appreciate your input. The numbers you have emphasized are exact figures and it cannot be disputed. You are correct.

That said - this is not 2011 anymore - we are a couple of months away from 2015. Back in 2011 BTC was an obscure curiosity known among a small community of hardcore programmers and coders, and now BTC is an international phenomenon with it being in the mainstream news everyday - this is a key difference between 2011 and 2014/15. However I cannot dispute your numbers - they are exact and strictly speaking you are absolutely correct. But what I am saying is that the setting is radically different now than it was in 2011. And this should affect the way you make you calculations and observations.

Like I said in the "Crunch time!" thread, a diff chart subtracting the current daily price from a year ago would be interesting. If we don't take off pretty soon, this diff will begin to approach zero pretty rapidly here. We're about a month and a half away from going negative after 365 days.

For sure. We haven't reached $73 yet on this downtrend, have we? :) Seriously, though, I really don't expect to see a mirror image of 2011. The low this time should not be so extreme. One can use such an extreme prior example as a measuring stick, not necessarily a predictor.

I wonder how many nervous hands will have cashed out their btc and given up on it because of these low prices. Will they be kicking themselves later on when the price recovers or goes to a new all time high? I don't even think bitcoin has reached even 10% of it's potential yet, so seems silly to dump now.

Imagine how many people bought in at the peak of 1000-1200 USD - those people are 75% down, and they are in the gutter, because I don't see no reason why this cannot go down to 100 USD or less since we are testing the April 2013 high of 270 USD now.

Be careful people, this ain't a game.

^^Very true

If BTC is just an investment, and has no value, ie not being used in daily life, then the price can be anything, even 0. But there are more adoption now.

I think 2014 is the best year yet..  ;)

Yes surely these people have watched their bitcoin devalue by 75% and have been waiting until now to sell.

or

Those people have been selling all the way down, and will/have run out of coins.

You are right you "don't see no reason" because you are blind to other people's opinions and concluded that everyone else in the world is a frightened rabbit.

Right now things are looking terrible, yes, of course! But I'm quite certain that this crash, or maybe another (potentially even bigger one) will finally clear things up again. The volume is high, and the price really is low. Things are being decided as we speak!

Sooo aggressive. Rawr rich fella, calm down ;D

Still almost 90 days for the end of year.


As someone said: This is not end, until it ends

I bet you are still in denial like so many others - hoping for the repeat of the 2013 autumn. It won't happen buddy. We have tested the 270 USD support, and there are strong chances this will go below 100 USD within a few months. Just being realistic here - I hold BTC - and I will not sell, but gotta face reality people.

$100 would be great...  it would be the BEST year for BTC then (atleast for me ) :)

Why because of the paypal and ebay thing?

It seems to me that you are the one who is ignorant of other people's opinions. You can give me all the techno-coding mumbo-jumbo to support your claim that BTC and crypto is the best thing since sliced bread, but this thing (especially alts) is turning into multiple pyramid schemes. That's all we have right now - I was in it for the philosophy behind it - and many other people are too, but what has become of this crypto world is a mockery of itself.

Trading money that is not really money, and bashing fiat along the way - with the only goal being to cash out the scamcoins and increase the amount of holding in fiat i.e. cash.

BTC has become a place for gamblers to go - there is nothing about technology or philosophy out there anymore, it's gamblers and pump and dump groups. Very sad indeed.