Bitcoin Forum

There can't be just one reason or factors behind the spectacular late 2013 bull phase for bitoin...so try to list them as top 5 reasons that caused the price to go from 170$ to 1100$ in such a short time...

1 China
2 China
3 China
4 China
5 China

We were in a rut...the price was stagnant for months.

Then Silk Road was busted. The market crashed, then rebounded to the same price within a day.

We were pleasantly surprised that even without Silk Road, the price was the same. It started the price moving up slightly as there were many media articles about the bust, the articles tended to mention the price rise.

That got the ball rolling, then China came into the picture.

This bull run will be because China is out and we see that the price did not crash the price.

The ETF potential and some other unknown factors will push it back up (there is a lot of upward pressure at the current price).

yeap, because of China.

China is slightly less important right now that it was last October
Not a bad thing at all

I honestly think we are almost priced in for a full out china ban.  I don't think the market will respond negatively to their bullshit anymore unless they somehow drive a bull run and PBOC cracks down.  But at these current lows, that ain't happenin'.

I tend to agree, not only that but Bitcoin is extremely unlikely to go below 400, if you study the 3yr logarithmic scale you'll see what I mean.

Reality check (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PKwq7b2i-vc):

https://i.imgur.com/I8AIyEX.png

Agree

Keep in mind that the crisis in Cyprus also had a significant impact.

so it is
1.china
2.cyprus
3.?
4.?
5.?

One of the factors would simply be that once the price started skyrocketing, everyone wanted to jump on board, so the momentum gathered pace.  When the rise in price is as rapid as it was, people start panic buying.  Then once that happens, it starts making headlines and attracts more potential buyers, so another factor would be the media.

1:  China
2:  Cyprus
3:  Panic buying
4:  Media attention
5:  ?

One of them should be the demand from China  ;) ,There still demand but with decreased country approval.

well it's pretty stupid of them to not move away from the banks and the euro after what happened to them.

Humans are stupid creatures

Who is to say that there are even five reasons? Lol.

Obviously the hype in China had a huge affect on that bubble, in both its rise and partial fall. But what caused the Chinese to start investing? There must have been something that triggered it, or was it just some initial buy that triggered a whole panic and trail of media?

Some people have said (in this thread too) that the effects of the China 'ban' are about priced-in now, that's very possible. The logarithmic scale graph that is passed around does make for tantalising viewing, with higher highs and higher lows, you might expect the next bubble to kick off soon enough, but what will be the cause? Is it even possible for the price to plummet to figures pre-October 2013 and sustain? Probably not...

100% agree, if only we can trade China for India now, the same skyrocketing in price could happen(India has over 1billion people, China has over 2billion, both very populated countries)

Actually I think that China and India have similar populations, with China edging it by the odd hundred million lol. Either way, I think that population size only matters with adoption. In terms of investment it just takes a relatively small number of investors to pump cash into Bitcoin to help generate a bull run.

Population adds up. 100million people buying even $1 worth of bitcoin is much more than a few investors here and there buying in.

As others said China will take all the 5 positions in this top list

Irrational exuberance?

I can give you a reason why I went in. It was because of the US govt. shutdown thing. Bought in I think first of October and held on until the govt. shutdown happened. I got caught in that bear trap, but still made some $.

You know that chart is incorrectly scaled right?  In what world is 50 the midpoint between 1 to 2,000?

In the world of LOG-O-RHYTHMS, baby!  Yeah, that's right!
All kidding aside, for measurements covering many decades, logarithms are the only sensible approach.

Indeed. All kidding aside, this is one of those awkward moments when some random internet tourist realizes they've entered a part of the internet full of people far more intelligent than him/herself.

Cue righteous indignation... now.

I agree the log chart is rubbish.

The log chart is historical fact.

The nice thing about mathematics, is that unlike some of the softer, pussy sciences, it leaves very little room for interpretation. Your opinion is irrelevant.

http://bitcoincharts.com/charts/chart.png?width=940&m=bitstampUSD&SubmitButton=Draw&r=&i=&c=0&s=&e=&Prev=&Next=&t=S&b=&a1=&m1=10&a2=&m2=25&x=0&i1=&i2=&i3=&i4=&v=0&cv=0&ps=0&l=1&p=0&
The China effect worn off and we still see an upward trend.

Totally depends on what time frame you were looking at.  Year to date, trend is down.
Last 60 days, trading is sideways.

Last seven days, last thirty minutes, yeah I get it. I didn't specify, so presume infinite term.

Not that I want to derail the topic, but logarithmic charts can be manipulative if used improperly.  The UK Statistics Authority felt compelled to criticise a chart published by the government that, on first impression, made it look as though similar amounts (http://www.newstatesman.com/sites/default/files/images/Treasury%20graph.jpg) were being spent in different sectors, when in reality, the figures were nowhere near equal (http://www.newstatesman.com/sites/default/files/images/UKSA%20graph.jpg).  The two charts show the same figures, but the difference in the impression they generate is vast.

I agree!

However charting is not math.  Charts are always open to interpretation.

I don't like log charts for the obvious fact that don't have consistent
Units of measurement on their axis.  That's merely my opinion as you pointed out.

But even non-log "normal" or linear charts are somewhat arbitrary because
who is to say how many pixels a given unit should get.  It could be stretched
to any arbitrary shape.  But at least it would be consistent.

So you're saying that we should be expecting the price to start rising soon? I would like that. I think that 400 would be the bottom now, but who knows.

It was Mark Karpeles alone doing fictional transactions

The price doesn't give a crap about what a chart says.  Price can do whatever it wants to.
Buyers and sellers determine the price, and we all know this.  

The fact is, 3600 new coins are mined daily.  Unless demand can keep up, price will keep sliding.
So, we need the next wave of adoption.  Many speculators may have been early to the party, (bought into the last bubble) me included.  That's ok.  Long term, we will be fine. The question is, when will the next spike occur?

I see some people here not believing that Cyprus playied an important role when it comes to the rise of bitcoin's price. The events in Cyprus indeed received much media attention but many people don't realise how desperate Cypriots were at the time.

As a Greek I can confirm that the days bank accounts were closed in Cyprus there was panic everywhere. Rumors and speculation were being talked everywhere. You can't even imagine what could be heard at the time. While the mainstream media were conservative about those events and were't letting out enough information out in many cases people were still being in panic in the thaught of losing their money. To me it sounds perfectly logical that people there would seek for alternatives to FIAT at such a time. It wasn't just the cypriots that lead the price to rise. It was the situation there that lead people all around the world to trust banks a bit less. And this is why Cyprus made bitcoin to rise, out of all the negativity there bitcoin was the winner.

sounds legit.