Bitcoin Forum

Buffett is a great but he is not always right. By his won admission, he doesn't understand technology which is what btc ultimately is.
Just sayin'

He's been saying bitcoin's shit for ages. His 2015 advice is no different to his 2014 advice.

...it simply doesn't fit his investment profile or personal character.

No.  There are many things Buffet doesn't understand or invest in.
His taking the time time to comment on Bitcoin & call it shit shit likely means just that--he thinks it's shit.
Don't overanalyze :)

as soon as we clean up the crypto trash (scams, schemes, and foolishness) we will produce billionaires, trillionaires, and quads (quadriliionaries).

There are many things Buffet doesn't understand or invest in.
His taking the time time to comment on Bitcoin & call it shit shit likely means just that--he thinks it's shit.

Clearly Buffet is speaking of Bitcoin more out of ignorance than intelligence:

“Stay away from it. It’s a mirage, basically. … It’s a method of transmitting money. It’s a very effective way of transmitting money and you can do it anonymously and all that. A check is a way of transmitting money, too. Are checks worth a whole lot of money just because they can transmit money? Are money orders? You can transmit money by money orders. People do it. I hope Bitcoin becomes a better way of doing it, but you can replicate it a bunch of different ways and it will be. The idea that it has some huge intrinsic value is just a joke in my view.”

He's comparing bitcoin's system to checks and money orders instead ACHs and wires.    Nevertheless it cost more to process a $5000 check than $5000 worth of BTC, a postal money order cost more, a bank money order cost more, an ACH cost less but is faster, and a wire cost more than them all and faster than them all but still not faster than a BTC transaction and yet the btc transaction goes far faster.  

Based on that alone, his intelligence about the value of BTC falls flat on it's face.  Everyone know time is money, which is the only reason why people are willing to pay so much for a wire transfer, or a cash advance on a credit card.  

BTC is not a consideration for Buffet because its 'none of his business', it's not what he does, and he could do without it -- for now anyway.

Cryptocurrency is making its way around very fast, anything tied to the internet has a way of doing that. 2015 will be a better year for crypto, but as soon as we clean up the crypto trash (scams, schemes, and foolishness) we will produce billionaires, trillionaires, and quads (quadriliionaries). No other industry can produce such wealth.   All we need is security, real security and mega wealth is on the way.

bitcoin_bagholder, your username is ironic if it's meant to be sarcastic.

So essentially get rid of everything this community is made of.

Does Warren Buffet go in for surgery and tell the doctor where to make the incision? No.

He knows absolutely zero about Bitcoin. Wtf makes you think his opinion matters? Because he has money?

I know some fucking complete fucking retards worth a lot of money. People with excellent business sense...but that doesn't make them experts on everything, now does it?

People tend to give their respect to people solely because they have money. It's quite sad.

You, yes YOU, solely being a member of this forum, already know more about Bitcoin than Warren Buffet.
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No, no he's not.

I know millionaires more savvy than him.

You know the difference between millionaire and billionaire businessmen? One of the two was luckier than the other...not much else.

Warren Buffet is a decrepid dinosaur. His time his over and Bitcoin will be the nail in his coffin.

Warren Buffet says he likes his money in fairly stable & certain investments, where major change and disruption are unlikely. It is not surprising he says steer clear of bitcoin. Unfortunately I think his advice will be quoted in a lot of upcoming articles that are critical of bitcoin and some people will take his advice. But imo this won't have any notable impact on price

Warren Buffet saying bitcoin is a scam:

http://www.businessinsider.com/warren-buffett-money-tips-for-2015-2014-12

How is this going to affect price?

...
some big player who don't know about bitcoin before will have a look into this and might be give it a try chuckle.

i think it will give bitcoin a boost
as one of the best investor is talking about something can't be a simple currency
some big player who don't know about bitcoin before will have a look into this and might be give it a try

..and by "ground" you only mean price?

When the price was $1,100, Bitcoin had a lot less infrastructure than it does now.

There is more to the Bitcoin economy other than price. When are you people going to quit with this one-dimensional thinking?

So the shirt maker doesn't understand the disruptive technology.

This is news?

Warren buffet will have a nasty wake up call when it comes to Bitcoin succeeding.

He simply doesn't care about the technology, he just cares about money. Nothing important to read here  >:(

You're right. Unlike Buffet, bitcoiners are actually trying really hard to save the world. That's their primary goal. Money is not even that important.

Warren Buffet is a smart guy, some that understand Bitcoin and its potential may think the fact that he doesn't invest in BTC as stupid, but he actually has the right idea. Don't invest in what you don't know. Hes not a tech guy, so he doesn't invest in tech. Will that bite him in the ass and will he feel regret for not buying? No, the guy is loaded and he will find other traditional investment mediums to make money in.

Frankly speaking, Bitcoin is not a safe investment. Don't get me wrong, I love Bitcoin, and I advocate its benefits to anyone who wants to know, but at this point in the game, if you don't understand Bitcoin, don't buy it. Your chances of losing money in the volatile market is nothing compared to your chances of having your investments scammed or hacked away from you. Until Bitcoin is as idiotproof as credit card transactions, ie there is a button you can click to completely secure your coins, investing in Bitcoins is not the right idea for people who don't have the aptitude to understand it.

He's got lots of IBM, article indicated that he bought more too.

Why IBM Is One of the Biggest Warren Buffett Stocks "Berkshire owned 8.3% of Big Blue, making it the third-largest holding in Buffett's portfolio."
http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2014/11/28/why-ibm-is-one-of-the-biggest-warren-buffett-stock.aspx






Absolutely.

Warren Buffet saying bitcoin is a scam:

http://www.businessinsider.com/warren-buffett-money-tips-for-2015-2014-12

How is this going to affect price?

Buffet was trashtalking gold and gold went from $200 to $1900 during its bull run.

This should be a forum sticky:

"Among the holdings that Buffett increased were his stakes in credit card giants Visa and Mastercard, as well as IBM."

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/berkshire-hathaway-13f-filing-november-14-2014-11#ixzz3NIzuC5XR

He's a statist that requires Bitcoin to fail for his investments to succeed.

ooh thats why hes saying that bitcoin will crash otherwise he wont have any profit ftom those now i get it :D

ITT:  We convince ourselves that a multibillionaire don't know notin' bout money.

ITT:  We convince ourselves that a multibillionaire don't know notin' bout money.

Gates has more money than Buffet, and he likes btc. Now, look at both backgrounds and decide who is more likely to be right. You should watch the '90's Letterman interview with Gates, where Gates tries to explain the internet to a baffled Letterman. All 3 of these men are very intelligent, just on different subjects.

How much has Gates invested in BTC again?  Or are you extrapolating from his comment on blockchain technology, i.e. crypto in general?

Who knows? Who cares? neither of these guys need to worry about whether btc succeeds, why would Gates bother buying any? as far as what he's said about btc, dyor.

Just took a look at your post history, Silver. Looks like you either lost a shitload of btc value and already dumped or still holding.

Just took a look at your post history, Silver. Looks like you either lost a shitload of btc value and already dumped or still holding. Either way sorry about that.

All I know is I bought my first 5 BTC on Monday at $700. [...]

How much has Gates invested in BTC again? 

Most people who are currently under the "Bitcoin as a currency" illusion are missing some very important details (on multiple levels) regarding Bitcoin. Most of the information that they've gathered is based on false premises that have been perpetuated by snake oil salesmen, scammers and intellectually dishonest idealists who rely on tenuous and also factually incorrect information. Bitcoin is a cult, it is not a money or currency. It is predicated on a system of half-truths and lies that fall on their face when put under the microscope.

These omissions, misperceptions, half-truths and lies are not at all trivial. They cut right to the core of why Bitcoin (the currency) is faulty at its core, and why it will soon hit a technological, economic and regulatory brick wall.

I'll do you and everyone reading a favor, and I'll provide a list of a few of the problems with Bitcoin, and explain how you've been lied to, where your fundamental misunderstandings are, and why Bitcoin is flawed on a technical, economic and regulatory level.

I'll start with the technical side:

1. In Bitcoin, proof-of-work (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proof-of-work_system) is the method used to create reusable tokens (i.e. BTC) that can be sent and received by someone else with a Bitcoin address. When new Bitcoin are created by a Bitcoin Miner/Mining Pool, transactions from the previous (on average) 10 minutes are incentivized through fees (of BTC) to be included in the next ledger, which is built upon the previous ledger.

2. Bitcoin Mining is *HIGHLY* centralized among often anonymous operators. There is very little "distribution" of "hash-rate" to secure the network. Healthy proof-of-work systems require wide distribution of compute power to protect against byzantine faults, and to protect a network against a 51% attack. Bitcoin completely lacks this feature of a healthy network.

3. The Satoshi White Paper DID NOT assume or predict that Bitcoin Mining would become centralized and controlled by very few groups and individuals. or that specialized equipment would be built to enable the level of centralization we are now seeing. When confronted with this fundamental problem of theory vs. reality, Bitcoin promoters brush the issue aside and explain that miners are "Rational Actors", and as such, they have an economic interest to ensure that the network continues in an orderly way. Unfortunately for the promoters, however, "Rational Actor Theory" (which they base their argument on) is a theoretical model that can not be applied to real world outcomes, and is only useful in flat controlled simulations (Game Theory) where all data points are known. It is intellectually dishonest to use the Rational Actor Theory as an excuse for why the Bitcoin network is safe and secure.

4. The Bitcoin network will never be able to scale to support thousands or even hundreds of transactions a second. There is a very real and impossible to overcome barrier in terms of distributed networks, physics, and proof-of-work, that simply cannot be solved, yet just like with the (dishonest) application of Rational Actor Theory, Bitcoin promoters continue to assume that physical and mathematical limits that are inherent and immutable in the proof-of-work system will somehow be overcome in the future. They will not be overcome. Ever.

5. The Bitcoin network is powered by a patchwork of virtually unusable codebase that was originally developed as a "proof of concept" for reusable tokens, much in the way that other academic software system research projects demonstrate novel solutions. The Bitcoin codebase was not designed to scale, yet early on, non-technical libertarians co-opted Bitcoin, raised its perceived currency/monetary value, and created an intractable greed based dilemma: In order to change network consensus methods (proof-of-work, mining centralization), implement solutions that might enable the Bitcoin network to be robust at scale (newer, more efficient messaging methods & optimized peer networking methods), or to be true to the Satoshi White Paper premise of wide distribution of Miners, the price of Bitcoin has to be trivially low. Remember, Miners have spent many millions of dollars to develop and purchase specialized equipment. This is tantamount to vendor lock in. Once the price of Bitcoin went up, and the investments in specialized mining equipment started, the ability to get Miners to *ever* agree to an economic disincentive (like changing the rules of the network to ensure fairness and robustness) evaporated.

6. There is no network or protocol level exchange mechanism. Bitcoin externalizes the exchange duties to 3rd parties (exchanges) in order to support its use as a money transfer instrument. These exchanges have bank accounts in various parts of the world that custody exchange customer USD's, Euros, etc. Bitcoin is completely valueless by itself. Bitcoin promoters often create the illusion that it is a perfect money, and that we will eventually not need exchanges in order for BTC to function as its own economy and currency. The last 2 years have demonstrated that the vast majority of Bitcoin "investors" only care about one ultimate outcome: More Fiat currency in their pockets.

7. Bitcoin (the currency) is totally and completely illegal as a value transfer method in its current state, as demonstrated on numerous occasions by regulators and governments who have made demands of the exchanges that they must either comply with regulatory burdens that other Financial Institutions must follow, or necessarily be criminally liable. This takes us back to the intractable problem of Miners and the flawed implementation of Bitcoin as we now know it: Any types of controls or additional protocol modifications that could be created to help Bitcoin (the currency) to comply with existing laws & regulatory regimes are impossible to implement without the agreement of *at least* 51% of the network. More realistically, the threshold required exceeds 80% of all Miners. Given that miners are heavily centralized (read above), and heavily financially invested in the core premise that Bitcoin promoters have espoused over the past 3-4 years, it is virtually impossible to expect that the Bitcoin network will ever be able to comply with worldwide regulatory requirements. Ultimately this means that existing exchangers of Bitcoin will lose their banking facilities in 2015 and beyond, and Bitcoin (the currency) will very quickly start to approach its real value, which is between $0 and $0.01.

Forget Buffet, let's talk about that hit piece somebody posted in the comment section:

The arrogence of broke kids thinking they know more about investing than a multi billionaire.  LOL

Buffetts point is that there's no intrinsic value  in the aartificial scarcity because the code can be created ad infinitum.  Anyone can create a currency.  The hard part is to get others to accept it as money

that applies to every currency


for the most part fiat currency comes in two forms paper or metal, yet far more money is moved electronically than via paper or metal currency so clearly electronic currency is the big winner here. 

Many around the world pay big money to order international wires for the ability to move large sums of money from point 'a' to point 'b', where is the "scarcity" or "intrinsic value" in a wire transfer?

Cryptocurrency solves a real problem in the world of electronic money and electronic money transfers, once the system is safe it will produce many trillionaires and quadrillionaires --  well beyond Buffet bucks.   

You miss his point entirely.  So what if you can use bitcoin to transmit money digitally?  That in itself doesn't make it valuable.  

And a paper with some words and pictures doesn't make it valuable.


Bwa ha haa. Give me all your dollars $$$                        (and your bitcoins)

You are clueless.  Buffett doesnt invest in dollars he invests in companies.  Even guys who trade currencies trade them in pairs.  The price is always relative.  Nobody buys dollars and just sits on them

You miss his point entirely.  So what if you can use bitcoin to transmit money digitally?  That in itself doesn't make it valuable.  

You are clueless.  Buffett doesnt invest in dollars he invests in companies.  Even guys who trade currencies trade them in pairs.  The price is always relative.  Nobody buys dollars and just sits on them

Clearly you are missing the same point Buffet was also missing, value is found everywhere.  

What is the "intrinsic value" of a paper dollar, what is the "intrinsic value" of a check, what is the intrinsic value of a credit card?  The value of a currency is derived by the faith in that currency to do as you expect it to do.  That's it, there is otherwise no intrinsic value in it.  

Given that there are tons of counterfeit money, tons of stolen credit cards, tons of wire fraud, and trillions in various kinds of fiat money scams each year the simple fact is electronic money transfers are better than cash transactions, and crypto currency transfers faster and less expensive than fiat based electronic transfers.

SWIFT's whole business model is based on electronic transfer of fiat based funds, there no reason that whole system could not be based on a crypto funds based system.  

Swift, mastercard and visa make money based on the ease of moving money not of the "intrinsic value" of an electronic transaction.  

Like I said, once the TRUST AND SAFETY is properly set in the system, it will be the norm and quads will form.

 

Why would one think that Warren Buffet would actually save them heart ache in investments?

If Warren sees a opportunity to make money, do you really think he will tell you to buy in to something? Moreso it seems to me that he would tell you not to buy it so he could at some point.

Since when is his agenda for the greater good of the rest of the population?....exactly....never.

Why would one think that Warren Buffet would actually save them heart ache in investments?

If Warren sees a opportunity to make money, do you really think he will tell you to buy in to something? Moreso it seems to me that he would tell you not to buy it so he could at some point.

Since when is his agenda for the greater good of the rest of the population?....exactly....never.

Obviously you don't know squat about fundamental analysis.  Buffetts point is that you cant derive bitcoins price from anything other than speculation.

I don't understand what you trying to say with regards to intrinsic value.  Doesn't apply to ehat hes saying

I may not know the price of tea in China but I do know that's not the subject of discussion here.    

As for intrinsic value, Buffet said:


There's no intrinsic value in fiat, yet you don't see him bashing USD.   If he doesn't buy currency then he should say that, but as for comparing btc to checks and the lot, that goes back to my previous comparative analysis to show you that the value is in the ability to move money quickly, easily, and safely.    BTC's system allows for money to move quickly and easily, individual transactions are safe however the system (or culture) is not safe -- yet.

It doesn't matter how you define 'intrinsic value' btc is a currency that includes a method of moving money quickly, easily, and at extremely low costs.  There is no fiat that does that.  All fiats need other systems to provide for the movement of their currency.  Fiat's electronic money is moved in various ways, via wire or ACH, there's no intrinsic value in the electronic wire, however the business of electronic wire transfers is worth trillions; likewise the intrinsic value of connecting fiat to plastic credit/debit cards is also a big money maker, if the value is not in the electronic nature of the currency why would anyone spend more for one electronic service over another -- speed and ease of use that's why.  As such even if you discount BTC's currency as worthless, it's ability to move money quickly and easily makes it worth billions by any reasonable standard.

Why would one think that Warren Buffet would actually save them heart ache in investments?

If Warren sees a opportunity to make money, do you really think he will tell you to buy in to something? Moreso it seems to me that he would tell you not to buy it so he could at some point.

Since when is his agenda for the greater good of the rest of the population?....exactly....never.

He is generally not that selfish. The fact that he has such a large amount of money means that he tends to buy entire companies (or large percentages of companies) as opposed to a few hundred shares of stock. Not only that but if he were to invest in a company and then were to say that he thinks it is a good investment then the price of the stock will likely rise because people tend to listen to his advice

If you asked him if investing in USD (i.e. stuffing a matress with cash) is a good investment he'd probably tell you you're an idiot.

Who cares if you can send bitcoins all over in digital space?  What does it have to do with the price?  You can do this whether it's $1 or $1000 per Bitcoin.  If you think there's a potential big business in transmitting Bitcoin money then invest in Coinbase or something similar.

Money or currency is just the intermediary for exchange economy.  The  'intrinsic' value is in the product or service being exchanged.  The business that creates products or services has intrinsic value.  That's his point.  The investment thesis of Bitcoin is false, "it's a mirage"

Buffett is a fundamental investor.  Fundamental investing is buying something at discount compared to future cash flows.  What's the future cash flow of Bitcoin?  None because it's price is speculative commodity.  Like beanie babies or gold.  If you think it's a currency then that's double stupid.  Nobody invests in currencies.  They trade currency pairs

You don't invest in currency by "stuffing a mattress with cash"

You don't invest in currency by "stuffing a mattress with cash" that's called 'saving'.   Currency trading is a totally different animal, you should know if you are in crypto, given all of the cryptocurrency trading exchanges available.   Long before crypto exchanges there were currency exchanges for fiat (still exist).

Anyway, as for your "who cares ..." statement, the answer is everyone.   And as for "what does it have to do with the price"  the answer is everything.   Checks take days to clear, ACHs generally go faster, and wires faster still, speed of flow is the largest determinate for the price/fee charged -- ask western union.

The "cash flow" question is just stupid.   And if you don't think BTC is a currency then you don't know the definition of the word currency.   A currency is a means of exchange between buyer and sellers for goods or services.  Currency is a commodity when it is the good that is being purchased or sold and not the means for the transfer.  As such most of the transactions done on most non-btc exclusive exchanges (ie: Cryptsy) are using BTC as the mainstay currency to buy and sell other currencies as commodities.   

When a currency is used as a currency to buy something ELSE such as a book that currency is unquestionably a currency.  Gold has very many different uses mainly in manufacturing (ie: jewery), but also as a commodity, and as currency but rarely as currency.   Gold cannot be transferred electronically.


"Nobody invests in currencies.  They trade currency pairs"   :o   Huh!, now you're just being a stupid idiot ... in case you are not stupid and just an ignorant idiot here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_exchange_market






 

Most posters here who call him an old man probably don't know how he became rich or what Berkshire Hathaway does as a company.

He is also one of the greatest modern day philanthropist donating approx $20B to date

...
Please tell me HOW he became rich.

Thanks.

When dude pays back the millions he owes in back taxes I might take something he says for a grain of salt, until then....

Old fart

What?

Warren Buffet saying bitcoin is a scam:

http://www.businessinsider.com/warren-buffett-money-tips-for-2015-2014-12

How is this going to affect price?

When dude pays back the millions he owes in back taxes I might take something he says for a grain of salt, until then....

Buffet is a smart guy but I would not take any advice from the elderly on new game changing tech related ideas, stocks, company, bitcoin...

+1
Furthermore he often does the opposite what he is preaching.

Looks like up.  Buffet has one month to go before he is dead wrong.  Bitcoin began the year at 316.

It’s a method of transmitting money. It’s a very effective way of transmitting money and you can do it anonymously and all that. A check is a way of transmitting money, too. Are checks worth a whole lot of money just because they can transmit money?

Anyone who makes a statement as ignorant about that is the last person who you should look to for advice on the potential value of bitcoin.  Your track record means nothing if you haven't done your homework.

That is very true but the old school people always will look at the past track records to get their results from. To them this is proven, so they are taking no risk. That is the problem with the older generations, they don't want to take that risk if an investment isn't proven to yield profits for them during a certain amount of time.
To them bitcoin is just an experiment and they are watching and waiting until it's time has expired.
That of course is not going to happen.

Well, Buffet is known to be a value investor. He invest in things that have value per se, companies that sell good or services that backup the value invested. Bitcoin value is only in that people agree it has value. There are no physical things behind it. It is not strange that his opinion is this.

yeah I believe he doesn't even invest in any tech companies. So naturally something like bitcoin is far too much risk. But unfortunately he has a large following of people who respect his opinion and will never give bitcoin a second look because of his advice.

Buffett has been all about "value investing" for most of Berkshire Hathaway's existance.

 Bitcoin is FAR too speculative for him to have any liking for it.

yeah I believe he doesn't even invest in any tech companies. So naturally something like bitcoin is far too much risk. But unfortunately he has a large following of people who respect his opinion and will never give bitcoin a second look because of his advice.

Warren Buffet's advise about not to buy bitcoins won't affect the price by a significant amount. Many bitcoiners don't agree with his comment.

Not going to affect anything. Bitcoin is going to grow at the speed as it is right now. Warren Buffet is probably just jealous that he didn't get into Bitcoins earlier.  ;)

Notice buffet hasn't told anybody what to do with their money in 2016...

Maybe he is secretly investing into bitcoin. But this might be against his advice. He does not see cash flow from bitcoin.

Maybe he is secretly investing into bitcoin. But this might be against his advice. He does not see cash flow from bitcoin.

If Buffet would invest in bitcoin, believe me that he would say all the benefits it possesses. Only by speaking greatly about bitcoin, he would make its value rise from several %. He actually is very listened in stock markets.

Not likely. He files a 13F and will not publicly disclose his Bitcoin holdings until he feels it's time to sell.

THESE FUDsters want to FUD because they trust Fiat and can't get used to the fact that a better currency is out there. They have grown so used to oil and cash that

they really cannot imagine anything else. Can you imagine them crying poor mouth once our BTC gets worth plenty?