Bitcoin Forum

"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."

http://www.cnbc.com/id/101494937

No, I think that we all know better than one of the world's most successful and experienced investors.

The difference is there is not an unlimited supply of money orders and cheques, there is a limited (albeit massive) supply of satoshi, and they can be recycled and used repeatedly. Should bitcoin have a monetary value, probably, should it be massive, debatable, but that's why there is a market in them.

 :)

The point is simple, the bitcoin network could become an efficient way for transmitting value world wide. Should not be used for storing value.

"Are checks worth a whole lot of money just because they can transmit money?"

Yes. A check is an instrument provided by a bank. And banks are worth a lot of money according to the stock exchanges, last time I checked.

But the bitcoin network can operate even if one bitcoin is worth about 10$.   

Buffett's analogy of bitcoin to checks is completely flawed, even he should know the difference.  Notice that he did not compare bitcoin to actual fiat money (fiat money being the most direct form of value transmission) which does have immediate, relative value, but no "intrinsic value" per se.

Buffett hates gold as well, which agrees with his argument of having little intrinsic value, but yet gold dumbfoundedly continues to climb in value relative to fiat money decade after decade.  Go figure.

Buffett acts as if companies like Coca-Cola will be with us FOREVER.  They won't.

Checks and money orders can have any amount put onto them. But you need more bitcoins to send more money.

Also checks dont come with decentralized ledgers.

Buffet is an investing genius but has no clue how BTC works.

I think the point he wants to come across is the fact that the bitcoins themselves are considered valuable, the "checks" how he calls them.
The part about "it can be replicated and it will be" is important in my view. He he clearly not referring to shitcoins altcoins (lol), what he is probably saying is that the breakthroughs of bitcoins underlying technology should (and will) be used  to simply improve the way payments work today, not forcing everybody to adopt a new stand-alone currency that is seriously problematic for a vast number of reasons and that it is not really needed as a currency.
We shouldn't be forced to suddenly accept that these "checks" (whether in limited supply or not) are valuable and use them for their original intended purpose.

I agree with him in that regard.


That's what the Boston Fed researchers and others recently said with their "we're bullish on the technology" article (if you actually read it).

PS: by saying "the technology behind bitcoin" they don't necessarily mean "the bitcoin blockchain" or proof-of-work or whatever.

The bitcoin network can be used to transmit money, doesn't mean that people will use the bitcoin "currency" as money.

If using bitcoin to transmit money from one place to the other will be cheap and popular then people will use it. But it doesn't mean that people will use bitcoin "currency" as money. One use case, efficient way for transmitting value, doesn't mean that people will work for bitcoin the "currency" and use it to buy groceries. Why should they?

If the bitcoin network is indeed transmitting money, then BTC will have a value

Buffet point is that there is no reason for the bitcoin "currency" to have huge value.

"The idea that it has some huge intrinsic value is just a joke in my view."

Bitcoin has value, and the bitcoin network can operate even if one bitcoin is worth about 10$.   

Warren Buffet is a old dinosaur that had luck and is using his past success to keep preaching about what is and isn't good. He will join the quote list of horribly wrong predictions.

A very related betting from March 2014: People was betting if price of bitcoin can out-grow Berkshire Hathaway class A after 1 year. This is response for Buffet saying "stay away from Bitcoin" last year.

http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/20gkdx/legitimate_wager_300_bitcoins_vs_1_class_a_share/
https://bitbet.us/bet/786/bitcoin-to-surpass-berkshire-as-an-investment/

It turned out BRK.A increased over 20+ percent while Bitcoin dropped from around 600 to 2xx.

The guy who deposited 1000 BTC on "Yes" is going to lose a big amount of money.

bitcoin needs two things to really be a money transmitter:

 - liquid market

 - enough security for my current transfer (miners need an incentive to secure the network - and they are paid in btc)

 - a price high enough that i am able to buy the amount of btc i want to transfer

For people to use bitcoin to transmit money, they need to use a service that will make it secure and very easy to use.

If this service will be popular and cheaper than the alternatives then people will use it. They will probably won't even know that bitcoin was used in the process.  But this will not mean that the bitcoin "currency" will have a lot of value, because there is no reason to use bitcoin the "currency" as money.

If there is a technology that allows the transfer of fiat currencies through a distributed ledger network (that doesn't need a cryptocurrency to secure it) the need to use bitcoin as a "check" to transfer value vanishes, same for your 3 requirements.

at first: as we talk specifically about bitcoin my points stand.

if you talk about something like XUSD (NXT) or BitUSD (bitshares) i dont think you are right. try "buying" 100Million bitusd, transmit them and sell them back.

Wrong. Bitcoin is money. Bitcoin transactions are ways of transmitting money. Just like checks, bitcoin transactions have little value in themselves. The value is what they transmit.

Is that even possible? How can you secure a more or less decentralized network without a "reward" system?

If you use the ripple network for example you don't need to buy any cryptocurrency ever in order to transfer any amount of dollars in the network.
You can transfer USD (or anything else) and you don't need liquidity in a crypto market (it's not a necessity anyway)

I expect more technologies like that to come out the next few years.

He either had no idea what Bitcoin was when he said this, or just is talking down a potential draw away from USD, which he has a lot of his wealth based on.

Is it really? I don't see why most people should use it for day-to-day transactions.

Is that cheaper to use Ripple over other alternatives?

ripple requires trust as i need a gateway to get my usd into the system. for me its the same as walking to my bank, deposit to my bank account and use ebanking to transmit it.

why should i use ripple? my bank even handles currency conversions for me.

you may even compare it with paypal if you reduce ripple to the money transmitting aspect - you dont have the usd. you have just an IOU.

 His track record speaks for itself. It also tells us that the combination of tech and certain PM esque qualities are both fundamental turn offs for him and always have been.  

He's an investor. At the moment this whole space is speculation. They are totally different beasts.

But isn't he a part of a demographic that supposedly will want to invest in bitcoin when (or if) the bitcoin ETF launches?

Always trust a shirt maker about advice on cryptographic internet protocols.

 ::)

I can't see grandpa going for it under any circumstances myself. If anyone does expose themselves a little to it, it'll more likely be folks in their 30s and 40s who've grown up around the idea of an internet economy.

I think that if they wanted to buy bitcoin, they could do it easily today.

You don't think he has advisers?

>cryptographic
no, just because it utilized cryptography does not make it cryptographic.
>internet
yes, Internet Funbuxcurrency.
>protocols
no, Bitcoin is not a protocol, it's a proof of concept prototype implementation, which has been pushed into production by delusions of grandeur. No matter how you like it.

I think bitcoin or alts are an excellent technology for storing value, volatility aside, there is no other form of money so versatile and stealthily transportable as a wallet file. Not to mention, if people use bitcoin only as a WU replacement and never save any, they have to use the tedious, time consuming and costly on and off ramp exchanges for every transaction. You can do it if you want, but bitcoin's natural tendency is to be self contained and currency-like.

Think about it, if bitcoin did indeed become that efficient way for transmitting value world wide with lots of adoption, and nobody hoarded it, then the transaction volume should be quite steady on average, supporting a steady exchange rate and thereby encouraging businesses and people to not bother with converting to fiat because it would be more expensive and less convenient. And there you end up with a very solid currency.

But the problem is that people treat bitcoin as an investment, and this is why volatility is part of the game.

OLD people like Buffet will never get their 20 century brains around Bitcoin. It's HOPELESS. I hope they live enough years to get proved wrong big time.

Buffett don't even understand where is fiat money's value comes from, not even mention bitcoin

If he was that calibre, he would invested in Bitcoin and become even richer. To me, he is just an old fart.

He was obviously wrong. Look the price is going up today .People believe in bitcoins and thats the only reason for it

I have exactly the same meaning as you mentioned in your post.
I find you are completely right.

The Winklevoss Investment Trust could literally provide Buffett with the opportunity to put his money where his mouth is by insuring the Bitcoin held by the ETF. https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=973048.msg10635752#msg10635752 (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=973048.msg10635752#msg10635752).

Buffet benefits from the status quo and seeks to maintain the status quo. He called bitcoin rat poison at one time which is a very ineresting statement which can be taken different ways. I think he is best summed up as a paper bug

QE is a joke ... but people are agree.
we (they) are already lost.

Only gold, diamand and bitcoin can save the world now.

Banks are a way to transmit money are are worth alot, also the check is only the front end, what about all the processing behind it eg the Banking system.

Not efficiently.  To move $10M @ $10 per BTC would require 1M BTC.  Trying to acquire and liquidate 1M BTC would cause massive disruptions in price.   That loss roundtrip would result in a high effective cost for both parties.  Also at $10 per BTC the network would be far easier to attack so not only would it be expensive to use it would also be risky.  More Expensive and risky than alternatives?  Not a very good value proposition.  So while in theory Bitcoin can work at any price there are practical limitations to the utility of the network based on the value of the underlying currency.

Yes and no.   For the moment, for sure.  The point is that the "price of a bitcoin" needed to do a certain number of transactions, with a certain amount of time in between them, is exactly what the monetary formula gives you:

P x Q = V x M.


P x Q is the total price (in bitcoin) of all goods and services bought with bitcoin in a certain period, say S, the total sum of bitcoin expended to buy stuff.

V is the number of times on average the same bitcoin participates in a buying action of such good or service in the given period (say, a year).

M is the amount of bitcoins in circulation. 

Now, V is the inverse of the (harmonic) average hold time T of a coin.  Indeed, you do not immediately upon reception of a coin because you sold something, buy something else with it.  If you sell a car today against coins, you will probably not spend all that money in the evening.  So all coins are held a certain time on average in between two interactions.  A dollar is held a few months on average for instance. 

Let us assume that a coin is held on average half a month.  That would put V to 24 (if the period is a year).  Now, with finally 20 million coins in circulation, that would bring us to a total sum spent on goods and services of 480 million bitcoin.

Every year, one will buy for about 480 million bitcoin goods and services under these assumptions.

If your bitcoin is worth $10.-, then that means that every year, for not more than about $ 5 billion goods and services are bought with bitcoin.

If you want to buy MORE stuff, then there's no alternative but for the price of bitcoin to go up (or for the holding times to go below half a month).

If you want to buy 20% of all of the black market (estimated $ 300 billion, so $ 60 billion bought with coins), then a coin needs to be at least 12 times more expensive, or at least $120 a coin.  (under the assumption of a spending every 2 weeks).

So the price of a coin cannot be arbitrary low if it has to buy large volumes of goods and services.

Really poor analogy. You can not compare Bitcoin to checks. Bitcoin is yes, a good way to transmit money under a decentralized network. Not just anonymously. Checks are supported by the bank. Without the bank, the check is a piece of paper. 

This is a bad analogy.

The correct one should be:

Bank = Bitcoin miner
Cheque = Bitcoin transaction
USD = Bitcoin

Bitcoin transaction, like a cheque, has no intrinsic value. But bitcoin transaction is not bitcoin

Buffett is an excellent investor but he doesn't invest in anything he doesn't understand. Obviously he doesn't understand Bitcoin at all.

Not in this case, but the check analogy and postage is good when it comes to transaction fees. Postage should be related to the number of checks you place in the envelope, not the value of the checks. Similarly the transaction fees should be related to the number of bytes you transaction takes up and not the value of the transaction.

Speaking of Buffett, he may be a good investor but he himself admits there are a lot of things in the financial world that he doesn't understand. He's not even a good trader. I've owned Berkshire Hathaway A for almost 20 years (bought 1 share in the 90's when is was only $80K) and it has done well, but it certainly has not been my best performing investment,

 

It was fate that he would appear right on this call. He would have said the same bs if asked about it at the price of $2, but he is just a pop star so no wonder he was asked and gave his thoughts on it at the peak of a mania driven bubble.

Buffet is a dying old horse, and his time passed a long time ago, but he's a smart horse, making bussinessman all around the world doing what he wants them to,
making them believe he's teaching them how to make money for themselves, when they're actually making his investments more profitable/sustainable.

I don't know is bitcoin an answer to world financial system problems, but fiat money is proven not to be.

cheers

Exactly, and due to bitcoin's long term appreciation potential, most of the bitcoin are being hold long term, 2 million maximum is circulating actively

Can't ripple be used to transmit money world wide more efficiently? If ripple will be cheaper and more convenient than all other alternatives (including bitcoin) then it will be used by most people. Most people don't care about decentralization.

Convenience, popularity and price is all that matters.

only on local (national) ground ... not international.

If he was right, also Gold is a mirage. The intrinsic value of Gold is also much lower than its actually perceived value. If Gold was only traded because its intrinsic value, we'd see prices maybe a 1/100th of what it's currently 'worth'.

Gold has intrinsic value, it is used for different purposes.

There is not reason for most people to use bitcoin as a currency. If a different network can be used to transmit money efficiently it will be used.

Why bitcoin has such a high value today is really a mystery.

Yeah, but the intrinsic value is much lower than the current price of Gold, how do you explain that? -> Speculation, Gold's purpose as a storage of wealth.
Bitcoin is unique in it's decentralization. Sure, there are altcoins, but that doesn't matter - they're only as valuable as their share of the cryptocurrencies is - negligible.

I don't know if Gold is overpriced. The price of bitcoin should represent the value it brings to the people. If it doesn't bring value as an efficient network for transmitting money (most people don't care about decentralization), and isn't used as a currency by a large amount of people, then it means that bitcoin is highly overvalued, and the people who invested their money into bitcoin will lose it.

I don't see a problem of it being an excellent storage of wealth. Why not? It's decentralized, accessible (almost) world-wide and not backed by any political agenda, state, whatever. This is what a lot of people want - like gold.

Gold is at the price it's at because of belief. Something has value because people reward it that value, and in gold's case they look to history and see that it's dependable. As long as that continues then it'll always be up there.

Obviously it does have practical uses, but that makes up a fraction of the value we award it today.

Once upon a time sea shells in certain cultures were an economic mainstay. They had practical uses too but the overwhelming portion of their value was purely because consensus awarded them value.

BTC's price is based on the belief of a lot fewer people, but it's still there. I'm not so sold on it as the idea of a day to day currency, but as a value storage and transfer mechanism there's never been anything like it before. Whether enough people decide that it has value for them is what we'll find out in the coming years.

But gold still has practical use. It might or might not be overpriced, it still is used. There is a need for gold.

If you have a service to transmit money world wide that is convenient, cheap and popular you won't need bitcoin, doesn't
matter if it decentralized or not. If it works, most people will not care.

There is no reason to use bitcoin as a currency, there is no need for it.

So if there is no need bitcoin, not for transmitting money and not for using it as a currency, why would it have value?

Are you claiming that the only thing that will give value to bitcoin is the idea that people might start to believe that bitcoin has value?

Well maybe there's also a need for Bitcoin's ability to store wealth, man. Sure there could be another system for transferring money. But we don't need gold, either it seems. It has good capabilities, but in no way is a must for many applications.

There are metals that are rarer than gold with industrial uses that are a fraction of the price.

A huge portion of its value is because it looks pretty and because of that it's lasted through the ages. It's been worth a large amount when there was no industrial use for it, or any industry at all.

If you'd offered me bitcoins five years ago for my services, the chances are I probably wouldn't have taken it. These days I would. The only thing that's changed in that time is that more people believe it has value so I can use it elsewhere.

By "need" I mean that there is a demand for gold for different applications other than store of value.

Bitcoin has to provide something of value, a practical use case.

To say that bitcoin is valuable because we believe it has value is not good enough.

Gold's other applications weren't what gave it value as money.  It became money over time because of the properties that it had.  Many of those properties are shared by Bitcoin - although there are different properties that give Bitcoin a unique place.

Money is chosen over time because it has specific attributes that make it highly useful in exchange.  Bitcoin has plenty of those attributes.  It's entirely possible that it could become a widely-used form of money.  It already is money, and the fact that it's sitting at $270 supports that.

Do people use gold as money today? Why should large amount of people decide to use bitcoin as money?

That sentence tells us all we need to know about your understanding of money, or lack thereof.

Your question needs adjusting.  It isn't why should people decide to use Bitcoin, it's why people are using and would use  Bitcoin as money.  Erik Vorhees summed it up:


As for your other question:


Couldn't have said it better.

Please enlighten me, I'm just asking questions. 

Still, it doesn't mean that large amount of people will start using bitcoin as money. There is no need for it.

The other poster made a good point, in that you probably need to do a little more research about what money is, and why certain monies became what they did, when they did.

Money didn't come around because of a need - Money happened because it was easier than bartering.  Nobody said "hey you know what, we need these seashells to trade back and forth." It made sense, and it made the act of trading easier.

Money is our way to get around the Coincidence of Wants dilemma, It is a common medium of exchange, whereby everyone agrees to trade for money instead of other objects.

Remember when I talked about the seashells?  People used that as money.  People used silver and gold as money.  People use paper in the form of dollars as money now.  Nothing is to say that we won't look back at paper in another 50-500 years and find that antiquated as well.

Again, it's not about need - it's about something performing the function of money better (or differently enough to warrant a place) than its predecessors.

Bitcoin does that.

The other poster only showed that he is unable to differentiate between real questions and rhetorical ones.

In the current form, bitcoin can't preform better than the money we use today. You can't solve volatility if you treat money as an investment and not simply as a tool. You are not supposed to invest in money, you supposed to use it.

Of course it can, that's why even banks and the fed are now scrambling to come up with their own version of BTC that they have control over - precisely the reason why BTC is superior than any of their versions would be.

Money isn't in an investment? You are not supposed to invest in money?

Have you ever heard of forex??? Let me Google it for you:

http://www.investopedia.com/terms/forex/f/forex-market.asp (http://www.investopedia.com/terms/forex/f/forex-market.asp)

Speaking of Google, it's part of what we call the internet.  The internet was also not needed back in 1990.

You're missing the big picture that money can, and has changed many times over the history of mankind.  It's not going to stop changing now because dollars are some perfect system.

Of course money will change, my point is that bitcoin, in the current form, will not replace it.

Bitcoin is not used as money by most people who own bitcoin. If the majority of people who own bitcoin don't use it as money - then it is simply not money. This is what I mean when I talk about treating money as an investment.

Who said anything about "replacing"?? Bitcoin doesn't have to replace anything.  It can carve out it's own place.

You're trying to use your own definition to determine what is and isn't money.  The problem is that it's just -your- definition.  

Let's use some more magic of the internet to look up what money is:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Money (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Money)


What do you know? Bitcoin is money

This is why the other poster was right when posting this:


You're claiming after the fact that it was supposedly a rhetorical question, but after more discussion it honestly seems more likely that you don't have a good grasp of what money is.

From sniffing around it seems that it's a lot of different things to different people at the moment. Some people are using it purely as money. Others are  speculating and nothing but. Many are a combination.

Some are super keen for it be fully integrated into the existing financial system. Others would boil their miners if that happened.  

Assuming it continues to survive and grow, what do you think its place in the world might be?

I don't love speculating, but a quick look through dataispower's post history shows that it's littered with Dogecoin-moon posts, and includes this gem:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=913538.msg10032317#msg10032317 (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=913538.msg10032317#msg10032317)

Maybe shedding some light on where he thinks (wants) BTC's place in the word to be?

The discussion is about bitcoin value, and the question why should the majority use it. We're talking about the practical use cases of bitcoin, how people could benefit from using it.

Irrelevant to the discussion.

A proof of concept for the blockchain technology.

It's quite relevant after reading your posts.  It sheds light into the manner in which you've lead this "discussion" - which is mostly around in circles.  The fact that you think Dogecoin could overtake BTC (or more likely want Dogecoin to overtake BTC, because of vested interest) shows a translucent bias.


Did you just seriously say we should talk about practical use cases for money??? It's money.  That's the use case.

The majority don't need to use it.  

He also said it could not be trusted because "this Satoshi guy" could have hidden something in the code to steal your coins. Warren Buffet does not know dick about bitcoin. Why would he?

We're talking about mainstream adoption here, so let us not change the subject. 

You've edited your post. The discussion is about mainstream use of bitcoin.

Mainstream adoption? I'm not sure when you were having that conversation.  I've been responding specifically to this:


I'm not surprised you're trying to move the conversation back away from that, though, since the last page and a half of you claiming "BTC isn't money" looks really bad.


Yes I did, to put emphasis on the point of ridiculousness in which you were asking for use cases of money.

The discussion was always about the majority of people, you can simply look at the past posts. All is consistent.

Oh here, I looked at the past posts:


Mainstream adoption? We're all the way back on the #25th post of this abortion of a thread and you made it clear you don't understand the definition of money.

How can you even expect to have a discussion about Mainstream adoption when you don't understand the underlying concept of money that the mainstream would adopt?

You're also making the assumption that Bitcoin has to be accepted by the


when that is garbage, too.  Here Bitcoin is, not adopted by the mainstream, and 6 years after inception we're sitting at $285.

"Why bitcoin has such a high value today is really a mystery."

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=973888.msg10643328#msg10643328

The subject of the discussion is clear, my posts are consistent and easily verifiable. 

The reader will be the judge.

You've been consistently wrong and/or unwilling to admit that Bitcoin is money, so I can't fault you for consistency.


The mystery was solved for you plainly like a page ago: It's because Bitcoin is money, and people speculate on currencies.

He is (was) a value investor. Analyze companies, find those with a promising future that is currently undervalued by the market. Good luck with that in the current QE/ZIRP environment.

The largest benefit for bitcoin is to set you free from the slavery of debt based fiat money system, but it is not the time yet

"Modern fiat money system is slavery. But when you're inside, you look around, what do you see? Business men, teachers, lawyers, carpenters. The very minds of the people bitcoin trying to save. But until it does, these people are still a part of that system, and that makes them hate bitcoin. You have to understand, most of these people are not ready to use honest money. And many of them are so inured, so hopelessly dependent on the system, that they will fight to protect it."

If more than 10,000,000 people consider bitcoin as the payment future, then Buffet was wrong, as of now, I think we can conclude he was wrong

He really doesn't understand tech.
He is trying to stay away from things he doesn't understand.

I do agree for the transaction fee's. Correlates pretty much perfectly. When referring to a check, though, what I believe he is undermining is the fact that a bank provides the piece of paper with value. With Bitcoin, you don't have anything to determine it's value. To your point about Warren Buffett, that's pretty much true. I see him as being extremely lucky to be in the position he's in. Not sure about his intellect, but he got to his net worth somehow. Probably just making the right decisions at the right times and using his wealth to reinvest. Not all entirely too sure on what Buffett did exactly but that seems to be the pattern for all wealthy people worth billions.

http://www.imageupload.co.uk/images/2015/03/06/6-ways-you-should-never-invest-success-resources-richard-tan-5-638.md.jpg

http://www.shoutmeloud.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Warren-Buffett-Quotes-6.png

http://gentleninja.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Warren-buffett-entrepreneur-quotes.jpg

His generation don't trust computers or anything to do with them.

The whole idea of value is that something is worth what someone else is willing to pay is it not? If we are all willing to pay $500 a bitcoin that is what it should be worth.

Yup. He's too old to learn and too old to change. His habits are related to fiat, how could he trust in something he cannot touch?
Instead, we are the "online" generation, that already know that computers can "make money", in various ways.

Also, if we would think like he does, we would not be here.

No, I don't think Buffet is right.

If "this Satoshi guy" hid some code to steal our coins, he/she/they could have probably done that when bitcoin's price reached $1200.

We are the next generation after him. Then maybe we trust computers because we are experiencing what tech can do to us, either good or bad.

I always believe value is somehow attached to or I would rather say is assigned by the community. If I were to pay someone using bitcoin, both parties must basically agree on a predetermined amount. That amount somehow translate to what we call value. Forget about intrinsic value and that sort of stuff. If I pay in bitcoin and the seller is happy, likewise, I feel the bitcoin is worth spending in exchange for the goods and services the seller provides, who cares about the rest on what the others think.

Well fiat money also works this way. We "magically" agree that fiat can buy these things with this price. It is true that the community that determines the value of things, be it service, goods, or even money itself.

this guy with out the federal reserve? LoL... please a raccoon will beat him easy.

Buffett's been right so many times in the past, been right about stock picks for so long, and where to invest, and what makes a good investment that it really is hard to argue against anything he says.  He is the most successful investor of the 20th century and for good reason.

That all said, this is the 21st century, and even legends like Warren Buffett, see their time pass.  He's what they call "Old Money".  He along with others of his ilk like George Soros and Carl Icahn did it their way, with brilliant stock picks and positions, brilliant hedges, dealing with risk, holding onto winners, and cutting losers quick.  They all grew up around the Great Depression and know the other side of the coin in dealing with adversity.

Now with this new era of Digital and Cryptocurrencies, their era is now coming to a close.  They've all accumulated so much fiat during the 20th century, it really doesn't what the dollar does in the next decade or so before they pass.  For the 21st century, if all goes as planned, these new innovators and investors will be new Buffetts and Soros and Icahns.  It'll be the Vers, the Winkleviis, the Andresens, Voorhees, Drapers, and last but not least Nakamotos that'll be considered the brilliant financial minds of our time.

Long story short, yea Buffett's wrong.   8)

And of course since it is open source there is no way to hide anything in the code. Clearly the concept of open source was new to him.  

He obviously fears bitcoin, quite likely because he knows he can't understand it.

He seam to always made his buck the same way, like he is still doing now, and bitcoin threatens the way he learned to do business, so no wonders there why he is against it.
I remember watching his speech where he was proud to say how he likes longterm businesses that have the same brand advantage and certain prestige that doesnt fade out, too bad he didnt realise how bitcoin is the next one to dominate the market, increasing strenght with every passing year.
Its time for changes, and all that wealth he accumulated over the years is going to be worth a lot less soon enough, leave the old man in the past where he belongs.

cheers

He is a total dinosaur of finances like it has been said before, he doesn't see the paradigm shit coming, or indeed he sees it and sees it as something that can damage his classic-style assets since once Bitcoin goes global it will disturb things at unseen levels.

he is too old, for a thing like bitcoin, old generation can't really predict(even if they are that good like Buffett) something about new tech like bitcoin

and for those reason i don't think he is right

Very good point, that should be reminded over and over again to many BTC-fanatics in this forum.
One thing is what we believe about Bitcoin, the other is how the market values it.

Everybody worships at the feet of the Oracle, but he's way overrated, IMHO. He made some smart moves, got really fucking lucky, and after he made it big, just levraged his market clout for risk free returns. The last few years he's been really unimpressive, relying on the bailouts in 2008 to save his ass.

It's despicable how he lobbied to kill the Keystone pipeline so that all the oil has to be transported on his railroads, as if that's better for the environment (not). His father was actually a good man as far as politicians go. He is a disgrace to that legacy. He is now a political entrepreneur. "Value investing" my ass. He externalizes costs to the taxpayer in almost countless ways.

Warren Buffet is not exactly the market.
Just because he is not a big fan of Bitcoin doesn't mean the market doesn't value it.

Nope, he is not the market, but he is on of these successful investors (proven by his track of records) whose opinion is always cited in the press. Meaning it is always better to have him on your side, rather than against you.

He has famously said that you shouldn't invest in something you don't understand.

He doesn't. Yet. There is always hope.

'Never invest in a business you cannot understand.' 'Always invest for the long term.' '

i doubt he will invest on bitcoin, even if he understands

Buffet does not have to invest anything in bitcoin, he already is rich beyond belief. But at least he is not fully sceptical like some equally know figures from the world of finance and business. Heck. Even Bill Gates was less enthusiastic of the bitcoin at first.

Exactly, it probably works against an investment that he may have or something. (I mean if he invested in some credit card company or something)

He might possible come around, once Bitcoin is well established.
Right now, the risks are still great.

Buffet would admit he doesn't know much about new technology and doesn't invest in them. He likely thought Facebook was not worth much.

at least is he coherent.

BTC is not the kind of investment that someone that follows buffet's philosophy would pick first.

You know, no dividends, nothing tangible, etc

Open-source to him = shady. Didn't understand the concept clearly.

Apart from the traditional investments. That's why he doesn't trust bitcoin that much.

Warren Buffet lives off his past investments, and all of the stuff he invested is old school stuff, he trully has no idea about new technologies, look at his portfolio, he never holded anything that was a technological mindblown like BTC.

Exclusive: IBM looking at adopting bitcoin technology for major currencies

"The objective is to allow people to transfer cash or make payments instantaneously using this technology without a bank or clearing party involved, saving on transaction costs, the person said. The transactions would be in an open ledger of a specific country's currency such as the dollar or euro, said the source"

"Unlike bitcoin, where the network is decentralized and there is no overseer, the proposed digital currency system would be controlled by central banks, the source said."

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/03/12/us-bitcoin-ibm-idUSKBN0M82KB20150312

"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."  -Buffett

^That's exactly it.
That's what Buffet meant.


Whether you like it or not, the future will probably be about using distributed ledger technology to move fiat currencies around for cheap, instantly, and globally (and distributed ledger technologies for smart contracts etc).
Not about "decentralize all the things" cryptocurrencies, which bring more drama than they solve problems.



Whether that will be "IBMchain", "FEDchain" or the ripple network idk, but definitely something in this direction.

"According to the Federal Reserve, there were 283 million debit cards in use in the U.S. last year, with an average 23 payments per month. But analysts speculate that debit cards have an expiration date of their own, possibly becoming obsolete within a few years, along with credit cards.

The reason is mobile payments, which are growing in use at an impressive pace. The research firm Gartner says mobile payments accounted for $235 billion in 2013, but that figure is expected to rise to $720 billion annually by 2017."

"It won't happen overnight, but mobile payment platforms like Apple Pay will eventually take the place of debit cards," says Sean Graw, the founder of BradsDeals.com, a consumer deals site."

"We've done a lot of research into the [peer-to-peer] payments market and tried out just about every developer service for paying users, and yes, debit cards take a central role in this area right now," he says. "But now we're seeing emerging mobile p2p payment markets, which are pushing payments directly to users in services like Venmo, Square Cash or Treat."

http://www.msn.com/en-us/money/credit/some-of-us-say-debit-credit-cards-are-done-in-just-5-years/ar-AA9J5ET

Facebook Introduces Free Friend-To-Friend Payments Through Messages


When you chat with friends about settling debts or splitting the bill, Facebook doesn’t want you to have to open another app like PayPal or Venmo to send them money. So today it unveiled a new payments feature for Facebook Messenger that lets you connect your Visa or Mastercard debit card and tap a “$” button to send friends money on iOS, Android, and desktop with zero fees. Facebook Messenger payments will roll out first in the US over the coming months.


http://techcrunch.com/2015/03/17/facebook-pay/

Fixed your highlighting.  I doubt your bank is fee-less.

"While only in the US for now, if Facebook opened up Messenger payments internationally, it could help migrant workers send money home much cheaper than through high-fee remittance services. But for now, Facebook says it just wants to get friend-to-friend payments right in the States. “We’ll consider where to take it after that once we get everything nailed down” says Davis."

That already exists, old news, Facebook is behind in the times:

https://rebit.ph/

https://www.bitpesa.co/

https://artabit.com/en/

Oh well.  One day Facebook you'll catch up...

I think that Buffetts track record is one that shows that he's someone to be listened to.

And many of us will say that Bitcoin is just as effective whether its worth $1 or $1,000, the only thing that gets affected is how much value can be transmitted at any given time.

But some people say that Bitcoin is a better gold than gold, that the blockchain is its intrinsic value... And when cast in that light, I'd agree with Buffett, actually... I'm not a gold bug by any stretch, but I acknowledge that gold has an intrinsic value; firstly because nearly all of the 7 billion of us believe it to have value. Beside that, it does have some actual uses; its extremely efficient at transmitting electricity, for example.That alone makes it a shame that its so rare, that we can't deploy it into the power grid.

But for Bitcoin? It has value only to the tiny subset of the population that believes it to; when 99.95% of the worlds population have no interest in Bitcoin, well, that doesn't show much for its intrinsic value. Nor do i think that the blockchain itself provides it with intrinsic value - that's like a circularly self-enforcing proposition; this thing created from nothing has value because it is a record of who else has these things. If you're outside of the Bitcoin circle, the past transactions mean nothing to you, intrinsic value wise...

NOTE: That's not a bash against bitcoin, odd as that may sound. Dollars have no intrinsic value. Put yourself on another planet with a huge pile of dollars, and all you've got is kindling. But the difference is, they have recognized value - because the US Government says we must transact with them. There is no hard and fast rule how much a dollar should be worth, only that some quantity of them will buy something.

But back to bitcoin. Yes, I don't think it has intrinsic value. But I do think that it has value, simply because there is a small slice of the population (us) who believe in its value. And that's enough to keep the bitcoin economy and ecosystem going. Among all the other reasons why I don't think that Bitcoin should ever replace fiat currencies for the mainstream, and instead remain a nationless alternative, the value proposition is another one.... People can argue that dollars euros etc, are valuable because if you take them anywhere on earth, people will transact with them. Gold has a value that's been recognized for millennia. But to tell the layperson that bitcoins value stems from it's keeping record of all the transactions before it... Well, that doesn't strike me as too valuable.

I'm sure that plenty of people are blasting Buffett in this thread, saying he's out of touch, doesn't get it, doesn't do tech, etc. None of that matters... Buffett is a money man. He understands that. He might not know cryptographic signatures, but in the grand scheme of things, that's just a minor detail.

I worry for a lot of us here... IT's so easy to get stuck in this echo chamber and think so optimistically. That's fine and good. It's great to have hope. But there's a lot of people who act incredibly irrationally, putting 100% of their net worth in BTC for instance. You can have all the hope in the world for Bitcoin, and it could be a technology and monetary unit without flaw, but unless the rest of the world catches on, your savings might not be there when they're needed. It's incredibly risk to be 100% invested in any one asset; whether its a single stock where that company could go down in flames, a single actively managed mutual fund, where not matter how good the track record, its manager could make a series of bad calls, or even a single asset class (i.e. all stocks and no bonds or vice versa). But to go all in on an idea that's barely 6 years old... That's bewildering. Sounds great if your only outlook comes from here, where everyone is constantly talking about its glorious future. But your bet involves the rest of the world too... Will they come around or wont's they? And having all your eggs in one basket, no matter how much faith you have, is not investing. It's gambling. Show me the smartest person in the world, and I'll show you someone that's been wrong about something in their lives. None of us are the smartest, though, and despite what we all say, we could turn out to be wrong.

Sorry... Got off topic though.

I'll just leave it at, when Buffett speaks about something in finance, I'm inclined to listen. Yes, he doesn't know iPods or CPU's. But bitcoins proposition is not a technological one, and it doesn't take a techie to understand it or not. And if anyone says otherwise, that it is a technological thing, and that's why buffett fails to understand it, I'll just point out if you need to be a techie to understand it, then lets give up hope for mass adoption, because most of the world aren't techies.

He doesn't "hate" gold per say, just thinks its a lousy investment. Most will say that gold should make for a great store of value because its value will keep pace with inflation. Most people invest because they want to do better than the rate of inflation. But gold itself is an unproductive asset. You buy an ounce of gold, and that's all you'll ever have. You buy a share of a company and reinvest your dividends, and that one share will grow into quite a bit more than that, given enough time. So, even if the value the company itself only grows at the rate of inflation, by virtue of reinvested dividends, you'll surpass that rate. Gold offers no such promise.

On the other had, Buffett did at one point attempt to corner the silver market. So, say what you want about his dislike of precious metals, the guy is shrewd and if he thinks he can make money at something he'll likely give it a go. Just as where we're at now, if he took a liking to bitcoin, he could move into the market and cause huge distortions. But he won't.

As for your sentiment about gold... It sounds great, but it's not true. It hasn't dumbfoundedly climbed in value decade after decade... Goldbugs were burned throughout the 80's and 90's... The 00's, they had their chance to shine. But here we are, halfway through this decade and its basically flat. Sure, those who owned at the start and sold at the peak could have made a fortune, but those that they sold to would have lost out by that same exact fortune.

It' bullshit he has no clue about bitcoin and how it works that's why he does think this.
Well, even those who don't belive will see in next years.

Buffet only invests what he knows.

So obviously the dude doesnt know much about bitcoin, so he`s referencing as what he think bitcoin is like.

Little does he know all these benefits of what it offers, like a wire transfer cost vs bitcoin cost to send money to the phillpines or some other country.

Bitcoin still has a lot to prove this coming years in order to become a successful long-term bet. For now all what we had were 2-3 bubbles based and fueled purely on speculation. Further down the road, we may even have one more, but without fundamental developments (plural form on purpose) we may not be able to see Bitcoin successful in the long-term. And I believe it is very valid to listen to all the critical voices to be able to understand where are the weaknesses that should be addressed. that is why I think Buffet is not very wrong on Bitcoin, as for now.

We should definitely listen to critical voices. But not critical voices from the completely ignorant, no matter who they are.

Even if bitcoin ends up failing, it wouldn't make buffet correct.

I'm not even a fiat hater, and I think that his implication that fiat has some sort of intrinsic value is a joke.

Well, it certainly has some form of value, being that governments around the world mandate that their citizens both accept it purchase goods and settle debts, and require its use for payment of taxes; Gold doesn't have that going for it, yet it is claimed to have intrinsic value because nearly the entire world recognizes that others see value in it. Bitcoin lacks all of those.

And it sounds to me that he understands it; first and foremost it is a payment system. That's what its advertised as, a means of transferring value quickly, with no fees, no barriers and no charge backs. There is the scarcity factor which serves as a cap on how much can be in transit at any given time, but ultimately, its best use is in transferring value. That people "hodl" it awaiting increases is another thing...  And though "hodlers" and others claim the blockchain itself serves at bitcoins intrinsic value, many others will disagree; the fiat financial system contains records of countless transfers, etc, but that's not why some might say there's intrinsic value there... Only because goods and services can be readily purchased, not because there's a clear record of every past transaction... where, especially in these days of dragnet surveillance, many appreciate cash as a means of not sharing with everyone in the world what they're up to.

Put another way, a lot of people hope that it will replace the dominant currencies; in order to do that, it first must be transacted with widely. But if it fails in that first, lofty goal, that doesn't mean its a failure, it still has plenty of use to it.

Of course it has value; that's why we use it. But it doesn't have intrinsic value. The value is given because people put their trust in it. If people put trust in bitcoin or feathers or anything else instead, then fiat can easily be replaced.

Gold has a little bit of intrinsic value in that it can be used as jewelry. But otherwise, money doesn't have intrinsic value.

Bitcoin, it can be argued, actually does have some intrinsic value because you can do stuff with the blockchain OTHER than purely keeping accounting of which address has coins.

Buffet is a joke, he walks around with his new friend Floyd Mayweather instead of paying attention to videos like this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yPIvqJsCOSo

Yeah, actually all the anti-gummint and full-blown-liberals put me off a lot. I think Bitcoin has a terrific function as a nation-independent store of value, gives you control over your own assets and can be transferred internationally within seconds.

He is not a complete ignorant, as most of the stock market (and Bitcoin?) investors. He has proven track of records and that makes him a guy who's opinion matters. In contrast to many, here in this forum as well, who consider themselves wise enough, but yet must wait to earn their pennies in trading. Very important issue Buffet is pointing out, and I believe many here would agree on that: one thing is to have brilliant idea, the other is to make the market to buy it. And Bitcoin has to yet prove to have the answer for the latter.

Buffett is good at what he does, but his track record doesn't mean anything for things he doesn't know. For example, I wouldn't count on him giving good advice on how to play go (an ancient chinese board game). He obviously doesn't understand tech, or doesn't care to understand tech, making his opinions on this matter about as authoritative as your average Joe.

Even if bitcoin fails, his reasons are simply not correct. A lot of people don't understand this concept. You can have the wrong reasons but accidentally hit the right answer. It doesn't make you right, though.

So yes, bitcoin still has a lot of obstacles to overcome. But we should listen to people who actually did their research and critical thinking, rather than famous people.

Well, in all honesty, he is giving advice on what he knows best - how to recognize market opportunity and make money out of it. That is where most of us who understand tech (or are tech-enthusiasts) may fail and that is where he made his money. His comment that he currently does not see Bitcoin as worth investing may mean two things: he is still taking the position and wants the entry price to be as low as possible (version for Bitcoin-enthusiasts), or he probably really does not see that currently Bitcoin is in the shape of making much impact - risk-reward ratio is not appealing to him (version for non-enthusiasts).

Buffet is too old to get his head around Bitcoin and why it matters, im pretty sure he didn't even got the importance of the internet back then, he can't see the analogy with Bitcoin being the TCP/IP of money, too computer illiterate to do so.

Bitcoin is based on tech, yes, but that's the minor part of the story. You don't need to understand merkle roots and such to understand Bitcoins use and potential, just as you don't need to understand C, Java or Cobol, or have an knowledge about TCP/IP in order to understand banks and banking; Bitcoin is no different; it's a technology, for certain, but it's use and application are certainly understandable to a layperson who wants to devote more than a couple of minutes to the task;

It's easy to say that Buffett's old and he just doesn't get it, but he's one of the sharpest investment minds out there, understands banking and finance better than anyone here, and unlike the vast majority of people here, who can easily get trapped in the self-reinforcing echo chamber that is here, telling us that the sky is the limit, individual bitcoins could bet worth millions one day, etc... He's a disinterested outside observer, who can offer the most unbiased analysis out there... I'd find much more value in Buffetts words, for instance, than the Winklevoss twins. True, he doesn't spout the party line, but just because you don't like his opinion, that doesn't make it any less valid.

Sure, Buffetts famous. But his fame is solely the result of his success at doing research, thinking critically, and most importantly, investing against the tide.

I'm certain that had Buffett said the exact same thing that he said, except ended it with "Bitcoin's a great idea, and I'm buying some personally", there would be no attacks no the guy, no one saying he didn't do his research, no one saying he's out of touch, or doesn't like tech. But because his opinion differs than what we want to hear around here, its open season.

I don't read his quote as him saying that it won't have much impact, only that he views it as a tool to use to transmit value, not the value itself.  Bitcoin could become the norm person-to-person international transfers, that doesn't mean that it will be worth hundreds of billions of dollars, it just needs to be valuable enough to accommodate the total amount of funds in transfer at any given time. Assume in a few years that there are 15 million coins to be circulated (assuming some are untouchable, due to simply being lost, or due to die hard "hodlers" refusing to part with them, potentially, say they're valued at $200 each, that's a system that can have $3 billion in transit at any given time... That's HUGE. But that also represents a decline in value from where its at now...

I'd speculate that it's memories the brief moment that it hit $1,000, along with the echo chamber in here that feeds peoples greed that levels such as $1,000, $5,000 or even $10,000 per BTC are "reasonable" future valuations for it....

Don't get me wrong, I think that Bitcoin here for the longhaul, but I don't think its tearing down the system, causing fiat currencies to collapse, or that its appropriate the fill the void should any of those currencies collapse. But that doesn't mean it doesn't have a future... Could be as a low cost means to transferring value, or as the a borderless technology of the internet...  But non of those require it to be worth any more than it is today...

"Buffet is good at what he does"
Don't you think that's just a tiny bit of an understatement?

Why don't you read some of my other posts before forming uninformed assumptions about my opinions and motivations? Sure, I'm bullish on bitcoin's technology, but I've even mentioned myself that I am not a government-fiat hater, I don't blindly believe that bitcoin is the solution to everything. Not going to repeat what I said before, just read some of my posts https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=990936.msg10779939#msg10779939 and https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=987258.0

As smart as Buffett is, he just can't learn everything there is about the world to take advantage of every single opportunity. It's just not possible. As such, there will be many opportunities he will miss. There were probably many great investments around the world that he never even heard about. The world is simply such a big place.

If buffett really sat down to learn, understand and think about all the possibilities, limitations and obstacles of bitcoin, I'm sure he'll be much better at it than I am. But what does he gain by doing that? Buffett, being an investor and owning an insurance company, he values his time. He even counts down the number of days he expects he has left in the world, and think about how to optimally use that time. So why, why would he waste time on bitcoin? There are any number of other profitable ventures waiting for him, things that he already understands, things that are virtually risk free for him. Why would he waste time reading and learning about something that, to a person who doesn't understand it, seems absolutely ridiculous? I mean when you first heard about bitcoin, did you think "wow, this is amazing" or did you think "WTF, people spend money on some fake money? What idiots"?

You see, I registered last month. But I first heard about bitcoin in 2011-2012, a bit after that first spike to $30, whenever that was. But I just dismissed it as silliness for the benefit of drug dealing criminals. I'm sure that's the first reaction for most people. There's really no reason for Buffett to look deeper into this.

I completely disagree. I'd like to think I'm pretty smart. At the very least, I'm not that stupid. It took me a lot more than a couple of minutes to understand. Heck, it took me months, and I still can't say I fully understand bitcoin, and I'm not even talking about the technical aspects of it.

I think one of the greatest barriers for bitcoin is that it's very difficult to understand. I like to bring up my go example again, just because I see so many similarities between go and bitcoin. Everyone who plays go goes on and on about how "elegant and simple" the rules are. But quite honestly, the rules cannot be more confusing to a beginner. You won't even know when the game ends/ended or who won for the first few times you play, without someone telling you.

I repeat, it is not about him understanding in every single detail how Bitcoin works. He probably doesn't care at all about it. It is about seeing an opportunity to make money on that, be it trading cotton, gold or Bitcoins. Mareket mechanisms and laws are similar for each, and that is when you can count on his experience. That is where his point matters and he made valid point in my opinion. Bitcoin has the potential to become mean of payment in the future (as are checks now, for example), if many ifs are fulfilled, but this fact alone does not guarantee the big return on your investment.

agree, on most of your points. But, there is also one but. Take the current value of M0 in USD only. according to this source: http://de.tradingeconomics.com/united-states/money-supply-m0, it is 3 840 341 Million USD. Today.
Now compare that to the current Bitcoin market cap. it is, according to this source: http://coinmarketcap.com/, 3 583 Million USD. Meaning 1000 times less.
So comparison to checks, may be considered a very good one here. A small fraction of M0, just fine.
Now, how realistic is the assumption that Bitcoin can increase its market 10, 100, 1000 times from here?

I disagree with the similarity of market mechanisms. Bitcoin keeps surprising everyone, even just looking at the numbers. It is very hard to be able to sense if something will truly take off if you can't even imagine 1% of the possibilities. I can't, and I'm much younger than Buffet.     

is impossible to get a grasp as to why it is rising or dropping on any given day. All you can do is buy some with money that you can afford to lose

So what is GOLD?

He's not a fan of gold either.

well than he is a complete lucky rich moron. 

what does he have trust in?

Government.

from tfa, Buffet stated:
---------------------------

 .....I hope bitcoin becomes a better way of doing it, but you can replicate it a bunch of different ways and it will be.

---------------------------
 
He just seems unaware to me, simply compares it to money orders.
Someone pops up and asks him about bitcoin, he's spent a little time looking at it,
he states his opinion.

Like Paul Krugman did re: comparing the impact of the internet on business being equiv
 to that of the fax machine.

And like these people who figure "..well, it just runs on computers... our <large org/gov> has computers, we'll just
duplicate what bitcoin does, but we'll own and control it and do it better and keep it to ourselves."

They all appear to be unversed in bitcoin, and bitcoin takes some study.

Buffet mentions just one of Bitcoin's abilities, but the genius of it lies
in the nature of the network, coupled with incentives and bound by
the blockchain and the idea of HAVING, aka money. Which aligns
it w/ human nature.

Even if the EU+US+China+Russia+Africa -or- ALLBANKERS&Lawyers_ON_THE_PLANET
decided to build out a network to unify commerce, intellectual property, insurance pools,
micropayments, voting reform etc-
could they succeed in surpassing what is happening?
NO, THEY CANNOT
Bitcoin appeals to so many aspects of humanity it amazes me repeatedly,
there is something for anyone and so much more to come.
People reading this forum are tuned in to bitcoin but arrive for a lot of different reasons.
 
Copper has had value for millenia. What might DaVinci/BFranklin/AdamSmith/a_copper_Baron have said
re: some new-fangled situation where copper is spun into threads and then electrically shielded from its neighbors?
None would have said:  "...clearly, there will be ethernet, and it will destroy/recreate newspaper publishing"

So, unless he really decides to investigate, Mr. Buffet simply doesn't yet realize what the protocol is.
Which is ok, and can be said of any of us.
"Since he's so successful, and bitcoin is some sort of money thing, let's see if he thinks its bullshit!"
 
But, as a cog, few seek my opinion on anything

'


Damn well being one of the richest dudes out there, I am pretty sure he helps fund the government.

well what I can tell bitcoin and checks.moneygram ect are of no where the same, type of instrument.  The way bitcoin is at the moment its looked as an investment,currency, leverage.

checks and any other type of money service is not looked as the same.

so maybe he knows something we dont.

I read somewhere recently that 40% of berkshire hathaway is shares in wall street banks and legacy financial firms. His opinion is not objective.

On dataroma you can check Berkshire's portfolio in december 2014.
http://www.dataroma.com/m/holdings.php?m=brk (http://www.dataroma.com/m/holdings.php?m=brk)

Financials he was invested in at that time: Wells Fargo 23,23%, American Express 12,9%, U.S. Bancorp 3,29%, Goldman Sachs Group 2,24%, Moody's Corp 2,16%, Bank of New York 0,82%, M&T Bank Corp 0,62%, Visa Inc 0,60%, Mastercard Inc 0,43%,

Sector analysis: Financials 45,57 % of the whole portfolio.

You're right mate!

Warren Buffet has never invested in anything too risky or revolutionary like Bitcoin. Most of his picks are always safe, solid ones and he holds them for long times. He's not got a say in Bitcoin because he doesn't understand it.

That is not the point here. The point is Buffett is heavily invested in old and traditional financial services and banking. So why should he speak positive about Bitcoin which could obviously be a big threat to these institutions in the future? Got it?!
And of course he does not understand Bitcoin. But he also don't want to understand it imo. He is a old believer.
I say just let him, it's his right to do so. He achieved a lot in his life.And I really respect that.
But in terms of Bitcoin I am totally convinced he is wrong.

He's probably thinking that he should stay with what he knows best and when you've got that type of money you don't need anything that's particularly volatile. Furthermore, he has no need to learn anything new at that point in his life as he's probably got 5 or so years left until he passes on so there's no real point. I'm sure a lot of the middle aged and younger folks in his sphere are taking note and keeping an eye on Bitcoin.

True but since he is a big name in the investing world, if the not the biggest one, I hate how influential he is and how if Buffet says something is not worth investing, all those idiots fanboys will parrot the same thing.

I agree, I think that's the point that they want to stress on earlier. For instance, you can see amex, visa, mastercard, those are directly in competition with what bitcoin is trying to achieve right now. To become a payment system in the retail business. Obviously he can't be supporting bitcoin at the same time because the success bring eventually spell collapse for the others.

If bitcoin has such huge potential, couldn't he just buy a large portion of bitcoin and see what happens? It is not like he is emotionally invested in other payment services.

He either legitimately believes Bitcoin is pointless, or he sees it as a treat for his future holdings, therefore intentionally spreads FUD's so their followers will think like him and hopefully keep their money away from it.

In this case I would think: honey badger.

We need to be more open minded. We're almost in dangerous territory, where the community attacks anyone who delivers a less than glowing analysis, whether that person is famous like Buffett or a fellow poster on Bitcoin talk. Always looking for ulterior motives as well, whether it's because Buffett owns bank stocks, someone else could be a supposed paid shill or else the constant contention that people are trying to spread FUD in order to buy on the cheap.

Fact is, bitcoins future could be less than glowing, or we could colkectively be overvaluing it.

As far as disinterested parties go, I thibh Buffett is in that crowd. Unlike all of us, he doesn't own Bitcoin, so his prerogative isn't seeing its value skyrocket. Yes, Bitcoin competes with the banks and credit card companies he owns, but that's beside the fact, I think. If Bitcoin was to take hold as so many of us hope, it's valuation COULD increase manyfold. He could buy a substantial amount of bitcoins for what would be pocket change to him. If there's even a 1% chance of it succeeding, then the losses in his finance investments would be made up for by gains in Btc. So yeah; he might be an owner of financial stocks, but he's one of the shrewdest investments minds out there, so I wouldn't discount his analysis simply because of his equity exposure 

This is a man that talks down PMs but attempted to corner the silver market years ago

KILL THIS HERETIC

The problem is he doesn't know what he is talking about. He literally does not get it, he doesn't know how to use it, and not only that, he doesn't know what Bitcoin really does and therefore what role it plays. Tell me why should I hear this guy then.

I really hope he doesn't have that mentality! Regardless of his position concerning bitcoin, he's a remarkable man. I don't see this sort of intelligence as really a lack of wish to know more in your final years, but  age probably is a big barrier for the older folks. Or maybe he's just chosen to take a strong position, that way he has 50% chance of being remembered as a prophet of the future of economy.

Of course Buffett was.....wrong.

Why the F#ck would both NYSE and NASDAQ invest into Bitcoin related startups and technologies?

http://techcrunch.com/2015/01/20/coinbase-confirms-75m-raise-from-dfj-nyse-strategic-banking-partners/

http://blog.cex.io/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/vi.jpg

http://www.wsj.com/articles/nasdaq-to-provide-trading-technology-for-bitcoin-marketplace-1427140006

http://media.coindesk.com/2015/03/Screen-Shot-2015-03-23-at-4.52.45-PM.png


Guy's a dinosaur.  Same with Carl Icahn and George Soros.  Sure they're multi billionaires, but they made most of their bank in the last century.  Their era and fiat based hunches and guesses will be phased out shortly.

Times are a changin'....

Buffet is known for not investing in technology
In early 1990's, Buffet said "Internet have no future, it's only for porn and gambling".

The guy has a lot of zeros on the end of his account balance for sure, but if you measure it in ROI % then there are a few people on this forum that have massively outperformed Buffet.

When you get to his portfolio size then you have to invest in a different style than a small player, because you don't want to own the whole market and have nobody to sell to.

Over the last 5 years, Birkshire Hathaway has performed roughly equal to the DJIA and the NASDAQ. Extremely underwhelming for someone supposedly great at stocks.

this old man don't see the potential of the new technology !

FIRST OF ALL We all Use Fit that FACT in Our MIND that Bitcoin IS NOT Design FOR MAKING LOCAL MONEY BUY SPECULATING

Bitcoin is Design For Use Instead of LOCAL Currency.


So STOP Using this as Personal Speculation Company Share. THIS IS NOT Company Share or Investment Firm.

alot of the posters talk about Buffett as though he is unsupported ie has to struggle himself to understand bitcoin. I am sure he has some of the smartest advisors around in his company and will have had reports given to him on bitcoin prepared by both believers and non believers.
Thats why his views are important and why he should be listened to. Sure he will be "biased' towards one way over another but that bias has stood him in good stead over the years. As another poster has said - its not really about the benefits or otherwise of the thing (here bitcoin) but whether the thing will take off (aka adoption)   

Alone the idea that people agree that something has value to begin with is the basis of money itself. Otherwise our beautiful tiny bills I cotton wouldn't have any vale at all And Bitcoin offers this world-wide and independent of any economy or political power!!!

Richard Branson, Peter Thiel take aim at Western Union

"How it works: TransferWise acts like something of a matchmaker for people looking to send cash overseas. When a customer in the U.S. wants to transfer funds to, say, a relative in the UK, TransferWise receives their cash in dollars and looks for a customer in the UK who happens to be looking to transfer pounds to dollars. Since no bank ever gets involved and money doesn’t actually cross national borders, TransferWise is able to charge very little in the way of fees — just 1% per transaction for U.S. customers., who also get better deals on exchange rates."

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/look-out-western-union-%E2%80%94-a-new-startup-is-making-money-transfers-way-cheaper-202315065.html

1%?!?! What a steal compared to bitcoin!

Okay, well if a start up trying to do the whole beat the percentage of transfer rate, then what does bitcoin offer.

Cause its sure as heck its way cheaper, but now its only a way of hiding your identity situation.

He's objectively wrong, just like anyone that is a anti-Bitcoin. They just listen to him because he's filthy rich.

Tsar Nicholas was rich.

King Louis was rich.

King Charles I was rich.

It worked... until it didn't.

MIT Technology Review: A Stanford professor claims to have invented a Bitcoin-like system that can handle payments faster and with more security.

"Stanford professor David Mazières thinks he has a faster, more flexible, and more secure alternative. If Mazières is correct, his technology could make digital payments and other transactions cheaper, safer, and easier—particularly across borders."

Dan Boneh, a Stanford professor who did not work on Mazières’s system but has reviewed it, says that SCP avoids some security limitations of Bitcoin. “The security proposition of Bitcoin is that the people who invested in mining infrastructure can be trusted, but that may not be true,” he says. “Here I can choose for myself who to trust.”

http://www.technologyreview.com/news/536641/a-new-competitor-for-bitcoin-aims-to-be-faster-and-safer/

Google Wallet just got a lot safer

"Google Wallet will now be FDIC-insured, which means Google users’ money is now a whole lot safer"

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/google-wallet-venmo-paypal-fdic-insurance-215842545.html

meh, first thing I thought was Ripple, and I was right

What? Do they want to become a bank?

Soemthing like that it seems lol. The beauty of Bitcoin is you have choices over imposition: You can be your own bank, or if you dont trust yourself, you can let a 3rd party to take care of them if you trust the more than you trust yourself (for example Xapo acts as a bank).

Don't think much people here are impressed with that. The Google definition of "safe" means nothing as you still are exposed to everything bad related to fiat currency.

With Bitcoin I own and hold my funds, and they are securely stored and only accessible by me. No government or service can freeze it, seize it, or entirely close it down.

I guess we're coming back to this quote time and time again. Thing is: I do believe that he does get the idea behind Bitcoin, but I think he underestimates the real value of a single commodity everyone agrees on. Why does Gold have such a high value? Due to its intrinsic value!? - not a chance!

Bitcoin wasn't designed with any "use" of it in mind as far as I know. It can be used as anything you want. Speculation, holding of wealth, treat it like an asset or like an actual currency. That is the beauty of it. Of course, its currency-like features are what makes it unique.

I don't think it's a flawed analogy.

First, let's make checks analogous to Ripple transactions, then compare BTC to Ripple.

Ripple is essentially a more convenient way of passing around checks.  In the Ripple network, XRP the on-network currency, was designed specifically to have a low value because the currency is really just there as a transaction 'lubricant,' so-to-speak.  The value of XRP needn't be valuable lest it be redundant.  It's simply a mechanism that facilitates the transfer of value in the form of IOUs (like checks).

Both the Bitcoin network and the Ripple network serve similar purposes -- to provide a more effective means of transferring value.  The fact that BTC as a currency is intended to also function as a store of value (unlike XRP) doesn't necessarily mean anything.  Just because something is intended to be a certain way doesn't mean it will actually be best suited for that purpose.

It doesn't matter whether BTC is worth $1 or $10,000 -- the network maintains its purpose regardless of the value of BTC.  To this extent, it can certainly be argued that BTC isn't inherently very valuable.  Checks, and also the BTC and XRP networks, all serve the purpose of transferring value (or debt entitlement...whatever).  All three can serve this purpose just fine without a valuable on-network currency.

Adding my two cents, I think there actually 'is' inherent value in BTC, but this value wouldn't be recognized by Buffet anyway because it's something that's extremely difficult to quantify.  To the rest of the world, a socially accepted form of currency that is not dependent upon 3rd-party trust *is* very valuable to many people.  Buffet has no need for such a thing.

Exactly. That's also the reason why we're still not able to put a definitive tag onto Bitcoin and have trouble actually deciding what it is. It has completely new attributes, and also consists of attributes that haven't occurred with a single asset at the same time. Highly interesting times, indeed!

No. He's right. Bitcoin is simply a way of transmitting money. Fiat is also a way of transmitting money. Money is simply a concept. It's all in out minds. You can't hold money, and you can't see money. Bitcoin is (just like fiat) a token that represents money, and its a means of transferring money, but it's not money itself.

I'm also a strong believer in Bitcoin, but concerning your argument, people might say that a regular currency "at least" has the backing of a respective economy, government, or even military. With Bitcoin, and gold actually as well, it only comes down to the fact that the supply is limited and people agreed that it has value. The intrinsic value of gold is much lower than its actual market price(!)

MasterCard Send debuts as faster alternative to ACH payments

http://www.mobilepaymentstoday.com/articles/mastercard-send-debuts-as-alternative-to-ach-payments/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypTMglmIsjE