After Bhaichung Bhutia, Sunil Chhetri was the big name in Indian football. If he was playing for any other country, then he would have achieved a lot of success and fame. But India is ranked much lower in the FIFA table, and no one really notices the matches played by the national team. Right now there is no one to replace him. I hope things will change in the future. That's why we have the ISL. Hopefully younger players will emerge.

Out of all these coins, I believe that Cardano (ADA) is the most technically advanced one. The developers are working hard to resolve various issues, and they have been successful to a certain extent. Ethereum is a second generation cryptocurrency, and it will become obsolete within the next few years, and will be replaced by various third generation cryptos. The extremely high fee will make sure that the shift occurs soon.

Despite technology advancing at such a fast pace, I am still not witnessing much progress in reducing the electricity consumption by the mining rigs. They still eat up a lot of electricity. For miners, in the long term electricity costs are more than their capital costs. Although electricity has become cheaper over the years, a lot of people take the electricity usage by Bitcoin mining rigs as an excuse to attack cryptocurrency.

Third match was D/N and therefore the importance of toss was reduced. But that doesn't take away the fact that England batsmen failed horribly despite batting first. Anyway, the last match start tomorrow and it is going to be crucial for all the three teams (India, Australia and to an extent England). The question is whether the WTC final will be between New Zealand and India, or NZ vs Australia. Both the scenarios look exciting.

I don't think that any of the publicly listed companies are hiding their Bitcoin purchases. Private companies can do that, but it is illegal for publicly traded companies to do so. For now, most of them are taking a "wait and watch" stance. With Janet Yellen and others in the government warning against the usage of cryptocurrency, I don't expect a lot many companies to jump in to the bandwagon too soon.

It is a difficult choice for the governments. They know that rising popularity of Bitcoin is a threat to their power. But at the same time, they realize that they can't ban Bitcoin because it is completely decentralized. By arresting a few masterminds or raiding mining farms, they can't destroy Bitcoin. There is only one way to put down Bitcoin, and that is to destroy internet altogether. I really doubt whether they will go that far.

Pyramids and Ponzi schemes won't last for more than a few months, because at some point the mastermind will decide to cash out and will vanish with most of the funds. Bitcoin has been in existence for more than 12 years now and there is no "mastermind" since it is completely decentralized. There was no premine and therefore even the creator of Bitcoin (Satoshi Nakamoto) never profited from his invention in any manner.

If you are going for a coin that is outside the top-20 list, then you need to do proper research about its future potential. Out of the 10,000 or so different cryptocurrencies created so far, more than 90% are now dead or dormant. If you make investment in the wrong project, then you may end up losing all of your capital. For now, I would stick with the already established coins, such as Bitcoin, Cardano and Ethereum.

A few days back, Rashid Khan was complaining, claiming that Afghanistan doesn't get much opportunities to play against the top teams. But if they perform like this, then why should the top teams play against them? The squad selection was also poor. They went for a very inexperienced side. Zimbabwe on the other hand had a mix of experienced and inexperienced players and that gave them the advantage.

The guy who installed the kiosk spent some time in jail. What is the use if the case gets quashed by the court after one or two years? He faced a lot of harassment as his house was raided and his personal belongings (phones, laptops.etc) were taken away. This is the price Indians have to pay for trying to popularize technological innovation. And it is not surprising that 99% of the Indian techies migrate to the United States at the first available opportunity. Just imagine how the Indian economy could have benefitted, if people like Sundar Pichai and Satya Nadella had stayed in India. But it seems as if the government don't want these people.

The latest news is that two more overseas players have tested positive for the virus. PCB hasn't released the names, but in the statement it also mentions that a few of the supporting staff have also returned positive results for COVID 19. This tournament had such a great start. And after all that, now there are doubts about how the new positive cases will affect the remaining matches.

I checked the TSLA stock price and it looks stable to me. Ever since January 2020, the prices have risen by almost 800% (more than that of Bitcoin). And I don't think that they can link any potential downside with Bitcoin purchase (I haven't heard any such statement from their officials). Because the Bitcoin purchase was hugely beneficial for TSLA. They purchased BTC worth $1.5 billion two months back and now they are having an unrealized profit of $900 million. This should actually pump their stock, not cause a decline.

Being a woman, I have to admit that males are more open to using Bitcoin compared to females. When I started using Bitcoin for the first time in 2014 (after coming to know about it through my husband), I tried popularizing it around my friend circle. It was not easy, as many people accused me of promoting a scam. None of the women whom I talked to were ready to listen to me completely. For them, Bitcoin was another internet scam. The men were not much better, but I found a few who were interested in the new innovation.

Satoshi wanted to provide an alternative to ordinary people, who were being exploited by the banking sector. I don't think that he ever wanted a complete eradication of the mainstream economy. It is laughable to say that Bitcoin will replace oil and gold. You can say that electricity can replace oil, but how Bitcoin is going to replace it? And gold is being used as a store of value for many thousands of years. Even if Bitcoin becomes hugely successful, why the gold owners should dump their assets? 

Gold has its own advantages. The factors that you have mentioned (such as portability and divisibility) are not among the merits of gold. Gold is in use for many thousands of years and it is accepted all over the world. However, if you are looking for a semi-liquid asset that can be easily transferred, then gold is not the suitable candidate. However in terms of scarcity, gold is similar to Bitcoin. Easily extractable reserves of gold are already exhausted and now it needs to be mined from less-profitable deposits. That means that the cost of production will go up in due course of time. In theory, mining of gold and Bitcoin mining are very similar.

Tesla's business itself is risky. And it is even more risky to invest in the Tesla stock, which is having a P/E ratio of more than 1,000. They took the risk and were rewarded. Bitcoin prices have risen by more than 60% ever since they purchased their coins and that translates to roughly $900 million in unrealized gains for Tesla. I guess this is more than their net income for the entire year from their main business.

Actually Iran tried with Bitcoin mining, as a way to get around the embargoes and sanctions that were imposed by the United States. Venezuela can also do the same, as it will be impossible for the Americans to prevent Bitcoin transactions. But then there are major questions. How cheap is the electricity in Venezuela? Bitcoin is highly energy intensive and they need cheap electricity if they want to mine Bitcoins at a profit. And the most important question is whether they have access to mining hardware or not. Aren't these covered under the sanctions?

I agree with eaLiTy.

I have never heard about any large-scale Bitcoin mining activity in India, because it is not profitable. First of all, it is almost impossible to get the necessary licenses and permits to start such an operation, since Bitcoin falls in the "grey area". And then there are practical difficulties. During the summer time, temperatures can rise to as much as 45 degree Celsius and therefore additional cooling requirements are there. Electricity is more expensive when compared to the other countries and finally the mining hardware needs to be imported from China (by paying a steep excise duty). I don't know how the mining farms in India can compete with those in China and Russia, given these circumstances.

One possibility is that there may be a group of people who want to convert their unaccounted money in to Bitcoin. In such cases, they can go for mining. But now that possibility is also not there, since Bitcoin itself is illegal in India. So why should they convert their wealth from one illegal asset to another, that too at a loss?

The pandemic is really unpredictable and right now it is difficult to predict what will be the situation in May. Till now, the UK has completely vaccinated (i.e two doses being administered) only around 1.2% of its population. The daily number of deaths still stand at three digits, which is higher than other countries such as Turkey and Azerbaijan. And the new strains can make forecasts useless. UEFA need to go along with the current plan, IMO.

It is definitely going to be a new pitch, although I don't really expect the ground conditions to change drastically. The pitch for the third test match was used only for two days, but by then it had disintegrated completely. I disagree with you on toss. It is still having a huge impact on the outcome and if England wins the toss, then the match is going to be very competitive.