I would like to point out that Bitcoin Cash is not an upgrade per se. They basically made a copy of Bitcoin and altered in such a way that would let its network handle more transactions right off the bat by increasing the block size. Bitcoin itself could also theoretically implement the same change but most of the community believes in exploring different solutions (side chains) like the Lightning Network first.

You can read this:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitcoin_scalability_problem

...for a more information about the subject. I personally prefer Bitcoin because I like the idea of side chains, and the general success of Bitcoin over Bitcoin Cash seems to indicate that most of the community has the same opinion. It's ultimately up to you to decide which you like better though. You even have the option to support both.

Yes, I do have an economic stake, and you'll find that most people on this forum is the same way. Moreover, I believe in the technology and its future potential. These two reasons for my support don't have to be mutually exclusive. I'm not anti-establishment either. I am of the camp that crypto can boom as a very viable alternative without tearing the entire system down. I believe that Bitcoin is, at its core, simply an electronic peer-to-peer cash system, that it doesn't have to be any more than that, and that it can fulfill that role supremely well in the future.

Is there a problem with my line of thinking that you'd like to point out? Or were you questioning my support of Bitcoin specifically over other altcoins?

The article says banks have lost the war to crypto and fintech companies. If you read through it, it mostly talks about how fintech companies are making fiat redundant. Crypto's potential, although praised, was mostly mentioned in passing because you can't really talk digital money without having it come up. Saying the article is about banks losing to fintech companies is more appropriate considering the content.

It's still nice I guess, but we have to take into consideration the fact that fintech companies are also in competition against Bitcoin as far as cashless payments go. They're payment processors, something which Bitcoin is supposed to render obsolete.

Ummm this is an advertisement for a compliance service. The article offers nothing new as far as regulations or compliance go. It went through a quick rundown of the current situation, and how a certain service uses AI to help businesses comply with AML regulations without really going in-depth as to how it does it. Not that there's anything wrong with that, of course. I'd just like to remind people to be mindful of what they share.

I don't know about popularity, but most experienced Bitcoin users won't recommend it. I also know that there have been several incidents of Bitcoin loss because of negligence on the part of blockchain.info (now blockchain.com) itself. That doesn't exactly paint a pretty picture regarding its reliability. If you're a newbie and you're reading this, do yourself a favor and switch to Bitcoin Core or Electrum.

I seem to always see a blockchain.info wallet recommendation on threads like this pretty often. Makes me wonder if the posters are really just happy with the service or if there is some shilling going on.

Is this a new trend at all? I mean, I'm sure the overwhelming majority of people wants to own a home at some point, so it's not like the demand is only for people who want to rent out their 2nd or 3rd apartments.

Real estate is generally sound for as long as you have an actual need for it. There may be more supply than demand in some areas now, but who knows how long it will stay that way. It's kind of like Bitcoin in that sense, where we know it will not be enough for everyone somewhere down the line. For as long as you're not putting all your eggs in the real estate basket, you should be relatively safe. This is one investment where "inherent value" is very relevant.

Wait what? The article says the survey was conducted in May this year. Or were you referring to a similar survey?

But yeah, I'm kind of interested as to how much these serious investors actually have in Bitcoin, and what would make those who aren't interested to reconsider their stance. Bitcoin still has a huge untapped market for sure, but this survey doesn't paint a very pretty picture of how it is currently doing in the eyes of traditional investors. It just seems like we're stuck in a paradox where we need more adoption to drive more adoption.

It doesn't really matter how they classify it at the moment because there is no ban in place. Their central bank does have a directive for banks not to get involved in any capacity with  cryptocurrencies though. It's specific to cryptocurrencies so however they want to classify them is besides the point.

Trading seems to be completely free for all at the moment, so you can trade crypto to your heart's content for as long as you don't use a bank account in doing so.

As for the central bank directive, their supreme court should have met on July 20, but I haven't heard anything about it. Anyone care to enlighten us?

I think what he meant to say was that the statements weren't legally binding. I wouldn't go as far as to say they're completely useless, but as far as formal policies go, they actually are.

I'm personally happy about this because it's much better than the alternative of outright opposition (like we need more of those lol), but yeah this doesn't really mean crypto can be used everywhere in the EU countries, as others may be thinking.

While it's true that you can theoretically start anywhere, Bitcoin is the perfect starting point because of its wide availability along with plenty of resources. You can stick with tried and tested wallets and exchanges, for example, which may not be applicable to some obscure coins.

If you want to learn about cryptos by actually experiencing using it, Bitcoin is the way to go. You can branch out slowly after that because pretty much every coin comes with a BTC pair anyway, but not vice versa.

Everyone should definitely diversify their portfolio. Spreading money across different coins don't count because they mostly move in unison. Those who play with ICOs or small market cap coins are likely traders looking to multiply their money rather than invest.

That being said, this is a Bitcoin forum, so people are more likely to talk about their crypto investments over their traditional investments. I'm sure most people who have enough resources to maintain a diverse portfolio do so. Those who don't should mostly fall under the umbrella of people who are only working with a small amount of money or hardcore anti-institutionalists.

I should also note that crypto has an incredibly low barrier of entry, so it's accessible to more people. That could also be the reason why, assuming your observation were true.

Yeah, searching for Bitcoin Miner still returns a lot of results for me too. Then again, it seems the article only says they've reached the decision to ban mining apps. It's unclear if they've already started the process, but it's clear that they're not done.

Also, before people start crucifying Google for being anti-crypto, this move is not anti-crypto. These apps are bad news; they're either malicious or don't work at all. This is for everyone's protection.

What you're describing is basically an exchange. You don't need to be based in the US nor would you need to wire money to access one. You just need to find out which exchanges support your country, sign up for it, then buy away. So where do you live? Try Googling "cryptocurrency exchange". It should return a few results relevant to your area.

Keeping the coins safe for long term holding is a little more complicated though, as it's not recommended to store them in exchanges and online wallets. You could invest in hardware wallets like TREZOR or Ledger, which could store multiple kinds of altcoins. You basically transfer the coins there after buying from your exchange.

One possible reason I see would be the entry of institutional money. Lack of clarity in regulation is always cited as one of their concerns about entering the market. Some average joes may also share that concern.

If we assume that clearer regulations would alleviate these concerns, it could very well lead to a bigger market, which is usually more stable. Lots of theoreticals in there, but I personally believe it to be very plausible.

What do you want out of your investment? Long term growth? Short term?

I'm oversimplifying things here, but if you're going for a long term investment, Bitcoin would be the way to go. If you want ti multiply your money quickly, you should look into some relatively new alts which have better short term potential than Bitcoin.

But yeah you should start with the fundamentals first. This isn't like the stock market where you could sign up for a brokerage service and be done with it. Cryptocurrency exchanges generally work the same way as them, but they're quite notorious for not being very secure. Make sure you do research into what you're putting money in. You can always ask questions here if the search function isn't being helpful.

I just want to add that it has been denied, at which point it dropped but then recovered again:

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/07/27/bitcoin-loses-steam-after-sec-denies-winklevoss-etf.html

The rally seems to have stopped though, so the mini bull run really could have been about the hyped up chances of the SEC approving the Winklevoss Twins' Bitcoin ETF. It did seem to rejuvenate the market, so I'm kind of optimistic that the $8k price range could be maintained.

Wait what? The article didn't mention any reasons why the theoretical bull run may be over. This is literally the only instance where they talked about the bull run being over:


It's an informative article offering a very plausible reason for the bull run, but the title is overly sensational. I thought for sure it would have something to do with the SEC shooting down the recent ETF proposal, but it wasn't mentioned at all.

I found one more site saying the same thing, but it's not exactly reputable:

https://cryptodisrupt.com/fox-business-network-will-air-exploring-the-block/?cn-reloaded=1

Either way, parts of it seem real. Google seems to return a lot of results for this particular tidbit:


So there really might be crypto shows headed to television. This is all well and good for as long as they don't spend all their time shilling altcoins. This should be about education and awareness IMO. Anything less and it may be counterproductive as far as adoption goes.

So not necessarily Bitcoin specifically, but rather cryptocurrencies as a whole? Bitcoin is the most popular so it wouldn't surprise me if it was targeted more often, but I imagine cyber criminals don't have much of a preference when it comes to stealing stuff. Bitcoins are just more widely available and is an actual household name so there are more opportunities in it for them.

But yeah, I'd even go a step further to say they don't have much of a preference at all for what they steal, it just so happens that there are a lot of opportunities for them within the crypto space at the moment.

As a general rule, inflation happens when new money is released. New Bitcoin is released everytime a block is mined, so Bitcoin absolutely suffers from inflation, as others have said. USD's 2017 inflation stands at around 2.1%, while Bitcoin's is at 3.9%, but Bitcoin's will be increasingly lowered every halving, and will eventually flip to deflation once all coins have been mined.

Either way, it's not much of a problem. People seem to be much more worried about the eventual deflation, which carries concerns towards its utility as a currency.