I think that the price in December was simply too high.
A correction had to come.
And now that many people have seen that the price of bitcoin moves both ways, it is harder to get up again.
In addition there were some regulations and news about payment service providers stopping to accept bitcoin.

Working with money and seeing opportunities are big strengths of the swiss nation.
Compared to a relatively small population they have big and successfull banks.
And success usually proofs the people are right in what they are doing.
If a government of such a country makes good basic conditions for crypto currencies, I am sure we will see in a few years how benefitial for everybody the integration of crypto currencies in a society can be.

When you look at the alternatives to a real job op gave, I think they are really depending all on one factor: luck.
And when your income depends on luck, then I see a life where you always fear running out of luck.
And a life full of fear, that is nthing I would want.
The only exception I see is coding as an income option. That is a wanted skill, every company in the crypto business needs people who are good at coding. And it is the closest thing to a real job as well.

One explanation for the drop in the bitcoin value would be that its value before was too high.
There seems to be a good support at the level of 10K, maybe that is a really fair value for one bitcoin.

If somebody would have said year ago that today the price would be above 10K, everybody would have cheered.
Now many are complaining. It's all just a question of perspective

I do not know of any bank that would directly accept bitcoin.
And even if one would, I do not think they would be ensured and you will get no interest for them.
So storing your coins at a bank would not bring an advantage, I think even more a disadvantage.
When you want to convert your coins into another currency, then an exchange is the place to go to.

My goal with crypto currencies is retirement. So what I am going to do after crypto currencies is clear: only what I want to do.
Grow my tomatoes, travel a bit the country, renovate the house. Not very big things, but I like the small stuff in life.

I have read that about some vague concerns because bitcoin futures are settled in cash.
It might be possible for investors to push around the futures contracts at the close simply by aggressively buying and selling.

In the end, holding the contract from the opening to the close was a losing proposition. These contracts opened for bidding at $20,000 on Decemebr 10th.
But on Tuesday, bitcoin was sitting right around 10000$, a fall of 50 percent.

What might become a problem is that a few shops have already removed bitcoin as a payment option.
But right now bitcoin is still dominant when it comes to trading pairs at exchanges.
For everybody who owns crypto currencies it should not be difficult to exchange bitcoin against another crypto currency that might be accepted.

It could really be that we are approching to a more stable price.
Even the trading volume has declined to one of the lowest levels since early December.
The mempool has started to decline as well, so have the transaction fees.
Personally I would really appreciate if we could have a few weeks with less turbulences. The price level we have at the moment seems very good to me.

The wallets are safe, but it is the software at the exchanges that can be hacked. There it is possible to assign illegitime withdrawals.
An exchange has the problem that it has to manage the ongoing trading actions, that makes it really complicated to keep security on the highest level.
Many of the members here advise never to let any coins stay at an exchange.
And then you have to keep in mind that many of the hacks at exchanges are in reality inside jobs. A person who has legitimate access to the wallets takes what he can and runs.

Of course bitcoin can not end world poverty.
The really poor people can neither read nore write and they do not have access to a computer. Bitcoin can not help them directly.
Maybe there is a possibility to gather bitcoins via crowdfunding in order to establish schools. But I doubt that much money could be collected this way.
I think that in the end it will be the responsibility of the nations to creat an infrastructure that offers every person anywhere access to knowledge.
Only after that step really everybody can participate and profit from bitcoin.

Oh.. I really do not think it is a smart move to convince and persuade. Especially not relatives.
People should be informed so that they can make a decision for themselves if they want to make an investment. Bitcoin is not a sect.

Do you really want to be the guy responsible when relatives lose their money? Because you would be the one who draged them in.
That could really harm the peace in your family.

I think as well that there are many people out there who dumped their coins because of the high transaction times and fees.
65MB mempool size seems to be still much compared to what it was a year ago, but the trend here goes down accordingly.
Maybe this is really the first step to bring bitcoin back to its original purpose: serving as a currency.

That is some very bold move to invest the money for school fees into crypto currencies.
You might be lucky, but honestly I would not count on that.
Of course it depends as well on how generous the scholl is when it comes to delays in the fee payment.
I really hope you do not study business economics.

I do not see one factor as  being the most influential.
I think more of it as a random meeting of different factors. That is why prediction is not possible.
Maybe two guys with a slightly bigger stack of coins want to cash out. Some newbies who recently read an FUD article see a few 'sell' orders in their exchange sell as well due to an unfounded panic attack.
And then the domino effect is already in motion until a few smart people recognize the opportunity and start buying again.

Somehow I don't understand the price developements in the world of crypto currencies anymore
500 million NEM get stolen and their price increases 10%. I would have imagined that the opposite would happen.
Maybe that has something to do with the refund the exchange promised. They buy up all the NEM and that increases the price.

To me the most attractive concept is that bitcoin allows me to gain some additional income without having to get a real side job.
I can work with my computer from home, and I do not have any strict working times.
That gives me money and freedom. The perfect combination!

That is exactly the point. When you convert bitcoin into a fiat and the amount is large, this will draw the attention of the authorities.
I suppose it differs from country to country what they will do. Some will want to know where the coins come from, others will just charge taxes.
But as soon as a bank account is involved, the anonymity is gone.

Bitcoin was the first crypto currency, so of course as the first of its kind it gets the most attention.
And the way exchanges work contributes to the popularity of bitcoin as well: at exchanges you have traiding pairs. So every coin that cam after bitcoin built a traiding pair with bitcoin first.
The exchanges still operate this way, traiding pairs of altcoin vs altcoin came later.

I would even consider that some governments really want to protect their citizens from losing money.
There are really many ways to lose money when you invest in crypto currencies.
Especially beginners can make wrong moves very easy.
Every life insurance or investment plan given out by banks is regulated by laws. In most countries that is missing completely when it comes up to crypto currencies.
And because it goes much faster to simply ban something than to work out guidlines how to deal with it, some governments take the quick way.