Why is this topic so taboo that it can't be discussed even hypothetically? What I'm trying to say is if you believe in Bitcoin as a viable long-term P2P currency then you need to identify the inherent risks to its longevity. Shouldn't the fact that a very small portion of the overall community having the ability to bring BTC to its knees be at least something to discuss?
I don't understand why early-adopters need to be treated as gods and any sort of topic that comes up is automatically met with, "oh yeah just another guy trying to get rich off them." As if my ONE thread can somehow re-write history...
I am confused by everyone's assumption that the 'early adopters' took a risk...pennies worth of electricity is not a risk on generating thousands of worthless bitcoins is not a gamble. If anything, they gambled their brain power on something they saw as immensely useful. Those that propped up the system and invested in BTC for cash and began to offer goods and services for bitcoin are the ones bearing a risk...basically everyone that came in after the 'earliest adopters'. The entrants into the current market are the ones bearing the greatest risk. Buying in at $14/per is a lot different than buying in for pennies... . He (and his counterparty) took more of a risk than any of us. and its not even about risk. Satoshi had a great idea that he released into the wild; early adopters saw the potential and jumped on it. they had a "vision". i'm not an early adopter per se. i read about btc about a year and a half ago and it just didn't click at the time. only this year did i jump onboard and i don't begrudge early adopters at all b/c they were the ones who advanced the concept to its current point. |
|
|
|
Bitcoin community is roughly 5,000 to date.
i think its much higher than this. The reason I ask is because the MtGox hack essentially showed that a small (~8%) portion of outstanding Bitcoins can unstabilize the market so greatly to the point where it reduced the price to $0.01.
this is not even close to being correct. there was no market during those 30 min. i witnessed the entire crash firsthand and all new buyers, except for Kevin Day, could not log on which would have blunted the fall. i believe the hacker blocked all access to prevent this. and how does the creation of 500K fake BTC represent a market event? |
|
|
|
|
coderrr:
in your opinion is it possible to make tx's totally anonymous and if so how?
|
|
|
|
First people complain that bitcoin price is too unstable, jumping up and down out of control
now people complain that the bitcoin price is too stable.
It never ends.
well come on, this is Oldminer we're talkin about. |
|
|
|
The banks have more liabilities than assets, which is why they get taken closed down by the FDIC in the first place. Yes, other banks buy the deposits, AFTER the FDIC adds enough cash to make the purchase worthwhile. You really should read the press releases that detail how much the bank failure costs the fund. More info at calculatedrisk.comMaybe it's my work browser but your link takes me to some foreclosure website which doesn't look like what you intended to show. Washington Mutual was the largest bank failure in history but the cost to the agency was zero. Yes, some of the bank failures cost the Deposit Insurance Fund but in turn all other banks pay higher premiums. If failures exceed what's available in the DIF, the FDIC has a line of credit with the Treasury it can tap into. I believe the only time the FDIC tapped into the line was in the early 1990s. The bank failures we are seeing right now are small, local banks for the most part. Nothing like what we were seeing ~2008. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying the FDIC has the means to cover a systemic bank failure, they don't. But the current bank failures are not really putting the FDIC in jeopardy. If that were the case, we'd already see a run on banks. the FDIC has been able to extend and pretend much longer than any of us would have thought. they really don't have the reserves to have guaranteed everyone's acct up to $250K and some accts have unlimited guarantees. thats plain ridiculous and they certainly would have to tap Treasury to cover losses in a bank run. what can't go on forever won't. |
|
|
|
Because of the FDIC the next bank run will be different. It won't be a mad dash to get dollars, we can get those for sure. It'll be a dash to get value for our dollars. There is and can be no guarantee on that. I suspect people who have no more room for cans of beans and toilet paper will try to get some of their wealth through the crisis in gold and bitcoin.
The FDIC has almost no money. The banks that fail every Friday like clockwork have depleted the insurance fund completely. Sheila Bair is operating off of a 500 billion line of credit with Treasury, which will not be nearly enough to prevent a bank run should a TBTF go down. Increasing that line of credit literally requires an act of congress, meaning it wouldn't happen in time to do any good. Besides, Treasury is Broke too. Bank runs are always, always deflationary, but the big financial crisis may not be a bank run. It depends on how much liquidity the FED provides. Too much and the ship alters course from Japan to Zimbabwe. Failing banks have had their deposits purchased by other financial institutions. They're not depleting the FDIC fund. The only issue with the FDIC is it's reserves are only a fraction of their outstanding obligations so a widespread bank run would deplete the fund. But the banks currently failing right now are not doing anything to those reserves. The banks have more liabilities than assets, which is why they get taken closed down by the FDIC in the first place. Yes, other banks buy the deposits, AFTER the FDIC adds enough cash to make the purchase worthwhile. You really should read the press releases that detail how much the bank failure costs the fund. More info at calculatedrisk.comyou're absolutely right but they also guarantee many of the bad loans that get passed on to the new bank owners. |
|
|
|
You're taking your advice from an article writen by "Tyler Durden"?
Zerohedge is the best econoblog on the Web, IMHO- certainly the most subversive. The blog owner uses a psudonym to promote free speech, the same way the authors of The Federalist Papers did. Zerohedge is the Wikileaks of Wall Street. +1 |
|
|
|
one of my favorite websites altho CR has been way more bullish than i have been. |
|
|
|
There is something going on behind the scenes, which will make headlines once they can't contain it anymore. Italy and Greeceyep.  i'm short everything except Bitcoin. |
|
|
|
He is always ready to give you a crash after your panic buying.
Keep money in hand and be patient, withdraw your open bid orders, to help the price fall, and you will get cheap coins.
Be afraid, be very afraid. I don't see what's wrong with being aware of the existence of the big holders, especially those ones who are always ready to slash the market. Stop yourselves from panic buying and always being patient, you will get better chance to buy in at a cheap price. Because slashing the market is in the interest of big BTC holders?  People have different view about the future of bitcoin. Maybe the big BTC holders are not big believers. you repeatedly put up these threads trying to spread FUD. why don't you put you money where your mouth is if you're so sure the way its headed. you ignored my bet offer in the last thread so i'll repeat it here: i'll bet you 100 btc that the price of btc will be higher in USD one year from now than it is today. put up or shut up. That's a terrible bet for him. If you win, you get more value in winnings than if he were to win. You need to bet something that has sticky value such as dollars. USD sticky value? you mean the currency that has just gone straight down since 1913? your argument is bunk. i made this argument to you in the other BTCEconomist thread. the market price now reflects all info about the USD/btc exchange rate today and there is no reason to think the price will be any different one yr from now than it is today. no one knows which way the price is going to go. b/c of that if the btc rate is 1 cent lower than today in 1 year, he still wins significant value from me. if i win b/c the exchange rate is 1 cent higher, i win significant value. your argument would hold only if the btc price plunges which seems highly unlikely to me and in that case, i still lose $1400. let me make this same argument this way: if we make the bet in USD, say $1400, if the btc price goes to the moon b/c the USD goes to zero, its a stupid bet for me b/c i lose either way. i would have sold $1400 worth of BTC to raise the money to place this bet in USD and i would have lost the opportunity to have benfitted from the moonshot of those same BTC and the USD i win will be worth zip. hows that for stupid logic? |
|
|
|
He is always ready to give you a crash after your panic buying.
Keep money in hand and be patient, withdraw your open bid orders, to help the price fall, and you will get cheap coins.
Be afraid, be very afraid. I don't see what's wrong with being aware of the existence of the big holders, especially those ones who are always ready to slash the market. Stop yourselves from panic buying and always being patient, you will get better chance to buy in at a cheap price. Because slashing the market is in the interest of big BTC holders? People have different view about the future of bitcoin. Maybe the big BTC holders are not big believers. you repeatedly put up these threads trying to spread FUD. why don't you put you money where your mouth is if you're so sure the way its headed. you ignored my bet offer in the last thread so i'll repeat it here: i'll bet you 100 btc that the price of btc will be higher in USD one year from now than it is today. put up or shut up. That's a terrible bet for him. If you win, you get more value in winnings than if he were to win. You need to bet something that has sticky value such as dollars. USD sticky value? you mean the currency that has just gone straight down since 1913? your argument is bunk. i made this argument to you in the other BTCEconomist thread. the market price now reflects all info about the USD/btc exchange rate today and there is no reason to think the price will be any different one yr from now than it is today. no one knows which way the price is going to go. b/c of that if the btc rate is 1 cent lower than today in 1 year, he still wins significant value from me. if i win b/c the exchange rate is 1 cent higher, i win significant value. your argument would hold only if the btc price plunges which seems highly unlikely to me and in that case, i still lose $1400. |
|
|
|
He is always ready to give you a crash after your panic buying.
Keep money in hand and be patient, withdraw your open bid orders, to help the price fall, and you will get cheap coins.
Be afraid, be very afraid. I don't see what's wrong with being aware of the existence of the big holders, especially those ones who are always ready to slash the market. Stop yourselves from panic buying and always being patient, you will get better chance to buy in at a cheap price. Because slashing the market is in the interest of big BTC holders? People have different view about the future of bitcoin. Maybe the big BTC holders are not big believers. you repeatedly put up these threads trying to spread FUD. why don't you put you money where your mouth is if you're so sure the way its headed. you ignored my bet offer in the last thread so i'll repeat it here: i'll bet you 100 btc that the price of btc will be higher in USD one year from now than it is today. put up or shut up. |
|
|
|
nice reference Steve. this is actually the crux of the debate about what will happen to the USD in the next crisis (which just might happen to be upon us). in 2007-09 i shorted the broad stock mkt correctly but my call on commodities was incorrect as i thought gold, silver, and PM stocks would rise. not so. we had an outright deflationary wave that almost took out the entire US economy and the USD and UST's paradoxically rallied. this only lasted about 6-8 mo and is an episode we have rarely seen in US history. this was very educational for me and i think we may be on the precipice of another deflationary wave which will be longer and deeper than 2008. this goes against all conventional wisdom but if you read this article carefully and understand what its saying, the USD will rise once again and not stop until all the bad debt is washed out. my fear for Bitcoin is that it gets taken down as well since one could argue it is an inflationary reaction to all the quantitative easing we've had the last 3 yrs. i fear this even more a network protocol break. |
|
|
|
|
she could afford to lose some weight.
|
|
|
|
|
this has everything to do with fiat currency and the USD. why do u think Satoshi put that quote in the code?
|
|
|
|
Nobody with a printing press is ever really broke  unless and until the USD crashes... |
|
|
|
LOL, where has all the time gone! Yes, i read that book in 2007? helped me navigate the 2007-present financial crisis. its a classic and so prescient that everyone should read. |
|
|
|
3 hours ago, someone is even as excited as willing to buy beyond 15$.
Not all the doubters have sold their coins yet. If you push the price up beyond 15, you're only make yourselves in a dangerous situation. I suggest we remain the price at this low level for a while, and let the price crash several times, and make doubters sell all their coins around 10-12$. Then we can move on to the next phase of rally. So don't buy at too high price, and always reserve some money for picking up the cheap coins.
based on the quality and frequency of your posts, i think you're trolling. i'd like to bet you 100 BTC, to be held in escrow, that the price of BTC in USD will be higher than it is today one year from now. |
|
|
|
http://www.hussmanfunds.com/wmc/wmc110711.htm"The accounts for achieving this are on the liability side of the Fed's balance sheet. As of Wednesday, there was $67.3 billion in the Treasury general account (which is the account where the Fed books interest earnings on its Treasury portfolio, which is normally repaid to the Treasury for public use). Per recent accounting changes at the Fed, losses on its portfolio of Treasury securities are treated as a negative entry in that account, essentially covering the losses with funds that would normally go back to the Treasury. The "Treasury supplementary financing account" has another $5 billion in liabilities to the Treasury. This is the account set up at the Fed's request where the Treasury issues a "special" series of Treasury bills outside of its normal funding requirements, and deposits those funds with the Fed. Given that the Fed cannot afford the embarrassment of a transparent balance sheet, the liability items to the Treasury presently amount to a $72.3 billion cushion that can be used to cover portfolio losses for the Fed. The concern here is not so much the risk of Fed insolvency per se, but the fact that the public is quietly being used as a backstop for what we continue to view as reckless Fed policy. "
|
|
|
|
|
i'm sorry that i only now saw this thread.
my suggestion is to suggest that the Icelanders promise in principle in their Constitutiton to back the Krona with a "stable standard" in the future and to limit fractional reserve lending to a "reasonable level" like 10:1.
this leaves open the question as to what will back the Krona. most people will think of gold, which is not a bad idea. but our goal would be to have it backed by Bitcoin.
this will allow their gov't time to analyze Bitcoin as a stable backing mechanism for the Krona as compared to gold. and for all the reasons we here have decided on Bitcoin, they will eventually as well.
|
|
|
|
|
Show Posts
