It isn't a bubble. I proved that last year in my analysis. If it had been one, we wouldn't be trading at 7, it would be near zero with the overall hashing capacity declining rapidly.

Now, this doesn't mean we can't have large price swings - just don't mistake volatility for a 'bubble', because you'd be using the wrong term. Exponential blow-off tops occur in different markets, and I'm sure we haven't seen the last of those here.

Overall, I expect bitcoin to advance and persist.

Even a retrace back to 6.60 - 6.70's wouldn't discourage me, as that would establish a nice upward channel that is making new highs every couple of days. Steady upward grind is preferred over exponential blow-off tops. For me, anyway.

I see parallels in how mp3 encoding became a dominant force on the music industry.

mp3 created ==> Digital Distribution ==> Napster moment ==> Media Companies dying/displaced ==> Artists making income directly with no interference

bitcoin created ==> Digital wealth distribution ==> < insert catalyst > ==> Banks and Financial systems dying/displaced ==> Individuals trading freely for services and goods with no interference

The question really is - what is the catalyst going to be, overall adoption 'tipping point' or some other event. And when/how fast this will occur.

I believe bitcoin will displace currencies managed by fallible humans. One other possibility however, is that sovereigns will start their own blockchains so they can apply taxation controls - making it illegal to not participate in their system. A bit horrifying, but that is a possibility if they embrace the technology and refuse to partake in the 'open' version.

I guess we'll see....

Every once in a while someone comes in wondering what would happen if everyone liquidated at once.

It doesn't matter, because to do so would mean taking out every bid that exists in the order book if the amount to sell was large enough.

There is zero incentive to bail on a large amount if you know you'll crush the price - it would make more sense to liquidate slowly if that was your intent, so price could recover and the bids you take out get replenished over time.

So, to recap - nobody has dumped on the market enough to kill the price, even though they could if they really wanted to.

The world keeps turning, and fiat keeps burning...

I'm sure it isn't by now, and yes - the market did do a nice exponential-like blowoff before settling down again. This actually happens from time to time in commodities due to supply problems (although limits on daily trading offset this effect partially).

Can't wait to see what happens next - we've had some good progress in the last few weeks, steady fill and grind, not the spike/collapse we saw last summer.

You must be bored, 'brah'.

I've worked with many different markets. Nice guess on forex, but then again a google search would yield as much, seeing how pervasive it is.

People being wrong on the internet++;

My cost basis for bitcoin isn't where you suggest it is.

People being wrong on the internet++;

I post here because I believe in bitcoin as a disruptive influence for good in the financial world. I'm sorry, there's no minimum fee to post on this forum.

People being wrong on the internet++;

As for your 'tip' -- I'll file it in the same place that I file hot stock tips, pink sheet recos, and non-solicited IPO recommendations.

People being wrong on the internet -- Buffer Overflow

If you don't hate the nature of banks, you sure will when capital controls come into play.

Just posting this here, so I can dig it back up when this starts to occur for a nice "remember when I said..." post. I simply don't trust banks, at all. Nice people work for companies and organizations that are reprehensible all the time. My complaint isn't with them, more that the bank exists in its current form and is a parasite in the financial system.

I'd diversify and prepare if I were you.

Merely a statement of fact and a vote of confidence in bitcoin. I don't furnish such things with the intent to 'impress' anyone. What I'm not kidding about is my belief that bitcoin is stronger on a technical and relative basis than sovereign-run currencies.

I'm well aware of how the market works, my moniker isn't by accident - I've traded 'real' financial instruments on real exchange floors. I did not mean to imply I could take out ALL asks, lol. I'm dedicated, not crazy-rich.

I hope that clears a few things up for you.

Nice swing.

I just put in about ~$1,500 in bitcoin, with a few more grand to come behind it.

Yeah, I'm not kidding.

Line up those asks, I need to empty the order book.

True, the whole Euro mess is tempting to predict an actual date, but its been rambling along to destruction for a while now. I'm relieved in a way, as it gives me more time to prepare.

One note about China - I've read some interesting sources that indicate their electricity production is flat/declining, and those numbers may even be fudged and way lower. I don't think they really have a scarcity issue.

Japan, absolutely. They brought some more plants online, but honestly a good portion of the country is poisoned with no easy way out, and the remaining plants topping out with summer demand.

Interesting time to be alive, that's for sure.

I'm on the same side as Vladimir. Bitcoin will outlast the Euro and the Dollar.

Black-Scholes and the assumption of a (normal) gaussian distribution in determining option pricing is one of the major flaws that blew up LTCM. The 'mean' should be thicker than the 'tails', and most price action disagrees. The number of two to three sigma events fall outside of the 'predicted' distribution, which means of course any assumptions based on that model are doomed to tail-risk of large magnitudes.

BTC is probably a more 'sane' market that anything out in the traded exchanges, if only by virtue of not having a crapload of sub-pennying front-running High-Frequency Trading algorithms dominating volume like the ES futures or the major Index stocks.

I think china goes *boom* and in a fit of panic - initiates their "Asian Prosperity Sphere" trading plan with their partners in defense of a rising dollar. The dollar will rise for a while, but not for the right reasons - all the way up to the point where the market finally can't be levitated anymore by FED-acronym program meddling.

Then the equities go *boom", treasuries become a 'safe haven' until that shoe drops, too. I suppose you could say the whole thing is like a 2D platformer game, where you have to stay just long enough to get enough speed on the step before it drops away into the lava, jumping to the next one.

Just my guess...

I've made the decision personally to invest more in bitcoin. I'm wary of upcoming events that could have large impacts on every traded currency in the world. Bitcoin was never just a means for me to turn one currency into another, either.

I've been spending some BTC on things that make sense, and building a good reserve as well. Even if the smallest fraction flows into BTC from the sources you've mentioned, it could be quite interesting. Not just the external dollar valuations, but the network would benefit from more participants using BTC.

I was talking to someone about this the other day, (scarcity of supply built into the system) and said "maybe one day we'll look at someone buying a WHOLE bitcoin as the luckiest bastard on the planet."

Wouldn't that be something - all of us used to 0.0000<something> transactions instead of whole numbers and fractions.

If only...

I see a decent rise without an exponential blow-off, which was worrying me slightly before we retraced back from the highs near 6.80 - seems to me we're backfilling and being quite orderly about it.

I probably should mention that I've been following/making charts for over 10 years in different trading instruments. Just keep your eye on the 6.80's for breakout potential, though I'd still buy it on a retrace to 6.10

A trading range plateau between 6.40 - 6.70 wouldn't be so bad either...

My theory is bitcoin will go through two stages:

1) People use bitcoin to transfer sums to tertiary currencies via exchange services
    Such  as:
   2) People will use bitcoin to transfer sums between exchanges, services and users, with no intermediate conversion. (This is the desired eventual outcome, of course.)

When you have a problem with the US Dollar, someone is responsible - but thanks to a corrupt system they'll pay a settlement fee and get back to ripping someone off.

When you have a problem with bitcoin, you probably didn't read something correctly, resulting in your losing your coins through your own incompetence. Much similar to losing your cash somewhere, except in this case a bearded idiot who has his thumb mashed on the 'print' button isn't ruining bitcoin -- just the dollar.

Bitcoin is chaos?

Chaos is blocks processed every 9 - 10 minutes? Chaos is a pre-determined supply? Chaos is $1.27 MILLION in estimated transaction volume on a dollar basis?

What color is the sky in your world, and if you can, tell us what the magical caterpillar said to you about bitcoin?

Are you completely insane?

And please note - if you had some rational, logical and procedural protest about bitcoin (protocol, etc..) I'd take you seriously. But what you wrote had the air of someone finishing a bender with their favorite hallucinogens.

I suggest you read more about what you are trying to comprehend.

Bitcoin, to me, has always been about asserting control over means of exchange. I'm tired of people insulated from the 'real world' making monetary policy decisions to my detriment. I don't care if bitcoin is traded at 1 dollar or 100*. The fact that it exists is enough for me, in addition to its algorithmic controls and underlying protocol.

It is a financial revolution which allows the user complete freedom over how they allocate and spend money. A lot of people who deride bitcoin as a 'ponzi scheme' or other similar tropes miss this entirely. It is this fundamental misunderstanding that bolsters my confidence in bitcoin. Why? Because people are notorious for dumping on a idea that is too far of an 'outlier' from their lives.

This doesn't mean it is a bad idea, just that the framework in which it is born is too far removed from 'normal' comprehension. Revolutionary ideas usually take existing concepts and apply them in ways never considered before. This confluence of computational power, cryptography, peer-to-peer networks and currency simply has never existed before.

This is why I think bitcoin, as a system and as a concept, is highly disruptive and ultimately world-changing.

*(In fact, I make the case that relying on tertiary exchange into other currencies is merely a phase before total adoption, which would make conversions unnecessary.)

I'm a fan, although I haven't done a trade person-to-person yet. Good work!