wozniak's point about supply being predictable and finite is spot on. i've been harping about that one for a long time as to why bitcoin is superior to gold.


bitcoin always had more upside potential than gold. that's the nature of being a brand new asset class starting from $0 compared to a time-tested asset that's already been increasing in value for thousands of years.

it's like buying amazon in the 90s vs a blue chip stock. of course there is more growth potential in the new asset, so this is probably not the fairest metric for deciding the "winner".

with both assets at their historical all time highs, they're both winners in this new financial paradigm as far as i'm concerned. the primary losers in this paradigm appear to be treasuries and cash.

thanks for the info. that's pretty weak. i signed up through someone's referral link---didn't realize it was gonna get my money locked up. why can't they just not pay out the bonus if you don't play it through, like other sites?

at least it was just a small deposit, because now it's just a donation to betnomi.

@betnomi

i created an account and made a small deposit earlier today to test out the site and play in the bitcointalk private series next week. after 30 confirmations, this is what my account looks like:





so it shows up in my balance history but isn't available to register in tournaments:



thanks for looking into this for me!

which is exactly why i'm not thrilled about these pranks---they damage exchange credibility in the eyes of regulators, which can only result in more rigid AML/KYC policies. it's all fun and games for twitter shitposters, but it's not funny at all for unverified users at places like binance and kucoin. we're all just waiting for the hammer to come down at this point.

kucoin getting hacked a few months ago may actually play in our favor, in the short term. they are still desperate to prevent a mass exit of users after that fiasco, and they are also intent on taking on new customers who are currently leaving bitmex and deribit.

so i'm thinking there may still be some time. by the end of 2021 (if that) though, i'd be really surprised if binance and kucoin are still allowing unverified users.

i finally got around to renewing my VPN subscription and registering on betnomi. my handle: FOMA777. 9am local time is early but i should be able to make it next weekend.

just to be clear, there is no separate buy-in like we did in the past series? i just need to pay the ~$15 buy-in on betnomi?

+1. throw us a bone and lower the minimum stake to 10/20.


that's quite troubling if true. how hard is it to rate limit login attempts at least?

i guess i've been lucky thus far because tbh my password was pretty weak. this is a definite wake up call to add 2fa.

the ideal is obviously direct order matching among OTC clients. this was a truly massive OTC order so that was impossible, of course. i'm sure any OTC desk would have done it the same way, with complex order algorithms across many exchanges/brokers to prevent slippage or moving the market too much.

i suspect the vast majority of OTC trades (on coinbase, kraken, bitfinex, etc) are closer to the low 6-figure - low 7-figure USD range. in those cases, direct order matching is more likely possible, so that spot prices are literally unaffected.

it's subjective value IMO. people believe---whether because of bitcoin's scarcity, network effect, security, etc---that bitcoin will hold its value into the future.

it's worth what the next person is willing to pay for it.


is it though? miners expend energy and convert it into computational security. you make it sound like that energy could be stored and reused, which of course is not the case.

this idea reminds me of marx's labor theory of value---that value is defined by the cost of production. in this case, that would basically mean that miners could point endless electricity at bitcoin and then bitcoin would magically rise in value to reflect the rise in hash rate.

i don't think that's actually what is happening. very, very few bitcoin investors care what miners are doing or how much energy is being expended. it's miners that are following the market, expanding or shutting down mining operations in reaction to price. and that price, it's purely subjective IMO. it's the aggregate of how the entire market values bitcoin. it's worth $19k right now because that's what buyers and sellers agree on at this moment.

metal that is, for the most part, useless. there is far more gold stored in bars/coins, sitting in vaults and safes, than could ever be conceivably used for industrial or medical purposes. i don't think non-monetary utility is where gold really derives its value from. it's more about predictable scarcity and organic network effect---basically the idea that it's universally accepted and can't be easily devalued/diluted.

among other things (portability, divisibility, the ability to pay electronically) bitcoin may prove to be superior to gold in the long run because of its predetermined supply.

programmable money---what an idea!

things are crazy for me right now. i'm spending more and more time on the road, really long hours. i'm confident i can play one or two of the upcoming games. it'll be just for fun. making all 4 games and qualifying for the championship---that sounds a little farfetched to me.

cheers guys, i'm glad you managed to keep the series going!

EDIT: what is betnomi's policy regarding USA players, VPN, etc? am i gonna have any issues making an account or withdrawing?

are you saying there was a database compromise, or suspicion of one? or is this more like the binance "hack" last year where phished users had their accounts drained?

not a big deal for me since everything associated with my SwC account is a throwaway, but i also feel very lucky that i was able to find the right email and reset my password just now.

is anyone who can't log into their associated email just locked out of their SwC account?

many smaller books can afford the risk because they aren't that exposed to bets backing trump. as small books, they only took a limited number of bets on the presidential election. on the <1% chance a trump victory emerges they can still survive, so it's worth it to them to pay out punters to free up money flow like you said.

betfair or any other books of large scale can't do that. right now they have $2.1 billion exposed just to the trump-biden match. if they pay out and the results change, they'll be immediately bankrupted---out of business permanently, and likely also facing lawsuits from burnt bettors.

it's all a matter of scale, really.

block dx just came out, so i haven't really looked into them. off the bat, their xrouter backend does depend on an SPV implementation, so it's not entirely trustless.

any idea how to monitor blocknet's network? how many nodes are there, and who's running them?

binance.je is utterly dead but not actually closed. on a good day their BTC/GBP market does a whopping 1-2 BTC worth of volume.
https://www.binance.je/en/trade/BTC_GBP


the auto-replies and such are obviously substandard service, but it gives me some hope that they aren't unwilling to comply with GDPR requests. they're just incompetent.

they only offer bank transfers---no paypal. in fact, it sounds like they may only support ACH transfers (no wires), which probably means no foreign bank accounts either. robinhood is only for USA citizens and residents so i wouldn't be surprised.

https://robinhood.com/us/en/support/articles/link-your-bank-account/
https://robinhood.com/us/en/support/articles/withdraw-money-from-robinhood/

that's the catch-22. all current implementations require a centralized infrastructure, even if they are made to be non-custodial.

in practice, that means any platform that's large enough to get the attention of regulators will be forced to implement AML/KYC. sure, anyone can fork the repo and swap without KYC, but that obviously removes all the original platform's liquidity.

it's clearly because of their investment in bitcoin. the nasdaq top 100 is up 15% since microstrategy first announced their bitcoin position. MSTR is up a whopping 160% in comparison! it's like night and day.

it sure looks like stock investors are using MSTR as a channel for bitcoin investment exposure.

because that's what ripple is selling it as---a distributed ledger and cryptocurrency. CNBC fast money reports accordingly. it's also just how the market perceives altcoins in general, as alternatives to bitcoin. the gauge isn't decentralization, but the use of cryptography and a native token. that's about it!

in practice of course, they're just alternatives in the sense of being different speculative vehicles, not in the sense of substituting for bitcoin's actual use cases like censorship resistance and long term value storage.

if the requirement for withdrawals is to prove ownership of the receiving address, you would just whitelist one address in a wallet you control. all withdrawals would go to that address only. from there, you can do whatever you want with the coins.

as far as likelihood goes......i have a feeling some of the more draconian requirements will be scaled back, but that something will be passed during the lame duck session. maybe they'll put the FATF's $1000 travel rule threshold into place.

how about encrypting your traffic as an alternative? or are you paranoid about VPN operators too?

i get where you're coming from though. i already avoid mobile wallets because i fly a lot. when i use them, it's just as a throwaway. in fact, i'm trying to get in the habit of only traveling with factory reset devices. they don't need probable cause to search you, and i'd rather not have customs wondering how many figures are in my bitcoin wallet...