I think that this remains a widespread wet dream about some kind of fork (implying a hardfork is somehow in bitcoin's future)...


Fuck...   I remain so surprised about how frequently the discussion of a fork is repeated over and over and over.

The whole strength of core's bargaining power is that the supporters of such are not really working towards any kind of fork that is anything but a soft fork and/or noncontentious to the extent that it would be needed or in the works.   


So in the end, the concept of "forking" seems to be way too emphasized in a lot of discussions as even a probability, except to the extent that such a fork would be non-contentious, and then not an issue and then the concept of a "FORK" becomes minimum and way less relevant in the whole scheme of things than the fact that bitcoin is a honey badger / energizer bunny of the crypto space that is going to keep going on and on and on and on...   

Let me ask you this..... Have you ever seen a honey badger give up or a energizer bunny run out of juice?    I really doubt it, and if you have seen such fantasy, then it probably has been photoshoped or is a unicorn or is otherwise fakedy, fake, fake.       

O.k.  Per theme of the thread… and popular demand......         here’s my go at a BTC price prediction based on our recent BTC price action.

I would suggest that currently, we largely are floating within about a $400 to $425 price channel, and how long will that last, I am not sure. Could be several hours or could last several weeks, but most likely a few days and through the weekend (until Monday or Tuesday is a fair approximation).

I do tend to think that we are getting some upward price pressures and generally people are no longer buying some of the imminent forking propaganda and the block size limit bullshit that has been in the press for the past 5 months and emphasized as a reason to push prices down in the past month and a half... and also people seem to be realizing generally that bitcoin core (and the general direction forward of bitcoin) has a pretty decent, conservative and reasonable plan(s). If you want me to cite some kind of source, here than let me know.

In the past several days or so, I kind of believed that we could have gotten enough upward price momentum to break out in the upper direction towards the upper $420s and maybe even into the $430s, but it is possible that we are not ready yet for that level of upward price movement, and the trade volume has not really picked up very much in the past few weeks (even with this recent price rise), but now after a little lingering in the lower $420s and then a bit of a shooting down to $414 last night, I am thinking that there is a pretty decent chance that we could possibly stay in this $400 to $425 price channel all weekend....

As is frequently repeated, never say never in bitcoinlandia, and surely within hours, I could be proven wrong and alerted again to another price alarm of BTC prices shooting upward and out of the upper $420s and beyond price range or even in the opposite direction.

Within any price channel (and possible consolidation period) we could break slightly beyond on the upside of the price channel or towards the downside of the price channel for short periods within that channel.

I am kind of thinking that maybe there is some needs for attempts at profit taking (that means down) at this time and to test the downward resolve of the BTC market, and in that regard, prices may break down first over the weekend, and then possibly get stuck back in a similar channel or a little bit lower price channel (around the $400 level) before breaking back upwards, later down the road?

If we do not break down over the weekend and manage to largely stay above $410 all weekend, then that outcome would probably be fairly bullish for bitcoin prices in the short-term and be a sign that chances are pretty decent that the next break out of this particular price channel is going to be upwards, rather than downwards.. and bring us, possibly, towards testing the upper $460s again (and who knows from there?  We would need a further assessment at that time, depending on the intensity in which such a price break out would occur).

Overall, at the moment, I am a bit more inclined towards upwards (53%) rather than downwards (47%) – even though I am thinking that there is a greater than average chance of a bit of short-lived downwards retracement first.

Maybe that is a bit of a lame and all over the place BTC price prediction, but since my BTC price alarms woke me up at $414 last night (and then prices bounced almost immediately back over $416), I thought that I should write a few thoughts about my revelations caused by that startling event. 

any contrary predictions?

Oh my  GGGG!!!!!!!!



You know actions speak louder than words, and I was kind of inclined to believe that you did not really value consensus unless you were getting your way... which is also frequently difficult to pin down.

Accordingly,  I usually was getting the sense that you are engaged in such combative stances on various bitcoin issues because you were attempting to push an agenda.. .and sure that could be a way to obtain consensus if people agree, but it frequently seems to end up alienating and taking away from "consensus building." 

And, isn't there a saying that "a leopard doesn't change its spots?"  Your apparent strong pushes for various agendas seem to be the exact opposite of consensus building or even acceptance of consensus coming from the people... also libertarians can frequently be like that too (focusing on self in such a way that does not seem to value consensus or the positions of others  - except some kind of difficult to imagine free market conception that consensus is going to be reached when we all act separately), and you seem to suggest that your libertarianism is compatible with some kind of consensus building definition?

But, o.k., whatever, I will take you at your word, for now, that you have some kind of inclination towards and valuing of "consensus building," whatever that means to you.   

BJA:   I hope that you are not suggesting that deep down inside that you possibly could be a consensus builder.

 

Bad analogy.

Bitcoin is not a company.... It is called an open source project that is peer to peer, and so the weight of power and influence that individuals have over the whole process is much more transient and diffused.. and that is how it should be.. it is both a downside and an upside, so long as you basically understand the difference.

That time frame was the beginning of the pump to $502, but I doubt that is very explanatory regarding so many factors for the price increase. In other words correlation rather than causation.

Seems to be a form of desperation to be either fabricating that kind of information or selectively finding such fabricated misinformation to spread in these threads.

I agree with you about taking out some of the guessing and the feelings, and you can also set up parameters in trading in order that no matter what you profit (or at least most scenarios - absent going to zero).

I am not claiming to be an expert trader or to have any vast experience, but I am claiming to be learning from my trading experience as I go, and I have created a fairly decent and thought out strategy that seems to work really well for me in the past 5 months. 


So, for example, if I have 100 BTC in my trading portfolio, every time BTC goes up $10, I trade an approximate percentage of my profits.  In this example profits would be $1,000 on a $10 raise in price, and I can trade 10% to 30% ($100 to $300) of those profits as the price is going up.  Then when it comes back down, I buy back, and if the price keeps going up, then the dollars are accumulating and left in my trading pool, but  because I am only selling a less than half percentage of my profits, I am always going to have enough BTC in my fund to keep profiting from price rises and to keep accumulating BTC along the way because sooner or later BTC prices are going to correct, at least somewhat.

Anyhow there can be decisions regarding how much BTC to trade, and how a guy wants to keep apportioned in his trading account (like mentioned earlier 90% or 80% or some other amount that likely fluctuates with changing market conditions), and for me it seems to make much more sense to put such BTC trading to practice rather than to consider such practices on a theoretical level.

Sure, each of us needs to find our own comfort level that's for sure, and my time in this bitcoin investing (and more recently attempts trading) is only a couple of years for investing and only about 5 months for attempts at trading.

The movement above the $200s really helped in that regard to make it easier to sell some and to have some of the BTC investment in dollars and some in BTC.

At first when I started to sell some of my BTC, I got a little bit nervous that the price would go up, and then I don't have as many BTC.

I still get a bit nervous when the price goes up and I have some dollars in my BTC allocated funds, but I've kind of figured out a system to attempt to continuously keep a sufficient quantity of fiat in the account (in case the price goes does that I can profit), which has caused me to become less nervous regarding whether I have enough BTC (even if, perhaps, I may at some point get down to 90% BTC and the price is going up).

I am personally coming to the conclusion that a guy has really got to put these principles to practice over and over again in order to figure out his comfort level, and I am continuously learning - yet we also, from time to time, will witness in these here forums that very experienced traders will make some bad calls and allocate a bit poorly.

I personally feel that I have a fairly conservative approach, and when I attempt to teach my approach to some other people IRL, people can be stubborn as fuck.  They assert that they are attempting to follow my approach, but they revert to their own ways and they tweak and in the end, they gotta get their comfort level, and I assert that they got to get to their own place by practice and actual application.

For example, right now, I would prefer to get my portfolio closer to 95% BTC and 5%  $$  or even 96%  BTC and 4% $$; however, my other philosophy is to attempt to buy BTC on the way down and to sell BTC on the way up, so if the price of BTC goes up from here in a considerable way before I am able to buy more, then I will be forced to sell, which will cause my allocation to approach 90% BTC and 10% $$.  Not exactly preferable, but I am not going to complain when the price of BTC is going up.. and let's say if the price of BTC shoots up (like it did for the $502 upsurge), then I will have to become nervous again in deciding how much of my BTC holdings to sell...  maybe 5% or maybe 10%, but probably, unless I clearly recognize a reversal, I will err on the side of selling a low amount of BTC, just in case it goes up more.  In any event, I think that these kinds of scenarios take practice to improve reallocating on the fly and attempting not to get too nervous about it, while it's happening..

But in my thinking, you do sound quite a bit too much allocated into BTC (for my own comfort level and apparently too much for your own comfort level too, and maybe that explains some of your earlier comments of frustration?)

That's what I am saying, too.

I don't see what is wrong... bitcoin is in a pretty decent place right now, no?

You've told me before that you don't ever trade all of your BTC portfolio, and I hope it's true this time, as well.

Accordingly, I hope that you are betting both ways.. rather than all or nothing.


I'm not sure if I have the definitions correct, exactly; however, at this time, I am about 93.75% long (my BTC portfolio in BTC) and about 6.25% short (my BTC portfolio in $$).

Roughly, at the moment, I think that you are at the bargaining stage.   

Probably sometimes we all need to take a bit of a break from our addictive lil friend....    

hahahahahaha...

That's some pretty creative cost calculations and levity added to the equation...   In any event, LN is quite a ways into the future anyhow.  Just think about all the time each of us wastes in these various forums...  (almost 65 days of my life for me, at the moment as i type).   


And, I wonder if I should back off my earlier tentative assessment that you may have transitioned into:


A LITTLE BONKERS.


 

Blunderer:  You are really talking non-sense in this above post, but I will accept your arguable nonsense as if it were some recognition for potential artful expression, even though it borders on an attempt to distract readers of this thread from our topic which in this particular post initially was meant to be (to the best of my knowledge) the practical application of bitcoin hard/softfork in the real world speculation.. blah blah blah.   

I think that more or less we are saying the same thing, even though you may have said it more eloquently than me.     

Most of the time, I really enjoy reading your posts, and I think that you bring a lot to the table, even if I may not agree.

However, in this line of discussion, you seem to have gone nearly completely bonkers, and for what reason I don't know.  It is like you seem obsessed with your ideas, and really they seem to be out there in their speculation and exaggerations that are frequently reading way too much into a variety of factors, including some of the evidence that you are presenting to support your conclusions.

For argument sake, let's say that currently transaction fees are somewhat open, discretionary and they can be free, at times, or range between $0 and $.25, depending on the service or how much the sender wants to include.

But probably the average reasonable fee for larger transactions (excluding micro-transactions for the moment for the sake of argument) is around $.08 per transaction.

a 100x increase would put the average at $8 per transaction, and that is quite outrageous, but really, I believe that you are speculating way too much.  We got a long way to know for sure until we can figure out how much the transaction fees are going to be under a variety of scenarios, and if there is going to be some variation for size of the transaction... sending $10 value versus sending $1million... or a variety of other amounts.

I don't think that is what he is saying, and it seems that he is not the only force behind the opposition to either classic or xt or any other attempted at a forced change.

I am not really sure if I agree with your point about bitcoin being democratic as being descriptive of what is going on.

What I keep suggesting and even asserting is that in bitcoin there seems to be a certain momentum and presumption of validity with the status quo and defending the status quo, so anyone who wants to change the status quo has the burden of presentation and the burden of persuasion.

Core is the status quo and challengers to the status quo have neither met their burden of presentation nor their burden of persuasion in order to successfully change the status quo.  That lack of success does not mean that they will not be successful in the future to make various changes to bitcoin.... If you want to call that democratic, then sure, it could be some form of democracy to attempt to persuade and to present evidence sufficient to persuade a change.. or even to bring computing power or some other leveraged asset (such as public opinion or bitcoin user opinion), and some assets carry more bargaining power than others.  At this point, the most bargaining power seems to be with the miners and the software developers, and there seem to be various factors influencing them.... that causes the directed changes, including seg wit and whatever is going to come thereafter.

Well, each of us is likely going based on a feeling, and my feeling is that a hard fork is more dangerous than a soft fork, and I don't see any reason to do a hard fork, even based on the information that you just presented involving the potential (maybe even speculative) ability of supposedly "powerful forces" to push potentially unwanted changes via softfork.

Yeah, but then the question becomes what the people want?  And is what the people want and what wallstreet wants different?  And, can bitcoin grow and/or succeed even if wallstreet does not value it?