Reviewing my posting history, it strikes me that I occasionally behaved quite a bit below my current standards. This note is directed to the Monero Speculation thread, because it has been my principal posting venue since it's inception, and hence my apologies are most due here.

Specifically, I wish to apologize for (1) arrogant, domineering argumentation styles or intellectual jiu jitsu, (2) self-aggrandizing impostures, (3) creating the impression that financial gain was a central goal or essential to a prosperous life, and (4) that my personal accomplishments, qualifications, or connections were somehow grandiose.  While I have not identified any actual falsehoods in my posts, upon review it is clear that some were (if not consciously, nonetheless in practice, and very likely by subconscious intent) misleading puffery, by their unstated implications.

All of these aspects of my posting history are beneath the standards to which I adhere, and could potentially work to the detriment of anyone thus misled.  I found it emotionally gratifying to boast of my successes at times when I was experiencing frustrating and humiliating setbacks in other, more important, areas.  I took on excessive risk, a form of gambling addiction, because the euphoria of rapid gains assuaged a deep internal shame at the mediocrity of my other achievements.  I was blessed to have identified a field in which, and a strategy whereby, those risks were abundantly rewarded; however, luck is not wisdom - nor is even the most incisive and insightful analysis, if it is not subordinated to the service of a worthy aim, or is conducted with inauthenticity or careless of its unintended consequences.

I like to think that my influence has helped others achieve a higher degree of financial freedom than they might otherwise have experienced.  But if that came at the cost of enslavement to greed or obsession with markets squeezing more important things out of their lives, it was no benefit, but an actual harm.

Likewise, I hope that I have encouraged preparedness for reasonably foreseeable adversities.  But if this was achieved by instilling fear or anxiety, or if it caused hostility to people associated with the mechanisms underlying the phenomena for which preparedness is warranted, I would be very much at fault.

It is my hope that by drawing attention to my past misbehaviors I can mitigate any harm which they caused.  I prefer not to further distract from the topic of this thread by engaging in a public discussion or follow-up to this post, but I am available by PM for further discussion.  In particular, if anyone finds their emotional life controlled by the events in crypto, or by their material fortunes, I would like to offer whatever help I may in escaping the kinds of addictive behaviors which yearning for a false hope have caused in me. Feel free to contact me privately.

When rising prices cause rising mood and falling prices cause falling countenance, something is very wrong.  If nothing else, it is counterproductive to good decision-making.  Don't be that guy (or gal).  Get out and enjoy the world, and do some good in it.  Be physically, emotionally, and spiritually healthier for it. I hope to see you there

Monies don't have to flow in, for btcusd to rise.  It suffices for outflows to be reduced.

As long as bitfinex arbitrageurs continue to book gains in btc, given the volumes involved in that trade, the btc avaliable for outflow sales will be constrained correspondingly.  When they decide to convert to another asset outside of crypto, btc usd will see corresponding downward pressure.

I know that at 5oz xaubtc I would be cashing out some proportion of crypto.  Others are likely to do so sooner.

There is nothing standing between xmr and it's successor as the primary legitimate fungible digital cash except marketcap.  Admittedly overcoming that obstacle can be challenging, but it is a vast, fecund, and competitive space.  The sooner we get back in front of ethereum, the less I will worry about the marketcap moat.

Trading view chart is deceiving you, I think.  This is a new ATH.  Using bitfinex' gox-ed numeraire pricing perhaps?

Mine is 15gb, 12gb after compression.  I would offer a copy, but it would take longer than that (i.e. your fibre sync) to upload to an s3 bucket over my (WiFi and docsis 3 cable modem) Time Warner residential internet. (Kids these days!)

*Note to self: Check Fios local availability again on Monday.*

My rule of thumb has been that the equilibrium price in a sideways market is roughly 2*bids/offers.  During a FOMO run it goes to about 3*, and during a panic it goes to about 1*.  There are numerous reasons why such an estimation should be deemed specious, with trivial manipulability prominent among them. Nonetheless, it has served my thumb well, in the rough, historically.

While I do believe from what i have read that Risto has defaulted on some obligations, from what I know of him elsewhere, I suspect the principal deceptions were self-deceptions.  It seems likely that the dissonance between his honorable intentions and the outcome of some earlier unwise decisions is creating internal stresses under which one might easily crumble.  Such times test men's souls.  Clearly, from the red, he will not escape with reputation intact.  I do hope he can come out the other side with his moral integrity and his health intact.  Creditors should wisely will themselves to agree, as without them their haircuts are likely to be close to the skin indeed.

Yet, we may self-interestedly encourage such wrongness, on the theory that his loss is our gain, as for example:

TrueCryptonaire, I find your ideas intriguing and would like to subscribe to your newsletter.

This is more my speed https://youtu.be/-0kcet4aPpQ

True, but this can change very rapidly - hence the enormous upside potential.  The next demand shock should come by q4, and this time they may heat up a lot faster than before: There is a lot of fiat swishing around out there, and it is going to be searching for a new home soon.  

Each of the big leaps in XMR has been due to some HNW individual deciding to hedge systemic tail risks by investing a small part of their wealth in XMR.  The number of persons seeking such a hedge will increase substantially when the indexing bull runs out of steam and the bond bubble begins to deflate.  XMR will tend to  decline as small holders draw down - but will remain persistently bid at $20 and rising as long as the economy continues to grow. Soon, howwver, when capital controls, or money supply inflation, or incipient hyperinflation (liquifying excess reserves, e.g.) threaten, the market will take more frequent leaps upward, again from tail hedgers.

XMR remains the single technology most like hard money: non-inflationary, fungible, private - and it far outpaces the field in minimizing counterparty risks, conflicts of interest, and agency problems, such as we see in the governance of ETH, ZEC, DASH, and even, now, in BTC itself.  While punters will always chase the speculative momentum of the day wherever it is found, the smart money, the slow money, the big money is much more concerned about risk management than speculation.  XMR provides a unique value proposition in this area:  Money which cannot be seen, cannot be stolen.

The long-term upside to being the natural inheritor of the crown of global digital cash is orders of magnitude beyond the scale of any "tarpit-complete"  "ponzi-node" or "developer's tax-donkey" snake oil fad.  Nothing about this story has changed in the past 3 years, except the nearness of its denouement. (Which I now believe to be imminent.)

Meanwhile, there is still a lot of hard technical, social, and business enterprise work which needs to be done in order to realize those potentials.  My advice: Invoice in XMR whenever you have pricing power.  Mine them, even when it is temporarily unprofitable, and do not sell, unless it is to create a new Monero user.  The main reason I have a job is so that I never, ever, need to net sell XMR, no matter what happens to my other investments.

I think declining volume is fine as long as the transaction volume and hash rates continue to trend up.  Trading volumes just indicate how close we are to price discovery.  In most alts, discovery tends to push price towards zero, but as long as there is a persistent demand for transactions and hash rate is high enough to restrict supply, dishoarding can't have much lasting market impact.  Volume is just one indicator of liquidity. 

tl;dr: Price discovery in xmr discovers happier things.

ho hum.  $20 yesterday, $20 today, and $20 tomorrow.  You'e just looking at BTCUSD upside-down, yo.

If price discovery is efficient, the volume is lower, but spreads are tighter, so liquidity is better.  I think cross-exchange arbitrage is about as good as it can get at these prices.  Xmr has far, far better liquidity in the 2-3e8 cap range than BTC did at that stage, in part because of crosses and futures.  Yeah, it sucks for vol trading, but it is very good for transactional uses.  Xmr is proving itself a workhorse now, after previously demonstrating it's racehorse potential.  When will it level up again?  Probably when you least expect it.  Seriously.

A lovely thing.  I would definitely buy an MW coin on spec.  Getting side-chain adoption is a tough row to hoe.  For both social and technical reasons I don't expect a generally usable liquidity vehicle to derive from any BTC side-chain in 2017 - and much longer for MW specifically.

As I see it, XMR is still the crypto-currency which best represents the essential properties of cash money, and provides by far the best liquidity (and exchange stability!) of all fungible crypto.  A truly liquid and usable MW side-chain for BTC  could change that, but not for some years yet.

I am less enthusiastic about ETH+ZKSNARKS than is Rangedriver, because I think ETH security is a bad joke due to the DAO history and the vast, utterly baroque, attack surface of such a beast. Also,  I consider ETH to be something like the Theranos of crypto (but less honest). They do have the advantage of good liquidity right now, but not in a fungible vehicle. 

The fact that XMRUSD is higher now than it was before the fake news hit suggests that I have been underestimating the size and growth of the economy.  I had previously considered the gap between my Fisher equation estimate and the market clearing price to indicate the degree of forward speculation, but if that were true I would have expected the reaction yesterday to be much stronger and more protracted, as short-horizon speculation should have been biased much more bearishly until the next squeeze caused a reset.  Instead, we see deep and persistent demand.  Either the committed longs have deeper pockets than I thought, or estimates based solely on alphabay statistics undervalue XMRUSD by roughly a factor of 2.

It seems the old resistance,  21usd, is the new support. now.

Days like today are why villages in the Sahel get potable water, girls in Chad get the opportunity of a quality primary education, and refugees fleeing war get legal assistance.

On their behalf, I express my thanks to nutildah, Miller, Möser, and the shorts.

Currently the return on best offer is .0001%.  Presumably such offers are made short term in order to hook a short borrower, and will be withdrawn later in order to squeeze them.  I haven't been watching but my guess is that the lending rates are hyper-volatile.

Looks very shady to me.  New account, imitating the name of a reputable party, asking you to install software... You get what you deserve I guess.

Crapstorm? 

"What we have here is a failure to communicate..." any added value whatsoever.