that's complete nonsense. even without bitcoin having value, the coins will always be there. they will never vanish. as long as there are a few miners and nodes, the whole system keeps running without any problems.

these times are over. if you as average bitcoiner wanted to get rich at some point, then you had to buy your coins back in 2011/2012. right now the get rich times are over for the average bitcoiner. no need to focus on this anymore.

people should always look at the long term, but a lot people here don't care about the long term value. these people are only interested in quick and easy profits. everything else is just not important.

i never look at what experts say. every prediction that comes from these "experts" has a hidden agenda. best is to do your own research. i personally expect no real upwards potential at this point. at least not higher than $700 for the rest of this year. i don't even rule out another sub $600 dive that may keep the price there for a while.

with bitcoin you actually hold what you own. that's not the case with banks. that said, when you store your money in bitcoin, you first need to make sure that you are having a clean virus free computer. if that's the case, then you can secure your wallet file(s) with a very strong passphrase in order to "guarantee" that your coins are safe. and of course there are more security options that you can use to have a safe wallet, but that was just an easy example. if your computer security isn't top notch, and the wallet file is secured with a poor password, then then a bitcoin wallet won't offer you any security. but that's all up to you.

coins having low value back in the days doesn't really matter since 1btc is and will always be 1btc. if you look back at how it is right now, then the value will be much higher of course. gambling in general is bad. the house always wins in the long run.

in modern countries you can pay everything automatically via your bank. no hassle here. but there are countries where this isn't as easy. especially when they don't have a bank account, and when they need to walk to a certain place to send the payment to the right company or person. that is in fact a real hassle. in this case bitcoin can help these people out if the company itself accepts bitcoin, or they make use of a service that offers such an option.

i don't think bitcoin will be stable enough where people say it's a safe haven to store money in. volatility will always be an important part of bitcoin. that makes bitcoin interesting for traders as that will attract fresh money.

bitcoin at all times offers a better return than any other investment, but in this case gold as that is the subject here. if the profits don't come from holding it for a certain period, and to sell it later on, then bitcoin is an attractive tool for trading purposes where you can benefit from regular ups and downs in the price. bitcoin as investment is more risky than gold, but the eventual rewards are much greater.

without a volatile price, it would basically be a waste of time for investors to step into bitcoin. so yes, in that aspect the price plays a crucial role into attracting money from traders to make sure the market has enough (or at least a good amount) liquidity.

there were many people buying at +$1000 levels back in 2013. people that bought at such prices were seriously thinking the price would rise even further from that point. it was pure greed that took the price to reach a new all time high. these people got burned heavily. from $1200 to sub $200 is sick.

there will always be newbies that blindly invest their money into something, but even when you're new, then you can still feel that certain things look too good to be true. greed takes over people and make them take bad decisions unfortunately.

i always advice people around me to diversify their portfolio, and to have 10% of it in bitcoin as long term investment. i adviced certain people to do the same last year when the price was below the $300 level, but they didn't listen. look now, they could have made a good 100% profit in a single year.

bitcoin is a more than interesting investment for the long term. especially when you look at the potential of both options and put them together to compare which one has more room for potential growth. and that one will be bitcoin. just imagine what will happen with the price if bitcoin lives up to all the expectations from people.

whales team up to get the price to be pumped up. if a single whale would try to pump the price, then the chances of seeing the price get dumped down, and all his effort go to waste, are very high. if you do it with other wealthy traders, then you can achieve much more, and the chances of succeeding are much higher.

people that are pumping money into obvious scams are seriously stupid. these people support them to continue their activities as with their money they can "pay out" new victims to make it look like they are legit. it's basically you destroying your own capital...

them being able to use bitcoin instead of their costly ways of doing payments can save them quite some money if you look at it from a monthly point of view. but it will be on a personal level, and not so much on a country level.

every bit of generated bitcoin should be seen as an extra revenue stream, and not as main income. that's very important to know. you should never fully depend on bitcoin unless you are earning big when you for example run a very profitable service or something.

well, people holding their coins for a long period of time can have several reasons. the pure investment minded people keep holding till it reaches a certain price level to sell at. others purely use bitcoin as store of value tool to keep their holdings out the reach of governments and banks. and the price going up makes it an extra bonus for them.

you don't need the price to be high in order to receive bitcoin as your salary. if you think the current price is low, then it means that your salary will get you more bitcoins as result compared to when the price is really high. that's the benefit.