In most cases institutions and other similar movers don't care about Bitcoin itself, and for that reason likely won't bother unless they are actually setting up a crypto based portfolio fund.

Exposure is all they care about, and futures are perfect tools for that. Future volumes are breaking records, which says enough, so the more that process gains traction, the more importance these futures will gain.

I wouldn't be surprised if these futures at some point will form an important indicator of this market. Institutions dominate almost every market, and I don't think Bitcoin will be an exception here.

It's always those with the deepest pockets control the market.

Finally cracking that $10,000 mark is a great achievement when it happens, but for me the real achievement is when we actually manage to stay above that mark. Forming base support levels above $10,000 is what matters.

I however doubt that it will stay above $10,000 since the main bottom is still far below that mark. Bottom development is a gradual process not caring about all time high peaks.

My best guess is that the bottom development will be >$7000, $7500, $8000, $9000, $10,000 and the list goes on. That's obviously assuming we don't experience another major bull run as the one from last year.

If we do, then we can make larger jumps instead of $500-$1000 steps.

We'll, he's referring to the crypto market as a whole to become worth that, so in reality it's not all that difficult to accomplish. Once Bitcoin starts pumping, altcoins will pump even harder, so the effect is significant.

On the other hand, we shouldn't add too much importance to a $1 trillion crypto market valuation since altcoins have their total coin supplies working for them, so it's like an artificial market cap increase.

If Ripple with its 100 billion total coin supply becomes worth $10 per coin, there you have your $1 trillion market cap, but it's not worth anything. People however don't look at things from that point, so they think it's genuine.

Bitcoin is losing popularity. Ripple is better than Bitcoin. Bitcoin is going to be worthless. And so on.

I like that mentality. It remains to be seen whether or not they will actually become what they aim for, but it will very likely result in a domino effect where countries will start to compete with each other for startups and talent.

If the effect is significant enough, which is very realistic, we'll see a large part of the world become a more overall friendly place to develop yourself in, and that's exactly what we need to happen.

More crypto friendliness means less severe regulations, and that directly means there are less obstacles and rules preventing you from developing yourself as startup. The words are great, now we need actions to follow.

Most of the get rich quick noobs don't care about the security of the platforms, and considering that the majority of the people using these exchanges are get rich quick noobs, it makes even more sense.

I'm wondering though, how exactly do you as user know how secure a certain platform is? Aside from the basic log-in and withdrawal security measures that aren't anything special, there isn't much to see to be honest.

The only thing you can do is hope they take their overall security standards as high as possible, and that's it. It's impossible to say that one exchange is more secure than the other just because it is more popular.

I can see a mini 'pump' out of excitement going to the $12,000 mark, but it will likely halt somewhere around that level. At that point the real battle won't be how much we go up, but how long can we stay above that mark.

Bull runs need to have everything synced perfectly in order to book ×5 gains at minimum, and these level of bull runs only happen once every few years. In 2013 we had one, and last year we had one.

Unless something extraordinary happens being able to generate an insane amount of hype and speculation, I wouldn't focus on actual bull runs. I rather just see a more stable form of growth, but I'm probably one of the few.

It depends on your personal preferences. I have seen quite some people speak of CMC as being trash, and similarly quite some people who say they love it. I'm in the middle of both options. It's good to have it, but don't take it too seriously.

There are too many variables involved making sure that these sources can't and aren't able to fetch accurate information. As long as you keep that in mind, there is no problem with CMC and similar sites.

People tend to get upset about everything quickly, while it's completely unnecessary. These sites offer an optional free service, so there is nothing that people can actually demand for. If you don't like it, use an alternative.

Altcoins no longer compete with Bitcoin since it's a battle they can't win. Altcoins compete with each other to rank up and convince investors and users to hop on board. The altcoin industry is like a ruthless competition.

In every way there are many altcoins doing the exact same thing, so they will have to fight for every inch of their share in this industry. Bitcoin doesn't need to compete with altcoins because it stands on a whole different level.

From the 99% of the altcoins in this industry, only a few % of them actually solve a problem or serve a useful purpose. There is too much noise there to be taken seriously, and it isn't being taken seriously.

People quite often look at the market caps of altcoins and say that they are catching up on Bitcoin, but they fail to understand that their insane total coin supply is doing the trick.

Ethereum's market cap comes from its total supply.
Ripple's market cap comes from its total supply.
Bitcoin Cash market cap is fake due to its instantly gained value.

That's the top 3 altcoins.

It's important to understand that the short term market isn't something worthy of your confidence. If you plan to use it as currency, then you should spend your coins as soon as possible after you having bought them.

Even if you buy them in a more stable market, it doesn't really mean much with how the sentiment can change in a matter of minutes based on a dump or certain announcement. It's too speculative.

That being said, due to its speculative nature people are more interested in trading Bitcoin than actually using it as currency, so the adoption won't experience any obstacles due to the volatility, people absolutely love it.

And still people don't bother to change their habits. It has been like that years ago, and it is still so today. MtGox should be the primary example of why storing fund on an exchange is like playing Russian roulette with your funds.

I understand that traders while trading need to have their funds available, but what really makes them look like complete fools, is that a lot of these traders never withdraw anything from their exchange.

It's a combination of them being lazy because they don't want to deal with desktop clients and such, and also the fact that they want to either buy or sell instantly when the opportunity is there. It's convenience over security.

They choose to follow the easiest way to make a few bucks without people feeling that they lose anything of monetary value. I don't think they will ever try to actually set up solar based rigs or mini farms for that purpose.

It's too much effort and would require them to hire people to keep monitoring everything, which costs money too aside from all the hardware. Why doing that when you can just sit back and see money come in like this?

I honestly wouldn't even want a charity to actually start getting involved in mining. The main incentive is to raise gifts and income from selling merchandise. The more they earn, the more goes to top board members.

These charities spend more money on marketing and their board members than the actual purposes they raise money for.

While current levels technically hover far below the current all time high, we must be realistic enough to understand that the $20,000 mark was only there because of the insane speculation last year.

It was nothing but a speculative hype peak that never stood a chance to remain up in the first place. The price went up far ahead of everything that makes sense ~ what goes up quick comes down quick.

The more people keep focusing on that $20,000 peak, the more they lose track of what's actually happening. In every market there are hype phases and the regular demand phases, which we are currently in.

Of course. XRP due to its centralized nature is a perfect plaything for banks. If we are looking at things from a general perspective, then why would one use XRP over anything banks themselves come up with?

At the end of the day, you are subject to the same form of ask permission to execute action structure. That's directly the reason I believe that while XRP enjoys great interest from banks, people will leave it for what it is.

Another thing that most people here don't pay attention to, and that while it's very important, is the fact that XRP is massively premined. That alone should be reason enough to ring alarm bells and thus to avoud that coin.

Risking money only happens when you are trying to ride the short term market. People not being interested in these short term gains won't have anything to lose if they hodl through for at least a whole year.

The majority of the people focusing on short term gains end up losing, and why do you think that is? It's because the short term market is an unreliable factor that isn't much different from a roulette wheel.

One day it falls on X number and the other day Y number is the one. It's nothing more than a guessing game based on hope alone. Technical analysis may help to a certain extent, but it's also not something you can rely on.

There definitely are a lot complaints about Bittrex and their way of operating, but thus far there hasn't been any case of actual scam that I know of. In most cases people call everything a scam when they have a problem.

In the same way a lot other exchanges have to deal with scam accusations as well, but there is no such a thing as a scam until it's actually a scam. Can you point me to a link where what you are referring to is being discussed?

I am using Bittrex too from time to time, and that far before they became as strict as they are right now, but luckily haven't had any problems. The only annoying thing I had to deal with is severely lower withdrawal limits.

How exactly will Bitcoin 'destroy' you? It's easy to say something without actually going in detail about what you're trying to say. I honestly can't think of a reason why Bitcoin would 'destroy' anyone.

If I think further and not directly jump on your destroy term, then one could say that you or the online wallet platform can get hacked with coin loss as result, but that's not Bitcoin's fault, but your own fault.

Bitcoin itself can get shaped into anything, which makes it near impossible to become outdated in the coming years, where we also have off-chain layers giving Bitcoin that exposure. If that's not what you meant, explain yourself.

It's probably a mixture of everything, but it largely comes down to crypto forming a threat to their business structure. Another possibility is that they are looking to hammer down on everything because of their own plans.

Nowadays we more and more hear about how banks are interested in developing their own crypto 'trading desk', and this might be somewhat related to it. It could be seen as early elimination of competitors.

With how crypto exchanges gain more popularity, their fee income is growing as well, and that might be the underlying incentive for banks to cut off any connections from and to these exchanges. It definitely could be that.

It's an easy but yet very effective way to deal with competition. Just think about it, if there legally isn't a problem to let people and businesses use their bank accounts like that, there shouldn't be a reason to close them.

This market is literally infested with act-first-think-later noobs. It's an entire industry they keep supporting because of their stupidity. I have never seen people be more willing to invest in garbage than the ones we're dealing with here.

Greed makes people do stupid things, that we have seen already. At some point you would think that people learn from their mistakes, but that doesn't even seem to be the case. It's mistake after mistake after another mistake.

It doesn't seem to be, and I certainly hope it isn't. I rather see the market climb up based on regular demand that's mixed with the common dose of speculation, than absolute hype demand that's based on nothing but fomo.

All fomo peaks have in common is that they all aren't and will never be sustainable. Aside from traders seeing it as a welcome money making opportunity, there is nothing fomo peaks contribute to.

Also, most people look at these peaks and based on that consider non hype prices to be low, which is exactly how people currently look at the market. They only see the $20,000 mark and everything below that is a 'cheap' buy.

Funny thing is that they don't even buy.........

Bitcoin's usability as currency is as low as it has always been. No matter how much I like Bitcoin, I am realistic about how things are, and the reality of the day is that Bitcoin and other cryptos are speculative assets.

Barely anyone is interested in using Bitcoin as currency, because that has been proven to be a guaranteed way to lose out in the long term. What you spent last month at $1000 for example, is likely worth $1500 next month.

That's exactly what holds people back from using Bitcoin as currency. That of course doesn't mean people aren't using it as such, but those who do are a very small minority. Bitcoin needs stability and off-chain layers.