One thing I noticed is that ETH and BTC followed almost the same spikes/dips during the last week. Why are they mimicking each other ? I think one reason could be that price corrections over the last 1 week have been caused by few "whales" and these whales performed the same buy/sell volume operations for their ETH/BTC portfolios.

I just noticed Coinbase going "unavailable" just at the moment of the largest dip, and then only becoming available again as it recovered somewhat. That does't seem a coincidence.  They close it temporarily during large dips ...  Kraken was also partially unresponsive during the dip.


This Coinbase company seems to be a large trader with big wallets. So seems to me their customers are trading against their wallets. i.e It is not like they connect buyers and sellers, but rather sell/buy to their customers from their own wallets.

Is  Kraken and the other big ones the same ?

Hi Guys,



Kraken's fee page  https://www.kraken.com/help/fees , shows 0.16% fee for trades with volumes up to 50 000 !!? Is this really just 0.16 % per trade ?  And how is it possible that the fee is so much lower than Coinbase's 1.5 % per trade ?

This will make me seriously  consider switching to Kraken  ASAP.

Hi Guys,

Questions about the Bitcoin/Ethereum chains, I assume both work the same way. I am trying to understand these:

1. Does the blockchain really contain a log of every transaction ever happened, and if yes which computers store that information, and how large is the whole chain at the moment ? Who runs these "master" chain servers and how do you run one ?  Is this what would be a "fully synchronized wallet" and wouldn't a fully synced wallet weight 1 TB in 10 years, so only few people can practically store these.

2.  Lets say you receive a transaction to your address while your "wallet is offline". When you connect your wallet, does it find out immediately its balance or you have to run a full wallet synchronization before it will know how much coins it has got ?

Could somebody recommend a site where I can buy ethereum directly without having to submit ID/photo verification.

If I understand this correctly it comes down to trusting the "site" to transfer the ethereum to my wallet.  For this process my wallet doesn't even have to be connected to the Internet, since the transaction will become part of the blockchain.

I think the interest from big tech companies and banks is genuine because of the distributed API and the inflationary/coin printing abilities. I think this is a strong pointer that  it will keep growing. And I don't want to support another fiat coin, but what can one person do ? Only try to make some cash.

I appreciate all comments. Not sure how I feel about investing in Ethereum just yet, I need to research more..

I only heard about Ethereum few weeks ago when there was an announcement that Microsoft, IBM etc have formed some sort of Ethereum foundation or cooperation .. It is late and I am even tired to look up the url but here it is http://www.zdnet.com/article/microsoft-intel-banks-form-enterprise-ethereum-blockchain-alliance/

So then I watched the Vitalik presentation where he explained that ethereum can run small programs distributed accross PCs. Like bittorent but for applications. So I figured that is why Microsoft / IBM are interested - because it is a distributed API platform. Banks are also mentioned as interested in the alliance, which probably is due to the fact, like I already mentioned above, that Ethereum can be inflated as much as they want. Banks like that.

Like I said ,I am not trading no coin at all so I am not into all this... but thought I don't want to miss if Ethereum is going to be jumping like bitcoin is. I can put some small amount in this just for fun.

I appreciate all the responses. It does seem like there is many "blockchains" these days and the newest thing seem to be... like Ethereum, they just sell their initial coin offerings for cash/bitcoins. So they are really crowdfunding themselves. Very clever of them. But for people like me... we just wanna see if can make some cash or maybe some site providing some service around crypto currencies ...

I hate the fact that they initially presented ctyptocurrencies as decentralized alternatives to fiat money... but today seems the crypto business model is to be  doing the "pump and dump" kind of deal ... Cryptocurrency has future and so there is new currencies all the time.

I hated bitcoin for Mtgox... those criminals stole money... and it was my first try ... So I got caught in a bad luck situation. I am not sure If I even trust any of these exchanges.. not that I have used any.

Ok I am just rambling now.. over and out.

I agree. The coin supply is not even decided yet. I.e they can print as much as they want. If you can make a profit in the meantime that would be great however. Bitcoin started that way as well. There is just couple of threads I have been able to find out so far that talk about Ethereum's supply. Basically they say it will be 80 - 120 million in the next 2 - 3 years. But again they will decide.

This is where Ether is different than Bitcoin and the main reason I have doubts about Ethereum . They can print when they want therefore the value/price of Ethereum will be pushed down by this. On top of that it is not clear yet how fast your Ethereums will burn in "fuel usage" i.e. there is not much ehtereum apps yet I guess, so we don't see ethereum burning rates yet. I guess Ethereum won't burn by itself in your wallet, except due to inflation the way fiat money does. But surely the ethereum inflation and the fuel-burning process will both keep the value of Ethereum down.

I too agree that despite all this, there is most likely money to be made in the process. Banks and corporates like it because of the inflation prococess and they are looking to move currency to being digital so they will likely support it, especially that is now the second one after Bitcoin in market cap...

Do you think it is better to mine on your own or get on a cloud-miner. ( I am not even sure how cloud-miners work, I think I pledge say 1000 USD for 1 year and it mines at a rate of say 26Mh and whatever coin you get in the end is yours. ) ? Or to decide to buy and not mine.

Why would you say Ethereum is centralized ? Isn't it the same like Bitcoins, once you have ethers in your wallet you can send them to whoever you want ?

Is the ethereum supply capped to a maximum like bitcoin ? Or is it they just "mine" as much as they want.

From what I understand the Ether is supposed to be "fuel" like but is being traded at the moment like currency. I guess no harm in that. Since Microsoft etc have joined it, seems like it is here to stay, given its API innovation over Bitcoin.

Or any useful Ethereum forums on the Internet ?

HI,

Is it as big as Bitcoin ? Should we buy some tokens ? Looks like Ethereum can be mined as well.. what is the profitability like, has to be better than Bitcoin at this point, plus good to reuse all those miners hardware ?