its value runs slowly because these is a firm, established basis of valuation. we can all agree on how useful gold is, across the various disciplines that actually use gold as a material. bitcoin doesnt have any kind of basis at all, much yet a firm one. why is a bitcoin worth up to 5k USD? Nothing significant has changed about the protocol except a few more people have adopted, and there is more liquidity now. this volatility, while rewarding, is the reason why bitcoin is not more widely adopted. you cant store truly long term value in something like this; there is no stable promise of a future.

good point. cell phones are more ubiquitous than identification papers and personal computers in America, at least. i really dont know anyone under the age of 35 that doesnt have a cell phone, to be honest thats more like 70 or 80 now. if you want to use something that is tied to someones identity much better than a forgeable piece of paper, then this is for the best

when we embrace microtransaction systems in the future, we will look at bitcoin as the model. but i dont think bitcoin will be the coin they use to implement this

If bitcoin was completely immune to government intervention, then possibly yes. unfortunately, we know thats not the case. we all live somewhere, and thats usually in the borders of a government. let me use America as an example. Despite trying not to as hard as possible, corporations pay the majority of taxes due to the amount of revenue that they generate. therefore, the opinions of corporations matter. not as much on a federal level, but certainly at a state/local level. corps do not want this tax basis, ans subsequent basis of influence, to shift. the government, satisfied with the status quo, is not willing to see that shift unless it is more profitable and pre regulated. so, the momentum is against bitcoin succeeding.

i think they will take the lesson of blockchains, and regulate bitcoin into a black hole. and then build something in its image.

With all the shit that Wells Fargo has been catching of late (they cant catch a break it seems), I wonder if any of JP Morgans dirt will come to light any time soon. its been a while since the shit hit the fan for them, so to speak, and the spotlight on poor banking actions that Wells Fargo is beaming on the industry cant help the situation. its pretty much a given they have been up to something; there doesnt seem to be a Fortune 500 that doesnt have some skeletons in its closet

my bet is they have some questionable foreign investments that may defy some sanctions, as well as some investments in the regimes of questionable leaders. just a hunch..

there is basically no country with lax enough laws to issue a "howey" token without registration/regulation. even the cayman islands, the grey finance haven of the world, doesnt have loose enough regulation for any old person to issue a security. even if you went through the proper motions to set up the corporate structures, you are beholden to the body that governs the people you sell the token to. you have a responsibility to prevent "unauthorized participants", and if you dont do this diligently, you can at least face civil liability from that respective government.

to be honest, it seems best to wait til guidance is issued an act accordingly, issue a non Howey token (good luck selling it) or hurry up and do this is the little time that is left, and hope for the best.

I dont know if bitcoin can cause a war (it doesnt have a state backing, hence it doesnt have a war machine) but it could certainly undermine the economy of any government that has issued a fiat. bitcoin makes it really easy to conceal value from a government, move that value, and avoid taxation of that value. on top of that, bitcoin can facilitate capital flight outside borders, something anathema to governments with tight capital controls (china) and govs that cant afford to lose value out of bounds.


bitcoin, at its worse, is a tool to subvert capital controls completely. of course no sane, self sustaining government can support that.

Dimon just seems to have a stick up his ass for bitcoin. besides all the shit he has said over time, he also has plainly mentioned that his daughter is heavy into bitcoin, maybe even cryptos in general. it takes a special type of asshole to talk shit about an asset that one of his family members is actively hold, especially his daughter. if i didnt like something I wouldnt think about it, let alone take time out of my day by talking the price down with fud. he clearly has a motive, and the legality of what he pulled is questionable (and Sweden is testing it).

Sodl is fucking hilarious, and RawDog is brutal 

but yeah, you went full retard if you have sold during any of these dips. if you need to access your value (shame on you, you invested more than you could afford to lose ) then liquidate what you need and wait it out. doesnt make sense to sell for a few reasons; you are late; if you try to short you could possibly lose some ground if you miscalculate, and obviously, eventually we will regain our previous price levels. granted, it could take a while, but it most likely wont if the past is any indicator.


ride it out people. unless you went to school to daytrade, maybe, dont try to daytrade.

we wont be dead, per se, but it will be different if China leaves the scene completely. this isnt the case, and wont be the case, but lets entertain the question. China makes up alot of the volume of the total market, at least according to them. China also generates the majority of new bitcoins that go into circulation. so removing the biggest sources of supply and liquidity would certainly have a serious effect on the market. not even considering that its widely believed China is the reason for the price runs. if that rumor is true, then they are also a serious source of demand as well. for one, we would see a way more reasonable price, and two, we wouldnt see as much of this volatilty, but the price swings would be much more grave. kinda how altcoins act, its a result of the smaller caps.

It seems pretty obvious at this point that satoshi is not a single dude. much like vitalik recently communicated, designing something like this requires expertise in multiple disciplines of study. this is way more than just economics, its more than programming too. it incorporates some civics, and a little philosophy. i dont think a single guy named satoshi, or even a guy that took the handle, would be able to accomplish something this nuanced. i do think the original idea, in a very basic form, might have been fleshed out by a single guy.

but even then, if it had to go through development by a team, at what point does it grow beyond the prototype into a new thing?

And I have some cheap land in sunny Nicaragua to sell to you

curb this enthusiasm. understand that the price can go to zero; the risk of ruin is real. also understand that if we see a valuation spike like what you described, that would be equally dangerous. we would see regulation and correction EXACTLY like what we are seeing right now.

as far as the value, there is no basis for valuation, or at least we dont ascribe to one. the rampant speculation is why the majority of folks are here, self included. now that ive been along for the ride awhile, im more concerned about longevity. we wont make it far, bitcoin i mean, like this.

the regulation must come. the investor maturity will follow.

there will always be great ideas that generate profit; way beyond bitcoin. bitcoin is by far one of the most accessible and prolific ways to generate wealth, but this was gold, this was tulips, this was high grade pot in the 90, and the dotcom bubble. essentially, a growth industry. there will be things after bitcoin that reward early adoption; and to be honest, these are things ( if you have an appetite for risk - hilariously, most crypto investors dont understand how much risk they take on a daily basis) that have the same returns of crypto, in the "real world".

Pretty sure China really doesnt have a beef with bitcoin. they have allowed the majority of bitcoin mining equipment to operate without really saying anything. retrospectively, i think this is more about capital ouftflows, and trying to get better control over the lack of proper aml/kyc and registration at exchanges. Im not talking the customers; im more talking the fact that alot of these coins and tokens dont actually pass the Howey test, or at least completely. to list these is to essentially list an unregulated security, which doesnt usually fly anywhere in the civilized world. also im pretty sure organized crime is seizing the opportunity these price levels provide to launder money, this should do a lot to prevent that as well.

unfortunately the fee is indeed fair; its the result of a mostly democratic process. the rub lies in the way we are misusing the protocol, at least per its original intention. we werent supposed to see these price levels, at least this quickly, and we also werent supposed to see the much traffic at this point. this was never intended for all that. in fact, I dont think corporate adoption is even feasible via Satoshis model until AFTER all block rewards are issued. any serious corporate adoption (the mere beginnings of which we are seeing now), will do exactly what is happening to the network now. we have a ways to go before the big leagues, if we even make it.

governments are so much banning bitcoin lately, as much as finally beginning to regulate it. this was inevitable folks, and we got here a lot faster by attracting attention to ourselves, via the ICOs, and the wild bubble. At these price levels, capital flight just isnt the only issue; you can greatly facilitate money laundering with cryptos. the ico circuit has almost certainly accepted some dirty money; which has gotten washed into the crowdfund, and came back as shiny new tokens.

this doesnt necessarily have to be an intentional thing, but it is definitely happening.  

media hits do have an effect on the price, but I think the real reason the price moves so much is that whales manipulate the price on the news. what im saying is, they exaggerate the price movements by dumping on bad news, in order to influence weaker hands into waiting buy orders. the dimon situation is a perfect example of this. and the news seems compiled to exaggerate the dips as well; they seem to release bad press in multiples lately

but the apparent majority of weak hands certainly doesnt help.

most folks in second to first world countries wont find as much opportunity from the random clickwork that bitcoin provides, than if they had landed a real world job and purchased bitcoin. click work doesnt build resumes, and its hard to explain to a potential employer why posting on a forum for income qualifies you for a decent job in the real work force if you live in the third world however, and have decent computer/device access and network connectivity, it seems like you can go pretty far with a bitcoin gig (the adjusted income is comparable with the local real world average income).


you might as well flip burgers. you can at least get holiday pay, at the least, and the opportunity for unemployment benefits.

Amen!! Some folks werent here when we slid down from 1000. Everyone was sooo bullish right before, we approached 1k and people were screaming 3k in a year. It was pretty much the opposite of that. It slid down, slowly, to about 300, before it started to pick up robustly. Mining companies stopped mining it was so bad.

Growth like this isnt sustainable folks. What goes up, especially on some hot shit, must eventually come down.

well, this is a bit over the top. they arent so much banned at the moment as they are temporarily restricted from being exchanged via formal platform. possession by private citizens is not illegal, and the restrictions are seemingly temporary, at least til they release formal guidance. i think people may even still be able to trade person to person. its just that transactions that would be subject to reporting, are now illegal.

... would be pretty much the same world it has been since before bitcoin, which is a pretty recent thing

bitcoin is an alternate currency, if you will. while the technology presents vectors for innovation and disruption, we could have gone along quite fine if bitcoin (which would have happened eventually) hadnt happened yet. more important than the technology itself, the paradigm is is facilitating (wealth transfer, in a downward fashion) is more interesting. the opportunities it presents for the lower middle class are the most remarkable. the opportunity to accrue generational wealth in a few years

thats why the status quo simply wont allow this to persist.