No. If we had to believe people, China was the main reason for Bitcoin to be at current levels, and if they would exit the game (they partially did), it would be catastrophic for Bitcoin. Look at how the market has gone up badly after China's partial exit. Countries prohibiting Bitcoin are nothing more than obstacles. If these obstacles take care of themselves, in the way that they exit this market, it only helps steering this market to new record highs. Bitcoin's adoption is now coming from basically all places in the word. It's not one country that we depend on, which is a great benefit. If the growth was centered at just one country, and that country would prohibit Bitcoin, that would be a bad thing, but this is something that is not much of a concern to us right now.

As long as there is fresh money flowing into this market, and people are willing to buy themselves into the market at any possible price, then it will happen. However, people due to the recent increase think that this market will only go up in value, and when the market does happen to correct significantly at whatever time, people will get the shock of their life when they see how the market gets sold down. One way or another, the correction will happen, the only question that matters but people have no answer to, is when it is going to happen. But then again, corrections are only of short term, so depending on how the market keeps performing, we might not suffer for long. People are desperately looking for a discount these days.

Oh yeah? If they had at least a decent share in each and every coin they are mining with their farm, it would be seen by the public and directly increase the credibility of Genesis Mining, but their mining activities are nowhere to be found!? It has been something a fair number of people were struggling with for years, and for that reason stayed far away from anything related to this service, but it's still thriving due to delusional people pumping money in there. This service is going to be responsible for a lot people losing their precious coins, but people don't realize that yet. As long as they get paid they are satisfied, but at some point there will be a moment people will look back and see how stupid they have been, but then it's too late.

Segwit has been active for quite a while now, and yet it lacks serious usage due to services being reluctant to actually utilize Segwit for whatever reason. I am quite sure that if the economical majority starts utilizing Segwit to the full, we would likely be able to get the fees to decrease a bit, but that's all for now - Segwit unfortunately isn't a solution. We definitely need off-chain solutions (Lightning Network) to offer people the convenience they expect a proper functioning currency to have. Till that time, we shouldn't expect any major entity such as Amazon to even consider accepting Bitcoin. But then again, Lightning Network will definitely stimulate micro transactions, but these will likely just be P2P transactions rather than people actually spending their coins. No matter how well Lightning Networks functions, people will still consider Bitcoin to be more of an investment or store of value, rather than something they spend to purchase goods.

If we look at this year, then trading could have been quite profitable, but the knowledge and understanding of this market to yield these gains, go far beyond what the regular person is capable of. And btw, you consider holding to be a time consuming practice, but prefer to start a business? These words don't add up. The far majority of the people here are far better off just buying and holding Bitcoin, because in this market trading isn't something you should be focusing on as regular Bitcoiner. Why taking huge risks where you will likely end up with a lower number of coins after each week, while holding in current bullish market allows you to see the price go up consistently? Choice is easy to make, but people make things difficult for themselves.

It's the fault of the noobish idiots that are so insanely desperate to obtain their rubbish fork coins. If you just patiently wait for reputable services to publish their own wallet, the chances for you to install malicious clients will be minimized significantly. Also, number one dumb-noobish-action is that they import their private key(s) into whatever fork client without having first sent their Bitcoins to a completely new wallet. If people want to get their private key(s) drained by scammers, then for sure continue doing so.

Forks only have 'public' value when they are backed by either a bunch of major miners, or entities with very deep pockets and strong ties with major economical entities in this market. If whatever random greedy entity creates Bitcoin Rocket (or whatever name the fork may have), people won't care and it will likely have a peanut value.

They don't get it. It isn't instant payments that make people go for crypto currencies. It's the fact that they don't have to deal with shitty banks and governments acting like they own everything. It's because people want to avoid being exposed to all destructive side effects of this broken on debt based system. It's freedom, which is something banks and governments can't offer to people. It makes me wonder whether they actually don't know what's going on, or they just act like they don't know it. It's not that difficult to understand the basic principles of Bitcoin, and especially shouln't be for those bankster kingpins.

That just shows with what kind of people we're dealing with here. I have said it plenty of times before already, and will say it again, quite some people here adjust their mindset based on how the market moves. If the price increases, people act like they are ultra bullish. If the price is going down, and that while we are still up like 700% for the year, people suddenly turn into bears and expect the worst to happen. In other words, these are the gamblers that more often than not end up losing big time.

It's not just something related to the USA. In basically every well developed economy it's not allowed to not declare any sort of wealth in an attempt to hide that part of your wealth from the authorities. Currently in western Europe where I live it's already a punishable offense to hide any sort of wealth, and thus also crypto wealth. In mild form you get to pay the "owed" tax for each year, and on top of that you get a 100% fine over what you "owe" the government. In a more severe form, you can even be put into jail for a good while. It's insane if you think about it, but that just shows how this system works. In that regard, it can even be seen as the USA being a bit late with catching up.

When it comes to altcoins, things don't only depend on being smart, but also the willingness to take that extra bit of risk. It's no secret that the far majority of the altcoins are blatant copy and paste coins adding absolutely nothing. How do you expect people to diversify in 'good' projects while 95% of the market is filled with these garbage scam coins just thriving on pump and dumps to gain attention. There are just a very few coins that actually solve a problem and at the same time worthy of investing in with a long term perspective.

No need to exaggerate things. Xapo wants to prevents its service from being infested with dust transactions, and for that reason has to charge certain fees, especially when it comes to lower amounts. Xapo has been a faucet farmer paradise for a while, but these people aren't of any value to them and only add clutter to their service and to the network. Let's be honest, the only reason people went for Xapo was because of their free external transactions. People collect their faucet dust for a good while, and once they added up to a 'decent' amount, they were either sold or spent. You can't blame them for putting an end to this nonsense, and especially with how the fees have been increasing.

The "pro financers" you are referring to base everything they say on traditional markets, and from there just assume that the same applies to Bitcoin's market, which we have seen isn't the case at all. Recently the far majority of the predictions have been far off, even from those who actually understand how this market works. It's more or less blind panic rage that's going through the market, and this is something that's impossible to read out. We might see this market shoot up all the way till $40/$50K before the block halving in 2020 takes place, or we might at some point fall back massively again. I use wide figures and time frames because of the fact that there is no way to find out what's going to happen in times where literally anything can happen. Take in mind that this is still the pre institution phase, where from the moment they enter things will get a whole lot more interesting.

Every time I see these articles pop up, I am getting even more proud that I hold Bitcoin. It just shows how broken this corrupted on debt based system is with these idiots shilling for something that pushes people only further into the hole. These people just blatantly assume that current system is the only thing that goes, and there is absutely no room for something that allows people to enjoy the freedom they deserve. If you think it doesn't serve a purpose, and is just a bubble, then why should it be outlawed? People are responsible for their own actions, right? No one has the right to interfere. Also, if this is indeed what he say it is, then it will at some point dry out and be left unused, so why the bitter tone mr Stiglitz?

It's simple, you scan their QR code with your smartphone, and then approve the transaction, and it's done. It can be done with basically any proper mobile wallet client, so you don't necessarily need to use an online wallet app for that. You could also choose to "spend" Bitcoin through a Bitcoin related debit card, but these just convert it to fiat, and then settle the transaction in fiat. It's not actually paying with Bitcoin.

It's nice if you can buy your burgers and french fries without paying 50% of the initial transaction value in fees. I just use the NFC field of every merchant in my local area to pay with my bank card, and it's done. No fees involved, it offers ultimate convenience, I enjoy buyers protection, etc. The incentive to spend Bitcoin isn't there for me.

That. If Russia, or basically any government wanted to at least get somewhat of a success in stopping Bitcoin, they should have banned each and every aspect of this market back in the sub 2013 years. It's their problem that they didn't take Bitcoin seriously back in the days, and now they will be paying the price for it. Currently it's far too late, and now the average person is gaining more knowledge on how to obtain Bitcoin and what it actually does technically, there is no way governments can prevent anyone from buying himself into Bitcoin. Russia's words in this case hold zero value due to their unsure/unstable stance on crypto currencies. If I say I'm going to do this or that, and that plenty of times in a row, and each time I don't back up these words with actions, how can anyone from that point take me seriously anymore? That's the case with Russia now.

I like the optimistic nature of how bullish the predictions recently are, but in some cases things are just too far off to become reality within the given time frame. At most, I see an attampt towards $20,000 before the end of this year, but that's really it. If we do happen to reach $20,000 this year, it translates into a growth of 2000%!! It gives all stock/bond/gold,etc investors wet pants by just thinking about it. People like quick increases I get it, but I add value to a more stable (sustainable) form of growth. For now, the only thing that can get the price to correct, likely for a brief period, is a rejection of CME's Bitcoin futures. In that case, we still have Nasdaq to function as backup, which I believe will lower the urge to create a massive sell-off.

People can talk as much as they want, but it seems that this market isn't going to do what they expect it to do. With Nasdaq being interested in offering Bitcoin futures, there is so much more to gain than what we have experienced already, and for that reason I will not even cash out profits at $12,000 as it was my second target. I'll just let the market play out how it wants to, and from there will see what levels I will end up securing profits at. Important is that we'll see more support build up around $10,000 which is something that slowly but surely will happen.

You have a weird definition of offline storage. Offline storage means that you have your coins either in an hardware wallet, or a paper wallet, that at all times isn't accessible from the internet. In other words, if you get hacked, or get infected with a million viruses, they still won't be able to steal your coins, because there is no way to access them.

That's why as I mentioned, one should store his coins offline. If you use a desktop client where your wallet file is always in the main wallet folder, then you are exposed to great risks.

What's up with you? Just because you don't know how to properly store your coins offline, doesn't mean that you should recommend people to use online wallets.

Exchanges are cheapskates. Instead investing in more capacity to offer people a reliable platform that even at peak moments functions without any problems, they try to tweak everything and here and there remove certain features, just to avoid putting money on the table. Result is that people lose out on great buying/selling opportunities, and people as frustrated that they are, have to suck it up. Coinbase is the wealthiest business in this market, and that by far, but I am fairly sure that the lacking will to invest in themselves might be something that's the result of the share holders not willing to take a hit. It's not the first time that Coinbase can't handle the increased user demand, and likely not the last.

People must understand that certain price levels in the extreme short term aren't sustainable at all, and current levels are no exception. The market reacts perfectly by securing profits at these levels, which helps in getting the price to fall down to a bit more 'appropriate' levels. People constantly look at the market as if it "lost" $2000 in a single day, but there has nothing been lost. It was more panic buying (i.e greed) that drove the price to these levels, than a market looking to increase further based on actual demand. In that regard you can say that corrections are more or less healthy, where it depends per case, but in current situation, it is indeed healthy. What's it worth to increase madly, when you know that the peak levels aren't sustainable?