Everyone's talking about bitcoin being godlike and all good, but is there some downside to it, excluding the funding of terrorism and whatnot, but as the deisik said: Though in a somewhat different context. Just earlier today I explained why Bitcoin can be used as an economic weapon of mass destruction. Since that explanation was made in another language, I think I can repeat it here. Countries with rogue or just incompetent governments may fall victim to a Bitcoin "attack", so to speak. In these countries population heavily suffers from constant currency devaluations (e.g. Zimbabwe in the past or Venezuela right now), so with Bitcoin they can completely abandon their low paid jobs and make a living entirely off Bitcoin. From an economic point of view, that would work as a reversed inflation tax. With a direct inflation tax, it is the population that suffers most from currency devaluation, but when we reverse this tax, it is the government that now gets hit by it. Thus Bitcoin can be used by powerful nations (say, the US) to ruin weak governments from inside entirely via economic measures without violence or blood (unless authorities start prosecuting people for using Bitcoin, of course) Some scenarios like this, where bitcoin can destroy one's economy or something similar. Theories. Currently people who live off Bitcoin still have to exchange it for their local currency, and they still pay taxes in a form of value-added tax if it's present in their country. So, a government which is "attacked" by Bitcoin can simply find a way to tax it. Of course people might start using Bitcoin directly to avoid taxation, but it's not much different from cash and current tax evasion practices, so I don't see any radical differences that can make Bitcoin a "weapon of mass destruction". |
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I wonder if in the future this might be possible, where both coins that were minable under POW, would switch to POS or something else, as the overall mining hardware comes from China, and miners holding the majority of the Hash power can be a concern due 51% rule of attack.
Everything is possible with Bitcoin, because it's an open source project and you can yourself fork it with any new rules while keeping the original blockchain with all the addresses and funds on them. So, in the case of 51% attack, there might be many forks that will try to solve the problem, some of them might turn into PoS, some might change algo to be mineable on GPU's or CPU's. It's really hard to predict the exact outcome of such situation, but I'm sure that people will find a solution as they always do. |
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Well, bitcoin addresses are public, so it should b easy to trace how much of Bitcoins were not moved since 2009-2010. Also, Satoshi might be scared to move his Bitcoins because it will deanonymize, since many people strongly suspect that those early addresses belong to him. And even if Satoshi does dump his coins, it will crash Bitcoin only for short term, it will recover and keep growing later for sure.
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Many posts discuss the possibility of exchange earnings with selling Bitcoin (and buy later). Other posts discuss the Bitcoin exchange rate, it seems that many agree there is a strong upward tendency and the volatility is hard to predict. It seems dat selling Bitcoin results in a serious probability of an opportunity loss. Selling Bitcoin can only be motivated by an (partial) exit. Do you agree?
Every price movement that is happening is an opportunity loss, if the price is rising you are losing opportunity by not buying, if the price is falling, you are losing opportunity by not selling. If we take some theoretical "perfect trader" who sells at every bump and buys at every bottom, he would generate some crazy profits. But this is impossible, and even generating some profit from trading can be quite hard, so many people decide to invest for a long term, in which case selling has a higher chance of turn out to be an opportunity loss, because of the growth potential of Bitcoin. So, it's most likely a long term opportunity loss, but may be profitable in short term if you buy back at lower price. |
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I have read some posts and some concerns that it is the volatility of Bitcoin that is preventing many people and many businesses to fully adopt Bitcoin. This can be the main factor why big online shopping stores are not yet adding Bitcoin into their payment facilities (though there is now a circulated petition for this but I doubt if it can make a dent).
Some are really saying that if volatility can be managed then we can see Bitcoin going mainstream. I am wondering then: Is volatility something that we should find a way to control and how do you think it can be done?
It could definitely be controlled. An example of this would be, say we have a bitcoin stability fund that holds half of its assets in bitcoin and the other half in USD. The fund has to be quite large, at least $10 million to make bitcoin really less volatile. The idea is simple, if bitcoin goes up, then the bitcoins are sold to offset the rise and bring bitcoin back to its normal resting level. And bitcoin goes down, the USD is used to buy into bitcoin causing a rise. However, this is only going to centralize bitcoin. And that's not something that anyone wants in my opinion. And bitcoin should be volatile, it's actually quite attractive to investors this way. If bitcoin is pegged with USD all the time, then whats the difference between bitcoin and USD? I think Bitcoin stability fund is actually great, and it can't cause centralization in terms of network in any way, and if it's funded by a bigger amount of people, there won't be financial centralization either. And no, volatility is not good, it doesn't attract investors, it deters users and merchants and attracts traders, who cause even more volatility. Only stable Bitcoin with low fees can compete with traditional currencies, otherwise it will be a "digital gold" instead of currency. |
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Which sports or matches are the easiest to wager on? I know different people like different sports but which one is most or easily profitable than others? Most people stick with what they know only, like me I prefer tennis, world cup football and basketball but which ones you should bet on since they are "easy"
Sports betting is a zero-sum game, so if it's easy for you, than it's also easy for everyone else. You should bet on a sport that you have a very good understanding of, so you can make better predictions statistically. If you want to become a successful bettor, you need to spend a lot of time learning and analyzing. As you progress, you need to make a big amount of bets to allow your edge to show up, because individual bets will always be a subject to variance. |
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I have been buying bitcoin when the price was around 400$-450$.Most of my bitcoins are bought at that price around 40 BTC and remaining at less then 600$ price.i have been holding btc in paper wallet since then and already my stash in usd is 6 times. here is one of my tx  what i want to know is please suggest some ways to invest my bitcoin at zero risk to earn some profit.Even 0.8% to 1% profit per month is good for me but it should be risk free.i don't mind the profit percentage but risk should not be there.if you have some suggestions please post that too,if i should keep holding for more years and if yes how long should i hold? First I'd suggest you to never disclose how much BTC you own and where do you keep them on the Internet, this info may be used against you by hackers, there are many examples when people who posted about their coins on social media got their accounts targeted by social engineering attacks and got their coins stolen. Always 2FA from Google on all your online wallets like casino or exchanges. Now, as for investments, there's no such thing as risk free in Bitcoin world, but for your desired rate of 1% per month the best option would be casino bankroll investments. Make sure too study this subject well before making your investment, because rushed decision will probably hurt you later. |
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hello..Please your opinion.
As we know that Bitcoin is being discussed right now and people hope in their country Bitcoin can be ratified as a legitimate transaction tool. But in my country, only about 30% are familiar with bitcoin. Is this because only the upper middle class knows the bitcoin, or is there any other cause? What about bitcoin in your place?
Bitcoin is good for everyone. Rich or middle class people can easily benefit from economic freedom of Bitcoin, but so do lower class people. Bitcoin allows to transfer value freely and without borders, meaning that you can find some work at the global market - this wasn't possible earlier since there's no payment processor that works in all countries of the world. I'm sure that in the future Bitcoin will be a major contributor to economic growth of developing countries. |
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if you wanna have a better security, i would recommend to have a multi signature wallet (the address with prefix of 3 instead of 1). in case of possibility of being hacked, they need certainly large amount of computing power which consumes all the possible energy in the Earth as there are more than googol (IIRC) of possible combinations and not all the private key is valid for bitcoin address.
Seems like you are theorizing about brute force hack, in which case multi-signature doesn't really matter, because even a single private key can't be hacked in that way. But it's possible that your bitcoin wallet get "stolen" by a specific virus, and your password too with a keylogger, so hackers can get access to your wallet without cracking private keys. There are also viruses that replace Bitcoin addresses on clipboard when you are just about to send coins. So, keeping your PC safe is #1 priority when you are using Bitcoin. |
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I need advice i want to invest in BTC i have about 15k should i do it now? or should i wait til after August 1st just incase the price drops?
Please help me.
Thank you,
Brendon
If the price after August 1st seems too uncertain for you, due to various opinions and predictions from different sources, you can just choose to split your sum in half, buy Bitcoin now with one half and save the rest for August 1st. This way you will reduce both risks and profit from your investment in case of bring price shifts during this period. Alternatively, if you are going to hold for years, you can just buy Bitcoin now and stop caring about the price for a very long period. |
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Weather Bitcoin fees are fair or not depend on perspective, because "fairness" is a very personal concept. One can say that Bitcoin fees are fair because they are determined by open market, miners don't charge fees directly or setup some minimum required amounts, they simple include transactions with highest fees first, and people completely voluntarily pay high fees simply because they want their transactions confirmed asap. There are also arguments that high fees can be considered as payment for immutability.
On the other hand, many users feel like fees are really high compared to fiat currencies and traditional payment processors, and historically this giant increase of fees started only around a year ago, so current fees must be unfair.
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I believe that cryptocurrencies can revolutionize PvP gambling and turn it into a big industry. In PvP gambling players play against other players and also bet against them. The most widespread and successful PvP gambling game is poker, but what other games do you know that work well in gambling? Before the Internet some people gathered in parks and played chess for money, but nowdays it's hard to play chess competitively on the internet due to the power of chess AI. Also, there are altcoin projects that allow people to challenge each other and bet on popular online games like CS:GO or Dota, but so far they didn't accomplish any major success.
So, what do you think the perfect PvP game for gambling should be?
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If in the future Bitcoin will become a widespread currency, someone will notice that being digital can be a downside, because it makes Bitcoin 100% tied to the Internet, electricity and electronic devices, unlike fiat money that can exist in many forms. Physical Bitcoin already exists, but mostly for collectible purposes. If someone will decide a physical Bitcoin for payments, they will probably get a lot of Bitcoins (lets's say 10 000), lock them in and release paper currency that will be backed by those Bitcoins. It will work just like current cash, but backed by Bitcoin instead of gold, and it won't have any problems with private key ownership that you have described in your post.
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I'm just curious. What if bitcoin and any other alts market fall and you invested all your money into this. Would you rather do Panic Selling? and How would you compensate all your losses?
It depends on how much it falls. Just one year ago Bitcoin was in 450-600 USD zone, and a lot of people are holding since then or even earlier, meaning that they can stomach even if Bitcoin falls below $1000 and still be in green. If the crash is driven by some important news, the best scenario is to sell immediately, predict how low the price will fall and place an order. Usually cryptocurrencies can be very underpriced during crashes, which means that you can get a very quick 10-15% profit if you buy very close to the bottom. |
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Hi everyone.
So with the date getting closer, everyone is talking about BIP148, Segwit, Fard Hork and what not... I here some say to 'not trade few days before and few days after to let things settle down'.
Some say they'll sell their BTC before that date.
I was thinking to exchange my BTC with some other Altcoin, but I'm not sure which. Speculating only, if you were to exchange your BTC to some other coin because of that BTC split, what would you exchange for and why?
I'm thinking of exchanging to Ripple, but also I have my eye on IOTA, since I believe it will be the next big thing after Bitcoin.
Aside form BTC, I'm invested in other 9 coins. Small time investments.
I think the best approach to Auguest 1st is to hedge your coins and be prepared for everything. First, if you are really afraid of losing money, because it's some very important savings, you should sell some portion of your cryptocurrencies and only leave what you can afford to lose. If you are ready to take risks in order to take bigger profits, you should send all your Bitcoins to a wallet that allows you to control your private keys. Alternatively you can try to keep your coins on exchange and try to get some bring profits during giant volatility during the fork. You may also want to prepare yourself for situation when Bitcoin crashes but alts surge, so invest 5-10% (or more) in top altcoins like Ethereum, Ripple, Litecoin. |
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There is one problem with Bitcoins supply - it's transaction fees, or a minimum transaction fee amount to be more specific. Today you the minimum rate you have to pay for your transaction is 1000 satoshi. Obviously today fees are much higher, but if in the future Bitcoin will keep growing and will try to become universal currency, than this limitation will become a serious issue. Here's a short example:
1 BTC = 50 000 USD, than the minimum fee of any transaction (0.00001 BTC) is worth $0.5, which makes BTC a very expensive currency to use, because even if people pay this minimum fee, it will still add up to a big amount, if you do 200 transactions per month it will be $100 in fees.
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2) every user who wants to take part in a draw, sends transaction (amount of B) and provides a server with some SHA-hash (it doesn't necessary to be unique) and BTC address he'd like to receive payouts to
3) when whole number of bets accepted (N), bankroll for the draw is N*B, an algorithm (Algorithm) makes a score table of all users/transactions took part in a draw, and server exposes it's secret
With current state of Bitcoins blockchain, on-chain games seems like a bad idea. People would have to pay the highest fees to get their bets confirmed, because you can't accept unconfirmed transactions due to double-spending risks. Some people are already unsatisfied that they have to pay high fees for simple depositing and withdrawing funds, but paying 0.005-0.001 BTC or more for every bet is just ridiculous. Ethereum got pretty high fees too, and the network can be unstable sometimes. You will have to use some other altcoin if you want to solve the issue with transaction fees, which will also reduce the amount of potential players. |
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Any gains in BTC is also a gain in USD value keep that in mind. There are just some variance in prices in exchanges since there are different activities in different markets.
This is not always true, for example you've closed your altcoin position with 5% profit in BTC, but Bitcoin dropped 10% during that time, than you've actually lost 5.5% of your investments USD value. So, both USD and BTC values of your trade are important. There are actually two methods of trading cryptocurrencies - one is only increasing your BTC value and stacking Bitcoin for long term, and the second is increasing your USD value at the current moment, by selling Bitcoins during peaks, even if it means that you have to close your position on altcoins prematurely. The second method is the most profitable, because you will be getting profit from both altcoin and Bitcoin volatility, but it's very hard to execute on practice and requires big amounts of attention and experience. |
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ICO market looks very much like Dotcom Bubble. If you are not familiar with it, people were investing in any ".com" company that appeared on the market, similar to how today people invest in every ICO, regardless of its content. The bubble bursted and most of the companies vanished, but some recovered and are operating to this day. The same might happen with altcoins, most of them won't survive the crash, but a few top coins, with hard-working devs who deliver their promises and featuring real innovations, will survive and continue rising. It's unclear though how it will affect Bitcoin - will it crash together with alts, or will investors move their funds to it instead?
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