I won't make it easy as much as I'd love to and perhaps, I'm better off making a puzzle piece for the said coin holding rather than give it easily to people I know will, at some point, wrong me, especially if there's money involved. Trusting is not easy at these times, especially if it involves money since everyone can turn their backs on you due to monetary incentives. I know it sounds harsh but the fundamentals of a 'family' is easily broken once there's huge money involved, so no, I won't give it directly but rather make them work or think for it. It's for them in the end, but while I'm still around, no one should be touching my coins.

This isn't revolutionary though in a way, it can somewhat be useful given that there are still constraints regarding internet on extremely poor countries. One fine example of money transfer services manifesting through SMS is M-pesa. Bitcoin can follow suit through the use of the said feature without a company patenting or copyrighting it and it could be a feature on stand-alone clients, especially mobile ones which people can use on the go.

I'd be more impressed if this feature goes on to the main bitcoin client embedded within the code, though I think we're far from getting there.

No matter how many ETFs are scrutinized and are reviewed by the SEC and regulators, I don't think they will ever approve one no matter how good the proposal is. I for one thinks that the postponement of ETF decisions are one way of manipulating the market indirectly but that doesn't seem to be the case now as most traders are not really affected by the ETF talks anymore. See the price, if traders are interested about ETFs, there would be some form of wild price swings but apparently, there isn't one. Nobody gives a shit about ETFs when they know that in the end, it will only get denied.

Satoshi envisioned that bitcoin is being used mainly as a currency and as a tool for safekeeping assets of the un-banked, but as a speculative asset? I guess that's not what he mainly wanted bitcoin to achieve the most on. He dreamt of breaking free from the chains of the oppressive banksters and governments while actively challenging the status quo, hence the creation of a disruptive tech which we see the uses and benefits nowadays with bitcoin. Though it may not seem to be used in what Satoshi really wanted, many people are now experiencing financial freedom and have, in part, learned how to safeguard their assets and refrain from trusting banks for their assets, which in a way fulfills his vision.

I don't think there'd be much difference compared to where it is right now. For one, I see cryptocurrencies co-existing with major fiat currencies but not to the point that they will completely replace the monetary system of the world. There are a lot of things which make fiat the best currency for every country knowing that it can easily be manipulated depending on the economic state of a certain country.  This cannot be done by any cryptocurrencies, but given the interest by corporations and countries on using their own digital currency, we're not far from digitizing money as we know it. It will still be the same world, same economy, but less of the physical money and more on the digital side of things.

I wouldn't call bitcoin being paired with fiat as dependency but rather a manifestation of bitcoin's value in fiat. Like gold and oil having their value in fiat, I see that as the same with bitcoin. You can't say that bitcoin is fiat-dependent given that it continues to produce its own coins without fiat's interference. However, the whole economy, together with the traders and the miners are the ones who are dependent with fiat, not bitcoin directly. If you remove fiat into the equation of the economy, people might lose interest, though they can still use bitcoin if they so do wish and if there are still people believing in its value. Fiat is a vital part of the economy, but not the inner workings of bitcoin, I'd say.

It doesn't matter at this point in time, though I must say that 600-700k bitcoins can still drown the whole market if ever Satoshi wanted to dump, or even move his coins whatsoever. I don't really see him utilizing those coins seeing that he hasn't even appeared on any forums, blogs, mailing list whatsoever in the web. Even if he has that many coins, it would be pretty useless assuming he can't and won't move it. The amount of bitcoin the creator has is just, IMO, a sensationalized part of what was that cannot be altered given that Satoshi himself don't even want to get involved on his magnum opus.

It is a great platform of the future but I doubt that the government would not oppose the idea. The reason they are in for regulations and constricting the growth of exchanges is not because of fraud prevention per se, but rather control from the money inflows and outflows that they can tax hugely. With that said, they will try to get their hands on these decentralized exchanges if ever it got the attention it deserves. Even centralized exchanges could conspire against the rise of decentralized exchanges since it might urge traders to just do atomic swaps rather than deposit, wait, trade, and withdraw.

A decentralized exchange is a top-notch solution for trusting third-party intermediaries to take care of your funds. While it offers convenience and safety to the traders, the platform still is susceptible to hacks and whatnot, as it is with any other trading platform and software in general nowadays. Count also the general knowledge of the public about a decentralized exchange's complexity and government opposition and you'll have a hard time getting these out in the open with strong support.

This ultimately the dream of many pioneers and enthusiasts, but let's face it, it will be near-impossible to get the coin into the mainstream economy short-term, and would likely see its heydays as a speculative asset and nothing more. Even I who started late in the game (2013) wanted to see bitcoin as a working currency and not just some speculative asset, although once it comes to fruition, the speculative side of things for bitcoin could weaken, ultimately lowering the number of users if the currency aspect of bitcoin fails. As of now, we will not be seeing the currency aspect of bitcoin as there are no merchants willing to take the risk (while bitpay and similar services exist) in the coin's volatile nature.

I've read somewhere in the past that the lower the price of bitcoin goes, the lower the price of ASICs will be, so I guess it might be a good reason as to why miners keep on expanding farms when bitcoin and other crypto keep on hitting their lows. You can also factor in the growing difficulty together with the waning profitability, and as such, in order to gain more profit, one must need to expand and outdo others on this quest for magic internet money. Also, miners think that a similar rise like that of $19k could possibly happen again, and stocking bitcoins as early as now is another thing they can do for maximum profit.

It might not pan out immediately seeing that only a few people really know about bitcoin but once awareness is spread across borders, people would absolutely love to use bitcoin to save them from their asset's devaluation. Right now it wouldn't cause much of a dent on the price seeing that the citizens of these economically oppressed countries are still in disbelief, but in the future, once they discovered that there's already an alternative to gold, the future is bright for bitcoin and could be used as an effective store of value and could act as a hybrid reserve for countries with high inflation rates like the one we're seeing right now (Venezuela, Zimbabwe etc.)

Venezuela is the worst country to live in right now given the exorbitant inflation rates and the corrupt government. The only thing citizens can do right now is to go away from the country and start somewhere else. No matter how hard the Venezuelan government tries to change what's happening in the said country, it's far for being saved and a new government with less corrupt official is the last hope from an utter destruction and anarchy. Perhaps it'll take a long time but then it's the only solution: overthrow the corrupt government and start anew.

Which goes to show how the government is confident on accepting crypto and have somehow accepted that bitcoin will be a part of the future. Upon reading the article, it seems that the judge ordered a certain bail to be paid in bitcoin or any cryptocurrency, which gives it a go-signal for acceptance on the Federal Court and possibly any other government services that requires payment. I hope that you can use bitcoin in any other things, not just paying a bail which does not seem to happen almost often, but knowing that they have allowed it, there's a huge chance that other government branches and services would follow suit.

People won't care as long as they're not entirely involved or affected by it, so who cares? We are far from having mass adoption on the general masses and even if we try to educate them to the best of our abilities, how sure are we that they can really grasp what we're talking about? On another note, for anyone who have been in the crypto world for some time now, it would be quite embarrassing to know that some can't differentiate EFT from ETF. It's fairly easy to do a quick search to educate oneself about it, especially if your money is at stake between these two abbreviations.

I honestly thought that the price would lose traction when the price stopped @ $2900 and sold my holdings since 2014. It made me quite a fortune and suddenly, the price started to move again. After settling @ $4500, I bought a few more and just let the price do its thing. $10k came and it again stopped momentarily, giving me a hefty 2x return to my initial investment until it played along the lines of $12k until $19k happened. For me, if you're already in the green, there's nothing wrong selling at what price range you're comfortable at. I'm sure almost everyone did what this guy pulled off once in their trading adventures, and it's okay since it helps you gain knowledge and better your decision-making in times such as this.

$1 or not, the fact remains that Donald Trump already is a billionaire and the $1 salary is just another way of having tax cuts, so I wouldn't praise multi-billion companies' bosses who do this. Moreover, this is just a stunt that sways people's opinion regarding these wealthy people's salary. Day by day, we can't deny that the gap between the rich and the poor is growing immensely, and sadly, there's no way to fill that gap in knowing that the capitalists will always find a way to exploit the working class and be richer while the ones who work hard will be poorer no matter what.

Both scenario will surely help bitcoin succeed however, the most plausible one is the mass adoption first, regulations follow. Governments only regulate certain type of asset class/investments if it see that public attention towards it is high. If people already adopt bitcoin right before regulation, there's a solid foundation for survival, regulation only strengthens the masses' confidence about it. Whereas in the opposite scenario, no one would dare touch bitcoin if regulations and taxes are already in place; no one would take hefty profits and no one would be interested as it would seem like bitcoin is just like stocks and derivatives, only with a sassy name.

Most of us are, sadly, ever since bitcoin gained traction and gained momentum toawrds $19k. Almost everybody wants to get rich quickly without having the need to work for it, and so they found bitcoin thinking that the said goal would be achieved easily by buying into it. Many people are looking at cryptos as a means to get rich without actually realizing its economic importance towards the financially-oppressed demographic of the world. Many un-banked people have the chance to finally get themselves involved in a growing web of e-commerce without having the need to go to their bank and place a minimum deposit.

In our hopes of getting it big through bitcoin, we actually lost interest on what it could possibly do in terms of being your own bank and keeping your assets away from the oppressive capitalists.

As the post per se isn't clear, I'd be replying based on the title.

Investing in bitcoin isn't "wise" or anything special; you simply invested on an on-going phenomenon and a new asset class that others are also doing. However, I'd call people who go nuts about bitcoin 'brave,' seeing how speculation heavily affects the market and volatility swinging like crazy in their faces every single day. I'd be more inclined to think that bitcoin investors are somewhat different than your normal investors because in spite of all the fear-mongering and FUD going on in the market, they stayed resilient and held through their coins all throughout the storms.

Isn't this already happening globally though go quite unnoticed given that no such 'threats' were discovered? I don't find it strange that the FBI releases such intel since it might help banks and financial institutions to combat the said threat before it goes live (if it indeed was a legitimate threat.) Prevention is better than cure anyways, so better be safe than sorry. Also, it's about time that most banks upgrade their fairly outdated systems since even at this day and age, I've seen a lot of vulnerabilities in the banks' that I visited in the past couple of years. Perhaps changing the way how the ATM cards work etc. and many other implementations, or perhaps an overhaul of the system in order to prevent card spoofing and the likes.