Are you aware of the psychological aspect of how bettors choose between over or under? For starters, over/under bets is a type of sports betting where bettors try to predict whether a combined number of score of both teams is over or under a predetermined value. It is observed that beginners tend to bet on the over side. Why? Because over means excitement.

Over means the bettor is anticipating a lot of action and this is how bookmakers get to them. If you have been watching and betting for a long time however, you may be able to objective and exercise restraint and not be overly excited over a match and only bet on the under side. Anyway, under is not always the correct answer as it really depends on the match, the teams, the gameplay and many other factors but most beginners end up getting too excited and betting mostly on over without proper analysation.

[Spanish franchise Vanadi Coffee is now ready to execute its bitcoin purchase strategy and cryptocurrency pivot following the approval of this move at a shareholder meeting. The company already holds 54 BTC under the custody of the Spain-based exchange Bit2me.]

Spanish franchise Vanadi Coffee is now ready to execute its bitcoin purchase strategy and cryptocurrency pivot following the approval of this move at a shareholder meeting. The company already holds 54 BTC under the custody of the Spain-based exchange Bit2me.

Backing this move, the company stated:

Vanadi Coffee is committed to blockchain technology as a pillar of the global economic future. Investing in Bitcoin is a long-term commitment to a new decentralized financial model. Vanadi Coffee is diversifying its business into Bitcoin investment and management and other cryptocurrency-related areas.

We often hear fintech companies investing in bitcoin and we find it good news. But now we are seeing all kinds of businesses get into bitcoin as well. If this continues all across the world, they may even accept bitcoin for payment. This could be the key to mass adoption of bitcoin. Which businesses do you think could be the next to invest in bitcoin?

The picture above is from a campaign in New Zealand running aimed to educate how young men aged from 20-30 is being "played" in sports betting. This campaign aims to shed light how sports betting is not just about winning but actually is about being part of a community. The slang or terms used in sports betting makes young men feel like they are in the know which encourages them more to gamble. The campaign is essentially pointing to this as the cause of gambling addiction.

My question is how do the gambling community feel about this? I think it does spread awareness as to how to avoid the possibility of falling into addiction but at the same time this might be a way for the public to generalize sports betting or gambling. Gambling might be painted in a negative light. What do you think? Is the campaign good for gambling or no?

How many coins are you confident in to still do well after a couple of years? After you have already passed away? How many coins would you want to pass on to your children? For me, the answer is bitcoin. It is one of the few, if not the only one, I am confident that will still have good value over 10 or 15 years or maybe even more. It has always been a topic of discussion how to pass on the bitcoins we are holding now when we pass unexpectedly or not.

Well, Binance founder CZ has suggested a function to be used in binance where one can set up a will and put in a contact to which the coins will be given to after you have passed. Either the coins will be passed to your trusted person if the account is inactive for a specific amount of time or your family can submit a death certificate. This sounds to me a fool proof function. Could there be downsides to this function?

See here.

[Investors]

“The ‘resilient six’ tend to have one or more of the three key recession survival traits — stable income, low fixed costs or flexibility,” said Kyle DePaolo, principal at DePaolo & May Strategic Wealth. But who exactly falls into these six groups? Here are the six groups that could thrive in a recession, per BlackDoctor.org.

• Young adults
• Renters
• People living on a fixed income
• Essential workers
• Investors
• Businesses with low operating costs

Let us highlight the investors part. There are different kinds of assets you can invest in like gold, real estate and cryptocurrencies. Bitcoin will be the best asset to hold in case of a recession, in my opinion. It is anti-inflationary, it is accessible, storing it is easy whether in a cold or a hot wallet. Anyone can afford to buy portions of it.

When the Pope was being decided in the conclave, people were betting on it. When there was hurricane or typhoons, people would also bet on the casualties. Have you seen people bet on about the war between Iran and Israel and now USA too?

If yes, do you think it is morally or ethically correct? For me, no. There are real people's lives at stake here. I think it is so tone deaf for people to bet on their lives. What do you think?

With US bombing Iran, talks of WW3 seems closer and closer. I am, of course, not wishing for this to happen as nothing good will come out of it. But let us think for a second how will bitcoin be useful to us should WW3 actually happen? First of all, expect chaos. Fiat Currencies would most likely decline. Governments would need to print more money to budget for fighting other countries. This will surely lead to inflation. This is where crypto would come in handy. Bitcoin can be a safe haven for most.

The most important thing is if you live in a country directly affected by the war, surely people would migrate and seek shelter. Bitcoins can be helpful for doing this as you will not be carrying your country's local currency. I am sure now that people would be buying crypto in fear of the war happening.

Consider a scenario where you play coin flip. Heads come out you win, you double your money. Tails come out you lose, 50% is reduced to your money.

So if you start with $10 and you win it becomes $20 but if you lose it becomes $10 which brings you to the start. But after consecutive wins, what does it look like? Your $20 can become $40 and the $40 can become $80 after consecutive wins and you lose one time and that is still $40. Sounds pretty neat?

Do you think you can make profit out of this game? Bear in mind that you can play for an infinite number of times.

[Currently, not a single one of its components is flashing a top signal.]

CoinGlass’ (a cryptocurrency futures trading and information platform) curated “bull market peak” selection contains 30 potential selling triggers and aims to catch long-term BTC price tops. Currently, not a single one of its components is flashing a top signal.

A marketing move by the platform? Trying to attract and keep their users to stay using their platform?

“According to these models $BTC will be $135K to $230K this cycle,” popular trader Cas Abbe wrote in part of an X post on the topic on June 13.

Just me or the range is too big? $135k is totally different from $230k and the latter is a very huge ask. While $135k does not sound too impossible within this cycle.

Abbe, in particular, highlighted three indicators — Pi Cycle Top, Market Value to Realized Value (MVRV) and long-term Relative Strength Index (RSI) — to demonstrate that the Bitcoin bull market still has plenty of room to run.

“This ain’t the top,” he concluded.

Don't we know that. What do you think of the indicators and would you agree that these indicators are pointing towards a peak that could reach $230k? These indicators could only be pointing towards the fact that the bull run is not over yet but do they specifically hint to a specific price range?

[banks or safety deposit boxes.]

Heard of car insurance? Life insurance? and so on... But have you ever heard of kidnap and ransom insurance? Apparently, this is availed by really wealthy people who may have had threats on their life. This insurance is to make sure that they are protected from financial losses from ransoms. How does it work? Well, once kidnappers call the family... the family is expected to notify the insurance company and that is only when the insurance company will get to work. They will give out the ransom money and even try to negotiate with the kidnappers. (I guess the reason why I have never heard of insurance for such thing because I have never had the threat of being kidnapped for money lol.)

These days, insurance company have laid their eyes on their new targets. They have heard of how frequent crypto enthusiasts are being kidnapped and threatened. Now they are targeting crypto enthusiasts. I have found this article but it raised some questions.

"Ryan Lackey, the chief security officer at Evertas Insurance, a company that sells insurance for digital assets, said the best protection for a publicly wealthy bitcoin holder is to both have physical security and to make it public that they can only access a certain portion of funds. Most of their crypto wealth should be protected with passwords stored in difficult-to-access locations, like banks or safety deposit boxes."

I am guessing that if someone avails their insurance services, they will be required to know where the rest of the funds are. Is this really the safest option for the famous and the wealthy ones to protect themselves and their crypto? I wonder how does Michael Saylor protect himself from such cases.

If you are a motorsport fan and a marvel fan, you must have been excited to see Tom Holland (Spider-man) be at Le mans this weekend. It got me thinking how many fans he has and how many could have been curious and influenced to get into Le mans or motorsport in general. It seems like Tom Holland really is a motorsport fan as he was also seen in a formula 1 race before.

Anyway, this makes me wonder if celebrities like Tom Holland who likes to attend sporting events for his own enjoyment affects the popularity of the sport. In the same context, does celebrities like Drake who also likes to gamble for his own enjoyment influences his fans to do the same? Have you ever checked out a sport or betted on a team because of your favorite celebrity?

We often deliver news about a certain country acknowledging bitcoin or cryptocurrencies and immediately assume that it is good news because finally they will have clear regulations when it comes to crypto. Another reason why this is considered a pro is because people trust bitcoin more and thinks of it as official when endorsed by the government.

However upon inspection, sometimes you will realize that the government acknowledging bitcoin is not actually a good thing. First of all, the government's acknowledgement is limited to only being a speculative asset and not as a currency that can be used for official transaction. Second, their rules and regulations usually include AML and KYC which totally strips away investors' privacy and disregards decentralization. Third, governments only acknowledge bitcoin to implement high taxes which only drives investors away.

So at the end, not all kinds of acknowledgement is good.

I have heard of people who decide they want to become a sports fan because they want to gamble. In your opinion, does this make sense? Would it not affect how you see the matches when your goal is to bet? You might already have some confirmation bias where you see gamblers always bet for a specific team and when you finally watch a match your brain tells you that the gamblers were right.

Can people actually end up liking a sport from wanting to gamble? or is this not sustainable as their interest in the sport fizzles out in the future?

[crypto capital of the world]

Trump has said that he wants to make the US the crypto capital of the world. Dubai has been called the emerging crypto capital. Few countries in Asia predominantly Hongkong, Singapore and India are all fighting for the spot to be the biggest crypto hub. Africa does not fall behind with Nigeria being their largest cryptocurrency market.

It is quite unclear where Europe stands with all of this. Anyway, I mentioned all these countries because it got me thinking which one really is or would be the bitcoin capital of the world? We know how nationalistic and patriotic people can be. They always want their country to be the first of everything and anything. And besides, who wouldn't want their country to be friendly to crypto when it benefits you directly as a citizen?

But the thing is, I do not believe there could be a one true bitcoin capital of the world. Bitcoin is decentralized because it does not have a single authority making decisions without others agreeing to it. Bitcoin does not have one focus point. It is distributed everywhere. So, would you agree that there is or at least there shouldn't be a bitcoin capital of the world despite the efforts of Trump and others? Or do you already have a city in mind that you consider as bitcoin capital?

Brazilian Finance Minister Fernando Haddad has confirmed gambling tax in the country will increase from 12% to 18% of GGR.

The Brazilian Institute of Responsible Gaming or IBJR has spoken up about the increase in tax and said that this would result in the black market growing from 50% to 60%. Six of the largest gambling trade associations have also released a joint statement pointing out that the gambling sector has already contributed significantly to the country and to impose higher tax will be a burden.

Do you think that casinos would continue to want to operate in Brazil with these taxes? I am assuming that as a result, casinos would offer higher prices on their services as well due to the taxes and would most likely drive away customers. Would this eradicate the gambling sector altogether?

[“We have changed everything,”]

The so-called bitcoin family sold their house and basically everything they own down to their shoes back in 2017 to buy bitcoin while it was still trading at $900. Obviously, we can see how that worked out pretty well for them. Now they are traveling with three children while continuing to use bitcoin.

We know how abundant kidnappings are these days just to get crypto which has made a lot of bitcoin enthusiasts worried. Didi Taihuttu, the father of the family, has said that he has changed their entire security setup after receiving some threats.

He said that they ditched their hardware wallets and instead went for part analog and part digital. Their seed phrases are said to be encrypted in encryption services or hidden across four continents.

“We have changed everything,” Taihuttu told CNBC on a call from Phuket, Thailand. “Even if someone held me at gunpoint, I can’t give them more than what’s on my wallet on my phone. And that’s not a lot.”

Right now, he said that the family stopped posting travel updates as well as vlogging due to people identifying his family's location. It really is better to keep a low profile especially if you know you are wealthy. Do you think his system is a smart one?

[Have fantasy sports massively impacted traditional gambling?]

Have fantasy sports massively impacted traditional gambling?

Some may say that fantasy sports have pulled in more sports fans and new gamblers. Fantasy sports is kind of like a softer introduction to traditional betting scene allowing you to focus on data and statistics which you can use in traditional betting. The benefit here is you do not even need to risk real money in fantasy sports.

But the question is, do fantasy sports draw away people from traditional gambling? Fantasy sports may be seen as a better alternative as you can make up your own teams and play manager. Another question people ask is whether what would fantasy sports be considered as... gambling or gaming?

[Poland,]

In the recent Presidential election in Poland, pro-crypto Karol Nawrocki, has emerged victorious with a 51% vote share. Ahead of this tightly contested election, Nawrocki had vowed to support the crypto industry and stated that it would curb any regulations that prevent the “freedom of investing”. Poland’s crypto industry has high hopes from Nawrocki to improve the country’s crypto landscape.


Currently leading the polls is Lee Jae-myung of the center-left Democratic Party, who is up against staunch conservative and People Power Party nominee Kim Moon-soo. Lee has proposed legalizing spot crypto exchange-traded funds and wants to allow
South Korea’s $884 billion national pension fund to invest in cryptocurrency. Kim also supports legalizing spot crypto ETFs and backed Lee’s proposal, showing rare bipartisan alignment. He has also pledged to ease regulations and expand crypto adoption.

Back then, we only had Bukele (president of El salvador) as the national leader that was actively and loudly pushing for crypto adaption. Then Trump followed and now we have so many candidates for presidency and already presidents pushing for bitcoin. I think that this is a testament to how much bitcoin has grown that not only your average citizens know and use bitcoin but also presidents. Bitcoin mass adaption might come a lot sooner than everyone initially thought.

[Michael Saylor, Max Keiser, and Jack Dorsey.]

A lot of us are aware of the ideology Bitcoin maximalism. To put it short, a bitcoin maximalist believes that bitcoin is the one and only crypto needed. A bitcoin maximalist believes that bitcoin will be the only crypto to give you significant profit and the one that is the most useful in the real world.

Some of the prominent bitcoin maximalists are Michael Saylor, Max Keiser, and Jack Dorsey.

As the original crypto, bitcoin’s blockchain is the longest (it stores the most blocks of transactions), making it harder and more expensive to hack. Bitcoin's originality also plays a huge benefit since it is now the most trusted crypto in the industry. A lot of people associate crypto with just bitcoin. Bitcoin has built a brand of its own. Most importantly, it grew without any real authority hovering over it. The growth of bitcoin laid on the people believing in it. Now, bitcoin is being adapted all over the world not just by your average citizens but governments at large.

Bitcoin might be the best cryptocurrency but should we play into the bitcoin maximalist idea? A lot of people argue that this is harmful as this closes off innovation. Altcoins may not share bitcoin’s track record, but they’re responsible for the majority of the innovation in the crypto space over the last nine years. Altcoins are responsible for experimenting new tech, new networks and etc. Some of which could be even applied to bitcoin, yes?
Personally, I believe that most of your portfolio should contain bitcoin but choosing a few good altcoins can't be all too bad. There could still profit in altcoins but we may just have to tread lightly. Would you consider yourself a bitcoin maximalist? Do you believe this idea to be the correct one? Is there even a correct ideology or should we just accept that we all have different strategies, preferences and goals while coexisting in the crypto industry?

If you are a bitcoin maximalist, would you want a world without altcoins?

Japanese law enforcement has arrested a 38-year-old man in what is being called the largest individual online gambling case in the country’s history. The suspect, Makoto Chomabayashi, is accused of placing bets totaling 28 billion yen (approximately $194 million) through an international gambling website, far exceeding previous records for individual wagering activity in Japan.

At first, I was like what is the illegal part here? Yes he gambled huge amounts of money but there were no signs of money laundering. I was confused until it was mentioned that gambling is illegal in Japan. Gambling is generally banned in Japan with a few exceptions. Chomabayashi also acted as a casino affiliate using his social media accounts to refer users to the casino. He said that he did all of this since he thought that he would never get caught. But he was publicly working for an online casino so I do not know why he would think that he would not be caught by the authorities. It is ridiculous to me to be fined just for gambling but if that is the rules of your country.... you would have to follow.

If gambling was illegal in your country, would you still gamble?