I doubt that we'll see that much of a bull market in 2019.

I think that the bear market will at least last until the end of this year before some form of recovery comes. However, based on the previous bear market data, it's more probable that it'll take around 1 year or so from this point on before bitcoin is able to truly bottom (just take a look at the graphs for 2014-2015 bear market).

Hence, it's unlikely for me to see bitcoin over $20k in 2019. Prices only recover slowly at the end of bear markets as there is still uncertainty in the market, and bullish sentiments come back gradually. It doesn't go parabolic straight away. But right now, we're definitely a long way away from any bullish prospects as the $6k support is being tested and most likely will not hold in my honest opinion.

I agree with the fact that we're going to see most likely bitcoin correcting lower, before prices are able to stabilise and start to recover finally. I don't think that $6k is the true bottom, because if you look at previous bitcoin bear markets, bitcoin usually only retains 20% of its peak value when it bottoms.

Right now, we're still not going to see any bullish movement in the coming months. There are simply no trend reversals possible right now imo with the level of bearishness within the market. The bottom should in my opinion should be somewhere around $3-4k.

We may see further dips as a result in the next 2 months, in fact I expect that to be the case. I think that your prediction is reasonable, although not guaranteed. Market volatility is going to low for certain though, along with periodic dips until we're close to the bottom which I don't think we are yet.

Not really at all.

Bitcoin was already on a constant dipping pattern before this news was announced due to the fact that the market was already bearish, and the $10k resistance proving too be too strong for bitcoin prices to go through at the moment.

Major exchanges in India are obviously affected by this new regulation, and that's definitely something negative. But the dips that we saw in the recent days are not really caused by it, since markets have already reacted to it and corrected months before when the Reserve Bank of India actually came out with the regulation. I do think that $6k support isn't going to hold, but it's mainly just due to the bear sentiments in the market.

But bitcoin isn't actually deflationary? Its monetary supply is still increasing, it's just that the inflation rate within bitcoin gradually slows down and will eventually after a century or whatever be virtually stable. There isn't any deflation going on, as in the currency supply shrinking.

This controlled inflation curve is actually a positive to me. It allows bitcoin to be able to hold its value over the long term, which is something that fiat currencies are not able to do. Also, we don't need to rely on a central bank to do the task of managing the supply of money, since all of this is decentralized, another positive.

I don't really get how bitcoin's inflation model creates new forks, though. Perhaps i'm missing something?

It's actually not illegal to hold, trade or just use bitcoin in general within India.

In fact, it shouldn't even be illegal to conduct business with a bitcoin exchange. As long as the exchange is offering the service to you, and there is a bank that is facilitating the withdrawals, there shouldn't be any legal issues with this.

To my understanding though, there are bans put over banks within India to prevent them from dealing with exchanges, which essentially means that a lot of exchanges will go out of business. You're still able to trade, you just have to trade p2p since most exchanges relied on banks to facilitate their fiat transactions.

These scam exchanges with no backing are really an issue that needs to be addressed.

The Ukrainians ought to be commended for doing this, because these are the things that shed a bad light on bitcoin as something that only scammers can use (obviously not true). This is also why a certain degree of regulation can be beneficial as people can judge much better which exchanges to trust as they would have to follow preset rules.

A lot of these people running scam exchanges overseas actually don't receive any legal repercussions as a result, so this is a rare sight.

Honestly, this is extremely detrimental to Indonesia itself. Especially when crypto is a growing sector and you're essentially trying to ban BTC which is the major crypto. It means that essentially, businesses are forced out.

Regulation is much better than an outright ban in these scenarios.

I don't see a complete and utter ban of crypto a likely scenario for Indonesia though, as even though this was basically released months ago, no new action was taken, no new bans, etc. It's unlikely for any country to ban bitcoin itself. Much more likely for them to put some sort of restriction on exchanges within their country.

It's just two incomparable things. Tulips are just things that look nice and didn't have any sort of utility within the economy, while bitcoin is an actual currency that can be used and bring benefit to many people.

I understand that people are trying to look at bitcoin in the same light as tulips due to its 2017 bull market and whatnot, but it's just completely different.

Bitcoin can be much better compared to gold. Gold has its bull and bear markets, so does bitcoin. Both of them are useful forms of currency, bitcoin more so than gold. That's where their fundamental value comes from. Tulips do not perform the role of anything. Besides, the supply can be easily manipulated, while there is a limited supply with BTC.

I agree with you that we'll see a huge adoption wave coming into bitcoin. Capital will flow into bitcoin as more and more people realize that bitcoin is one of the only safe havens out there that is able to store your wealth in.

Institutional investors are only starting to come into the markets, and this trend should continue for the next decade for sure.

I really doubt that $10 million is possible though, unless we see an extremely hyperinflated fiat currency that leads to a parabolic increase in BTC's nominal prices as well. However, there will definitely be huge gains in the long run with BTC until adoption reaches its max potential. Also taking into consideration the fact that the limit to the supply of BTC is hardcoded, BTC is going to most likely not only store its value but also increase in value in the coming decade.

Despite the bear market right now, I'm still extremely bullish on bitcoin in the long term.

Use localbitcoins. You're unlikely to get better rates than what Bitpanda is offering you though. Be prepared to pay at least a 10% premium if you're not willing to verify, potentially a bit less if you are able to verify yourself.

However, if you're dealing with larger amounts and you're willing to go through KYC, buying with paypal is rarely a good idea. Transfer the funds from paypal to a bank first and buy on a major exchange instead.


I'm pretty sure that even though xCoins markets themselves as a lending site, they pretty much perform the same functions as a bitcoin buying site. However, their site is pretty shady at least to me so I wouldn't suggest using them. You could try with small amounts though, doubt you'll have an issue but doubt you'll get good rates.

Virwox is the safest bet for you. The order book is indeed thin, and the rates you'll get will be pretty bad. You'll be charged a fee after every step of the USD -> SLL -> BTC, including depositing USD and withdrawing BTC. As I said, for anonymity, go to paxful/localbitcoins. If you're able to verify yourself anyways, then use a major exchange and use bank transfer as your payment method instead.

We may see prices bottom out this month. We might see further dips in the coming months and prices would only bottom then, we don't know exactly what would happen. Even if there is a huge dump at the end of the month that you're suggesting (and it's possible, ofc), it doesn't necessarily mean that we've definitely bottomed out.

One thing is for sure, though, regardless of when prices bottom.

We're probably not going to see much bullish activity from here to the rest of the year. There could be short term rallies, but I don't feel like a major trend reversal this year is possible. Expect plenty of sideways movement and periods (like right now) with extremely small volatility, with some dips at times.

The fact that they promised to add support for segwit back in Nov in a tweet (search it up if you want), and it was never added makes me really wonder what's going on with them. They promised BCH support in the same tweet and that was done within 2 months of the tweet.

It's obviously got nothing to do with whether or not their web wallet is trustworthy or not as you mentioned, but everything to do with what they do to fulfill their promises as a business.

They're now devoting their energy into rebranding and new features without addressing Segwit support. It doesn't necessarily make their wallet any less trustworthy to use, and I actually like their wallet a lot, but it says a lot about them as a business. And without segwit support, a lot of users will switch to desktop wallets instead, so it's probably worse for them.

I disagree on the fact that you say bitcoin's volatility makes it not a good store of value.

It is still a good store of value in the long run in my opinion because of the fact that it is decentralized and its supply cannot exceed 21 million as we all know. Of course, there are short term fluctuations, but that doesn't really make bitcoin any less of a store of value in the long term. Gold and silver can also fluctuate in the short term as well, but they hold their value way better than fiats do.

And bitcoin is pretty much just a more convenient and fair system than gold/silver, with better divisibility and fungibility (you don't need to verify the purity).

Is BTC perfect as a form of money? No. But it sure does fulfill the basic functions of money imo with its tech.

Most governments are already saying this and putting out guidelines as to how much tax individuals should pay and the scenarios at which these taxes are applicable at.

Capital gains tax is probably the most prominent tax that is applicable to bitcoin, and most countries already have crypto CGT rules in place. Does it hinder the growth of bitcoin or the adoption of bitcoin? Not a bit.

I think that your misconception comes from the fact that you're talking about a tax for holding bitcoin which is completely illogical and no countries have or probably ever will implement.

In fact, i think that a clear and refined tax schedule should help adoption, if bitcoin is recognized as a currency instead of a good.

I'm perfectly fine with bitcoin being taxed as a currency or an CGT asset.

However, some countries previously or still are currently classifying bitcoin as a good, and charging VAT on purchases of bitcoin. This I don't think is anything logical by any means. Firstly, bitcoin is not a good or a service. By having this VAT on bitcoin, it also means that people have to pay extra on their bitcoin purchases over the market rate, which is obviously bad.

I think that a combination of these tax rules will make sense. For example, income received through BTC can still be taxed as income tax. I think that as adoption grows, these tax rules will mature as well with specific guidelines which is not the case yet.

There could be a short term rally that may occur this month or in the next. However, I don't see this as the bottom yet. We're still in a market with an extremely bearish sentiment, and the bear market has not gone on for enough time for us to consider it completely over (look at 2013's bear market which took 3 years to fully recover to ATH).

So I do believe that there will be further corrections with the price.

$4500-5000 could be the floor, it could be lower, could be higher. Nobody knows. But that range imo should be close to the bottom of the bear market based on historical data showing that BTC usually loses 75-85% of its peak value during a bear market.

It's probably a good thing to do for the brand as .info is probably not as recognized a TLD as something like .com. And since they already own the blockchain.com domain anyways, it wouldn't make sense to have two separate sites performing different things owned by the same company that people can easily get confused about. It's all coming from a branding perspective. Blockchain.info will most likely still redirect after the change, so old users shouldn't be that affected.

The domain probably cost them a ton, obviously, and it means that they want to brand and market themselves better and are investing a lot of money into that.

I haven't used them though since they got the update in their interface, but they should still appeal to new users because of their easy to use interface. I honestly would rather them fix some obvious issues with their system, such as the fact that exporting privkeys isn't an easy process. Their choice though.

Yes, withdraw your funds asap from these exchanges, because once RBI regulations start kicking in it'll be unclear how you could get your funds out. You will still probably be able to withdraw your funds in BTC, but I doubt that there will be demand for rupee balances stuck on these exchanges.


Well, this has been announced ages ago by the RBI. So it's really expected by everyone, it's just that it's only coming into effect now.

It's important to note though that these regulations imposed by the RBI are only applicable to banks, and you are still able to trade bitcoin freely with other payment methods. I expect that p2p trading within India with various payment methods becoming a lot more popular following this announcement from major exchanges.

I don't believe that there is any threat that this bear market has on the long term development of bitcoin as a currency whatsoever. Prices are quite distinct to adoption and use, you have to understand that, since prices can be easily influenced in the short term due to the fact that bullish and bearish sentiments exist in the market and influence traders.

There won't be any longlasting effects on BTC. Nothing like what some are saying (bitcoin is dead etc.). It's just a bear market.

Accumulating BTC while everyone is selling in a bear market is probably the most sensible thing to do, at the moment. I think that anything under $7k is worth buying at given that you are able to hold for at least a few years. With the new institutional investors and a lot more established bitcoin services that are currently heading into the market, I expect the next bull market to be quite significant (although it's probably not going to be as heated as 2017).

If you want no KYC, then go to Localbitcoins, paxful, Bisq network, hodlhodl. With both localbitcoins and paxful you are able to purchase BTC and other cryptos with a wide range of currencies (pretty much every single fiat currency out there) and payment methods. However, with LBC they've recently instated new rules in terms of KYC for users with significant volumes. Similar stuff with hodlhodl and bisq, just that there is a lot less offers.

The disadvantages to these two exchanges is that you're unlikely to find a lot of cryptos available, the main use is to convert fiat to BTC, not BTC to other crypto. Rates are going to be slightly above market as well.

Binance and shapeshift are the exchanges that I use if I want to get some other crypto quickly. They are both extremely reliable, and have pretty much every major coin. Don't use exchanges like poloniex, hitbtc, yobit, which have terrible track records.