Paper money is worth nothing intrinsically, apart from the paper that was used to make the notes. This is because governments can always turn more of the paper that money is printed on into actual currency that we deem as valuable. However, there are absolutely no guarantees that fiat will ever retain its value.

It doesn't even have to be paper money, it could be centralized, electronic currency.

I agree with this quote. We haven't seen a single fiat currency hold its value at all over the long term. It may take time for it to lose value, but eventually, it will. That's why I feel like decentralized currencies are where most of your assets should be put into.

Regardless of how much this sort of theft is costing the average American, it's still costing them more than robberies "on average". Being denied your rightful wage is obviously extremely bad. In some cases you might have someone losing out on thousands, others, perhaps none. But it still means that the employees in the former case suffers as a result.

I doubt that blockchain will be able to help that much, since it's still based on trust on the employers to write the rigthful data in the first place, doesn't it? It still doesn't guarantee overtime to be paid.


That could work. But how does blockchain play a role in random inspections at all?

I don't know whether it's just a coincidence that all of a sudden people are having all sort sof problems with their service, but with the lack of communication from the admin of the site and the consistent stream of complaints, it does seem like an exit scam, or just a poorly managed project. The site isn't even live right now as we speak, might be another sign of an exit scam.

The apparent owner of the site is still active on reddit, so perhaps trying to contact him there would help: https://www.reddit.com/user/raix_jaydubs

Even if they do come back online, and do sort out all their issues, I doubt there is any point in using them considering the risks. There are much better exchanges that list the same coins as they do. We don't even know if they are regulated or just a random exchange on the internet. No point in using them, imo.

I think that this is a demonstration of what bitcoin can bring to the table practically.

Bitcoin is a decentralized currency, unlike all of the fiat currencies that are issued by governments. Obviously in the case of Venezuela, hyperinflation is ensuing and a lot of people are left without a way to store their wealth even for the very short term, in order to retain value from their wealth to be able to afford groceries. Bitcoin can serve as a store of value, and perhaps even a medium of exchange, when the fiat system becomes dysfunctional.

That's why bitcoin is a hedge and a store of value for the long term. Thanks for sharing your experiences OP, and hopefully more of the unbanked population in Venezuela are able to integrate bitcoin in their daily lives for their benefit.

It's not a crucial day. There's still some resistance at $7.7k, which is the major resistance that you said to be watching. Prices were around that level yesterday, however, prices early in the day today have taken a 1.5% hit so the short term future remains somewhat uncertain.

But I agree, if bitcoin does break $8k within the next few days, then I feel like there is a high likelihood that we're going to test the $10k resistance again. Though I don't think that there is enough momentum in the market to propel it above that level just yet.

Loading up at $7-8k would be a pretty good price for the long term anyways, but if bitcoin does break $7.7-7.8k, it would make sense to make the trade to buy at those levels at sell at near $9-10k where the major resistance is to take advantage of the swings in price.

Exactly. How reliable is a centralized network is something that people need to ponder about. This is just a practical demonstration that even with the extensive countermeasures put in place by Visa to prevent these crashes, these things do happen.

Cash in this instance would be much more reliable. Even a decentralized network like bitcoin wouldn't have these issues.


Hacking problems still come from centralized platforms, like exchanges. If you use bitcoin as it is intended, with you having sole control over the private keys, these issues can easily be mitigated.

I wouldn't count on them responding to you any time soon, or giving you a different response other than "we temporarily disabled wire withdrawals". Fiat withdrawals are a complicated thing, because it involve a lot of regulations that are out of their control. They've stated clearly in this case, that they have temporarily disabled it. Nothing you can do.

If you are urgently trying to withdraw, have you tried converting your USD balance back to BTC?

If you can do that, then just withdraw BTC, and sell it on a platform such as LBC that you know is guaranteed going to work. You'll be taking probably a 5-10% loss for the convenience, but that's your only option other than waiting for them to reinstate the fiat withdrawals, which could be any time in the future (could be months).

I think a lot of people get this stuff mixed up.

A ponzi scheme that accepts bitcoin has really nothing to do with bitcoin. They simply elected to accept bitcoin as a form of payment - it's not directly related to the bitcoin platform, nor is it endorsed by anything or anyone within the bitcoin community/network.

Now, I believe that the biggest telltale sign/rule that you should use to spot a ponzi is their business model.

Can you verify what they're doing as their business model to be true? For example, if there is a cloud mining site, can you verify that they are actually mining? If not, then it's probably a ponzi.

A ponzi is based on the idea that they use a cover story in order to suck in investors, and pay out investors based on previous investments. So their business model as well as the claims that they make are really both important points to consider.

I don't get why people think that bitcoin is a ponzi scheme/pyramid scheme.

There is simply no central entity, and that is the exact thing that bitcoin is based on. There isn't anyone that is collecting investments. When you use bitcoin, there isn't any single person that benefits from it. That's the plain truth.

Also, it's important to note that bitcoin doesn't even promise any returns. Its price fluctuates due to market supply and demand. How this can be classified as a ponzi scheme is really just beyond me.

I'd say that most people would agree nowadays that bitcoin is a legitimate currency, though it was disputed in the past.

I have never heard of a company called "payforks mining" before, which probably means bad news for you.

I agree with Steamtyme, it doesn't look good for you at the moment. Your money is held up in a cloud mining service that probably doesn't even mine anything. The sole reason that they exist is to scam investors out of their money.

If you earn anything, that money should be yours. You shouldn't be required to pay more money in order to withdraw your existing profits, that just doesn't make any sense. No legit company would do this to you.

Consider this money gone since I dont' see any probability that they will pay you back. But just keep an eye out for these scams in the future, and cloud mining in general.

For small amounts, I wouldn't bother signing up and getting verified for a major exchange. My suggestion would be to sign up for an account at localbitcoins, and just sell your coins there to a trusted seller with lots of feedback. That's the most convenient and hassle free option.

For bigger amounts, perhaps look into Bitstamp/Kraken. You'll get better rates, but verification process is a hassle.

BTW do you want USD, or the local currency of Azerbaijan? I'm not sure what you mean by Azerbaijani USD.

I don't think that Bitfinex really works with USD anymore? They only work through Tether, which I would personally never touch.

They literally picked the worst name possible for their business.

Needless to say, they are a pretty obvious scam. It's funny, because they literally copied everything over from Bitconnect and still thought that people would believe them and invest in this. Lending platforms like these are already a thing of the past. I think they're trying to get people to think that they are the new version of BCC.

Arbitrage is actually a legitimate way to make money, but definitely not on the scales that they are promising. Plus, they are guaranteeing returns, which means that their business model has nothing to do with this anyways.

Anonymously and loans simply don't go together.

Sure, you could go to the lending section of bitcointalk. However, if you don't have the valid collateral or reputation (which you definitely don't have), then you simply would not be able to get a loan. Since bitcoin is an anonymous and irreversible payment method, nobody will take a risk with you.

If you are able to provide identification as well as proof of income, then you could potentially a) get a personal loan from a fiat short term loan company or b) get a loan from p2p lending platforms like Bitbond. But generally, even ID isn't considered to be acceptable collateral on this forum, because lenders simply have no use of a piece of ID if you default.

Have you tried cryptocompare or altpocket?

Your choices are quite limited if you want one with a desktop/website version. Altpocket probably has everything that you're looking for here. You can link it to your coinbase account, you can share your portfolio and present to your clients or whatnot, and pretty much do everything that you're able to do on blockfolio.

Cryptocompare is probably a simpler version. You have to buy premium to get all the advanced analysis tools though.

I'm not sure about Fintab because I simply have not heard about it at all.

Absolutely. It's not really out of anyone's expectation that bitcoin has not performed as well this year compared to last year, because of the simple fact that we've entered the bear market stage of the cycle at the start of the year.

That's completely natural. What was unnatural was probably the FOMO buying that brought prices up to $10k. Of course, that was met with huge resistance and a pretty big correction, which is why we're here right now.

I wouldn't confidently say that prices are going to be recovering yet, but I believe that it's only a matter of time. Dips like these should be excellent opportunities to buy, when everyone else is panic selling.

I believe that poloniex has recently started to esssentially eradicate all legacy accounts from trading on their platform, which means that basically you need to be fully verified or otherwise you are not able to use their exchange. That's why they are demanding you to provide identification.

There has been some complaints of poloniex being unresponsive and taking a long time to respond to verification requests, so rest assured, you're not alone.

You've just got to continue to try and communicate with them via support, and otherwise, you just need to be patient with them because the amount of verifications they have to go through due to them eradicating the legacy accounts have been on a steep increase as you know. But yes, i do agree that without a legacy account or an anonymous account, there would be no point in using poloniex.

That's literally how a ponzi scheme operates.

Based on the "investment plans" that they are offering alone it's safe to say that they are 100% ponzi scheme/scam. If you had received your withdrawals then it simply means that they are paying out early investors that invests small amounts of money selectively.

It doesn't mean that they are any more trustworthy, or that their business model is sustainable. There has been countless other sites that offer similarly structured "plans" to lure investors in, and none of them have been legit.

He's online right now, it seems: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=18640.

I definitely find it hard to believe that he would just scam for $120 when he has been escrowing so much more. Perhaps he's busy, but I'd definitely echo the sentiment that he's still legit and there is probably a miscommunication somewhere.

I feel like that he hasn't received the message from the buyer to release the coins, based on the quotes.

Tell the other party to send SJ the confirmation message again, he may have missed it or your buyer may have directed the message to you instead of him the first time he sent the message. But I'd remain calm about the situation right now, there is no reason to think that he would all of a sudden turn scam.

If the 18% GST is implemented, then obviously it would mean that the Reserve bank of India will lift their restrictions that were recently placed on banks. It's not a ban, but it's still restrictive.

However, since India has been pretty much campaigning against any anonymous payment method, which included cash, I don't think that even though they are talking about a tax reform which means increased taxes on bitcoin trading, it is guaranteed that it will happen.

Things are quite uncertain within India right now regarding the regulation of bitcoin and other cryptos. It doesn't really make that much of a difference, to be honest. Even if RBI's regulations are lifted, and these new taxes come into effect, it'll still mean that mainstream crypto exchanges would not be able to operate due to the higher tax rates. Either way, p2p trading with cash or other non-bank payment methods will be the future of bitcoin trading within India in my opinion.

Bittrex is sort of having the same issues as poloniex.

They used to be two of the biggest exchanges in terms of volume, but now they are overall just mediocre. I think the primary reason is that Bittrex got rid of the legacy account and forced people to verify, which meant that small time traders who previously was able to trade anonymously without any sort of limitations most likely abandoned the platform altogether, since it's not convenient anymore.

Secondly, their support was really bad at one stage and a lot of people weren't able to get their tickets resolved in a satisfactory amount of time, which led to their reputation slip. Bittrex's presence in social media has also just not been there compared to newer exchanges like Binance. They also don't have newer coins listed on their exchange.

It's not necessarily anything bad, since they're still a regulated exchange. It's just that they are not as popular anymore.