Saw this other explanation of their business model on reddit:

"To explain what they mean by this note you would have to understand their basic business model. In exchange for a 1% margin, Coinbase offers short term loans of USD so that you can buy at the market price today using money that is still in your bank account. To do that Coinbase has to have money in place at an exchange, or close enough to an exchange that the exchange will let them trade with it. When bitcoin is more or less flat, there is very little cash movement, instead some buyers put money in, and some sellers take money out. But during a surge, a lot of money has to move through Coinbase and into an exchange, and the rate at which that can be done is limited by how much cash Coinbase has on hand, how long cash has to sit between transfers, and how long the ACH and international wire transfers take to complete. Divide cash on hand by the total delay time, and you get an approximation of their expenditure limits per day."

So if I'm interpreting this correctly, CB's purchasing of coins is limited by the speed of ACH transfers of new USD to the exchanges.  So what happens 3 business days from now, when their flood of new $ from today's Expedia news finally hits the exchanges?

No, me + the 1.3M other account holders on CB.   Imagine what would happen if they all just wanted to buy 1 coin today.  

Me, I just bought a bunch of new coins this morning.   

With the recent announcements (Yahoo Finance, REEDS jewelers, Expedia, etc.) I can definitely feel the media momentum building surrounding bitcoin.  Because the media is simply a tool for the rich, powerful, and well connected, I feel that an even bigger announcement in the media is on the horizon.  But this BIG news will be held back and expertly timed, after the wave of new fiat starts building bigger momentum and reaches a crescendo.

So the real question is, what will this game-changing headline be?  A Bitcoin ETF going live?  A big name like Amazon or even Google getting into bitcoin in a big way?  The NY State bitlicenses?  Warren Buffett changing his tune and buying bitcoin? (lol, no I don't really see that happening).

Obvious Bitstamp price suppression is obvious. 

But they can't keep a lid on a boiling pot forever.

+M'fking 1000.

Idiot n00bs refuse to believe that this question has been discussed (and summarily answered) over and over... for 4 fkn straight years now.

Trolls will be trollin'.

And up until now, in virtually every print article or online news article, they've been reminded of nothing but the bad news surrounding Bitcoin (e.g., Mt Gox implosion, China "ban", Charlie Shrem arrest, Silk Road, etc.).  So they know of it or have heard of it, but the articles put a "stay far away" negative spin around it.  Almost a condescending tone, as if to say 'you'd be a silly fool to buy some bitcoin based on all of this bad news.'

But imagine what will happen after the next cycle or so, when the press starts reversing previous bad news surrounding Bitcoin, and actually starts putting a positive spin on it instead?  Like quoting the PayPal CEO, or when PayPal/Amazon/Facebook/Apple adopts it, or a big name financial institution endorses it, ETF fund, etc.  

I mean look at this news, and yet hardly anyone in the U.S. even knows about this:
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/reeds-jewelers-now-accepting-bitcoin-120000388.html
http://www.reeds.com/about/Bitcoin.html

I can hear the articles of the future now, "...previously we were skeptical of Bitcoin, but with recent endorsements from X/Y/Z, we are suggesting that everyone should purchase and use some bitcoin."  When that happens, then public perception will change very rapidly.  

This sea-change happened with the public perception of the Internet, I should know as I'm old enough to remember the evolution.  

Not in the short term, too much risk for merchants without it.  At the very least services like BitPay and Coinbase will help accelerate merchant adoption.

Yes, someday^tm.  Actually, there's a Malaysian merchant that recently decided to hold btc instead of converting:
http://www.coindesk.com/malaysian-online-retailer-accepts-bitcoin-wont-convert-fiat-currency/

Where is our begh...

Very true.  Although I think it's pretty ironic that the majority are so sure and convinced that the bitcoin price will hit $50K, $100K or even $1M one day given enough time, but on the flip side are still too scared to invest any more of their money right NOW for fear of it going to $0.  Lol.  

I guess people just want to keep saying "shoulda, woulda, coulda" for the next 3-5 years because it makes them feel safe.

Troll trader/FUD Spreader #1: "Damn, btc price hasn't budged in a few days.  We need some new FUD panic. We need the price to fall to get cheaper coins!"
Troll trader/FUD Spreader #2: "Yeah, but what FUD?  China ban again?"
Troll trader/FUD Spreader #1: "Nah, we tried that again a few days ago, didn't work.  People just don't care anymore."
Troll trader/FUD Spreader #2: "Willy bot?"
Troll trader/FUD Spreader #1: "Nah.  Old news, plus Gox is way dead."
Troll trader/FUD Spreader #2: "Bitstamp insolvency?"
Troll trader/FUD Spreader #1: "Won't work, people know they are pretty solid now."
Troll trader/FUD Spreader #2: "....hmmm..."
Troll trader/FUD Spreader #2: "Wait, I've got it!"
Troll trader/FUD Spreader #1: "What?  What?"
Troll trader/FUD Spreader #2: "The 51% attack FUD!  People haven't heard about that stuff in a while! Let's resurrect it, I'm sure it'll cause some panic again. We'll post like crazy on Reddit and other sites, and whip this back into a frenzy!"
Troll trader/FUD Spreader #1: "Perfect." <evil grin>

Not sure how this would work for e-commerce transactions.  That's like saying you can only acquire and spend U.S. Dollars in denominations of $20s, $50s, or $100s.

And when the Nxt bubble slowly, agonizingly, drops back down to 0.00005 BTC after a month or two, they will get burned.  Again.  

Like I said, look at the fake head-and-shoulders pattern that these whale(s) have been trying to paint on the tape since May 30th.  Now they're trying to paint the right shoulder and get it to roll over and fall off.  They want all the n00b TA traders to see that, and be like "It's the right shoulder forming!! See ?!?! SELL! SELL! SELL!"

Whales are desperately trying to 'paint' a head and shoulders pattern they started on May 30th.

Don't let them win!  Don't give in, hodl!  

Proudhon^TM -trolling with 3 years of excellence

Bitcoin does! FB has around 1.3B (yes, that's billion) active users per month.

I can't wait until the bitcoin marketcap is finally high enough when we get past this silly notion of having to buy "whole" bitcoins, like whole round numbers really matter.  That holdover notion goes back years, when you bought coins in tranches of 100s, thousands, or even tens of thousands.  I still have friends who ask me, "Did you really buy a whole bitcoin for $500?  Isn't that a lot of money to spend?"

Part of the problem also lies with broker services like Coinbase, that denominate all purchases in btc (or fraction of btc).  In other words, currently you can't just punch in that you want to purchase exactly $47.23 worth of bitcoin directly into their web interface.  They should fix that pronto.

The Joe Public has to get past this notion of having to buy either whole bitcoins, or buying nothing (because they say they can't afford it.)  We need Joe Public to understand that they can buy $0.09 worth if they want.  Or $5 worth.  Or $103.76 worth.  It doesn't matter how much you buy, it'll likely appreciate long term no matter what.  Quadrupling your money on $2.50 is just the same as quadrupling your money on $2500.  As is quadrupling your money on $452.78 worth of bitcoin.

We need the script to change from "I just bought another bitcoin" to "I just bought $655.57 worth of bitcoin."

I think the psychological barrier will be finally broken when a single btc gets back into the 4 digits USD and well into it.  Hopefully.  By 5 digits, hopefully people won't even care anymore what the exchange rate is.

Yeah, this.  Also, why would the CEO say that he actually owns bitcoin, but then only integrate something else into PayPal?  Wouldn't make sense.

You kinda summed up how I feel right now as well.  While I'm all for fabricated or well-timed positive news during uptrends (and hate fake FUD during downtrends), I feel the media will be the devil of bitcoin until it's marketcap grows sufficiently large enough to be able to resist the media mania crap and the whale manipulation.