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pedrog and josepht have it right.
Just the act of buying a large amount will raise the price before and during the purchase.
Similarly, as the "rich guy" would try to dump his LARGE amount of BTC, he would depress the price in the selling process.
Sometimes, buying or selling LARGE AMOUNTS does not work well...
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jones techbit wrote that the Feds could take the gold (by Executive Order, a la 1933).
They can try. It is estimated that they only got some 10% in 1933.
Also, hardly anyone trusts the government anymore, especially owners of gold. Gold owners would be unlikely to give it up. There is also a high correlation between gold owners and gun owners...
Seize the guns and the gold?
Molon Labe!
EDIT: same for seizing the Bitcoin.......
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... Monnt I went and looked at Agora Commodities, but they have changed their name to "veldtgold.com": veldtgold.comThey seem to be US-based. They accept (and encourage!) Bitcoin as payment. They also sell platinum. At some point I will get in touch with them. But, Provident is tough to beat. Provident is part of Elemetal LLC, the same company owns Ohio Precious Metals ("OPM"), the USA's largest refiner of gold. Provident sells OPM kilo gold bars, pant, pant, pant... All Ohio Precious Metals bars are RECYCLED (from jewelry, etc.), they make it very clear that they do not buy "conflict gold". |
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... I received my latest gold order from Provident today, everything OK, and I even "tested" the coin ("ring" test, OD, and weight). The "ring" test is carefully balancing a 1 oz Gold Eagle on your fingertip, and lightly striking it to hear the very nice ring. The Eagle (22 kt, has 1 toz of gold and a little copper and silver to make it tougher) has a very nice & distinct ring, the (24 kt) Buffalo has a very weak ring. TUNGSTEN does not even have a "ring", only a dull thud sound. * * * I note that BTC is over $270 as of my writing (so ratio of Au:BTC is about 4.42). Maybe I should have waited another week before buying gold from Provident... But, it really does not matter. BOTH BTC and gold are alternatives to the USD. I have (and will HODL) both. Au:BTC ratio can be found at: ounce.me <=== Very handy! |
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I am aware of them, but have not bought yet from them. IIRC, they have a nice & slick website. Perhaps I should give them a try. Especially if they have platinum in stock.
Have you bought from them? If so, how was your experience?
Are they related to the Agora publishing group ("The Daily Reckoning", etc.)?
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... iamback Thank you for your comments re programming. At 59, well, I will have to make a reasoned decision on how to spend time & energy learning a programming language... I saw earlier this evening (here at bitcointalk) that PHP is tied into OP_RETURN (I am interested in the whole "putting data on the blockchain" subject, my comments are on other threads), but it looks like I would need a Linux box, groan.......... I know a young guy who is interested in digitization of documents. Posting (hashes of) docs via proofofexistence.com and bitproof.com is an interesting subject that may fit in to a business idea he is looking at. SOMEONE, IMO, is going to make some serious dough finding the right business model of putting docs, one way or another, on the blockchain. A company I saw at TNABC ( factom.org) is working hard in the same general space. * * * But, if my efforts come to naught, that's OK... I'll just stick with analyzing our bearing sales in Peru and buy some gold when I get some of the profits sent up.  |
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... I have bought from amagimetals.com as well as providentmetals.com. I prefer Provident, as their shipping time was much quicker than the time I bought from Amagi. I have an order en route from Provident even now, maybe Monday... On the other hand, Provident does not have any platinum (Pt American Eagles, which I greatly prefer) in stock now, whereas Amagi DOES. It took some two weeks, but I did get my Pt coin from Amagi. Even though I like platinum as well (great diversification in precious metals, Pt is used by industry), I have not kept track of THAT ratio (it would likely highly correlate to gold:BTC). Platinum is currently selling for a small (roughly 2%) discount to gold. That is relatively rare. Historically, that means platinum is a good buy now... |
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... As a fan of both Bitcoin and gold, one indicator I often observe is the gold price to Bitcoin price. https://ounce.me/ currently (12:37 AM, US ET) has the ratio at 4.757 (4.757 BTC to buy a troy ounce of gold). I have bought gold with BTC three times, alas I was "lucky" (buying a tiny amount of gold at some 3:1, high BTC price). Lately I bought a bit more at some 4.89, the first time I had seen BTC relatively strong vs. gold. I cannot draw any conclusions yet as to when is a good time to accumulate more Bitcoin (at a low price I hope) vs. when to USE some of that BTC to buy gold (when BTC is relatively high vs. gold). But, I am watching, watching, watching... |
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... BlindMayorBitcorn jump-started my brain (thanks!) enough to remember the thread where I mentioned two other ways of posting data, the first can be read via blockchain.info: transaction no.: 4b1cd9f9e68a348eba331c9458ed59f59464ff993a0262905ef643439c153bb9 The message: http://goo.gl/k7zxjp* * * A document that I had proofofexistence.com run a hash and post: transaction no.: 09c388c5e1ef405751fb5dccb0767ed5f77f5f7f209def56ccae6433a111761b |
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... My guess is that a LOT of money is going to be made in posting data on the blockchain. I have been experimenting...: transaction number: 6a9922d3267b3b479a68215c68a81d4c308d71288f2c58d36c796eb01c938293 Using blockchain.info you can note the OP_RETURN script, which pretty much matches coinsecrets.org: j tu�܊=��1���S�1�N��1�{s N���� (Above using bitproof.com) * * * I also did something similar using proofofexistence.com, but that information is on my office computer, not here.  |
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It looks like I should repeat what I earlier wrote re Bitcoinfog...:
"They ought to pass a law that you cannot use a BTC mixer (tumbler) until after you have read this thread."
* * *
bitcointalk member _otacon_ (Comment 421 above) wrote:
"A clearnet bitcoin blender...lol I can just see LE looking at the transactions as they come in. Anything that's hosted on the clearnet has zero anonymity and is not secure."
_otacon_ might be right re LE. It might be that NO ONE can beat the Big Rhino (US federal government) with all of their neat-o NSA tools...
I am not concerned about NSA and our friends at .gov, but I think that adroit use of mixers (and exchanges, etc.) are likely to give almost anyone "Pretty Good Privacy".
The feds probably have TOR compromised anyway... Probably no place to hide from them...
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... Yes, the US$ has lost some 96% of its value since 1913. And I am a big fan of gold and Bitcoin. <== Everyone should own some of each (where possible). But, in the past two or so years, the dollar has been very strong versus almost everything. Stocks have been very strong as well since 2009. The Dow, the S&P 500 and NASDAQ are all near their all-time highs.Diversification !! * * * Top gold analyst "FOFOA" recently wrote that in his opinion there are NO "safe" investments that would beat or even match inflation. There is risk of default (that would include "default by inflation") in almost everything. FOFOA discusses these kinds of subjects at great length (emphasis on "great length") at his blog: fofoa.blogspot.com |
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... Grrr... I had a wonderful long post nearly completed and just lost it, "fat finger error", grr... CoinCubeYou thread has evolved very nicely, I read ideas here that I see nowhere else. Shine on! iamback, B.A.S., picoloI agree with all of you re loss of liberty and that personal freedom (and small government) was the key to the rise of America. Clearly we are in a decline. Does it match the rest of the world's decline? Great comments, keep 'em coming. * * * Re arming up, YES, I agree that as many Americans (inc. women) as possible should have firearms, be proficient in their use and have deep stocks of ammunition. Currently there is an attempt at an "Ammo Grab" here underway, namely a version of AR-15 ammo much used by recreational shooters (it's cheap ammo). Disclosure: I practice what I preach: I own a Saiga "AK-47" (semi-auto) and a Beretta 9 mm. I have ample stocks of ammo for both. * * * iamback raised an issue some two weeks or so ago that has stuck with me... Namely to improve (educate) oneself. I am considering learning Python, a computer programming language. Python appears to be relatively easy by programming standards and also appears to be friendly to math & statistics programs I am interested in (to learn more about our company's sales data). This (of course) will not be easy... But, I can take my time, and just learn what I need and/or want. Python might be of some use to me to learn more about Bitcoin, perhaps even the newly hot topic of placing data on the blockchain (via OP_RETURN operations). Most of the "guts" of Bitcoin and the blockchain are black boxes to me, I know next to nothing about how they work under the hood...* * Sorry for all of the bad metaphors |
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Actually I think the new rules are good. 75 characters is not burdensome, and bitmixer is paying, so they can insist on higher quality posts.
I am new to the campaign (two payments), and it is hard for me to see how I will ever post 50 times in one week. (Of course, being somewhat of a beginner and not a programmer would make it harder for me to reach 50 "worthwhile" posts)
"He who pays the piper calls the tune."
EDIT:
bitmixer's bot is really something! Automating tasks is one route to making more money....
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... Lyth0s I join the parade in cheering you on: posting economic stories. I have no quibble with the ones you have chosen. Our country's financial problems are epic. How it will all turn I have no idea. But I doubt that it will be pretty, I suspect the opposite. After one is convinced that we really DO have severe problems, the next item on the menu is what do each of us (as individuals) do to protect our savings and our families? * * * Here are two well-known websites that provide "News of the Day": -- zerohedge.com, very bearish and contrarian, fair number of trolls -- marketwatch.com, very conventional, but provides a wide range of stories There are a wide range of financial websites covering almost every subject. Perhaps the main problem is finding one or more that have sufficient information and that you can trust. |
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Well I had a problem with a blockchain.info wallet, and it had 2FA. I was able to get my BTC back from them, however, after a little back-and-forth (hey, it was THEIR fault).
As an aside, I was never able to get 2FA to work smoothly with my wallet (Google Authenticator).
So now I keep (another) blockchain.info wallet, but only to use for small transactions or to mix coins with their SharedCoin service. My current balance is about $7.00 worth of BTC.
I would recommend keeping larger amounts in a trusted hardware wallet. I am happy using Trezor and Ledger Nano, both seem to be excellent.
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I had one problem with a blockchain.info wallet, but apparently not the same one as Blazr referred to. I had a wallet there, but one day I saw that everything had been sent out (this wallet had 2FA "protecting" it). There was also a "Public Note", instructing me (and many others) to contact blockchain.info. My wallet and the others who also had BTC sent out all had the same wallet as the receiving (thieving?) wallet.
I did contact them, and after a little back-and-forth (not bad), they told me to open another wallet, with another password and to never use the old one. I did what they said, and everything then went fine.
* * *
I now use blockchain.info wallets only for transactions and mixing (their SharedCoin service). I also use their "Second Password" feature (look to the "Settings" to find out how to use that). The second password is used to send money out (or to get another address). The second password is typed in via a "virtual keyboard" displayed, a little like Trezor's password prompt. That helps keep the keystroke logging programs at bay.
Blazr knows a lot more than I do. But, some of blockchain.info's problems do indeed seem to be bugs that they inadvertently introduce when tinkering with their coding.
Still, I have switched over to Ledger and Trezor hardware wallets for larger amounts of BTC I want to keep in cold storage or keep around for larger purchases. The hardware solutions seem to be much safer.
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juju & batesresearch
Thank you very much for the links. Clearly I now have some work to do to learn more.
This is a subject worth keeping an eye on. Someone will likely make a lot of money.
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... I received my second payment from bitmixer, thank you. But at this stage, I will not post each week when I get a payment, I do not want to *spam*. |
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... Keep in mind that bankers and governments lie. I have no way of understanding the financial strength of "the banks" now, but I would recommend (and already do, to an extent) HODLing the below: -- physical gold and/or precious metals (5% is way more than 99% of Americans own) in your own possession -- Bitcoin (up to 1% for those who do not understand BTC well) -- CA$H, long green, sufficient for three months expenses if possible. Very few have all three of the above. You could add guns & ammo, food & water, etc., but then discussion of all that would best be put in a survival thread... |
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