I would just like to point out that Ireland is NOT part of the United Kingdom. An important distinction, as hundreds of people in this country lost their lives fighting for independence from our British overlords in the the Irish war of Independence. I don't think anyone in the USA would take too kindly to someone dismissing the achievements of George Washington et al by referring to the USA a British colony.

Regarding the identity of Satoshi and the speculation on his potential Irish nationality, I wouldn't be surprised. We have some of the greatest thinkers in the world here in our Emerald Isle. And since we have known what it is like to be oppressed for over 800 years, we have a strong social distaste for unjustified authority. So it wouldn't surprise me to find out that a technology as economically and politically subversive as bitcoin was conceived of here, considering the abuses of power these institutions have gotten away with over the past few decades.

Whether or not it is the case remains to be seen. I personally doubt it, as the evidence is lacking.

Forgive me if I am jumping to conclusions as I don't know if you were being ironic or not, but if you weren't, how arrogant and conceited is this statement? We are not all from the USA, nor do we all agree with the cut-throat neoliberal greed, self interest, individualism, commercialism and consumerism so dearly loved by the business elites in your country, which are peddled to the rest of your society and devoured voraciously as if it were akin to that pillar of american gastronomy, high fructose corn syrup.

Despite what you might think, the world does not revolve around North America. In fact, the majority of the rest of the world consider the USA to be an irritable little child who knows nothing but instant gratification and throws tantrums when he doesn't get what he wants.

Bitcoin is a project that supersedes national borders. It was created by a japanese guy, so please don't presume that american schools of thought have a monopoly on the bitcoin economy.

I'm not getting mad, I just like a little heat in my discussions.

Part of why I am arguing so strongly against excessive speculation is because I see the same bullshit being dished out by "investors" who want to do the exact same thing with bitcoin as they have done with every other asset, i.e. create artificial volatility so they can skim profits off the top while contributing absolutely nothing and simultaneously making the economic environment of bitcoin incompatible with legitimate commerce. This is my biggest grievance with the speculators here.

Few seem to understand that what has been happening to bitcoin over the past couple of months is a result of the exact same mentality that caused all the other asset bubbles we have seen since the 70s, only since the value of bitcoin is solely determined by investor sentiment, and the system has even less regulation than our current monetary system, the opportunity for pulling off these scams is incredible.

The only way to counter this is to persecute speculators who are in it solely for short term profit. Doing this, you often end up tarring all investors with the same brush. But I have nothing but respect for people who invest and hold long positions because of their belief in the future success of bitcoin.

It is the people who buy and sell only to realize short term fiat profit that I have a problem with, because they are siphoning value out of the system, away from those who believe in the project, and making the whole thing as unstable as an elephant on a pogo stick.

I disagree that we should stop talking because we can't agree

I don't think it was fiat currency alone that is to blame. It is a huge part of it, but it's a deliberately complex situation that the banking elites have tried to obscure from us. In my opinion, it is more to do with the perfect storm of fiat currency, the lack of fiscal discipline in the central banks, the advent of derivative investment vehicles, and of course fractional reserve banking which resulted in swathes of investment capital flooding into virtually every market you can think of, causing massive speculative asset bubbles the likes of which have never been seen before.

If fiat currency was regulated properly and banks were held to account for excessive risk taking we wouldn't have the ability to pump money into these asset bubbles, and they would therefore not reach the levels we saw in 2008 with the housing market in the US and some european countries.

The problem as I see it is the lag in information dissemination between investment bankers and the general public. The bankers begin to inflate an asset with their large purchasing power, after which, lower rung investors begin to pile in. The bankers know they are triggering asset bubbles, and are ready to sell their holdings at the height of the bubble and then short all the way back down. They artificially create volatility so they can enrich themselves and their shareholders, taking money off everyone else.

And when their tactics fail, the government is there to bail them out with public money. They take massive risks on the behalf of the rest of society, and when they win they take all the rewards but when they lose, suffer none of the consequences. Since the 70's, and Regan's policies of abolishing financial regulation, they can do this with impunity. Nobody is held accountable, as they just conveniently blame the market when these bubbles burst claiming that 'nobody saw it coming'.

Anyone with a brain could have saw it coming, in fact, the worst part is that the people who tried to bring some sanity to the table were completely ignored or silenced, and the rest kept the information to themselves so they would have a competitive edge when the inevitable occurred. This thing resulted from a wide-ranging conspiracy between banks, governments, the media and wealthy elites to enrich themselves at the cost of everyone else.

I too love bitcoin because of what it is trying to achieve. Whether or not it is successful or not, what keeps me going is the thought that one day, bankers will wake up to find that poison arrow lodged squarely in their chests.

That thread talked mainly about filling partial orders, and there was only a very brief discussion with regards to the ability to place orders without having any bitcoin balance. It was just skimmed over and brushed under the carpet as far as I can see.

I have read from a few people that nefario has been MIA for a while now. I can somewhat empathize, I imagine the pressure he was under to be quite high. He had been talking about open sourcing the GLBSE server code for the past couple of months. But is there anyone actively responding to technical queries like this on the forum?

Quite worrying...

I'm surprised by Nefario thinking that this would be a good idea. It's an absolutely TERRIBLE idea, and it's the first I have heard about it other than the few experiences I had with vanishing bids. If as you said, that depositing funds does not validate the order anyway, then what is the point? As far as I can see, the only thing this achieves is to give people who know about it the ability to misrepresent market depth. Absolutely unforgivable.

This needs to be fixed. How can any of us who own stock on the GLBSE evaluate our positions properly when there is such uncertainty about the depth of the bid side? It's not a major problem if you are going long all the way with the stock, but if you are buying and selling these instruments daily then I can only imagine that it is a major headache.

Are there any existing threads discussing this on the GLBSE forum?

Well... that saves me the effort at testing out my theory then. It's pretty ridiculous that the system is set up this way, allowing people to falsely manipulate market depth. Huge oversight in my opinion. But it doesn't sound like it would be hard to remedy. All that would need to be done is to check if there are any outstanding bid orders when users try to withdraw their coin, and if there is, don't allow the withdrawal of more funds than is required to meet the order.

Are you saying that you can create bid orders without having ANY coin in the first instance, or that you need the coin to place the order but it is not cancelled after you request a withdrawal from the account? I hope it is the latter, as this might be attributed to a simple oversight and easily remedied, but the former is absolutely unforgivable.

Nefario or one of the GLBSE devs need to address this problem immediately.

I have a theory on how this is being done.

I wonder if you funded your account, made an order and then withdrew the bitcoin, would the order still stay in place but with no funds to back it up? If so, when someone tries to sell into the bid, the GLBSE platform attempts to transfer the coins, but since there is no coin to back up the bid... hey presto, bid vanishes. I'm going to test this theory and report back when I have an answer.

Other possibilities would be bots operating on the site that can detect sell orders BEFORE the glbse client itself and can then withdraw the bid in time, or an exploit in the software that insiders are using to manipulate the platform. I think both of these scenarios are pretty unlikely however.

Nobody is disputing your enthusiasm for bitcoin, it is admirable. I have already read some of your thread on Gold over the previous weeks, and I know that you are not a run of the mill lemming like so many of the others.

You clearly know what you are talking about when it comes to gold, but that is the crux. Bitcoin is not like any existing currency, commodity, equity or any financial instrument currently in existence, so the traditional ways of viewing these things have to be called into question.

You cannot rationally be a investing in the bitcoin market and basing decisions on fundamentals alone, because there is very little change in fundamental economic indicators. As others have said, 99% of the speculation that is going on is speculation on the speculation of others. It has no grounding in the growth of the real bitcoin economy, and actually discourages adoption of bitcoin by new merchants, thus ultimately dooming your own investment.

The level of speculation we are seeing is completely irrational until the bitcoin economy is able to post figures that can, at least somewhat, back up the wild delusions of these zero-sum cowboys.

I have thought about this myself, and came to similar conclusions. This might be reflected by the fact that the share price has risen recently to 1.4 btc/share, an increase of 700%, which on the surface looks too good to be true. But on 16th September, when I first listed this company on GLBSE, the bitcoin exchange rate to USD was roughly $5-6. It is currently standing at about $3, which is almost a 50% drop - so it might be rational to assume that half of this 700% increase might be explained by the reduced purchasing power of bitcoin.

However, the price of the service has not been altered to reflect the exchange rate. In fact, it has actually been reduced by 50% from the original price I had set in my growth estimates. I really try to ignore the btc:usd exchange rate as best I can. Deciding not to link to the exchange rate was more of an ideological decision than a profit-seeking one, I know shareholders will shudder to hear me say that, but several users have commented positively on the pricing structure, so I think it is bang on target to encourage use and growth of the service.

Shareholders will also be happy to know that BitCoinTorrentz is currently turning over a profit 480% greater than my original growth estimates which where admittedly quite conservative, despite the price being 50% more than what I am charging now. So it is rational to assume that 480% of the 700% increase can be attributed to my undervaluation of the share price at the IPO. The other 220% might be due to the 50% drop in value of bitcoin as you suggested.

It's difficult to come to any sort of meaningful conclusion however, as interpreting all the variables is challenging - especially when you try to factor in the volatility of the bitcoin price.


Haha. Thats awesome, and thanks for the referral!

I do think that there is still huge potential out there for this service, even considering the very impressive current growth figures. It's only been 5 weeks since launch. It took 3 years after it's inception for me to discover bitcoin. I could go out and spam every forum I can find, but I would rather grow this business slowly and organically, so that I can adequately cope with increasing demand.

cypherdoc: I don't speculate on what other speculators will do.
mjcmurfy: that's bullshit. what do you speculate on then?
cypherdoc: how can i possibly answer that? stop acting so smart.

It's quite easy. Just tell me what it is you are speculating on if you aren't speculating on metrics that are directly related to the decisions of other speculators? It's only difficult to answer if you were lying, or didn't fully understand what you were saying, and now realize that you cannot answer the question without invalidating your original statement.

Either way, this only highlights and reinforces the assumptions I already have.
So, keep trying, or else stfu.

I will make whatever assumptions I like, based on the things that you are saying and the points you are arguing. My post was in direct response to a statement that you made claiming that you "don't speculate on what other speculators will do". This is just bullshit, and you have been called out. Feel free to prove me wrong, the onus is on you to refute my assumptions, not on me to read through a week-long thread. I am still waiting for the answer to my previous question, so my assumptions will remain until you answer it, and will be reinforced if you fail to answer it adequately.

This is a ridiculous statement for any speculator to come out with, and highlights the level of delusional thinking I have come to expect from these people.

So you have never used a financial chart, or any form of technical analysis then? You don't consider support and resistance levels to be significant in your trading decisions? You don't look at trade volume or any other kind of financial metrics? You don't buy when you see large upward price movement or sell when you see large downward price movement? Did you sell any coin after the CosbyCoin incident or MtGox hack?

You must be a highly unique type of speculator, because all of these things directly reflect what other speculators are doing. Especially when it comes to the exchange rate of bitcoin, which is more directly associated with investor sentiment than any other speculative vehicle currently available. If you don't base your speculative decisions on what other speculators are doing, then why do you even bother visiting the speculation subforum?

What exactly is it you are basing your speculative decisions on then?
Lets hear it... this is going to be good.

I know, but I felt inclined to point out that it is difficult to get liquidated if you earn the coins properly instead of spinning them around, gambling on a leveraged zero sum game. Maybe those getting screwed over by margin trading might have more luck investing in those bitcoin ponzi games that are so popular - at least with those they can only lose what they actually "invest", so at least thats a plus, right?

There seems to be no end to the means by which gullible people are getting robbed of their wealth. You all can keep gambling and "investing" and handing your money over to luckier idiots, but I think I will stick to the traditional method I outlined above.

I have not lost a penny of my money, because I have not gambled any of it away.

I have obtained the total contents of my wallet through some early attempts at mining and then (the majority) by earning it through the provision of a service to the bitcoin community. So no matter the exchange rate to fiat, I still will have a net increase in my wealth quantified by the present and future purchasing power of bitcoin.

Bitcoin margin traders will learn the hard way how NOT to make money.

There are definitely bots on GLBSE. I suspected it a few weeks ago, but now I am certain. On some of the stocks I have bought, I have noticed bid-walls that mysteriously vanish when disturbed, just like on MtGox. They artificially increase market depth, then buy up some of the higher priced asks, and wait to lure in investors. Soon after comes suspicious sell volumes. Someone has been using this tactic for a while now.

I think this is a great idea.

I too am putting my name on this list. I vow not to exchange any bitcoin revenues generated by my business BitCoinTorrentz for fiat, except that which is required to pay expenses that cannot be otherwise covered. It would just be a blind-faced lie for anyone to say that they won't exchange any coin, ever, but I pledge to keep the amount I exchange to an absolute minimum.

Since I have very few expenses that cannot be paid for in bitcoin, this will not be too difficult of a promise to keep.
I have not exchanged a single coin for fiat to date.

I hope this happens. But do you think that bitcoin could withstand the loss of MtGox, which has managed to establish itself as a crucial cog in the bitcoin economy? I think negative PR on that scale would trigger a massive outflow of goodwill and capital from the system. It may end up being a devastating blow.

Though, with no way of easily cashing out bitcoin for fiat, speculators would then be forced also to take as bullish an outlook for bitcoin as they are currently forcing bitcoin merchants to do. I don't know what the outcome of all that would be, but I think it probably would result in a much better economic environment for everyone involved.

+1


+1

I agree. From a merchant's perspective, volatility makes bitcoin a nightmare to do business in. Some speculation is necessary, to ensure that hardware, goods and services required for the bitcoin economy (but cannot as yet purchased with bitcoin) can be obtained with fiat currency. But when nobody wants to leave any capital within the bitcoin economy, it is extremely difficult to operate a business under these conditions.

It's hopeless to expect speculators to only take the long view, and since there is no defined floor for the price of bitcoin, any merchant who adopts it is taking a huge risk. As a bitcoin merchant, you have no option but to force yourself to assume an overly optimistic and bullish outlook, whether you believe it or not. So the only merchants who will adopt the system are those who can successfully delude themselves. Do we want to entrust the development of the early bitcoin economy to irrational people?

With speculators buying and selling schizophrenically, sending the exchange rate wild, rational entrepreneurs naturally find it difficult to maintain this optimistic outlook when they see such bearish signals coming from the markets and then feel their balance sheets squeeze and expand within no defined range.

It is going to take some time still for all those irrational speculators out there to get bored of their zero sum game and realize that it is a pointless exercise before we get any kind of economically viable environment for businesses to operate in.

If you have to point out your sarcasm, you didn't do it properly.