A quick check of the news easily confirms what others have already mentioned in the thread. It's clearly a fake, the SEC didn't get a new chairman. I did find some info from months ago with calls to change the head of the SEC, but that didn't lead to results. That's a shame because the current chairman has a very strong position that Bitcoin should not be regulated by the SEC, and a move to replace him could actually signify that the SEC will change its stance.

That's wonderful news! I've seen lots of inspiring threads here about Bitcoin adoption in Nigeria, and it was unfortunate that it had to be going on in spite of restrictions. Now that the trading ban is lifted, it makes the de facto situation okay de jure, and it's also paving the way toward more reasonable, crypto-friendly regulations in Nigeria that would embrace the entrepreneurial activities of Nigerians. I don't think it's big enough to affect the price of Bitcoin globally, but it's still very positive news because Nigeria is often mentioned among countries that have a lot of crypto usage.

There are plenty of currencies to choose from already. Some are controlled by specific nation-states, some belong to corporations. Others, and particularly Bitcoin, are decentralized and corporate-free. Bitcoin is a good currency for those who don't trust govs and corporations. It's accessible via the Internet, you don't need to have much to get started, and while the fees are too high right now, that's something we can wait out. But there won't be a single currency to unite everyone and replace other currencies. That's just not how things work.

Unfortunately, the article only says that he'll have to pay if he loses the trial, and this is just legal costs, not a fine or anything like that.
He can't log in to this forum. AFAIK, nobody can log in as satoshi any more (but unfortunately I can't find the info of what made me think so, so perhaps I'm wrong). But if he was Satoshi, he could find ways of proving it. It's been going on for many years now, and we still haven't seen a single piece of strong evidence. I think he's doing this as a publicity stunt, just to get attention. Then attention, of course, is transformed into money because he can capitalize on it.

Bitcoin's main point wasn't that it would be cheap, but that it would be decentralized, allowing to eliminate intermediaries in financial processes. Bitcoin is still decentralized and impressive in that sense. Ripple was created to improve global financial operations and with intention of lots of collaboration with centralized entities. And while Bitcoin isn't a corporation, Ripple is an invention of a certain company, so it's less decentralized. I think Ripple failed because it didn't manage to secure strong enough support of global financial operators, whereas Bitcoin didn't have to secure it in the first place.

Firstly, it's not just the US, but an international tea that includes people from the EU, the US and Ukraine. Secondly, it was just a recent discussion about the prospects of such a decision, but the implementation is still considered challenging, and the decision hasn't been made yet. More importantly, I don't think it will impact the USD's value and/or stability because that money won't be released into the overall supply but will instead go directly to the Ukrainian fight against Russia (and only if the decision is actually made).
The USD has been very stable lately, and it's the world's global reserve currency, with a very strong dominance on that market (no other currencies are close to challenging it).

Judging from the post and some interpretations in the thread, you spent some BTC on buying a hair straightener, right? So you didn't literally give her BTC, you used some BTC to buy this thing?
It's hard to read the post when a lot of times the op is saying "he" either when meaning "she" (wife) or when talking about himself... I also found it weird that you celebrate your wife's birthday "almost every year" because I thought every year makes more sense.
In any case, I'm happy it worked out for both of you, with you using BTC to buy her a present, and her making a BTC logo.

Experts predicted a very high percentage (something like 90%) of probability that we'll see the SEC approving Bitcoin ETF till the end of this year, but we're pretty much at the end of the year now, and I really don't see it happening in the very few work days that are left. I'm not surprised that everything is still unresolved with approvals because I initially assumed that the SEC doesn't want to grant an approval and is merely buying some more time for the issue to become less relevant to the public. Maybe I'm wrong, and we'll see an approval soon after all, but I expect the SEC to remain vague for as long as they legally can.

It's interesting that some people here tend to agree that higher liquidity means higher volatility. I wanted to write that there's no correlation because things can vary depending on an asset, and an asset can have low liquidity but be volatile because even small changes make a big impact, or, conversely, something like gold can be relatively stable but have very high liquidity. But then I also came across an academic article that says that there's actually a significant inverse correlation between liquidity and volatility. So the higher liquidity, the lower volatility and vice versa.

In my country, there are local online marketplaces that are popular for shopping online. Of course, you need to watch who you're buying from and what kind of things you're buying if you want it to have decent quality. Such platforms rather help than hurt local economy, I think. There are some people who use AliExpress, but it's usually for something you can't buy on local platforms, especially since delivery to my country takes forever. The prices are low, but the prices aren't everything. I do agree that if people use AliExpress to buy something that can be reasonably bought on a countrywide online marketplace, it's not good for the local economy because the money is getting out of the country and local producers and distributors aren't getting their share of it.

You're saying that marriages break up because of poor financial structure and planning, but is there actual data to back this up? I decided to find out more, and it seems that the top cause is irreconcilable differences, which means that people simple realize they aren't right for each other. Then there's infidelity, which is also cited very often as a cause of divorce.  Financial issues are mentioned within "other causes" in this article.
Then there's this article based on interviews with divorced individuals, with the main causes being the lack of commitment to marriage, infidelity, arguing too much, then getting married too young, and only then financial problems.
So it seems quite a stretch to say that the root cause of divorces is poor financial planning.
In my opinion, people actually often don't get married because they focus a lot of their finances and careers, and gradually lose their relationships over that. Moreover, getting married and building up financial resources together can actually be a good bonding experience for a couple. It's also very traditionalist to focus on men as providers for the family, when there are tons of countries where both men and women usually work and provide for their families.

It's true that many are excited over the expectations of an ETF approval, but I don't think a rejection would crash the market. Maybe we'll see something like a 10-15% drop, with an eventual recovery over a couple of months, but why more than that? After all, the current build-up of the price is gradual, and it's not over any serious approval news, so a rejection should not come as a major shock. Lots of people don't care what's going on in the US regulatory field, and in an even of a rejection, nothing will change in practice because ETFs aren't allowed now and will stay not allowed.
I'm pleased to see that many people seem to have similar thoughts in the thread about a rejection not having a major impact.

I'll just address predictions individually, stopping on those I have something to say about.
1: Seems like a safe prediction, I agree with this one.
2: It's considered very likely, according to industry experts, so perhaps we'll see it happen.
4: No, I really don't think stablecoins can beat Visa, and do it within the next year. Although that might depend on the metrics.
8: I don't think we're there yet, and AI assistants don't pay for things because they aren't human (unless the authors meant something different by the term here).
10: That's a very bold claim about Ethereum transaction fees, but Ethereum is doing really well in terms of the fees, even at a current level of around $1.

I'm happy that the last time the craze blew over, so I just hope we'll see the same again soon. Unfortunately, there seems to be a big enough market for those useless images and inscriptions. Ideally, Bitcoin just shouldn't be used for that, and I'd be in support of a motion to restrict such projects on Bitcoin blockchain because there are plenty of other blockchains to use for that stuff. Leaving Bitcoin alone is just basic decency. Its transaction capabilities aren't that good even without all these extra transactions, and using other platforms for this stuff is not a hard thing to do.

As was pointed out, generic discussions of mixers would still be allowed, as long as nobody is mentioning specific websites or suggestions to find specific websites. I've never used Bitcoin mixers, and I'm not planning to use them in the future. As for what's illegal, it always depends on a country. You should check the legislation of the country where you live, as well as see if there were any notable cases of people getting in trouble just for using mixers (and not people getting in trouble because of using mixers to launder money, for example).

Transaction fees are occasionally high, but it's not a trend of them getting higher over time. It's just that, at some periods, some events trigger increased activity, and those periods are bad for casual Bitcoin users just wanting to make a small transaction. 2022 was a year of very reasonable fees, and the same goes for parts of 2023.
I don't think Bitcoin's "whole concept" is of it being the cheapest system. To me, it's more about having a currency that's truly independent of the governments and from corporations; it's also about being able to send funds online without intermediaries.

Game 1:  29, 28'
Game 2:  29, 16'

Not everything valuable can buy water bottles. For example, you can't buy a water bottle with the Internet as a technology, only through the Internet on specific platforms. You can't buy a water bottle with a smartphone, either, even though it's an invention that reached global adoption fast.
Bitcoin is an alternative to fiat, another way to do money, so to speak. Bitcoin is also a valuable asset.
I don't think that the main issue is the resistance of major actors like governments, banks, or lobbyists. Bitcoin is volatile, Bitcoin doesn't scale well, Bitcoin transactions are irreversible, there's nobody to blame for Bitcoin going up or down, and Bitcoin transaction fees regularly rise too high. There are enough reasons for people to prefer fiat and banks over Bitcoin, simply because there's someone in charge, there are some ways of controlling the value, fiat tends to be stable (generally more stable than Bitcoin), etc. Not everyone wants decentralization, financial freedom and responsibility that comes with it.

I don't get how it can cost that much either, but I'd say it's better when the wealthy use their money on something relatively harmless instead of being fond of hunting animals, buying stuff made out of elephant bones, or something else in that fashion. The only downside is, of course, Bitcoin transaction fees spiking because of Ordinals, but I hope it's a temporary thing that will naturally die out.
When people buy stuff like that, maybe they do it because they can, or maybe they think they can sell it for an even higher price. Whatever it is, it's not the worst thing to spend money on, even if it's definitely not the best either.
Maybe it's a scam, though, as others suggested in the thread. In that case, it is harmful. But there's no evidence of that, right? It's just something that seems to make sense, but there's no proof.

Investing in altcoins can be a very unfortunate experience. Sometimes the problem is with the coin itself having a relatively low market capitalization and a high risk of an exit scam. Sometimes it might be a problem of buying too late or simply at a wrong moment in time. I've had my share of positive and negative experiences with altcoin investments, but overall, I agree with the op that they aren't worth it, and a simple good old Bitcoin investment is a better choice. It's simply a safer bet because Bitcoin is the #1 currency, it gets the most attention of high-profile investors, and it's been gradually growing for a longer time than altcoins.