New Year newbie Question...

[adam2018]

Hi guys, i have a question...

I am a uk user and im registered with Gdax and Bittrex.

I buy my Bitcoin at GDAX, and sometimes i like to hold Alt-Coins over at Bittrex.

Now my worry is this... (i have ignored fees and actual growth/retreat levels to make it simple)

Suppose i have $1000 to invest in Alt-coins and the price of Bitcoin is $10,000 and i buy 0.1 bitcoin ($1000)

Lets suppose i invest that amount in Alt-Coins and the Alt-coins grow by 50% so now my $1000 has grown to $2000 in Cryptos. Fantastic.

I sell my Alt-Coins for Bitcoin and i want to cash out the Bitcoin back into Fiat so i can see $2000 in my Bank Account...

But lets say the price of Bitcoin falls to $5000.

My $2000 will shrink to $1000 regardless of how well my Alt-coins performed, because now 0.1 of Bitcoin = $500  

I know 50% may be a extreme exmaple, but the point holds that even if Bitcoin goes down 10%, my Bitcoin is worth less and hence the only
way for me to actually gain wealth is for both Bitcoin and the Alt-Coins to go up together (or for Bitcoin to stay stable and for the alt-coin to go up).

If i have misunderstood please explain, and what do you think about this?

[The End Is Neigh]

What's the question? Yeah if you buy litecoin at 0.02 and sell at 0.04 you'll have doubled your bitcoin. Who knows (or better yet, cares) what that'll be worth in fiat.

You're thinking about this all wrong. You've come over to a system better than fiat. Why would you go back? If everyone keeps doubling their money and going back to fiat, how would that not give governments even more incentive to print more money?

[adam2018]

What's the question? Yeah if you buy litecoin at 0.02 and sell at 0.04 you'll have doubled your bitcoin. Who knows (or better yet, cares) what that'll be worth in fiat.

You're thinking about this all wrong. You've come over to a system better than fiat. Why would you go back? If everyone keeps doubling their money and going back to fiat, how would that not give governments even more incentive to print more money?

The question is why are ALt-Coins pinned to the price of Bitcoin ?

If we can find a way to buy coins without pinning them to BTC (or any other coin) then it doesnt matter if Bitcoin goes up/down i will get to
keep my Alt-coin gains.

At the moment i can make fantastic gains and then lose my profits because Bitcoin has gone down.

TheEndisNeigh...are you trying to say all your wealth is in Crypto ? I dont know about you but i still have to pay my Bills in Fiat.

[bitperson]

Hi guys, i have a question...

I am a uk user and im registered with Gdax and Bittrex.

I buy my Bitcoin at GDAX, and sometimes i like to hold Alt-Coins over at Bittrex.

Now my worry is this... (i have ignored fees and actual growth/retreat levels to make it simple)

Suppose i have $1000 to invest in Alt-coins and the price of Bitcoin is $10,000 and i buy 0.1 bitcoin ($1000)

Lets suppose i invest that amount in Alt-Coins and the Alt-coins grow by 50% so now my $1000 has grown to $2000 in Cryptos. Fantastic.

I sell my Alt-Coins for Bitcoin and i want to cash out the Bitcoin back into Fiat so i can see $2000 in my Bank Account...

But lets say the price of Bitcoin falls to $5000.

My $2000 will shrink to $1000 regardless of how well my Alt-coins performed, because now 0.1 of Bitcoin = $500  

I know 50% may be a extreme exmaple, but the point holds that even if Bitcoin goes down 10%, my Bitcoin is worth less and hence the only
way for me to actually gain wealth is for both Bitcoin and the Alt-Coins to go up together (or for Bitcoin to stay stable and for the alt-coin to go up).

If i have misunderstood please explain, and what do you think about this?

I’m not sure I understand your question. If you exchange an altcoin for bitcoins and then immediately into fiat currency, the rate of fiat per bitcoin would be unlikely to change much due to the short time span. Of course, the longer the time you would keep those assets in bitcoin, the greater the chance of significant volatility.

And of course, if the value of bitcoins would drop while you were holding altcoins, you would instead receive a greater amount of bitcoins when selling your altcoins for bitcoins.

[jiggabyte]

Your question is simple arithmetic. If you have $1000 in bitcoin and it increases in value by 50%, you have $1500 in bitcoin. At any point, you can exchange your bitcoin to fiat currency at the current market conversion rate.

Note bitcoin is very volatile, so you should expect for it to lose 90% of its value at any time. Most people here are in it for the long term. If you're a noob don't expect to make $ by trading cryptocurrency, you will get rekt by better traders & algorithms that take advantage of your emotions & other weaknesses. Trading is a zero sum game - someone has to lose for someone else to win. https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=375643.0

You seem to have a lot to learn. This is a good starting point https://lopp.net/bitcoin.html

[adam2018]

And of course, if the value of bitcoins would drop while you were holding altcoins, you would instead receive a greater amount of bitcoins when selling your altcoins for bitcoins.

Ah yes that is a good point.

But what i have found is that when Bitcoin goes down, it drags down all the Alt-Coins with it.

The reason for this i think is because we have to buy BTC in order to buy ALTs.

Question... is why ? so i guess my real question is, is there a way to buy/sell Alt-Coins directly from Fiat ?  

[U2]

And of course, if the value of bitcoins would drop while you were holding altcoins, you would instead receive a greater amount of bitcoins when selling your altcoins for bitcoins.

Ah yes that is a good point.

But what i have found is that when Bitcoin goes down, it drags down all the Alt-Coins with it.

The reason for this i think is because we have to buy BTC in order to buy ALTs.

Question... is why ? so i guess my real question is, is there a way to buy/sell Alt-Coins directly from Fiat ?  

Certain alts yes. But not a lot of them. It's mostly well known alts, which at that point you'll see smaller gains than a low market cap coins that you can only buy with BTC/ETH/LTC/DOGE.

If you're Chinese or Korean there are much more fiat to crypto options.

[bizul]

Hey adam2018, forget bitcoin. Over the past few days, bitcoin share of the whole market reduced to less than 50% for the first time. Many are leaving bitcoin to invest into other alternative crypto-currencies. Bitcoin is slow, with high fees and not anonymous or private. Even if they fix the speed and the fees goes down, it is still missing many modern block-chain features.

Bitcoin is a difficult investment at this price. I suggest to search into new coins and buy now before the price goes up. If you are not sure which coin is worth your investment, diversify. Look for coins that are open-source and provide anonymity, privacy and decentralization. Soon, anonymity will be a necessity to hide your transactions from the public so governments won't be able to enforce taxes.

[odolvlobo]

The question is why are ALt-Coins pinned to the price of Bitcoin ?

They are not.

Coins may frequently go up and down together, but that is only because people investing in different coins invest for the same reasons. There are plenty of times when coins move differently.

Take a look at this page: http://blog.mclain.ca/buy-and-hold-31-cryptocurrencies-for-365-days-week-16/

[Mi5h0]

But what i have found is that when Bitcoin goes down, it drags down all the Alt-Coins with it.

No, not really. The idea that bitcoin falling drags altcoins down is an unproven hypothesis, it is something that traders have noticed, but due to the various flaws in human observation, we cannot say for certain it is true. There are several factors that could lead to this effect in the short term - but these are all speculative.

The reason for this i think is because we have to buy BTC in order to buy ALTs.

Wrong again. That mostly depends where and how you buy altcoins.

Question... is why ? so i guess my real question is, is there a way to buy/sell Alt-Coins directly from Fiat ?  

Yes, there is. There are plenty of options out there when it comes to buying altcoins. For example, all the coins that are on the Korean exchanges, whether they are alt or bitcoin, can be bought in fiat currency.