Halving block reward will NOT double the price!

[scintill]

what if auxiliary services like pools mess up on the halving and give out too many (or too few?) coins,

each and every node verifies each block to ensure it complies with the protocol, or it rejects the block.  This has been coded (and tested) long ago.

I know the nodes and protocol are fine, but pool software could credit too high "unpaid rewards" based on shares, into pool accounts.  If it amounted to anything substantial and the miners noticed before the pool operator and cashed out, the pool could lose coins.  (I'm assuming they usually have an address holding enough coins to meet anticipated payout demand, and the software automatically transfers whatever balance is on the pool account.)

[finkleshnorts]

what if auxiliary services like pools mess up on the halving and give out too many (or too few?) coins,

each and every node verifies each block to ensure it complies with the protocol, or it rejects the block.  This has been coded (and tested) long ago.

I know the nodes and protocol are fine, but pool software could credit too high "unpaid rewards" based on shares, into pool accounts.  If it amounted to anything substantial and the miners noticed before the pool operator and cashed out, the pool could lose coins.  (I'm assuming they usually have an address holding enough coins to meet anticipated payout demand, and the software automatically transfers whatever balance is on the pool account.)

Pool ops are well aware of the reward drop and will plan accordingly.

[DublinBrian]

Point being that we've all always known. The halving is a part of bitcoin and has been influencing the value since the beginning. In my opinion, without halvings no one ever adopts bitcoin and the value is 0. So the halving does way more than double the price, but it doesn't do it when the halving happens.

+1

The halving is already incorporated into the price, to a certain degree. As we get closer to the actual event, more and more of it becomes incorporated into the price.

[lucif]

Halving block reward will decrease the ask on market. This will absolutely have effect on price dynamics. Of course, if there will be no bubble on market (i.e. market will not be overbought).

[P4man]

Halving block reward will decrease the ask on market.

Actually, no. As long as there is a block reward, the amount of bitcoins will increase and thus ask will increase. At a slower pace than today, but its still a tangible increase. Whether or not bids will keep pace with this increase is what will determine future pricing.

[n8rwJeTt8TrrLKPa55eU]

Reward halving will have no meaningful effect on price or, possibly, might cause a short-term price drop when speculators who have stupidly bought expecting a quick double are disappointed and try to exit en masse.

The dynamic in Bitcoin is exactly the same as in gold mining because Bitcoin, like gold, is a hoarded (i.e. monetary) commodity.  Gold/Bitcoin moves up or down almost exclusively due to fluctuations in investment demand, regardless of mine output.

As an example, consider that the insane price volatility of this past Friday occurred with coins being produced at a constant rate (50 every 10 minutes).  So clearly the immutability of incremental supply had no impact whatsoever on keeping the Bitcoin price constant as well.  The fluctuations in demand (both short and long term) far dwarf the hourly output of 50 (or 25) coins per hour, because even with a 20% inflation rate, the amount of coins already held massively exceeds the amount of new coins being produced at any given time.  So coin price is determined by whether existing coin holders decide to sell or keep their coins, and not by anything that the miners are doing.  Confidence and demand are the only meaningful price drivers.  

Obviously the gold market is much more mature and further along than Bitcoin, but the principles at play are identical.  For further stocks-to-flow analysis of monetary commodities, replace "Gold" with "Bitcoin" in James Turk interview below:

Stock to flow ratio is key to understanding "Bitcoin":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9A7CZgPld8

[IIOII]

Point being that we've all always known. The halving is a part of bitcoin and has been influencing the value since the beginning. In my opinion, without halvings no one ever adopts bitcoin and the value is 0. So the halving does way more than double the price, but it doesn't do it when the halving happens.

+1

The halving is already incorporated into the price, to a certain degree. As we get closer to the actual event, more and more of it becomes incorporated into the price.

+1

I think after the ''halving event'' took place a price drop is much more likely than a doubling. Though I expect substantial expectation driven upwards movement before this event.