The current bitcoin market is inefficient

[pretendo]

This is implied by the fact that price is not uniform at any given time, even within the same exchanges. Causes of this is the high profile scandals, such as exchanges and large wallets being compromised what seems like every other week. Confidence is very low, and speculators, who would normally correct inefficiency and volatility, lack the solid information to make decisions. This means that technical analysis indeed viable, and will be useful until bitcoin finds equilibrium from big players being compromised.

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[evoorhees]

No market is perfectly efficient.

Markets tend toward efficiency always, and never achieve perfection. Bitcoin is no different than any other market in this regard, though you could say since it's newer and more volatile, it is still in a primitive state of efficiency.

[pretendo]

Markets being efficient means that price movements become a random walk. Bitcoin prices are almost certainly predictable

[gusti]

Markets being efficient means that price movements become a random walk. Bitcoin prices are almost certainly predictable

Congratulations, you will be soon very rich by trading in such a predictable market. 

[Stephen Gornick]

Markets being efficient means that price movements become a random walk. Bitcoin prices are almost certainly predictable

Easy to say in hindsight. 

Well, put some predictions out there and let us keep score.

So far, about the only prediction I've seen ending up being right more than 50% of the time is what is called the "Weekend Dip Strategy" (which says that in a downtrend, shorting bitcoin on a Wednesday evening (West) / Thursday morning (East) and covering at some point before new money arrives the following week is more often than not a profitable trade.)

 - http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=63312.120


Everything else seems to come from a permabear (sell now, and sell more tomorrow) or permabull (buy now, and continue buying forever):

 - http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?board=57.0

[pretendo]

I don't think anyone who is making money on their private prediction strategy is going to be sharing it. And I say almost certainly from the logical Implications not anything empirical. I have not tried
my hand at trading yet. If you have reason to believe that inefficient markets are as unpredictable as efficient ones, please share, evidence of the impossible is a sight to behold

[Stephen Gornick]

I don't think anyone who is making money on their private prediction strategy is going to be sharing it.

Well, the Weekend Dip strategy has been covered in the open:
 - http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=63312.0

[Seal]

Bitcoin prices are almost certainly predictable

I have not tried my hand at trading yet.

A bit of a contradiction there? Not many are going to believe you unless you have a trading history to back that statement up.

The markets are inefficient and there are a lot of opportunities.

[johnwhitestar]

Markets being efficient means that price movements become a random walk. Bitcoin prices are almost certainly predictable

No so much, but still you are right.

[pretendo]

Bitcoin prices are almost certainly predictable

I have not tried my hand at trading yet.

A bit of a contradiction there? Not many are going to believe you unless you have a trading history to back that statement up.

my experience is irrelevant to the truth value of my conclusions

[Realpra]

Bitcoin prices are almost certainly predictable

...truth value of my conclusions

... which quickly is cast into doubt when you use words like "almost certainly" and tell us you have zero experience.

Conclusions require premises and premises require facts.
If you have no experience, how can you have facts and thus meaningful logic or conclusions?

Your conclusion could be right, it almost certainly is - the BTC market is very new and rapidly growing which means inefficiency - but it has nothing to do with any of your reasons.

Allow me to demonstrate:
"Bitcoin prices are almost certainly a random walk, hence the Bitcoin market is perfectly efficient." Its pulled-out-of-ass-logic.

As for inefficiency I'm sure people learned lessons from Pirate, Matthew, the hacks and others so that going forward we will see slightly less of that.

Converting from DKK to BTC recently became cheaper I know and Finland is at 2% for fiat->BTC so we are going forward.

[Jermainé]

inefficient to what end? Theres always going to be irregularities and speculators and not just in bitcoins. All you can do play the market for your own gain Period

[pretendo]

Bitcoin prices are almost certainly predictable

...truth value of my conclusions

... which quickly is cast into doubt when you use words like "almost certainly" and tell us you have zero experience.

Conclusions require premises and premises require facts.
If you have no experience, how can you have facts and thus meaningful logic or conclusions?

Because I know a priori the logic of efficient and inefficient markets.

[Seal]

Bitcoin prices are almost certainly predictable

...truth value of my conclusions

... which quickly is cast into doubt when you use words like "almost certainly" and tell us you have zero experience.

Conclusions require premises and premises require facts.
If you have no experience, how can you have facts and thus meaningful logic or conclusions?

Because I know a priori the logic of efficient and inefficient markets.

I agree with your tread title but not much else pretendo. I'm sorry but you're not backing up your argument with  anything tangible.

Conclusions require premises and premises require facts.
If you have no experience, how can you have facts and thus meaningful logic or conclusions?

Certain elements of the market may be more predictable yes. But given that they can EASILY be controlled and manipulated with less than $5mill by a single person, your argument is flawed. This is unless you can predict the actions of this person. This has been demonstrated many times, most recently by pirate.

Remember the market cap of bitcoin is just over $100mill...

[allthingsluxury]

Nothing is perfect. Bitcoin will continue to work out the kinks as time progresses. It has gotten drastically better since inception.

[benjamindees]

Of course the Bitcoin market is inefficient.  It's a global market with a tiny number of participants using an extremely complex computer network that burns energy and resources at a completely unbalanced rate and inflates at 25%+ per year.

The fact that it exists at all, and is growing, despite this, is amazing.

[pretendo]

Take what you said, compare it to the "real" financial market, and you will see how silly it sounds

[the joint]

Pretendo,

How efficient were you when you were 3?  Cause that's how old Bitcoin is.

Give the market time to grow and mature.  The market is a system, and because it is small it is prone to large imbalances between systemic inputs and outputs.  As the market grows bigger, the laws of probability will increasingly minimize these imbalances because Bitcoin will be larger relative to its outside environment.

[YokoToriyama]

the current bitcoin market is strong.