Pump 'n' Dump - Happening Now?

Like everyone I'm enjoying the Bitcoin price rampage upwards. But lets remember that it could just be a pump and dump from a shadowy figure with deep pockets. Here's the mechanism, for those unfamilliar:

1) In a stable market, The Pumper buys the market heavily.
2) As all offers are taken by the buyer, the market price rises rapidly.
3) The masses see the price move upwards and get excited.
4) The masses start buying at higher and higher prices
5) The Pumper starts selling his bitcoin to the new buyers at the new high price, making a profit
6) The Pumper sells all his coin
7) The market falls back to its original state, losses for the masses

This could be what's happening.. easy to do in such a small market.

I think that the prices are only of a serious concern to people who are trying to buy Bitcoins really, it's a bit like people who claim that a rising Chinese yuan is bad for everyone else, yeah, that's because you have crappy currencies that aren't worth anything so it will get more and more expensive as the real value of it is realised. If you only take Bitcoin it's going to be fine for you, if you only deal in conventional currencies then it's going to become increasingly more expensive to get Bitcoins this is why diversification is a really good idea but for me personally because Bitcoin just has too many benefits I'm probably going to take the plunge and only take them.

I'm not worried one bit Cheesy

Seems to me that pump and dumping bitcoin would be harder than it looks. What if some other large player or early miner moves against you? Bitcoin would have a bunch of such people now. Or what if some big news event happens midway through, causing a crash before you have even started your dump?

It's actually a Pump and don't Dump Wink

Quote from: Endgame on February 28, 2013, 12:23:06 PM

Yeah, its not without risk, but it could be easy money if done right. Pump it up, dump it down and repeat.

this is defiantly possible i am highly skeptical of this huge raise lately

Why dump? A shadowy figure with deep pockets need merely to offer BTC to big players at MtGox price, rather than dumping them on MtGox.

Either BTC is here to stay or it's not. If it's here to stay, it's easily worth billions of dollars as a phenomenon, thus, "dumping" coins at $30 (that is to say, the bitcoin revolution as we know it is only worth $350 million) would appear sort of foolish.

Quote from: casascius on February 28, 2013, 04:02:33 PM

So somebody like Coinbase could be buying the bitcoins on mtgox, thus eating up all the ask orders and driving up the price, and then selling the coins at the new higher rate to the public, selling at the high mtgox price but not pushing the price back down?

Quote from: casascius on February 28, 2013, 04:02:33 PM

"Dumping" really means the market just falling to its natural, free market price after the pumper has exited his positions.

Only problem with suggesting a pump n' dump is that we have seen a pretty steady release of "good news." Enough to easily warrant a rally.
I would suspect manipulation if a rally was happening out of nowhere.
But if someone is pumping and dumping at the same time as a rally was happening, probably the most damage they could inflict is a correction.

Quote from: Peter Lambert on February 28, 2013, 05:19:23 PM

Quote from: casascius on February 28, 2013, 04:02:33 PM

Dun dun dun... sounds interesting.

Although the market is small enough to be manipulated to some degree, there is no specific evidence. Why not just attribute this to the growth of bitcoin. After all, BBC news is calling it "light years ahead" in an story today. It may be just be growing because it is a good idea.
Huh

Quote from: RodeoX on February 28, 2013, 06:06:22 PM

That would be nice. I mean chances are in the long run Bitcoin is going ever upwards, even with pump and dumps along the way.

People goofing on this forum now are still reasonably early adopters... we could all be rich in five years.

Quote from: casascius on February 28, 2013, 04:02:33 PM

Why dump? A shadowy figure with deep pockets need merely to offer BTC to big players at MtGox price, rather than dumping them on MtGox.

Because it's much easier to manipulate a $350 million market vs a multi-billion market. And MtGox has the volume needed in this sort of scheme, you can't get rid of that many coins anyplace else as easily.

Quote

Either BTC is here to stay or it's not. If it's here to stay, it's easily worth billions of dollars as a phenomenon, thus, "dumping" coins at $30 (that is to say, the bitcoin revolution as we know it is only worth $350 million) would appear sort of foolish.

Irrelevant. This is looking at it from the standpoint of someone like you or I, who wants to see Bitcoin succeed in the long-term. Someone with big pockets could just see an opportunity to make a quick buck. Their bullishness/bearish outlook on Bitcoin doesn't matter if all they're looking to do is make a few hundred thousand and move on.

I'm not saying this is actually occurring, I have no idea and as Bitcoin's market cap (for lack of a better word) increases, it further distances itself from being the low hanging fruit by potential market manipulators. But it shouldn't be something easily dismissed either.

Think about this...A few people have enough cash to go long and they make sure they hit their mark. Its a win-win situation.

It's me, I'm doing it.

I'm buying BTC when it's cheaper before selling when it is more expensive.

I see it's all gone quiet, maybe Evil mc-Nipulator is listening.

Quote from: Peter Lambert on February 28, 2013, 05:19:23 PM

What you are describing is called "Supply and Demand" isn't it?

MtGox has the supply, and Coinbase is providing a demand. Isn't that how it's supposed to work?

Coinbase is frequently selling out of coins. It took me three tries today in order to actually get an order in, starting from fairly early in the morning.

Quote from: justusranvier on March 01, 2013, 07:50:19 PM

Coinbase is frequently selling out of coins. It took me three tries today in order to actually get an order in, starting from fairly early in the morning.

I tried to do an order through them a few minutes ago, they said they already reached their daily limit. Do they operate on weekends? When does their day start?