What is the main reason for the recent price raises?

[AnonyMint]

Thus as I said, only the government can give paper money its value, unless they are gold or silver.

Bitcon is just another fiat. I know, I know it isn't debased as much. Irrelevant! The value of money is based on confidence. The government can change the confidence at any time. So the government can cause inflation or deflation in Bitcon at any time that they wish.

So all this BS about NO INFLATION is just utter nonsense.

[superarthur]

Thus as I said, only the government can give paper money its value, unless they are gold or silver.

Bitcon is just another fiat. I know, I know it isn't debased as much. Irrelevant! The value of money is based on confidence. The government can change the confidence at any time. So the government can cause inflation or deflation in Bitcon at any time that they wish.

So all this BS about NO INFLATION is just utter nonsense.

It's not only the Americans that are using it. Unless all governments act together against Bitcoins, there shouldn't be too much of an effect.

[BigJohn]

I don't understand what the FinCen announcement has to do with it. So it means that someone wants to use it to make a US exchange, and therefore bought a ton of Bitcoins, which drove the prices higher? How does FinCen translate into higher prices?

[michellj]

"Bitcoin is just another fiat" - well everything used as money is fiat - Gold only has value because some people want to hold it but in itself it is rather useless and far less practical than BTC.

BTC is probably nearer to Gold in reality than to national fiat currencies in the way it behaves - independent of governments and easily exchanged among individuals.

Back to topic - BTC is increasing rapidly against fiat currencies because people are becoming aware about its existence and the smart ones see it as a real opportunity to get in at a relatively early stage of something big.

Sure the Cyprus fiasco confirms to those who were unaware how incompetent governments are when it comes to money - and many see BTC as a viable alternative.

I'm not sure about the FinCEn stuff - BTC is global rather than US-based.

Having worked with governments I see no danger that many governments will get together against BTC - they find it almost impossible to get together to agree about anything much as a common aim - systemically BTC is safe from their meddling - and that is another reason why BTC has a great future - it is a people's not a government's currency!

[MikeH]

I've seen a lot of talk lately (even in the mainstream media) that the US dollar will collapse and there is no way around it.

Countries are moving gold like there's no tomorrow and people are also waking up to how the banks operate - my first introduction was in watching Bill Still's Money Master and that was only a few months ago.

I'm in IT and I have various rss feeds like slashdot yet I somehow I never saw mention of bitcoin until about a month ago.

Unfortunately by the time I had investigated it and decided to get on board it was at $47 - by the time I was able to actually purchase bitcoins after waiting for Mt Gox then being screwed around by people via localbitcoins.com, I ended up buying at $87 plus an 8% fee.

I just keep thinking if I had quit work 2 years ago as I had intended, I would have known about bitcoin a whole lot sooner and may already be rich.

I guess a lot of people here are kicking themselves to some degree, at least I didn't buy a $900,000 pizza.

[shiv]

Would BTC really survive a dollar collapse?

I mean, it would break almost all BTC related payment services.

[AnonyMint]

You fools have so many delusions driving your fanatical demand. Ripe for manipulative control of confidence! See below in addition to link above...

"Bitcoin is just another fiat" - well everything used as money is fiat

BINGO! So who controls confidence in a socialized institution?

- Gold only has value because some people want to hold it but in itself it is rather useless and far less practical than BTC.

Gold is a private hedge against government. BitCON is a public IPO for the supra-national corporation's global digital currency.

Physical gold can't be hyperinflated away by Bitcon's inherent design weakness which insures there will be a 51% attack.

BTC is probably nearer to Gold in reality than to national fiat currencies in the way it behaves - independent of governments and easily exchanged among individuals.

The government controls it, both because of the incorrect design linked above which will force mining to be monopolized by the corporate interests and also because every rose has its thorns.

BitCON has nothing in common with gold. Gold can be traded with no global record of all transactions (in conjunction with the government tracking of every action on the internet so they know very well who is making the transactions in most cases). Perhaps (that fictional story known as) the Bible's reference to throwing gold and silver into the street is because you will be forced to use Bitcon when corporations take over all retail and 51% of the hashing power in Bitcon, couple that with the 99% enforcement against blackmarkets now.

Martin Armstrong wrote in the above linked article:

What is different here than at any point in history is they track everything. Not even Hitler could do that and his conviction rate was 90% whereby we are at 99% [in the USA for criminal convictions]. Government will become far more aggressive. Storing bullion will not survive. Can we retain enough of civility to vote out these people and reclaim civilization? That remains to be seen.

Gold's supply is always increasing and the rate of nominal increase in supply is increasing every year. BitCON is geometrically decreasing so as to lock in 50% of the money supply for the early adopters, a certified scam. Which the government will surely have to regulate, put early adopters in jail or fine them, etc.. once the public interest is burned.

Back to topic - BTC is increasing rapidly against fiat currencies because people are becoming aware about its existence and the smart ones see it as a real opportunity to get in at a relatively early stage of something big.

Correct except they are not smart. And the perception that FinCEN's guidance was a step towards official legalization was another factor driving these expectations of bitcoin's future.

They are not smart because due to Ponzi Satoshi's design, bitcoin only scales to one thing.

1. a "666" monopoly for corporate-fascism

The only other possible outcome is the power elite abandon it because I reveal it is scam (and possibly provide an alternative that becomes more popular), then they dump it and it crashes and burns. I am hoping for the second outcome and working (but maybe not for long) to make it happen. So shoot me?

Sure the Cyprus fiasco confirms to those who were unaware how incompetent governments are when it comes to money - and many see BTC as a viable alternative.

I'm not sure about the FinCEn stuff - BTC is global rather than US-based.

Having worked with governments I see no danger that many governments will get together against BTC - they find it almost impossible to get together to agree about anything much as a common aim - systemically BTC is safe from their meddling - and that is another reason why BTC has a great future - it is a people's not a government's currency!

Supra-national corporations are really in control now (of the socialized institutions, not the private sector such as individual arbitrage within socialized open source programming).

I don't understand what the FinCen announcement has to do with it. So it means that someone wants to use it to make a US exchange, and therefore bought a ton of Bitcoins, which drove the prices higher? How does FinCen translate into higher prices?

The perception that it was a step towards legalization and success towards the supra-national digital tracking currency.

[AnonyMint]

The developers of bitCON are so afraid that I have revealed the truth about bitCON's design, that stole 100+ points from my SE bitcoin reputation so that they stop me from stating the facts about the design:

http://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/users/3441/shelby-moore-iii

http://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/users/message/9?sent=1#9

This will all be part of the public record, when the criminal prosecutions begin.

I am the living ghost of the Cherokee tribe. You've never seen how fiercely we fight.

[perseus]

Another factor is that Avalon sold its machines denominated in BTC, which driven demand -- folks need to buy BTC to pay for them. 600*88 = a decent amount of coin.

[Wekkel]

Nice FUD.

[AnonyMint]

Nice FUD.

Factual and technical retort?

(if you engage me in a debate on the technical design of BitCON, you will lose. Be forewarned. I welcome a debate with any BitCON developer. Bring it on!)

[numismatics]

I don't understand what the FinCen announcement has to do with it. So it means that someone wants to use it to make a US exchange, and therefore bought a ton of Bitcoins, which drove the prices higher? How does FinCen translate into higher prices?

The announcement signals that the US Treasury Dept., and thereby the US Government, recognizes the use of BTC for barter, and clearly proclaims it legal. While there's some exceptions for other activities—use from which an income is derived, i.e., mining or arbitrage—the announcement legitimates US BTC holders and increases certainty in BTC transacting. Whether or not it wold be easy for the US government to interfere with US BTC use is besides the point; if the FinCen had announced BTC use contravened criminal statutes with stiff penalties, do you think the USD-BTC currency pair would have responded the same way? Generally, receiving recognition and legitimacy from a sovereign increases that asset's value; when that sovereign is home to a significant proportion to the demand of that asset, the announcement of recognition and legitimacy will affect the price for which that asset is traded, provided sufficiently liquid markets.

[AnonyMint]

They have begun deleting my questions and answers to attempt to hide the facts, such as this one that I saved a copy of:

http://www.coolpage.com/commentary/economic/shelby/mining%20-%20Any%20counter-proof%20that%20Satoshi%20Nakamoto%20did%20not%20design%20a%20ponzi%20scheme%20on%20purpose%20%20-%20Bitcoin%20Beta%20-%20Stack%20Exchange.htm

The developers of bitCON are so afraid that I have revealed the truth about bitCON's design, that stole 100+ points from my SE bitcoin reputation so that they stop me from stating the facts about the design:

http://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/users/3441/shelby-moore-iii

http://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/users/message/9?sent=1#9

This will all be part of the public record, when the criminal prosecutions begin.

[Wekkel]

Nice FUD.

Factual and technical retort?

(if you engage me in a debate on the technical design of BitCON, you will lose. Be forewarned. I welcome a debate with any BitCON developer. Bring it on!)

Actually, your tone puts me off from engaging further. I'm sure there's a lot to learn from you but it is the tone that makes the music. I clicked one of your links.

"There is a distinction between preventing excessive inflation (probably good), preventing insider control over and front-running deflation/inflation rate (probably good) and no debasement (certainly bad and unrealistic)."

If it concerns voluntary choice to hold certain currency, I could not care less. But with government money, the games is played differently. Yes, I stopped being interested after reading the -th time about deflation-Baaaad. But I like the slogan  

"Gold is a private hedge against government. BitCON is a public IPO for the supra-national corporation's global digital currency."

You made me think, and that's a good thing.

[AnonyMint]

I am contacting friends in high places now. Time to put a stop to this. You all should know that my father was a general counsel for Exxon.

Search Attorney Shelby Moore Jr. Pensacola, FL

[BitFutex]

The madness of the crowds or the new gold, either way, the price is too volatile.

[AnonyMint]

Wekkel,

FYI:

Imagine a world of slavery where the rich got richer just for collecting interest on bonds and doing nothing with their mind? That is what the delusional goldbugs would get with no debasement.

To understand money, you need to understand the economy, see How an Economy Grows and Why It Doesn’t.

Bitcoiners will rationalize that gold is a superior money because they claim that no one can debase it. This so stupid. First of all, both inflation and deflation concentrate wealth to the rich. Secondly, because of this concentration of wealth under gold to the rich, the public will never allow it! You get a world war if necessary, but the public will always demand debasement, and there is no technical way to stop it (not even Bitcoin is immune, the government can easily subvert it when they are ready). Besides Bitcoin is even more harsh deflation than gold, as gold’s supply and nominal annual increase are both increasing. Bitcoin’s is geometrically declining.

And this is the way it should be! A free-market does not mean that it is a merit to encourage non-productivity by erroneously assuming that BLIND capital can invest most efficiently in productivity. The larger the capital one has, the less knowledgeably one can allocate it. This is a fact. This is because innovation is born in the small, and no person is omniscient.

Storing past productivity and holding the future in chains with your past accomplishments, is the antithesis of prosperity.

Yes we need some savings, because this represents sacrifice and hard work, which is a merit based system.

But we also need to debase the capital over time, so that the BLIND and LAZY rich don’t have an unfair advantage to make the innovators slaves to the lack omniscience.

The philosophical paradigm of Bitcoin, is that the early adopters from first 4 years will have 50% of the money supply. That is insane and will never be allowed in a meritocracy. The free market will never allow this. Yes people should profit on their innovations, but they should not have 50% of all future production. Society will go to world war if necessary to remove those chains, but regulation and corporate-fascist takeover will probably suffice in this case (there isn’t always a distinction).

Also all you goldbugs should read this:

Does Money Have to be Backed?

One point is gold is a private vote on the economy. BitCON is a socialized vote. No debasement of the private vote is good. No debasement of society is impossible. BitCON is thus very much subject to future hyperinflation, because its design insures that to scale big it has to suffer the 51% control by corporations.

But that is not the technical reason for failure. Go back to my prior post for the technical design flaw in BitCON that makes it so.

Wekkel, you would be wise to realize my IQ is well north of 140. My IQ is focused on seeing the generative essence of any thing. I have only a moderate IQ w.r.t. to language. It is a handicap.

[Wekkel]

After reading 10 words I stopped. Its full of fallacies and, no, I wont be spelling them out because I need to spend my time better. You can consider that my loss  

The reason for prices going up is more buyers than sellers. The rest is just stories. People like stories.

Wekkel, you would be wise to realize my IQ is well north of 140.

I realise that genius and insanity are closely related. And no, I don't mean that as an insult.

[AnonyMint]

After reading 10 words I stopped. Its full of fallacies and, no, I wont be spelling them out because I need to spend my time better. You can consider that my loss  

The reason for prices going up is more buyers than sellers. The rest is just stories. People like stories.

Wekkel, you would be wise to realize my IQ is well north of 140.

I realise that genius and insanity are closely related. And no, I don't mean that as an insult.

Then it confirms you have not the IQ (or attention span or bias) to understand. So move on.

Logic fail. You read 10 words, then you can say it is "full" of. Look up the definition of "full". You would need to read the entire thing to make such a determination.

[Wekkel]

Then it confirms you have not the IQ (or attention span or bias) to understand.

There, I corrected it for you. You did indeed understand me correctly 

I'm going back to my other life. There is Bitcoin crashing to watch. I suggest you join as well: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=85687.16660;topicseen