Bitcoin: The Scamming

[Evan]

So here I am reading my Economics books... and its hits me...

How to double my lifesavings.....

1. Buy 10,000 BTC at $10-12 prices 6 months ago
2. Create many many many many Wallets
3. Sell BTC and ever higher rates using the exchanges to inflate BTC value
4. Wait for something major to happen that causes a finical panic
5. Once inflated to where ever I SELL.... (since in theory I am controlling the market)


@$100 USD I just Made my savings go from 100k to 10mil... all in the span of 3 months BTC trading(better then a Ponzi scheme)?

6. Rinse and repeat

Can anyone tell me how this might be stopped? If this theory might be correct? Better ways to pull it off?

[JoelKatz]

It's easy to think, after the fact, that you would have bought and sold at the right times. But there's no bell that goes off to let you know the market has hit the top or the bottom. It's a lot harder when you can only see the chart to the left and not the chart to the right.

As for trying to manipulate the market, you lose money when you do. You can only manipulate the market by buying high or selling low. And then everyone has the same opportunity to take advantage of the manipulated price, not just you. So you bear 100% of the costs of manipulation and get maybe 5% of the profits if you're lucky. And the profits are miniscule -- it's hard to push something away from its unmanipulated price and it takes very little to get it back there. So it always costs more than you expect and you make less than you expect, even before you take into account that you only get a tiny sliver of the "profits".

[BlackBison]

Congratulations you found the secret.

[kgo]

I think you mean 'buy' in step three.  That's the only way you can force the price up.  You can only sell at higher and higher prices if there are already buyers who think the price is fair.  You can't force anyone to buy.

But your plan relies on the Greater Fool Theory.  There's no guarantee that people will panic and buy at the price you want when you dump your bitcoins.

[bubblesort]

LOL, I love time travel investing schemes.  Might as well buy lottery tickets if you are going to time travel, though.  You'll get a better return, even after taxes.

[gradient vector]

You'll have better luck trying to manipulate the market by spreading misinformation ala Nathan Rothschild after the Battle of Waterloo.

[Evan]

LOL, I love time travel investing schemes.  Might as well buy lottery tickets if you are going to time travel, though.  You'll get a better return, even after taxes.

I love you

[inbox]

.

[Bitzing]

With bitcoins being divisible by 8 dec and there is going to be 21 million in existence with million yet to be created and other multiple millions in trade/stored you will never be able to get enough of them to do this unless your name is Max Kieser.

[Adrian-x]

Can anyone tell me how this might be stopped? If this theory might be correct? Better ways to pull it off?

1) Don't invest in Bitcoin until you believe in the economic principals it enables.
2) Don't sell or exist Bitcoin for less than you have put in.

Follow the golden rule and you will beet that system.

[jgraham]

Can anyone tell me how this might be stopped? If this theory might be correct? Better ways to pull it off?

Selling BTC at progressively higher rates doesn't change the value of BTC.  If you have 1000 BTC which you bought at $10 and you sell them at progressively higher rates (say one at a time).   You can only sell at a higher rate if there's someone who is willing to buy at a higher rate.  If nobody is willing to buy your order just sits there until someone does.

[Adrian-x]

Can anyone tell me how this might be stopped? If this theory might be correct? Better ways to pull it off?

Selling BTC at progressively higher rates doesn't change the value of BTC.  If you have 1000 BTC which you bought at $10 and you sell them at progressively higher rates (say one at a time).   You can only sell at a higher rate if there's someone who is willing to buy at a higher rate.  If nobody is willing to buy your order just sits there until someone does.

Bang on, Bitcoin is by design deflationary, deflation by its design encourages saving, you just need to follow human nature.

By contrast the biggest scam ever undertaken is fractional reserve banking and the resulting inflation, arguably just the central bank controlling interest rates.  With inflation you cannot beat the system because as you save the value is lost from your savings account. You have to become increasingly more productive just to survive.

You only lose with Bitcoin if you sell out for less, it's all up to you.

[MatTheCat]

So here I am reading my Economics books... and its hits me...

How to double my lifesavings.....

1. Buy 10,000 BTC at $10-12 prices 6 months ago
2. Create many many many many Wallets
3. Sell BTC and ever higher rates using the exchanges to inflate BTC value
4. Wait for something major to happen that causes a finical panic
5. Once inflated to where ever I SELL.... (since in theory I am controlling the market)


@$100 USD I just Made my savings go from 100k to 10mil... all in the span of 3 months BTC trading(better then a Ponzi scheme)?

6. Rinse and repeat

Can anyone tell me how this might be stopped? If this theory might be correct? Better ways to pull it off?

Whilst I am sure their are entities or individuals who have made obscene profits from Bitcoin, I suspect that the overriding motivation of those with the power to shift this market in any direction they want like it was their bitch, is too discredit Bitcoin, give it a bad reputation in the mainstream, and even make it seem very unappealing amongst much of the fringe groups who actually use it (other than merely speculate in it). Possibly, the losses they may suffer in doing this, if indeed any at all, are utterly inconsequential to such an entity.

[botlove]

the only scam here is the perceived volume of transactions required at the time which dropped the price.  See, everybody assumes that there is an unlimited stream of smart buyers aroudn the corner, but in reality... once a seller saturates the market and takes all the buyers out of the way, the smart money moves out of the way and leaves just the manipulator, and since only a few people are seriously buying coins in large amounts at any given moment, this is simply a timing attack.... they picked a time where people were sleeping, it was all poor quality bots, they wrote some code to perform the timing sell-down, and they're loving every minute of any coin that is priced below $174.25, you morons.

go ahead, give these bankers your coins for less than $174.25, and then scratch your head when you can't buy back in for less than $200 each.... in two days.

 

[jerkoff]

So here I am reading my Economics books... and its hits me...

How to double my lifesavings.....

1. Buy 10,000 BTC at $10-12 prices 6 months ago
2. Create many many many many Wallets
3. Sell BTC and ever higher rates using the exchanges to inflate BTC value
4. Wait for something major to happen that causes a finical panic
5. Once inflated to where ever I SELL.... (since in theory I am controlling the market)
@$100 USD I just Made my savings go from 100k to 10mil... all in the span of 3 months BTC trading(better then a Ponzi scheme)?
6. Rinse and repeat
Can anyone tell me how this might be stopped? If this theory might be correct? Better ways to pull it off?

You should read that economics 101 book again a few times, there are a lot of flaws in your reasoning.
Step 2 seems unneccesary, you could have all coins in 1 account on mtgox and achieve the same.
The big flaw is of course step 3. Selling would depress the price, price only rises when people want to buy more coins than the sellers want to sell at that price, the sellers sell out at say $131 and the price goes up to $132 where there are more sellers.
Step 4, why would you need that ? You'd be more profitable selling it all on the uptrend, when it went from $200 to $250 than waiting for a crash.
Step 5, if you want the price to go up while you sell, you want to avoid controlling the market, not control it. And how do 10K coins turn into 10 million without the price reaching $1000 ?

Your whole plan is based on the price booming into the sky caused by the actions of others, something which you cannot predict. In fact this is what almost all stock investers are trying, buy low, sell higher, and since nobody knows the future, a lot fail.

[darkmule]

It's easy to think, after the fact, that you would have bought and sold at the right times. But there's no bell that goes off to let you know the market has hit the top or the bottom. It's a lot harder when you can only see the chart to the left and not the chart to the right.

As for trying to manipulate the market, you lose money when you do. You can only manipulate the market by buying high or selling low. And then everyone has the same opportunity to take advantage of the manipulated price, not just you. So you bear 100% of the costs of manipulation and get maybe 5% of the profits if you're lucky.

Yep, and you assume nobody else out there is smarter or more nimble than you are, because when you buck a market trend, someone else out there is going to bet against you.  And if you're unlucky, maybe you get no profits at all and instead lose your shirt.

[sauna]

When people own 1% of a currency, you're damn right this can happen.

[Adrian-x]

When people own 1% of a currency, you're damn right this can happen.

The advantage with Bitcoin is you can eroded there strong hold by saving.
In the current model you are a slave as they just print more money.

Another feature of Bitcoin is, if someone gains control of all Bitcoins, because it is OSS you can start afresh.

[MatTheCat]

the only scam here is the perceived volume of transactions required at the time which dropped the price.  See, everybody assumes that there is an unlimited stream of smart buyers aroudn the corner, but in reality... once a seller saturates the market and takes all the buyers out of the way, the smart money moves out of the way and leaves just the manipulator, and since only a few people are seriously buying coins in large amounts at any given moment, this is simply a timing attack.... they picked a time where people were sleeping, it was all poor quality bots, they wrote some code to perform the timing sell-down, and they're loving every minute of any coin that is priced below $174.25, you morons.

go ahead, give these bankers your coins for less than $174.25, and then scratch your head when you can't buy back in for less than $200 each.... in two days.
 

Oh really!?

I can tell by the way that you speak that you are an expert in market psychology so I wouldn't dare to doubt this little nugget of wisdom.

Obviously, you too will be chomping at the bit to pick up some Bitcoins at 'fire sale' prices, so you go ahead with that and we will see where we are at the end of the week.

If you don't mind though, I will sit this one out. Always been more of a spectator than a participator, me.

Terribly nice of you to point out what a big bunch of fools everyone is though.

[botlove]

actually, im holding, not buying, untill i can guess who is who, ... for the time being i dont want to speculate short term, i should keep my mouth shut now.  =)