Wall Observer BTC/USD - Bitcoin price movement tracking & discussion

[Spaceman_Spiff]

50 minutes since last block sucks if you are waiting for a transaction 

[ChartBuddy]

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Explanation

[hdbuck]

50 minutes since last block sucks if you are waiting for a transaction 

hodlers still not affected tho

[Spaceman_Spiff]

50 minutes since last block sucks if you are waiting for a transaction 

hodlers still not affected tho

What the fuck has sending a transaction got to do with holding BTC or not?

[Fatman3001]

50 minutes since last block sucks if you are waiting for a transaction  

hodlers still not affected tho

What the fuck has sending a transaction got to do with holding BTC or not?

You misunderstand the situation. He really is that stupid.

[ssmc2]

If you're a trader and haven't bought back in yet you're doing it wrong.


disclaimer: i just hodl

[ZyclonRacerX]

50 minutes since last block sucks if you are waiting for a transaction 

hodlers still not affected tho

What the fuck has sending a transaction got to do with holding BTC or not?

Bitcoin is for hodling, not transacting (sodling). Delayed transactions are not a bug, but a feature: helping you hodl.
I'll give you an example, show you what I mean:
Say you decide to reward yourself for years of hodling with a pair of alpaca socks & some honey and/or honey products.
Your smart bitcoin wallet senses this, and automatically (and virtually instantaneously) calculates the tx fee required.
Required to have your bitcoins safely returned to you (or, rather, to it) in 72hrs, that is.

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from dark magic."

[ChartBuddy]

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Explanation

[Fatman3001]

50 minutes since last block sucks if you are waiting for a transaction 

hodlers still not affected tho

What the fuck has sending a transaction got to do with holding BTC or not?

Bitcoin is for hodling, not transacting (sodling). Delayed transactions are not a bug, but a feature: helping you hodl.
I'll give you an example, show you what I mean:
Say you decide to reward yourself for years of hodling with a pair of alpaca socks & some honey and/or honey products.
Your smart bitcoin wallet senses this, and automatically (and virtually instantaneously) calculates the tx fee required.
Required to have your bitcoins safely returned to you (or, rather, to it) in 72hrs, that is.

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from dark magic."

Bitcoin is so full of nutters I have no idea if you're joking.

[rebuilder]

Bitcoin is so full of nutters I have no idea if you're joking.

That seems like yet another NLC alt. Hey Lambie, how many accounts have you worked past newbie status now? When do the fireworks start?

[Fatman3001]

Bitcoin is so full of nutters I have no idea if you're joking.

That seems like yet another NLC alt. Hey Lambie, how many accounts have you worked past newbie status now? When do the fireworks start?

It smells like a lambie account, I just haven't seen it before.

[BitconAssociation]

So I was telling Grandma about Bitcoin & how it's not for criminals, and she wanted to buy some.
Found this helpful post explaining how she should go about it:

I've done a lot of localbitcoins transactions, both as a buyer and as a seller, and I've never had an issue.  I take a few precautions, but so far they've never been necessary.

Typically, the localbitcoins transaction escrow is funded before we meet.

My preference is to meet in a public place (such as a fast food restaurant or coffee house).  I try to arrive earlier than the agreed time, and sit inside as far from any exit as I can, with my back to the wall so I can see who is entering, and which door they enter from. This allows me to see if the other party arrives alone or with a friend, and what direction he is likely to exit. It also means that the other party will have a distance to cover to get out which may allow me to chase, or shout, or gather information about them and their vehicle. In situations with a large amount of cash, I've had a friend come along with me and asked that friend to sit next to the most likely exit. I usually will buy a beverage from the business I am meeting in, and have it at the table with me.

It is important to remember though, that your health, and life are far more valuable than any amount of money you might lose.  If at any time before the transaction you feel concerned for your safety, you should just call it off and make other arrangements with someone else.  If, during or after the transaction, the other party becomes threatening or engages in any activity that risks your health or life (such as pulling out a knife or a gun) you and any friend you bring along should be prepared to just walk away and let the thief keep what they've taken.

Once we meet, my preference is:
The seller gets their mobile device ready to send the transaction while the buyer counts out the money for the seller to see that it's all there.  The buyer leaves the money on the table in view of the seller.  The seller then releases the escrow to the buyer and asks the buyer to confirm that they've received it.  Once the buyer confirms they've received the released escrow, the seller removes the cash from the table and re-counts it themselves in view of the buyer.  When both parties are satisfied that they've received what is due to them, they thank each other for a smooth and easy transaction and go their separate ways.  I typically remain at my seat and continue to sip at my beverage. It is obvious that I plan to finish my beverage before leaving, or if it happens to come up in conversation I mention that I'm going to finish my beverage and possibly order some food. This allows me to wait for the other party to leave and be comfortable that I'm not going to be followed when I leave.

Note that there can be variations to this scenario. There is no "standard" or "official" way of completing the transaction.  You'll need to be flexible enough to deal with any modifications.  For example, some people are uncomfortable with leaving cash sitting out on a table in public.  They may expect the cash to be exchanged discreetly.  Others might require you to complete your side of the transaction before they are willing to complete their side.  You might arrive and find that the other party is already there. Some people refuse to use the localbitcoins escrow service and will want to send or receive bitcoins directly.  You'll need to decide for yourself if someone's requirements are acceptable to you, and if not then find someone else to exchange with.

Note that, the business you are meeting at probably has more than $500 in their cash registers and office.  So, if the other party is going to use a weapon to try to get away with your cash, they can get a lot more for the exact same risk to themselves buy stealing from the business instead of you.  The other party also risks you contacting the police and being able to identify them, and they risk you leaving feedback on their localbitcoins account explaining to all future potential victims what happened.

Some risks to be aware of...

It is possible for a seller to pretend not to arrive and instead wait outside for you to leave. They now have a victim that they can wait for, knowing that you are carrying at least the specified amount of cash.  When you leave they can use a weapon to steal from you before you get to your vehicle, or they can discretely follow you and use a weapon to steal from you when you get to a less populated location (such as your house?).

If a seller sends directly to your wallet instead of using the localbitcoins escrow, it is possible for them to create a transaction that will take hours (or even days) to confirm.  They might do this on accident if they are using a poorly written wallet, or they might do it on purpose with the intention of attempting to invalidate the transaction later (before it confirms).  In either case, it can be difficult to agree on what should be done about this.  If possible, it may be a good idea to have an agreement ahead of time as to what will happen if the transaction doesn't confirm before either of you want to leave.

If a seller uses localbitcoins escrow, it is possible that they could fund the escrow but the localbitcoins service is down at the time of the transaction. It can be difficult to agree on what should be done about this.  If possible, it may be a good idea to have an agreement ahead of time as to what will happen if escrow is funded but localbitcoins is unavailable at the time of the transaction.

[ChartBuddy]

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Explanation

[conspirosphere.tk]

Hm BTC spam attack is over and ETH is crashing. What a coincidence 

"Some lose yet gain, others gain and yet lose."
               — Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching

[BitconAssociation]

Hm BTC spam attack is over and ETH is crashing. What a coincidence  

"Some lose yet gain, others gain and yet lose."
               — Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching

"Dear Log:
Can it be true? Do all bitcoiners go through a process of dumbening? ... Wait, that’s not how you spell dumbening.
Wait, dumbening isn’t even a word!"
               — Lisa Simpson, The Dumbening Meditations

[JimboToronto]

Good morning Bitcoinland. I see the small window of buying opportunity is closing fast.

I hope everyone got their cheap coins yesterday when the price was below $400. I also hope nobody here was foolish enough to sell at such a low price, although obviously someone had to sell cheap in order for the smarter ones to buy.

Sideways for a while or back up over $420?

[ChartBuddy]

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Explanation

[JayJuanGee]

Bitcoin looking healthy again.

Yes, and blocks are still maxxed out.

The blocks are hardly maxed out ----- unless you are just making up shit in order to attempt to exaggerate some problem that is not even close to what the loud mouth FUDsters are attempting to portray.


Blocks floating around 65% at the moment... ... but they had  experienced some peaks approaching 90% in recent days (within the past week)

https://blockchain.info/charts/avg-block-size?timespan=60days&showDataPoints=false&daysAverageString=1&show_header=true&scale=0&address=


Surely, there may be some more spam/ddos attacks on the bitcoin network in the coming days that could return bitcoin transactions to peaking at 90% or possibly more, but so far, the blockchain seems to have been handling such attacks pretty well (and I have seen pretty decent descriptions of apparent attacks that may also largely be undermined once seg wit is implemented in the coming months), and even in current times, bitcoin transactions have been going through in reasonable times given the value transferred and the potential for various kinds of self-directed control over 24/7 transactions.. without middlemen (banks taking out a cut)..

Bitcoin transaction fees still remain low as fuck and can be as little as .0001BTC per kilobyte or even lower and transfer a lot of value in a relatively short period of time and be finalized in less than 24 hours (more frequently less than an hour but sometimes a bit longer time frame).


There can be a bit of a variance in the median transaction time with small fees, but surely, median transaction times seem fairly reasonable too... getting 1st confirmations largely within 9 to 12 minutes (and would go through completely relatively quickly after the first confirmation has taken place - I think 3 confirmations are currently required to have the coins available to the recipient - used to be 6 confirmations, no?)

https://blockchain.info/charts/avg-confirmation-time?timespan=60days&showDataPoints=false&daysAverageString=1&show_header=true&scale=0&address=


In sum, bitcoin is looking relatively healthy and the price seems to be decently moving away from the most recent $382 bottom, causing some comfort that another short term bottom has been visited and we will be moving upwards, again.. No?  At this point, I put the odds of upward price movement (of maybe a 5 % adjustment) to be a bit greater than downward movement.. maybe 57% to 43%...

[JayJuanGee]

There's a fella on r/btc doing a sterling job bringing the Chinese side of things to life. Here's his latest summary of Jihan Wu from Antpool's post on 8btc - https://www.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/495866/the_rbtc_china_dispatch_11_summary_selected/

What seems bizarre to me is that the HK CRTA comes out and the market shoots up from $375 to $450, a seventy five dollar increase. Then pools start coming out one at a time making it clear there is no consensus, and the market only retraces 60 bucks.

It seems like there should be more than a complete retrace.  28.4 million in leveraged longs on BFX. It seems crazy to say this, especially so close to the halving, but I think there is a real possibility that $300 will get another serious test of support.  There is still too much uncertainty with scaling and governance. 

Were you able to close those shorts that you had opened in the $370s and $380s?   Oh?  why am i asking?  it seems you are still predicting $300, so probably, you have not closed those shorts, yet.  Oh well... It's starting to seem more and more like $382 may have been the bottom... at least for now...

My short is a hedge because I am way too heavy and undiversified, having almost my entire life savings in Bitcoin. I WANT that short to blow up. It is a hedge. So no, I didn't close it and I won't until and unless it
1) blows up
2) I can see some tangible progress on the scaling, governance and mining concentration problems
3) there is a real, honest to goodness long squeeze.

That sounds like a decent plan, even though the downward movement of a couple of days ago, and the 3000k coin dump (on stamp) should have demonstrated a sort of short term bottom... and maybe even a longer term bottom given the whole dynamics in the space (as you describe scaling etc)....

And, surely your plan to hedge does not sound bad either so long as you are doing that with your own coins, and you are not paying interest on the coins. 

Sometimes, you seem to be playing reasonably, but also sometimes you seem to be playing a bit more balls to the walls than me, and accordingly, I generally agree with you that you would not necessarily want to close or partially close if you are closing at a loss, but sometimes, it becomes more clear that the short term price is inclined to move in one direction or another (but yeah with bitcoin, we can never really be sure and we gotta hedge to some extent in order to feel more comfortably on a personal level).

Also, even though I don't really engage in balls to the walls investing (including my bitcoin investments), even after a while, my dollar cost averaging into bitcoin of "no more than you can afford to lose" begins to add up to really significant amounts of money that causes more and more emotions and after some price appreciation - for example bitcoin prices going from below $200 to $502 and then largely floating in the $360 to $460 price range for more than 3 months can cause considerable amount of value to have been appreciated in a dollar cost averaging bitcoin investment and then there are ongoing questions regarding whether to reallocate some of the profits and to hedge.. which I have been engaging in my own tailored efforts of such since October 2015.

[AlexGR]

Surely, there may be some more spam/ddos attacks on the bitcoin network in the coming days that could return bitcoin transactions to peaking at 90% or possibly more, but so far, the blockchain seems to have been handling such attacks pretty well

All is working as Satoshi said:

I am not claiming that the network is impervious to DoS attack.  I think most P2P networks can be DoS attacked in numerous ways.  (On a side note, I read that the record companies would like to DoS all the file sharing networks, but they don't want to break the anti-hacking/anti-abuse laws.)

If we started getting DoS attacked with loads of wasted transactions back and forth, you would need to start paying a 0.01 minimum transaction fee.

...although the min fee is much lower nowadays. But the essence is the same. If there was no abusing of the network we could be sending coins for free right now due to the max blocksize being more than accommodating for our genuine transaction needs.

Zero cost txs / near zero cost txs => bring zero-cost abuse or near-zero cost abuse.

When that happens => cost to transact increases to bypass the abuser's queue.