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

[gembitz]

/\BTC $2OOO street price!! ... >.>

 ~> somewhere in Japan supergeek Mt Kerpeles buying?   #vice #bitcoin

[machasm]

Has anyone been taking note of the fees at the moment. Seem quite high.
https://bitcoinfees.21.co/

[RayX12]

Has anyone been taking note of the fees at the moment. Seem quite high.
https://bitcoinfees.21.co/

Getting out of hand.

[leowonderful]

We're going to be at 400 sats/byte soon if we don't reach consensus. I wish we could just get along and reach consensus soon so we're all happy, but bitcoinland doesn't work like that. Combined with the current trend, we'll absolutely take off once Segwit or BU activates, but neither looks likely soon.

[Qartada]

Has anyone been taking note of the fees at the moment. Seem quite high.
https://bitcoinfees.21.co/

Getting out of hand.

This is pissing me off.  I didn't mind when it was 220 satoshi/byte or so, but this is a step too far.  Any transactions under $10 equivalent or so are completely impractical because of the fees that you have to spend and the fees that the receiver has to spend in the future.  Any transactions below $500 equivalent or so still have large fees compared to VISA.  Bitcoin is not a millionaire club.

Even arguments about the size of the transaction are meaningless now.  The smallest transactions you could do still have a fee of >$1.

[Lauda]

Even arguments about the size of the transaction are meaningless now.  The smallest transactions you could do still have a fee of >$1.

No. This remains constant. Fee is determined by the size + recommended fee-rate. It always has been. That put aside, there is a massive spam attack again. Mempool jumped by over 100-150k in <24 hours.

In case that TA isn't a lie. Source. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C_tvXDnXcAA4G55.jpg:large

[gembitz]

Even arguments about the size of the transaction are meaningless now.  The smallest transactions you could do still have a fee of >$1.

No. This remains constant. Fee is determined by the size + recommended fee-rate. It always has been. That put aside, there is a massive spam attack again. Mempool jumped by over 100-150k in <24 hours.

In case that TA isn't a lie. Source. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C_tvXDnXcAA4G55.jpg:large

^i noticed china is catching up to us in price  

[Torque]

I can feel the concern trolling level rising....

[JayJuanGee]

That put aside, there is a massive spam attack again. Mempool jumped by over 100-150k in <24 hours.
 

I do agree with the conclusion that these major back ups are largely caused by spam attacks, so yeah, delays and rising fees can piss people off, but also inability to move coins can also cause coin shortages and rising BTC prices because exchanges run out of coins (when the coins cannot be easily moved).

[arklan]

this transaction backlog is just getting insane. i mean really out of control. but i don't really see what we could do about it. what i mean is, even with segwit or BU's solution to scaling, couldn't these type of spam attacks just continue?

[savetherainforest]

I can feel the concern trolling level rising....

New perspective on the whole situation...    


It just feels like we have been here before!

[bitserve]

That put aside, there is a massive spam attack again. Mempool jumped by over 100-150k in <24 hours.
 

I do agree with the conclusion that these major back ups are largely caused by spam attacks, so yeah, delays and rising fees can piss people off, but also inability to move coins can also cause coin shortages and rising BTC prices because exchanges run out of coins (when the coins cannot be easily moved).

Coins can be easily moved if you pay the right fee and don't do anything stupid like sending unconfirmed funds as input.

The people, even if them all combined, moving 0.1BTC to an exchange with an underpaid fee have no significant impact on prices.

The people moving bigger amounts, tens or hundreds of coins, sometimes even thousands, are the ones that can have an impact on the price.

If someone moving that amounts cannot pay 30cents-1dollar (those with bigger stashes don't need long tx's with multiple imputs) then the world is way fucked than I thought.

No, I don't think that's the cause of the price going up. In fact, it is the reason why price is not going higher.

[bitserve]

this transaction backlog is just getting insane. i mean really out of control. but i don't really see what we could do about it. what i mean is, even with segwit or BU's solution to scaling, couldn't these type of spam attacks just continue?

Yes, and they will.

If you check the backlog, there are lots of transactions that are trying to spend unconfirmed funds, with fees so low that will never confirm, even with 0 fees... There are lots of clearly spammy ones, so they are and will keep unconfirmed because that's how they need to be.

Right now you can still get your transaction into the next block simpky by paying the right fee. So only problem that there is right now is if fees are or aren't too expensive. I, for one, think it is a too expensive fee for small transactions.

When LN is into place I wouln't mind to pay this fee for medium to big transfers of funds, and using LN for small/micro ones. But, anyway, it will also have the effect of reducing the fee also for blockchain txs. Maybe that's why some/most miners are against it.

[metacoin]

High fees and a long transaction backlog indicate demand for block space. Personally I prefer using Bitcoin as a payment method because the experience is much better than using any analogous method. The situation we are in is not surprising. Bitcoin is far superior to any other payment method.

It is perfect for exactly the type of transactions I use it for: finding the best deal on Earth for a server and being able to pay for it, even if the company is overseas, or hiring someone from another country to do translation work, investing in a project, donating to a charity. The list goes on. None of these things come even close to paying for coffee and if I am limited to using the legacy banking institution for my morning coffee and afternoon lunch that's fine with me. If I truly wanted to I could easily use petty cash for local day-to-day purchases by turning Bitcoins into cash via an ATM or local traders within a block from where I live or where I work.

I have had issues with paying legitimate overseas companies with my credit card due to automatic fraud protection and I have had issues with eBay and other similar services regarding chargebacks, payment disputes, and other high-friction painpoints that simply do not exist in the context of Bitcoin (as long as you are an honest merchant).

I suspect I'm not alone in this case -- others are figuring out how much better Bitcoin is than traditional means of transmitting value -- and it is reflected in the price, volume, and transaction backlog. Would it be better if it were fixed? Yeah, probably. Is it affecting anyone who cares about *why* Bitcoin is effective? Probably not in any significant way.

[JimboToronto]

I prefer using Bitcoin as a payment method because the experience is much better than using any analogous method. The situation we are in is not surprising. Bitcoin is far superior to any other payment method.

I got a distress email from an old friend today from Mexico. A severe storm ripped off her roof and flooded her electrical system. I wanted to help:

Do you have any way to receive and convert bitcoins? If you could email me the QR code to the public key to a Bitcoin wallet I could have funds to you in minutes.

Here's her answer:

i am giggling at bitcoin thank you, our nearest resemblance of a bank machine is thirty miles away
the fastest way would be western union, i hate them but they do get the job done for the price.

Cost $15CAD with Western Union. What a ripoff. 

[bitserve]

WTF!

Talking about fees I have just made my first Monero transaction, from Kraken to Poloniex. As I always do to check everything is ok, I have sent one single XMR, before sending the rest.

Ok, here comes the shocking part:

XXXXX   05-17-17 XXXXXX +XXXX   Monero   ɱ0.95000   ɱ0.05000 Success
   
WTF again!? A 5% fee?

I have never had any problem with fees paid by Kraken (it doesn't let you specify it) with BTC or any other coins so I have to assume that there are other coins with MUCH WORSE transactions fees?

This is crazy.

P.S.: Considering XMR is now around 25€, that's 1.25€....

[yefi]

I think that the whale pumpers have just about squeezed all of the 'free ride' they can out of the alts. Now that XRP (the pinnacle of shitcoin) has finally been pumped, there are literally no more alts that anyone might care about to pump.  Unless they're saving Auroracoin, Feathercoin, or Maxcoin for the last hurrah? Lol

I'm not seeing any evidence yet that the pumpfest is over. The inflexion point could be sharp however.

[JayJuanGee]

That put aside, there is a massive spam attack again. Mempool jumped by over 100-150k in <24 hours.
 

I do agree with the conclusion that these major back ups are largely caused by spam attacks, so yeah, delays and rising fees can piss people off, but also inability to move coins can also cause coin shortages and rising BTC prices because exchanges run out of coins (when the coins cannot be easily moved).

Coins can be easily moved if you pay the right fee and don't do anything stupid like sending unconfirmed funds as input.

I doubt that the empirical data actually supports this assertion.

In other words, I doubt that merely increasing the fee solves the spam problem and causes your transaction to go through in a timely or expected manner.

No, I don't think that's the cause of the price going up. In fact, it is the reason why price is not going higher.

Sure if the price is not moving too much, you can make these kinds of assertions, but in the end, we don't really know for sure if there were coins that were delayed in being moved and therefore delayed in being dumped in order to lower the price.

[marcus_of_augustus]

I can feel the concern trolling level rising....

FUDster alerts going off all over the place.

[Torque]

I can feel the concern trolling level rising....

FUDster alerts going off all over the place.

Yeah, I noticed this little pattern. r/bitcoin normally averages around a couple hundred users at any given time. Whenever it goes above a 1000 users, they're all troll accounts concern-trolling and posting FUD. Currently at 2811 users... lol

Edit: Now at 3682, lol