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

[JorgeStolfi]

One of the several things that make me skeptical of bitcoin's future is that its community resembles more a religious sect than a bunch of sane, rational nerds.

In order to sustain belief in their initial ideal, bitcoiners have developed a network of dogmas that is becoming increasingly intricate and increasingly disconnected from reality.

A substantial part of that theological edifice is meant to allow denial of the single most important fact about bitcoin:

CHINA SETS THE PRICE

To make the denial of this fact possible, bitcoiners pretend to believe, e.g: that almost all of the Chinese trade volume is fake; that BTC-China is the most important Chinese exchange (and the only honest one); that the November rally was due to some magical property of bitcoin that generates rallies at regular intervals, with exponentially increasing magnitudes; and a number of other bizarre dogmas.

Because of these dogmas, the main bitcoin chart sites still omit most or all the large Chinese exchanges (but they all carry the insignificant BTC-China).  Even when it is obvious that price changes are clearly due to Chinese traders reacting to Chinese news, the deniers blame "stupid sheep" in the Western exchanges for "paying attention to China" -- when in fact the Western exchanges are tied to China by arbitrage, and follow China no matter what their clients think, wish, or do.

I can't understand how people hope to succeed in day trading or long-term investment without taking this basic and all-dominant fact into account.   

On the other hand, it is easy to see why bitcoiners desperately need to deny this fact. Bitcoin entrepreneurs would not find investors and clients if they admitted that the value of their fundamental asset is decided and sustained by a legion of fickle amateur traders in China, who, a year ago, were all speculating on fermented tea or some other kind of tulip.  Libertarians do not want to know that their main "anti-government weapon" was taken over by a country that they see as the epitome of oppressive government -- and was reduced by that government to a harmless hobby, in one day, with a single decree.  And the old-timers, in particular, will never admit that "their" beloved bitcoin is no longer "theirs".

[hdbuck]

Are we sure it was the Chinese news that caused the dump and not this?
http://online.wsj.com/news/article_email/SB10001424052702303663604579504691512965308-lMyQjAxMTA0MDEwNTExNDUyWj

see thats exactly what im talking about, you're desperate about finding correlation between exterior events and bitcoin's price. search more and you'll definitely find something that suits your concerns.

[Bitcoin_is_here_to_stay]

Still waiting for 3070 on Huobi

BTC-e already in $4xx, looks like other will follow - sooner or later.

And you know this is true, because the previous two times that prices went below 400 this year it was at 700 within the week and that sort of thing just never happens 3 times in a row.

Sarcasm? My unprofessional opinion was just based on the lack of buyers' enthusiasm - and sellers' nervousness. Although $500 is an important psychological barrier, so may take a while.

[podyx]

We're gonna see a big bear trap in a couple days

(about 430 is expected)

[windjc]

We're gonna see a big bear trap in a couple days

(about 430 is expected)

Where do you get 430 from?

[aminorex]

That's very interesting and I agree, not conducive to increased adoption.
I wonder what the perma bulls (aminorex, risto) think of this.

(I am a permabull in the sense that I have a long-term view which is bullish, and unlikely to change as a result of short-term trend changes.
When I say long-term, I mean multi-year.  I will cease to be a permabull when fundamentals cease to compel me thus.
Coincidentally,  I am also bullish on short- and medium-term bases at the moment, but that is likely to change quite often, and I probably won't share my views, for fear that I might cause some naive and vulnerable holder, somewhere, to loosen their grip.)

You can ease the burn of non-compliant funds or the burn of compliant funds.  Non-compliant funds have less choice than do compliant funds, so easing the burn of compliant fiat is better for fueling the fire overall.

[oda.krell]

One of the several things that make me skeptical of bitcoin's future is that its community resembles more a religious sect than a bunch of sane, rational nerds.

In order to sustain belief in their initial ideal, bitcoiners have developed a network of dogmas that is becoming increasingly intricate and increasingly disconnected from reality.

A substantial part of that theological edifice is meant to allow denial of the single most important fact about bitcoin:

CHINA SETS THE PRICE

To make the denial of this fact possible, bitcoiners pretend to believe, e.g: that almost all of the Chinese trade volume is fake; that BTC-China is the most important Chinese exchange (and the only honest one); that the November rally was due to some magical property of bitcoin that generates rallies at regular intervals, with exponentially increasing magnitudes; and a number of other bizarre dogmas.

Because of these dogmas, the main bitcoin chart sites still omit most or all the large Chinese exchanges (but they all carry the insignificant BTC-China).  Even when it is obvious that price changes are clearly due to Chinese traders reacting to Chinese news, the deniers blame "stupid sheep" in the Western exchanges for "paying attention to China" -- when in fact the Western exchanges are tied to China by arbitrage, and follow China no matter what their clients think, wish, or do.

I can't understand how people hope to succeed in day trading or long-term investment without taking this basic and all-dominant fact into account.  

On the other hand, it is easy to see why bitcoiners desperately need to deny this fact. Bitcoin entrepreneurs would not find investors and clients if they admitted that the value of their fundamental asset is decided and sustained by a legion of fickle amateur traders in China, who, a year ago, were all speculating on fermented tea or some other kind of tulip.  Libertarians do not want to know that their main "anti-government weapon" was taken over by a country that they see as the epitome of oppressive government -- and was reduced by that government to a harmless hobby, in one day, with a single decree.  And the old-timers, in particular, will never admit that "their" beloved bitcoin is no longer "theirs".

Don't make a complex situation simpler than it is.

Where do you get the idea from that the price is set by China? From your own "Chinese slumber" method? Last time I checked, it was wildly off, during several large swings.

Or is it your impression that China/Huobi "leads" all large movements, which is somehow self-evident? Then the answer is: no, they don't. They lead, and they follow, just as you would expect between exchanges that are linked together by arbitrage.

Here's an example, taken from the April 10 crash. China "led" the first part of the decline, volume picking up at around 2:45 UTC, and price from 2700 to 2400. Bitstamp follows, 4k volume, but 400 holds so far.

Next, Huobi slightly recovers, back to 2500. Volume declining along. And suddenly comes Bitstamp with another 4k dump, and China tags along (on barely any volume), but completely on the heels of stamp wrt price.

2nd observation: the Huobi bottom came in almost 2 hours *after* stamp. That makes zero sense if stamp blindly "follows" China.

The reality of the Bitcoin market is more complex than you describe it, and it's a pretty poor indication of your analytical faculties that you feel the need to oversimplify it to the point where it becomes grotesque.

This reminds me of the often stated "fact" that stamp blindly follows gox. Of course prices on the two exchanges were correlated to an extremely high degree, and often enough, stamp followed gox, but towards the end, the two simply decoupled, without much ado. If your theory can't account for that (and in the polemic way your phrased it, it cannot), then it is worthless, in my opinion.

graphs: 15min views of stamp and huobi on April 10

[podyx]

We're gonna see a big bear trap in a couple days

(about 430 is expected)

Where do you get 430 from?

It's based on the last reversal

The last reversal has been almost exactly as this one and bitcoin following the same patterns is expected

[billyjoeallen]

There will be differences in every individual, of course. Maybe you have more of a female brain than you realize.

Possibly true and I don't consider that an insult, but I doubt it. I am extremely right-handed and test higher in areas where you would expect a male to test higher. My best class in Naval Nuclear Power School was physics. 

My main skill is language. I was the first person to identify TERA as a woman, something she has never refuted. If I'm right and TERA is female, then she is a very unusual female, one who excels in traditionally male-dominated fields. The I.Q. bell curve for women is less flat, so that means she is very rare.

Trade what you know. The key to winning an argument is framing the debate. The key to winning a fight is choosing the battlefield that best suits your strengths.
It's not all tactics. It's strategy too.

[billyjoeallen]

Don't make a complex situation simpler than it is.

Don't make a simple situation more complex than it is. I can't believe I'm backing trolfi here, but he's right. The exchange with the most liquidity is the exchange with the most liquidity because of network effects. Bitcoin is the dominant cryptocurrency because bitcoin is the dominant cryptocurrency. The market will follow China because the Market will follow China.  These things are very sticky and something BIG has to happen for that to change.

[aminorex]

One of the several things that make me skeptical of bitcoin's future is that its community resembles more a religious sect than a bunch of sane, rational nerds.

Your writing resembles Bill O'Reilly more than Bill Moyers.  You're writing agitprop against BTC on a BTC forum.  You're a total troll, and either a masochist or a shill.

CHINA SETS THE PRICE

I think everyone is aware that China is dominating price action at present, has been for several months, and is likely to do so for several more months.  Why does that put your panties in a twist?

...that the November rally was due to some magical property of bitcoin that generates rallies at regular intervals, with exponentially increasing magnitudes

It's not magical.  It's science.

...deniers blame "stupid sheep" in the Western exchanges for "paying attention to China" -- when in fact the Western exchanges are tied to China by arbitrage

China doesn't set the price.  Chinese supply and demand is a major factor in the price.  The variability of that factor has been profound, but is likely to decline rapidly.  Then other factors will become more important to the margin variations.

It is reasonable to consider that the fundamental value of BTC is not strongly impacted by the variability of supply and demand balance in China.  That is a longer-term view.  It is common for value-oriented investors to have frustrations or even contempt for momentum traders.

On the other hand, it is easy to see why bitcoiners desperately need to deny this fact. Bitcoin entrepreneurs would not find investors and clients if they admitted that the value of their fundamental asset is decided and sustained by a legion of fickle amateur traders in China

Firstly, I think you are talking about price, not about value.  Secondly, most viable bitcoin-centric business models are required to accommodate the volatility of the commodity.  That would be true regardless of the source of the volatility.

Libertarians do not want to know that their main "anti-government weapon" was taken over by a country that they see as the epitome of oppressive government -- and was reduced by that government to a harmless hobby, in one day, with a single decree.  And the old-timers, in particular, will never admit that "their" beloved bitcoin is no longer "theirs".

I don't quite understand how you consider BTC to be an anti-government weapon.   I think the virtue of BTC from a libertarian perspective is that it facilitates free markets.   It's not anti-government so much as orthogonal to government.  BTC implements a parallel government of its own, with laws expressed in code, which does not depend upon the sword of the state.  Government is not an enemy, for BTC, it is merely irrelevant.  That doesn't seem strongly impacted by the Chinese regulatory environment.  

As for the old-timers, they generally esteem decentralization quite highly, and that has suffered primarily, if not exclusively, from ASICs, and not at all from China.

You do seem to be raving at this point Jorge.  It's kind of sad.

[bobdude17]

Just in case you guys aren't watching Reddit:

Second Market Exchange is now LIVE!

https://www.secondmarket.com/bitcoin-trading

25BTC transaction minimum.


Ahead of schedule.

[frienemy]

The key to winning an argument is framing the debate. The key to winning a fight is choosing the battlefield that best suits your strengths.
It's not all tactics. It's strategy too.

Just a thought, I feel the urge to share about the "winning a fight": Winning an argument and the ability to beat someone six feet below the ground by the simple power of words does not neccessarily provide the proof that you are right. That's completely NOT related to your current discussion, it's just a thing that quite a bunch of people should keep in mind before eating others alive on the forum

[jonoiv]

A simplistic way of looking at the market, yet quite often effective.  History repeats itself imho.  

So history repeats itself until when? We go to zero?

It repeats itself until it doesn't. Until whatever is causing this to happen stops causing it to happen or is outweighed by other factors. Rationality is sometimes beneficial, but sometimes the safety of the herd is beneficial when predators are around. We have to have a healthy respect for our limitations as well as our abilities. There is the unknown and then there is the unknowable.

Bitcoin cost of production is too high right now relative to utility value. The speculative value to me and I imagine many others right now is negative. I don't have the tools to trade with confidence in this environment. I don't speak Mandarin or Cantonese. I'm very good with language, but Google translate does not allow me to pick up the subtle cues that give me a small edge.

My TA sucks, but my skill at language allows me to know who's TA to trust. The people I trust who are more skillful than me, and are intelligent and honest tell me not to trade, so I'm not trading. Bitcoin may be a fantastic buy for someone right now, but not for someone with my investment portfolio. Again, if the situation changes then my position will change, but not before that.

China is an unknown. in the amount of time I have, it is an unknowable. I'm hedging.

I expect it to follow the same path.  That's why I'm not buying back for the time being.

And if trusting people are more or less intelligent based on language you are very mislead,  plenty of very cleaver foreign people posting that may not have a total grasp of the language.

language is a non-logical skill learned via repetition and imitation. Countless genii of pure logic, science and art throughout history were thought to be dyslexic and were poor at written language skills.

Albert Einstein
Galileo Galilei
Leonardo da Vinci
Steve Jobs
John Lennon
Jonoiv  (kidding)

to name a few!

[aminorex]

These things are very sticky and something BIG has to happen for that to change.

Certainly, something BIG, but it can happen gradually, without attracting attention, until suddenly everyone wakes up one day and realizes that events in China are no longer impacting price action disproportionately.

[billyjoeallen]

Just in case you guys aren't watching Reddit:

Second Market Exchange is now LIVE!

https://www.secondmarket.com/bitcoin-trading

25BTC transaction minimum.


Ahead of schedule.

Volume? Volume is key.

[seleme]

One of the several things that make me skeptical of bitcoin's future is that its community resembles more a religious sect than a bunch of sane, rational nerds.

In order to sustain belief in their initial ideal, bitcoiners have developed a network of dogmas that is becoming increasingly intricate and increasingly disconnected from reality.

A substantial part of that theological edifice is meant to allow denial of the single most important fact about bitcoin:

CHINA SETS THE PRICE

To make the denial of this fact possible, bitcoiners pretend to believe, e.g: that almost all of the Chinese trade volume is fake; that BTC-China is the most important Chinese exchange (and the only honest one); that the November rally was due to some magical property of bitcoin that generates rallies at regular intervals, with exponentially increasing magnitudes; and a number of other bizarre dogmas.

Because of these dogmas, the main bitcoin chart sites still omit most or all the large Chinese exchanges (but they all carry the insignificant BTC-China).  Even when it is obvious that price changes are clearly due to Chinese traders reacting to Chinese news, the deniers blame "stupid sheep" in the Western exchanges for "paying attention to China" -- when in fact the Western exchanges are tied to China by arbitrage, and follow China no matter what their clients think, wish, or do.

I can't understand how people hope to succeed in day trading or long-term investment without taking this basic and all-dominant fact into account.  

On the other hand, it is easy to see why bitcoiners desperately need to deny this fact. Bitcoin entrepreneurs would not find investors and clients if they admitted that the value of their fundamental asset is decided and sustained by a legion of fickle amateur traders in China, who, a year ago, were all speculating on fermented tea or some other kind of tulip.  Libertarians do not want to know that their main "anti-government weapon" was taken over by a country that they see as the epitome of oppressive government -- and was reduced by that government to a harmless hobby, in one day, with a single decree.  And the old-timers, in particular, will never admit that "their" beloved bitcoin is no longer "theirs".

Don't make a complex situation simpler than it is.

Where do you get the idea from that the price is set by China? From your own "Chinese slumber" method? Last time I checked, it was wildly off, during several large swings.

Or is it your impression that China/Huobi "leads" all large movements, which is somehow self-evident? Then the answer is: no, they don't. They lead, and they follow, just as you would expect between exchanges that are linked together by arbitrage.

Here's an example, taken from the April 10 crash. China "led" the first part of the decline, volume picking up at around 2:45 UTC, and price from 2700 to 2400. Bitstamp follows, 4k volume, but 400 holds so far.

Next, Huobi slightly recovers, back to 2500. Volume declining along. And suddenly comes Bitstamp with another 4k dump, and China tags along (on barely any volume), but completely on the heels of stamp wrt price.

2nd observation: the Huobi bottom came in almost 2 hours *after* stamp. That makes zero sense if stamp blindly "follows" China.

The reality of the Bitcoin market is more complex than you describe it, and it's a pretty poor indication of your analytical faculties that you feel the need to oversimplify it to the point where it becomes grotesque.

This reminds me of the often stated "fact" that stamp blindly follows gox. Of course prices on the two exchanges were correlated to an extremely high degree, and often enough, stamp followed gox, but towards the end, the two simply decoupled, without much ado. If your theory can't account for that (and in the polemic way your phrased it, it cannot), then it is worthless, in my opinion.

graphs: 15min views of stamp and huobi on April 10

Of course there are moment when some other exchanges take control for short time but this time, beside his usual biased bullshit Jorge is right in general.

We can deny it as much as we want but Bitcoin is currently China's bitch and largely depends on each fart coming from that part of the world. Their government decisions or even only rumors about them are moving the market as a wheel. It might change at some time surely but right now we are under China's mercy completely and that's awful thing, specially for people who are trading as no skills and indicators can beat a single news coming from China. And their exchanges are in most cases the market leaders.

[bobdude17]

Just in case you guys aren't watching Reddit:

Second Market Exchange is now LIVE!

https://www.secondmarket.com/bitcoin-trading

25BTC transaction minimum.


Ahead of schedule.

Volume? Volume is key.

Doesn't matter right now. Being American is key.

[seleme]

Just in case you guys aren't watching Reddit:

Second Market Exchange is now LIVE!

https://www.secondmarket.com/bitcoin-trading

25BTC transaction minimum.


Ahead of schedule.

Not really the exchange as we are familiar with. I expected more than that.

[rudius]

Trade what you know. The key to winning an argument is framing the debate. The key to winning a fight is choosing the battlefield that best suits your strengths.
It's not all tactics. It's strategy too.

By far, the first and best lesson for a trader. The comfort zone and an edge is essential for long term winnings