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

[ChartBuddy]

Explanation

[luigi1111]

It's official, bitcoin is a ponzi-scheme, the price is just gonna go down if more fools don't get in.

I wouldn't count $155 as "rich".

[finlon]

It's more like you are into special wooden nickels made of a specific tree, cut down and uniquely identifiable by it's dna. It's the first kind of wooden nickels that are uniquely identifiable in that way. The problem is there are other people who have done that with other trees, and their wooden nickels have the same properties besides being from a different tree.

While they have the same intrinsic properties, their extrinsic properties are dramatically different.  It is not the intrinsic properties of BTC which give it fundamental value, but extrinsic ones.

Things with different properties behave differently.

Are you suggesting that it's not the technology but the userbase/great PR which gives bitcoin value?
I was lead to believe the value behind bitcoin was disruptive technology

A great PR always does vary prices. In a positive as well as a negative way. But the technology is the major factor imo.

[Silverspoon]

It is bitcoin.de, a german exchange.

Thanks.  Could you give me a link to 2012 price data?  I'm having a hard time getting anything prior to late 2013

[jertsy]

It's more like you are into special wooden nickels made of a specific tree, cut down and uniquely identifiable by it's dna. It's the first kind of wooden nickels that are uniquely identifiable in that way. The problem is there are other people who have done that with other trees, and their wooden nickels have the same properties besides being from a different tree.

While they have the same intrinsic properties, their extrinsic properties are dramatically different.  It is not the intrinsic properties of BTC which give it fundamental value, but extrinsic ones.

Things with different properties behave differently.

Are you suggesting that it's not the technology but the userbase/great PR which gives bitcoin value?
I was lead to believe the value behind bitcoin was disruptive technology

A great PR always does vary prices. In a positive as well as a negative way. But the technology is the major factor imo.

First mover advantage probably helps give bitcoin some value. The technology and the PR are probably also major factors.

[Richy_T]

What if I told you that the real monetary inflation for BTC is actually even higher than most people think?
That's because a lot of BTCs from the early days are totally lost (so nobody owns the private keys anymore, it's like they never existed).


2 million BTCs (minimum) are very probably lost:

http://onbitcoin.com/2013/12/07/bitcoin-spoilage-2-million-bitcoin-likely-lost-old-hard-drives/




The supply of BTC in circulation is actually smaller than believed, that means that the inflation is actually higher.

A reasonable point. But if you are using BTC in circulation, you almost have to cut out a lot of Bitcoins that are being kept off the market by holders also. Depending on what you are trying to measure I guess. It's just one of many reasons why market cap is actually pretty meaningless as well.

It's also feasible to argue that there is no inflation at all, that since there will only ever be 21 million BTC, it's not inflating, they are just becoming accessible. Again, it is important to define what you are trying to measure.

[Silverspoon]

It's more like you are into special wooden nickels made of a specific tree, cut down and uniquely identifiable by it's dna. It's the first kind of wooden nickels that are uniquely identifiable in that way. The problem is there are other people who have done that with other trees, and their wooden nickels have the same properties besides being from a different tree.

While they have the same intrinsic properties, their extrinsic properties are dramatically different.  It is not the intrinsic properties of BTC which give it fundamental value, but extrinsic ones.

Things with different properties behave differently.

Are you suggesting that it's not the technology but the userbase/great PR which gives bitcoin value?
I was lead to believe the value behind bitcoin was disruptive technology

A great PR always does vary prices. In a positive as well as a negative way. But the technology is the major factor imo.

First mover advantage probably helps give bitcoin some value. The technology and the PR are probably also major factors.

So what, exactly, are bitcoin's "extrinsic qualities" that can't be replicated?  First mover advantage, and ... that's all I got.  The infrastructure can be easily usurped by any SHA256 clone coin.  As I understand it, a big chunk of hashpower was just recently switched back to bitcoin after mining some alt?

[JorgeStolfi]

Well, I'm stuck here: http://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/22/is-it-possible-to-brute-force-bitcoin-address-creation-in-order-to-steal-money
The math posted there is ok for me but I'm not familiar with crypto so those parts are over my head for now, Anyway, as one can see, there is no consensus among experts. Interesting enough, it seems that one post there clearly reads "It is possible to brute force some Bitcoin addresses, because some people generate their private keys in an insecure manner." and further the author even gives some practical cases!

Well, yes, if the private key was not generated at random, it is possible to crack it.

This is in fact what happened earller this month to customers of Blockchain.info (BCI) web wallet.  That service gives you javascript code that is supposed to generate random private keys, which remain in your computer so they are supposedly safe.  One day their Chief Blunder Officer tried to improve the random number generator, but instead broke it quite thoroughly.  As a result, some clients who generated private keys with the broken javascript got some keys that were easy to guess (so much so that the same key was given to different clients, it seems).  Also, any transactions that were signed with that buggy code contained enough information to allow guessing of the private keys of the input addresses.  

Fortunately, a "white hat" hacker was monitoring the blockchain for the latter weakness, promptly warned BCI, and the bad javascript was pulled from their site a few hours later.  Even so, about a thousand addresses with about a thousand BTC total had their contents swept by hackers who broke the private keys -- fortunately, most of them by that "white hacker", who returned them to BCI.   Those keys were so weak that they could be cracked by an ordinary PC.   There were similar incidents in the past but this may have been the worst one so far.

However, I suppose that old addresses do not have this kind of weakness, since there were fewer wallet programs available and those were written by competent programmers.  But who knows.  Perhaps Satoshi was still using some lousy random number generator when he generated his private keys...

This is a also method that a hacker could use to steal bitcoins.  He gets people to use malicious wallet software, that generates intentionally weak keys, and/or transaction signatures that reveal the private keys.  Unlike the BCI accident, these weaknesses can be masked so that they cannot be detected by looking at the keys and signatures.  The hacker then needs only monitor the blockchain until he sees enough BTC in those compromised address.  This attack would work even if the victim generates the keys and/or signs the transactions in a computer that is not connected to the internet.

[ticoti]

I think this lateral market is going to be some weeks else

[ChartBuddy]

Explanation

[jertsy]

Explanation

Is this what chartbuddy's chart looks like to everyone else, or is it just me?

[esse83]

Explanation

Is this what chartbuddy's chart looks like to everyone else, or is it just me?

no, to most people he looks like "ignored".

[ejinte]

USD is up against almost all other currencies, not only crypto, I find this strange.

usd is finding new oil boom by new methods and technology, nothing is strange about it.

USD is up against almost all other currencies, not only crypto, I find this strange.

it's not really strange. the same thing happened before the 2007-2008 economic crisis.

How is it going to be? This is really strange.

[Bitcoin_BOy$]

Btc-e

Last Price: 311.02 USDLow: 308.3049 USDHigh: 317 USD
Volume: 3935 BTC / 1230958 USDServer Time: 30.12.14 00:28

[Silverspoon]

Yeah, trying to break the weekly low, but sure is taking its sweet time.
Like watching paint dry.

[inca]

Yeah, trying to break the weekly low, but sure is taking its sweet time.
Like watching paint dry.

So are you lambtrolls latest alt?

[Wandererfromthenorth]

Next big move should come in a few days (4-6 max)
Wait for volume to confirm a breakout/breakdown.

If big volume confirms a break in either direction, it should be a major move.

[Bitcoin_BOy$]

Next big move should come in a few days (4-6 max)
Wait for volume to confirm a breakout/breakdown.

If big volume confirms a break in either direction, it should be a major move.

Price will Up or Down what you guess

[ChartBuddy]

Explanation

[Wandererfromthenorth]

Next big move should come in a few days (4-6 max)
Wait for volume to confirm a breakout/breakdown.

If big volume confirms a break in either direction, it should be a major move.

Price will Up or Down what you guess

You don't need to guess beforehand. That's the point. You short the breakdown (if we go down) or you long the breakout (if we go up) when we exit the triangle trying to get the best fill. Only if volume confirms it though.