Here comes the bitcoin crash!

[joepie91]

As a newbie who just heard about bitcoins on a pod cast ( Buzz out loud ), I too want to get into them but @ $18+ makes me cautious. I personally think there is a lot of hype going around and the short attention span of the internet will cause prices to stabilise sooner rather than later.

A number doesn't mean anything. It could be 1800$ per BTC as well, and all that would mean would be that you'd shift some decimal places.

1 = 1 (parity) is nothing more than a psychological waypoint. The value itself does not say anything, the change of the value over time does.

Unfortunately for bitcoins, psychological waypoints, as you like to call them, can be quite significant.

Let's face it - would you rather buy 100 bitcoins for $10, or 0.001 bitcoins for $10?  It just doesn't feel right to be buying such a small fraction for such a large price, and that is something that will prevent many people from entering the market.

And that is why it may be a good idea to use the smaller "denominations" more regularly, so that it still seems familiar to people.

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[taqistan]

As a newbie who just heard about bitcoins on a pod cast ( Buzz out loud ), I too want to get into them but @ $18+ makes me cautious. I personally think there is a lot of hype going around and the short attention span of the internet will cause prices to stabilise sooner rather than later.

A number doesn't mean anything. It could be 1800$ per BTC as well, and all that would mean would be that you'd shift some decimal places.

1 = 1 (parity) is nothing more than a psychological waypoint. The value itself does not say anything, the change of the value over time does.

Unfortunately for bitcoins, psychological waypoints, as you like to call them, can be quite significant.

Let's face it - would you rather buy 100 bitcoins for $10, or 0.001 bitcoins for $10?  It just doesn't feel right to be buying such a small fraction for such a large price, and that is something that will prevent many people from entering the market.

No, you just bought 1000 uBTC for $10!!!

[Joker007]

It's not going crash at all. There is already value in bitcoin because people took their time to use their energy to mine, just like mining for gold.  If nobody uses it, then it'll be worth a penny, no less. Like last year.

It's dropping because somebody is selling less than value thus people would buy it, then other will follow up. I will expect a price increase this weekend or next week. Who knows, it's all depends on the speculations and the market value. We shall see.

Still waiting for the dwolla pending to end. This is really irritating.

[supahlovah]

Still waiting for the dwolla pending to end. This is really irritating.

This is the biggest problem, there's no easy way to instantly put money into bitcoin. Once that's dealt with, the price will go up too.

[dday]

So here's a chart that kind of backs up my prediction (so far)  -- I posted this just a few hours ago when it was in the hight 18's - right now it's in the 16's -- but this chart does not look like a chart you want to jump into right now.  Maybe I can pick some up at 10 sooner than I thought....but now I might wait until $8 and start there.  I wish I could short this like I did AIG in the high 20's.  Is there anyway to short bitcoins?

**not a debbie downer...I love bitcoin more than most but own zero right now....I will be in soon!  Just would like to be short right now.

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/844/bitcoindrop.gif/

[neneko]

Fancy economics aside it's pretty simple. For the price to go up there have to be people willing to buy bitcoin. We got a influx of investors with the media attention which drove the price up. A lot of those people were looking to make quick cash though and that's why we see the drop now. Hopefully there will be more people interested in investing in bitcoins. It'd help if there were more services/products tied to the bitcoin. Of course with the bitcoin being as unstable as it is right now it's hard for shops to accept it since that means extra work and an added risk for them.

[dday]

haha, there will always be posts about ____ crashing. how often is it true?

This is the truth.  A 300% increase in price does not necessarily mean bubble.  These types of run ups are often seen in stocks with a low market cap.  Just the nature of few trades allows for huge volatility.

but I'm talking over 300,000% in less than a year right?  This is a bubble for now....everything like this is a bubble...it will pop at this level!  I was 2 days away from a big IPO in March of 2000 when the dotcom bubble exploded (we even had champaign flutes with our NASDAQ ticker symbol) hahaha -- so I've seen the biggest of the bubbles pop (Yahoo stock at over 200 a share)!  5,000+ PE/ratio! ...and have seen many since then...this is a big temp bubble...and it will pop in just a bit.  So just's sell what you can now...and come back in later.

**I currently own zero bitcoin -- but my opinions are based on my honest opinion/expericne/DD  -- soon I will be long bitcoin!

[Joker007]

Well prices is going up now.

Thanks dwolla for screwing me over... TWICE! 

[mg101]

Yeah it's volatile, yeah it's high risk, from an investment sense, but hey - it's life can be like that sometimes

and who knows, btc might actually take off, and how often do you get to be among the first at something!

[dday]

Yeah it's volatile, yeah it's high risk, from an investment sense, but hey - it's life can be like that sometimes

and who knows, btc might actually take off, and how often do you get to be among the first at something!

I'll soon be long don't get me wrong...I just think this is a bad entry point for new adopters and a great selling point for early adopters.

We're now seeing a dead cat bounce as I type!  This is exciting how fast this is all happening!   -- To be honest...soon I will put all of my money into bitcoins (and silver) and I will live all over the world solely on bitcoins and silver.  I'm excited to get off the US Dollar! 

[demoncrest]

I just think it went up so fast because of all of the media attention...so I would expect it's only natural to see a major correction in the next week.  

Also, would it be possible for say the US Government (or someone else) to buy all of the bitcoins they can since there are only around 6 million in existence and then they would become the market makers?  I mean it would be great if someone did that because they wanted to embrace the technology...but if someone who wants to fight it/destroy it - does it...couldn't that be another risk?

Well, can you imagine what the last Bitcoin owner is going to charge for his last bitcoin?

My point being, you can only buy Bitcoins if they are for sale.

He can charge whatever the hell he wants for the last bitcoin, if the markets crashes then he just won't have a buyer so where's the value?

Too many people overlook the fact that even though something can be assigned a value, if no one wants to buy it then it's worthless.

[Joker007]

We're now seeing a dead cat bounce as I type!  This is exciting how fast this is all happening!   -- To be honest...soon I will put all of my money into bitcoins (and silver) and I will live all over the world solely on bitcoins and silver.  I'm excited to get off the US Dollar! 

I rather get out of fiat money. Fiat money does nothing but destroys the mean of living. All it does is fuel the gov, politics and give corporation more power. I can't wait to see bitcoin thriving in the next decade. It's going be amazing!

[dday]

oh oh back in the 16's -- I see the big trouble once it falls below 15 -- that will be a psychological barrier that will increase selling...and then the drop below 10 will happen fast.  But I see support in the 8's low 9's....then it will be up to better marketing/grass roots effort to promote bitcoins and to make them more usable in the real world to more people.  The fact that properly securing them on ones computer or a thumb drive is not the easiest of tasks...it would be nice to secure them in an Online wallet, but that does not seem like a good solution at the moment...I'm sure many talented hackers can get in there if they really wanted to...I think once someone comes up with less than a 14 step process to secure your bitcoins...that it will help increase the amount of new buyers.

[finnthecelt]

oh oh back in the 16's -- I see the big trouble once it falls below 15 -- that will be a psychological barrier that will increase selling...and then the drop below 10 will happen fast.  But I see support in the 8's low 9's....then it will be up to better marketing/grass roots effort to promote bitcoins and to make them more usable in the real world to more people.  The fact that properly securing them on ones computer or a thumb drive is not the easiest of tasks...it would be nice to secure them in an Online wallet, but that does not seem like a good solution at the moment...I'm sure many talented hackers can get in there if they really wanted to...I think once someone comes up with less than a 14 step process to secure your bitcoins...that it will help increase the amount of new buyers.

You assume most buyers know about the 14 step process.....that won't stop many people anyway. You can just keep it in your Mt. Gox account until you're ready to cash out.

Of course you have to watch out for the boogey man under every rock......sigh.

[dday]

oh oh back in the 16's -- I see the big trouble once it falls below 15 -- that will be a psychological barrier that will increase selling...and then the drop below 10 will happen fast.  But I see support in the 8's low 9's....then it will be up to better marketing/grass roots effort to promote bitcoins and to make them more usable in the real world to more people.  The fact that properly securing them on ones computer or a thumb drive is not the easiest of tasks...it would be nice to secure them in an Online wallet, but that does not seem like a good solution at the moment...I'm sure many talented hackers can get in there if they really wanted to...I think once someone comes up with less than a 14 step process to secure your bitcoins...that it will help increase the amount of new buyers.

OH OH!  We almost broke the $15 Psychological barrier!  This is the test right here!  If/when it hits in the 14's the decline will accelerate. (I hope you see my posts as objective analysis)

http://img191.imageshack.us/img191/1232/bitcoincrash.gif

Uploaded with ImageShack.us

[btyako]

oh oh back in the 16's -- I see the big trouble once it falls below 15 -- that will be a psychological barrier that will increase selling...and then the drop below 10 will happen fast.  But I see support in the 8's low 9's....then it will be up to better marketing/grass roots effort to promote bitcoins and to make them more usable in the real world to more people.  The fact that properly securing them on ones computer or a thumb drive is not the easiest of tasks...it would be nice to secure them in an Online wallet, but that does not seem like a good solution at the moment...I'm sure many talented hackers can get in there if they really wanted to...I think once someone comes up with less than a 14 step process to secure your bitcoins...that it will help increase the amount of new buyers.

OH OH!  We almost broke the $15 Psychological barrier!  This is the test right here!  If/when it hits in the 14's the decline will accelerate. (I hope you see my posts as objective analysis)

http://img191.imageshack.us/img191/1232/bitcoincrash.gif

Uploaded with ImageShack.us

looking at the 48hour plot of any chart can be pretty crazy..
http://bitcoincharts.com/charts/mtgoxUSD#rg60zvztgSzm1g10zm2g25 might want to look at something like this to get a little perspective...

[lmlbs]

This is the truth.  A 300% increase in price does not necessarily mean bubble.  These types of run ups are often seen in stocks with a low market cap.  Just the nature of few trades allows for huge volatility.

but I'm talking over 300,000% in less than a year right?  This is a bubble for now....everything like this is a bubble...it will pop at this level!  I was 2 days away from a big IPO in March of 2000 when the dotcom bubble exploded (we even had champaign flutes with our NASDAQ ticker symbol) hahaha -- so I've seen the biggest of the bubbles pop (Yahoo stock at over 200 a share)!  5,000+ PE/ratio! ...and have seen many since then...this is a big temp bubble...and it will pop in just a bit.  So just's sell what you can now...and come back in later.

**I currently own zero bitcoin -- but my opinions are based on my honest opinion/expericne/DD  -- soon I will be long bitcoin!

This in NOT like dotcom bubble. When there would be 1001 systems like Bitcom, all growing to insane levels - that would be a bubble.

On the fundamental side - in 2000 there were way too many companies not having a product (or ability to develop a product). Bitcoin's product is very easy - it is called "REAL MONEY", without too many parasites attached. Humanity has a need for a product like this. Granted, it will not come EASY, but I'd compare Bitcom to RedHat in 1993, with the difference that you can buy a bit of ownership. But then - the need for REAL MONEY is much more urgent then the need for Good OS. It can be compared only to Internet itself.

The US Govt (or World Govt) scam with US dollar is coming to an end. Like Internet had done with a Govt. Scam called "BORDERS" (there were no borders, visas and all the crap 100 years ago), likewise the "MONEY SCAM" is coming to an end. We, the people of this Planet want money we can save in, money not subject to inflation, money not used to satisfy endless Govt. greed.

Of course BTC will be volatile, fluctuate a lot, but overall trend is only UP.

[GoldZuGeld]

Of course BTC will be volatile, fluctuate a lot, but overall trend is only UP.

yeah would be great. I think higher Difficulty results in higher Prices

[skyhigh]

Well this whole bubble we had last 30 or whatever days was not really unexpected. I'm not saying anyone could see it coming, what I'm saying is when it all started moving it was pretty obvious it has some legs and the run up $33 was the result. Now it certainly needs time to adjust and take out every weak hand that wants out for whatever reason, mostly fear of the unknown by the newbies who bought too high simply hoping for the greater fool effect taking place. This is all great news for early investors and miners who can hold in this shaky times, because now the real trading is starting to evolve.

Where to next?

In the near future, next 10 days, it will be very important if $15 will hold or not, and the total volume we will get in the meantime. As long as there are more and more people coming in this game, more are total number of bitcoins spread around, less are concentrated to a small group of people who could control it to a point. Everything is still so early and all this things will/could change drastically in a year based on the fact that for example right now there's only lets say 50k people trading/mining and in a year there will be 500k people doing the same thing. There is no reason right now for bitcoin to fail at this stage so whoever bought in cheap is pretty safe to hold for long term. That said it doesn't mean they will get rich from it, it only means they are well set for possible gains if things will go the right way.


Let me give you a simple example..

Lets say that right now the only real use for bitcoins is SilkRoad (SR) and float of bitcoins is 3mill (which I doubt, but OK for the explanation it will do). Since SR is the only real consumer of coins their users need to eat up this float for bitcoins to get rare, so when the new group of SR members will want to buy goods there won't be able to because they wont be able to get any new coins. BUT here is a catch. SR sellers, guys who are offering this goods, they don't want to hold bitcoins, they want to exchange them back to $$ ASAP. I'm sure that right now there is a big group of bitcoins owners who are selling goods on SR, who WOULD LOVE to have someone buying all those bitcoin off them on a regular day to day basis, because right now they can only use mtgox, with $10k monthly withdraw limit. If you know what is mainly sold on SR you could have an idea how quickly sellers are turning around $10k worth of goods.

For price to have another real run up like we saw in the last 30 days from $5 to $30 we will need tons of SR buyers wanting to buy 3mill bitcoins which at current trading price would mean $45mill of buying power or more similar services like SR in the very near future.

I don't  think we will get one or the other in the very near future, 3mo period, the only way for bitcoin price is to correct itself down. I think $15 will get tested and it will fail based on the fact that it went up way too quick in a super short period of time and the whole move was based on thin hot air. $10 looks very solid for a bottom right now. If we ever get there or not is another question. There has to be a reason for price to move, it can't be based on nothing.


MINING DIFFICULTY HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH BITCOIN PRICE.

[drknark]

Of course BTC will be volatile, fluctuate a lot, but overall trend is only UP.

yeah would be great. I think higher Difficulty results in higher Prices

MINING DIFFICULTY HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH BITCOIN PRICE.

Personally I have a third viewpoint. I don't think higher difficulty can result in higher prices, supply will be the same no matter what the difficulty. Therefore only increased demand can result in higher prices.

But saying difficulty has nothing to do with the price cannot, in my mind, be correct either. The most logical connection is that increased price leads to higher difficulty. This is because high prices will make more people buy mining hardware.

Decreasing price would however probably not lead to decreasing difficulty, since most people who already have the hardware will keep running it until the electricity cost is say more than half the income they get.