How can we form a Bitcoin investment syndicate?

[Luckybit]

This is an idea built around a question.

To define a syndicate:

“A syndicate is a self-organizing group of individuals, companies, corporations or entities formed to transact some specific business, or to promote a common interest. In most cases formed groups aim to scale up their profits. “ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syndicate

Distribution syndicate:
“A group of investment banks that work to underwrite and sell an initial public offering (IPO) of securities to the market. Investment banks often form syndicates when working on large securities offerings to reduce risk and to increase the potential network of contacts through which to sell the securities. This is especially true in the case of firm commitment offerings, where the distributing syndicate may suffer considerable losses if the full offering cannot be sold.” http://www.investopedia.com/terms/d/distributing-syndicate.asp

Some advantages I can think of are:

1. Coordinated buying pools so that miners and investors can agree in advance.
2. Buying pools can reveal the demand to mining pools.
3. Political protection should a day come when Bitcoin comes under political attack.

A lot of talk about protecting the blockchain from technical attack or protecting Bitcoin from technical insecurity but what about protecting the blockchain and Bitcoin from political attack? That would mean protecting those who mine and protecting the community itself on the political level. This would require a much more sophisticated level of organization but if we can all agree on a self sustaining cause of protecting Bitcoin or maintaining Bitcoin profitability then we can easily form a syndicate or syndicates around that.

[franky1]

using the IRC - OTC for bitcoin, do a shout out for any regular traders who are always online and always have a regular income.

that way you can build up a list of users who pledge to be online most days at certain hours and are guaranteed to have X amount of currency to swap. and are able to pre accept/pledge to do trades at a certain +/- against spot price.

then when a miner wants to cash out you just get the contact list knowing you have avoided 15 minutes of bartering with traders because you have already pre agreed EG 1% below gox to simple get on and do the deal.

this is how trading between bitcoin/fiat was envisioned for large numbers that people did not want to do on localbitcoins before Gox became the power house of centralisation.

the sooner we return to peer-to-peer trading where there is not one single bank account holding the main 'pot' of market capital the better

[joesmoe2012]

Count me in :p

I can help setup a small, private, invite only forum for collaboration.

[Luckybit]

Count me in :p

I can help setup a small, private, invite only forum for collaboration.

How could this syndicate offer protection for it's members from political attack? This could be a very real problem if things turn partisan with Bitcoin. Right now it's not a political currency it's math and libertarians support it, but in the future it could come under increasing attack.

[New_Frontier]

I like this idea, although I'm still a little confused by it.  Is this like setting up a quasi mutual fund that we all invest in?  How would we be protected from theft & what not?  This sounds like setting up a Corp. in EVE and then some guy runs off with all the money..lol.  I'm interested though..

[Luckybit]

I like this idea, although I'm still a little confused by it.  Is this like setting up a quasi mutual fund that we all invest in?  How would we be protected from theft & what not?  This sounds like setting up a Corp. in EVE and then some guy runs off with all the money..lol.  I'm interested though..

It's more like an international trade union than a Corp. It's groups of Corps who agree to a common interest in defending Bitcoin politicially and financially by forming a sort of union of Corps, but a syndicate is not just built of Corps, it's individuals, it's all kinds of entities in a syndicate. A syndicate is probably the best kind of organization for a community to form to defend an economic interest.

If we all agree we'd like to see the price of Bitcoins go high and be stable then we can agree to take action to do that if it's coordinated. This means in the future volatility can be controlled through increasing sophisticated levels of organization and coordination. At the same the political agenda could be based around the common interest the community syndicate agrees to, preventing the community from being divided politically.

We all want our Bitcoins to be worth as much as possible? We want Bitcoin to be a success? Whatever it is, we will need organization to protect it just like any other industry. Later on there can be lobbyists, political protection and support, etc. Investors generally share a common interest so an investment syndicate makes sense but I'm not a lawyer so if anyone here is they can come up with a legal organization to provide all sorts of services to make creating syndicates decentralized and easy by just using the right legal forms which should be freely distributed to anyone. At the same time lawyers will also be necessary to provide legal protection, what if people don't know their rights or what if in some countries people who use Bitcoins are oppressed?

[deadweasel]

I like this idea, although I'm still a little confused by it.  Is this like setting up a quasi mutual fund that we all invest in?  How would we be protected from theft & what not?  This sounds like setting up a Corp. in EVE and then some guy runs off with all the money..lol.  I'm interested though..

It's more like an international trade union than a Corp. It's groups of Corps who agree to a common interest and form a sort of union of Corps, but a syndicate is not just Corps, it's individuals, it's all forms of organizations in the union.

If you can find a single professional corporation in all of bitcoin I would be surprised.  What I see are hacks and people scraping by as a 'personal service' at best.  Just because they sling a webpage up doesn't mean it's run professionally.

Let's start where we are:  Learning how to be professionals.

[Luckybit]

I like this idea, although I'm still a little confused by it.  Is this like setting up a quasi mutual fund that we all invest in?  How would we be protected from theft & what not?  This sounds like setting up a Corp. in EVE and then some guy runs off with all the money..lol.  I'm interested though..

It's more like an international trade union than a Corp. It's groups of Corps who agree to a common interest and form a sort of union of Corps, but a syndicate is not just Corps, it's individuals, it's all forms of organizations in the union.

If you can find a single professional corporation in all of bitcoin I would be surprised.  What I see are hacks and people scraping by as a 'personal service' at best.  Just because they sling a webpage up doesn't mean it's run professionally.

Let's start where we are:  Learning how to be professionals.

Define "professional"? If you're saying many of the current corporations have problems you're right they do, but this isn't going to change if we don't reorganize. If Bitcoin is important to you, then you join a syndicate which allows you to legally and politically coordinate your moves within your corporation, as an individual, within your church, school, or workplace or whatever. Even something basic like talking points for PR would be something which could be distributed in the form of a newsletter to individuals within the investment syndicate.

[ElectricMucus]

Alas "Bitcoin Supernode 2.0"

[Este Nuno]

Bitcoin H

Alas "Bitcoin Supernode 2.0"

I suggest...


Bitcoin HYPERnode

[EndTheFed321]

Sounds interesting, if you allow the riff Raff in like myself who is not at all professional or will ever learn to be count me in  

[kriwest]

I feel that for bitcoin, or any cryptocoin for that matter, to become a viable currency - there needs to be an agreement among businesses about the initial mid term valuation in order to get the ball rolling and stabilize the economy by growing the customer base and thereby increasing velocity - eventually to the point where volatility won't be an issue any more.

Screw using the dollar to determine the value of bitcoin for anything other than the very beginning of the transition.

If the members of a syndicate / trade organization comprised of different levels of business; from manufacturer to distributor to store owner to marketer etc... all came to an agreement that this is our base price that we will charge in BTC to get the ball rolling and grow the bitcoin economy by increasing adoption and thereby velocity and stability.. there's no need to measure it against any other currency. The goal is to reach a market cap and velocity where crazy volatility is no longer an issue. After that, the value of the currency will be determined by the market.

The goal is simply to get over that hump in order to make bitcoin safe and viable for business transactions.

Of course this demands that the people involved are prepared to take a loss to start with in order to achieve a common goal. If for example a manufacturer of leather decided to dedicate 5% of his resources to grow the bitcoin economy - he could just say "hey, I'll join the BTC-syndicate and accept the fact that I'll be taking a loss in order to hopefully gain a lot more than that back in the future".

He then sells his leather to another member of the syndicate for the decided upon wholesale price in BTC, who in turn makes it into a jacket - sells it to yet another member in the syndicate for a markup, who talks to a member dealing with importation, distributes it to another member in X country, who sells it for BTC to the end customer.. every step of the way keeping it within the syndicate, and trading for the agreed upon base valuation.

The more people involved, and the more diverse the member base, the faster the adoption rate. And eventually the "price fixing" won't be needed. The market will have decided upon a price, and will be stable enough to run itself.

[superduh]

kriswet, not gonna happen

[datz]

Just join the Omega Hedge - vested and paid out in April - may be raising a round two.

[datz]

Just join the Omega Hedge - vested and paid out in April - may be raising a round two.

This time the Omega Hedge is Ripple geared.

[countryfree]

Before thinking about the organization, we should start by defining precise, common goals. That, while keeping in mind that bitcoin doesn't belong to anyone, since the only person who could claim bitcoin ownership has disappeared. I mean that there could be a syndicate, but that it will never been able to speak or act as a legal bitcoin representative.

[btceic]

Sounds interesting,
How about setting it up as an MLP


http://www.investopedia.com/terms/m/mlp.asp

TL;DR;

Definition of 'Master Limited Partnership - MLP'
A type of limited partnership that is publicly traded. There are two types of partners in this type of partnership: The limited partner is the person or group that provides the capital to the MLP and receives periodic income distributions from the MLP's cash flow, whereas the general partner is the party responsible for managing the MLP's affairs and receives compensation that is linked to the performance of the venture.

Investopedia Says    
Investopedia explains 'Master Limited Partnership - MLP'
One of the most crucial criteria that must be met in order for a partnership to be legally classified as an MLP is that the partnership must derive most (~90%) of its cash flows from real estate, natural resources and commodities.

The advantage of an MLP is that it combines the tax benefits of a limited partnership (the partnership does not pay taxes from the profit - the money is only taxed when unitholders receive distributions) with the liquidity of a publicly traded company.

[jamesgarfield]

Not sure about this one lol