So bitcoin has been stable for a while..

[BitWulf]

It seems strange to me that bitcoin has become so stable all of a sudden and for such a long time (in comparison to the last couple of months).

Can anyone explain this? Is there some form of manipulation going on?

[XXthetimeisnowXX]

in the past it was calm foooorreeerrr.

but in recent times a calm usually means its building support for a bull market. just my opinion.

[arsenische]

I have a hypothesis.

1) Bitcoin was growing too fast. Everybody expected it to crash. When mtgox failed to handle the load, it crashed.

2) Almost everybody is long-term bullish, that is why many buy when bitcoin is cheap. But at the same time everybody knows that bitcoin is volatile and unpredictible. So people try to use the price swings to increase amount of BTC they own and maybe to make some pocket money too.

3) It is too easy to make profits when price swings widely. You just make an order in any direction at any price, and it is highly likely that you'll be able to take profit if you do not fix losses (since the price can go literally anywhere within few days).

So many people followed this strategy thus reducing the amplitude of price swings. And now there are a lot of fixed profits and unfixed losses, and the price can't fluctuate that much until something happens. And probably trade volume reduced because both short time bears and bulls don't want to fix losses and are waiting for price to come back to make even more profits to them.

That's why it looks like that:

But that is just a hypothesis. The other hypothesis might include some kind of conspiracy and manipulators.

[Crypt_Current]

I have a hypothesis.

1) Bitcoin was growing too fast. Everybody expected it to crash. When mtgox failed to handle the load, it crashed.

2) Almost everybody is long-term bullish, that is why many buy when bitcoin is cheap. But at the same time everybody knows that bitcoin is volatile and unpredictible. So people try to use the price swings to increase amount of BTC they own and maybe to make some pocket money too.

3) It is too easy to make profits when price swings widely. You just make an order in any direction at any price, and it is highly likely that you'll be able to take profit if you do not fix losses (since the price can go literally anywhere within few days).

So many people followed this strategy thus reducing the amplitude of price swings. And now there are a lot of fixed profits and unfixed losses, and the price can't fluctuate that much until something happens. And probably trade volume reduced because both short time bears and bulls don't want to fix losses and are waiting for price to come back to make even more profits to them.

That's why it looks like that:

But that is just a hypothesis. The other hypothesis might include some kind of conspiracy and manipulators.

long story short:  Consolidation.
The longer the consolidation, the more dramatic the eventual breakout.
And now for a rhetorical question:  Which direction will price breakout toward?
You have a 50/50 chance of being correct by a completely uneducated guess ...

[BitWulf]

I have a hypothesis.

1) Bitcoin was growing too fast. Everybody expected it to crash. When mtgox failed to handle the load, it crashed.

2) Almost everybody is long-term bullish, that is why many buy when bitcoin is cheap. But at the same time everybody knows that bitcoin is volatile and unpredictible. So people try to use the price swings to increase amount of BTC they own and maybe to make some pocket money too.

3) It is too easy to make profits when price swings widely. You just make an order in any direction at any price, and it is highly likely that you'll be able to take profit if you do not fix losses (since the price can go literally anywhere within few days).

So many people followed this strategy thus reducing the amplitude of price swings. And now there are a lot of fixed profits and unfixed losses, and the price can't fluctuate that much until something happens. And probably trade volume reduced because both short time bears and bulls don't want to fix losses and are waiting for price to come back to make even more profits to them.

That's why it looks like that: https://i.imgur.com/fY9NewR.png

But that is just a hypothesis. The other hypothesis might include some kind of conspiracy and manipulators.

long story short:  Consolidation.
The longer the consolidation, the more dramatic the eventual breakout.
And now for a rhetorical question:  Which direction will price breakout toward?
You have a 50/50 chance of being correct by a completely uneducated guess ...

So now the question lies within when. This is going to be cool

[Coinseeker]

It seems strange to me that bitcoin has become so stable all of a sudden and for such a long time (in comparison to the last couple of months).

Can anyone explain this? Is there some form of manipulation going on?

Can you explain what makes you think it's stable?  How can something be considered truly stable, when you have no volume and every time we get volume, there's no stability.

[BitWulf]

It seems strange to me that bitcoin has become so stable all of a sudden and for such a long time (in comparison to the last couple of months).

Can anyone explain this? Is there some form of manipulation going on?

Can you explain what makes you think it's stable?  How can something be considered truly stable, when you have no volume and every time we get volume, there's no stability.

Well the price is not swinging profusely as it was following the crash. I thought I made that clear in my post where I said - in comparison to the last couple of months.

What do you thinks happening?

[Wekkel]

It will first dip (from the perspective of the daily chart) and then skyrocket again. Please note that this could take months up to a year to play out. Buy that dip! 

[Coinseeker]

It seems strange to me that bitcoin has become so stable all of a sudden and for such a long time (in comparison to the last couple of months).

Can anyone explain this? Is there some form of manipulation going on?

Can you explain what makes you think it's stable?  How can something be considered truly stable, when you have no volume and every time we get volume, there's no stability.

Well the price is not swinging profusely as it was following the crash. I thought I made that clear in my post where I said - in comparison to the last couple of months.

What do you thinks happening?

I wish I knew.  Bid and asks are waiting on each other.  It's a stalemate.  I really don't know what to make of it.  I just think calling it "stable" is to ignore the complete lack of volume but I heed your point on a broader scale.

[Protagonus]

 From thread: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=174619.msg1817577#msg1817577 
                                                                   

noob here.  Only have a couple coins.  Bought them rather high even (near peak appx).  Still,...not selling 

Looks as though once all the VC's and banksters get enough coins in "their minds";  should go back up lol.

Hey, least it will be more stable (sigh)

Still holding......both BTC and opinion 

 

[Malawi]

It seems strange to me that bitcoin has become so stable all of a sudden and for such a long time (in comparison to the last couple of months).

Can anyone explain this? Is there some form of manipulation going on?

Can you explain what makes you think it's stable?  How can something be considered truly stable, when you have no volume and every time we get volume, there's no stability.

Well the price is not swinging profusely as it was following the crash. I thought I made that clear in my post where I said - in comparison to the last couple of months.

What do you thinks happening?

I wish I knew.  Bid and asks are waiting on each other.  It's a stalemate.  I really don't know what to make of it.  I just think calling it "stable" is to ignore the complete lack of volume but I heed your point on a broader scale.

More like silent before the storm perhaps?

[Coinseeker]

More like silent before the storm perhaps?

Perhaps...question is will it be a storm of destruction or prosperity.  

[Malawi]

More like silent before the storm perhaps?

Perhaps...question is will it be a storm of destruction or prosperity.  

With BTC volatility is good, it brings more action, attention and people.

Weather it goes up or down, It will be a storm of prosperity.

[Coinseeker]

More like silent before the storm perhaps?

Perhaps...question is will it be a storm of destruction or prosperity.  

With BTC volatility is good, it brings more action, attention and people.

Weather it goes up or down, It will be a storm of prosperity.

Not exactly what I meant but, that's a really good way to look at it.   

[BitcoinAshley]

Usually, this portends a drop in price, because speculators go elsewhere.

... Ok, which is it?

Low volatility means speculators go elsewhere, or
High volatility means "normal folk" will go elsewhere?

Lol.

In high volatility we have people saying "Omg this is bad for bitcoin, because Average Joe won't adopt!"
In low volatility we have people saying "Omg this is bad for bitcoin, because speculators will go elsewhere!"

Make up your minds! 

[ThatDGuy]

The answer is that high volatility is good for Bitcoin. I have been very consistent on this position. The people who say that volatility is bad for Bitcoin are wrong.

Agree with you on this, also volatility helped the price get as high as it did on a few occasions - the most recent one brought 18,712 new members to register on this forum in April and 11,789 so far in the month of May.  Prior to that there was only one month that crossed 10k new members since 11/2009.

After the initial flirtation with Bitcoin volatility might scare non-speculators away, but I believe that's only temporary when they start to learn about how resilient it has been.

[Ultraviolet]

This kind of stability where it's only stable because there's no volume isn't worth much. As soon as someone shows up with a 500k-1M market buy/sell the price will swing +/- $10.

If you want stability you need a market with depth so that volatility only really shows its head during times of huge boom/bust.

[Psikopit]

Yup, I descovered Bitcoins a month ago and acquired some with an Mt. Gox account. I've read many things about bitcoin and I think this concept will stay / the price of bitcoin will increase. But I think volatility allow us to "play" a bit with the money and attract new members... Low volatily -> I'll get bored faster but still trust in this system. I'll just stop trading and wait for my BTC to worth something more

[Zangelbert Bingledack]

High volatility --> More speculators to buy the dips and sell the peaks --> Low volatility --> More interest from everyday people
--> Price rise --> High volatility ....

Wash, rinse, repeat until $1 million/BTC.

[epetroel]

Personally, I'm sitting tight and waiting to see what Gox comes back with regarding the CoinLab and Dwolla situations.  Absent a reasonable solution there, I probably won't be trading much on Gox anymore.  I suspect many others have the same wait-and-see attitude.

Also waiting for Kraken