[OFFICIAL]Bitfinex.com first Bitcoin P2P lending platform for leverage trading

[noggin-scratcher]

On further reflection, the key problem with the FRR is that taking a swap at FRR doesn't increase the rate. With so much of the market being FRR swaps that means ignoring the effect of a lot of demand for funding because it gets absorbed into the unresponsive FRR monolith and then isn't included in the rate calculations. I'm thinking it needs a rate-setting mechanism that would continue to function well (and respond to changes in supply/demand) even if everyone were using FRR exclusively, because to a first order approximation that's what the orderbook of offers actually looks like. Relying on the rates of fixed-rate swaps to set the variable rate with that imbalance present is just producing stupid results.

But of course, devising that independent rate-setting mechanism is prone to exactly the kind of difficulty that a market solution is supposed to avoid; it means effectively "picking" an arbitrary rate rather than letting supply/demand sort it out for you, and is liable to end up with magic numbers scattered through the calculation and a methodology that tries but fails to estimate/approximate the market answer... as we've seen with several of the suggestions.

That's why "Fuck it, just rip it out" is so appealing; it completely eliminates the question of how to pick a rate by removing the need to do so. But if there must be an auto-rate for the passive lenders (and that's fair enough from Bitfinex' perspective I guess; there's lots of them and they provide a lot of the funding) it needs to have it's own mechanism to adapt the rate to market conditions without relying on a hokey half-baked measure like averaging the other active swaps.

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[QwertyCore]

...~25% YEARLY is considered LOW  WTF!?!

Until the market crashes is a way that Bitfinex didn't fathom or that the swap engine cannot keep up with and you lose half your principle.  Everyone seems to forget that bit.

That is the point of a free market. You get to decide at what rate you will take on a certain level of risk, which you also have to quantify. This is exactly why a fund doesn't work, but a market does. I think that our track record at protecting swap providers continues to grow stronger, and as we are growing, it makes sense that people are starting to trust us with more of their money. I think that USD swaps are a pretty great value, even at their current rates, but that is just my opinion.

Yes, but a free market does not have de facto, system forced price point does it?  Something you have steadfastly refused to fully address.  This 'market' is controlled in the same manner that Fed exerts control; by adjusting rate of the single largest pool of money available.  The Fed has the Discount Rate and Bitfinex has the FRR.

I'm not going to debate this anymore.  You originally ask for ideas on how to improve the FRR.  The general conclusion was to best way to fix it was to remove it. It was not the answer Bitfinex wanted.  If I look at the situation from your point of view I can see the somewhat perverse logic in it.  The FRR serves Bitfinex well and hopefully soothes some guilt you have about the treatment of the leveraged traders. 

So be it, the FRR is not going to go away, but, I would ask for some intellectual honesty on Bitfinex's part and quit trying to portray the swap market as even remotely 'free'.

I'll address the rest of what you said in a later post. Can we please agree though, because this is basic, that you cannot "improve" something, by making it not exist anymore?

This isn't going to end well, but I'll play for a while.

Let's see how 'basic' we can get this; adequately resolve the following and I will agree to your statement.

You have a hole in your tire.  What is the best way to improve it?

[sleger]

Can we please agree though, because this is basic, that you cannot "improve" something, by making it not exist anymore?

Seriously ? No I do not agree.
As a doctor would you rather have a sick patient with a disease that you are able to control rather than a healthy patient ? I guess maybe it makes sense because you can get more money from the patient, is that maybe what you meant ?

[QwertyCore]

USD swap demand goes up if the price goes down ("BTC are getting cheaper, let's buy more, TO DA MOON!") and it goes up if the price goes up ("It's_happening.gif"), it only seems to go down if the price doesn't change a lot over several days. Basing a rate on the price delta of the last 15 minutes is not going to model demand easily I'm afraid.

I'm still more in favour of keeping FRR as is and rather changing defaults or introducing more strict rules (e.g. FRR can only be set for 3 day durations max. so fixed rate swaps have more space to discover prices?). Also it might be interesting to know how FRR would look like if 30 day FRR is based on 30 day fixed rate swaps, 10 day FRR on 10 day fixed rate etc.

Swap demand does not go up simply because the Bitcoin price goes down.  It goes up in anticipation that the price will go up, which is (presumably) more likely when the price is down. Traders are only borrowing the funds and with that the bitcoins that they 'buy'.  The only way to make money with swaps not to hold the bitcoins, but to sell them for more at a later date. The 'TO DA MOON!' people are using their own funds.

The swap rate goes down when the price is stagnate due to lenders undercutting the FRR trying to get their money into the hands of the few traders willing to take it or replacing currently existing swaps for cheaper ones.

When the price plummets, the swap rate doesn't drop, it evaporates.  Traders close their positions and return the money to the swap pool. In effect, the rate goes negative.  Traders are choosing to lose money now so they don't lose much more money later.  The swap can be 'sold' by the trader simply by closing it, they do not need to find a 'buyer'.

The 2, 5, 10 day swap rate would be interesting to look at.  I reasons don't think it would work is that 1) swap duration is one sided, a trader can close it at will and is not required to carry it for it's full term and 2) a trader can jump from swap to swap without closing their position and with no penalty.

The price Delta might not work, but without the will of Bitfinex to explore it we will never know.

[mjr]

Hey MJR, care to address the issue I posted earlier about your API?

I think I may have figured this out...

Do you have a balance in DRK/LTC/TH1? The call to balances will only return those assets in which you have a balance.

Hope that helps

Thank you for your prompt response,

I do not have any balance yet: 0 BTC, 0 USD, 0 DRK ecc.. so that is not the issue and, if I may, it is wrong and resource-wasteful to not send balance if "there is no balance".

This is the answer I am getting right now:
[{"type":"deposit","currency":"btc","amount":"0.0","available":"0.0"},
 {"type":"deposit","currency":"usd","amount":"0.0","available":"0.0"},
 {"type":"trading","currency":"btc","amount":"0.0","available":"0.0"},
 {"type":"trading","currency":"usd","amount":"0.0","available":"0.0"},
 {"type":"exchange","currency":"btc","amount":"0.0","available":"0.0"},
 {"type":"exchange","currency":"usd","amount":"0.0","available":"0.0"}]

IMHO you only need to add the appropriate queries to your database for DRK, LBC, TH1 and add the results to the JSON accordingly.

I don't understand, it is a waste of resources to NOT include balances that you do not currently have? By adding a new query, this uses less resources? If you do have LTC, DRK, or TH1, you will receive those balances when you use the "balances" API call. If you do not have those balances, you can simply fill them in yourself with "0.0".

Here are the volumes for the last 30 days:

782339.31 BTC
1061895.98 LTC
104072.32 DRK
1121.72 TH1

If you do the multiplication so that you see, in USD, how much each market is trading, it is easy to see what most people are trading. That is why BTC/USD are automatically returned, and other balances are only returned if necessary.

[Killerloop]

If you do the multiplication so that you see, in USD, how much each market is trading, it is easy to see what most people are trading. That is why BTC/USD are automatically returned, and other balances are only returned if necessary.

I'll try to put DRK and LTC and see what happens then, thanks!

[mjr]

USD swap demand goes up if the price goes down ("BTC are getting cheaper, let's buy more, TO DA MOON!") and it goes up if the price goes up ("It's_happening.gif"), it only seems to go down if the price doesn't change a lot over several days. Basing a rate on the price delta of the last 15 minutes is not going to model demand easily I'm afraid.

I'm still more in favour of keeping FRR as is and rather changing defaults or introducing more strict rules (e.g. FRR can only be set for 3 day durations max. so fixed rate swaps have more space to discover prices?). Also it might be interesting to know how FRR would look like if 30 day FRR is based on 30 day fixed rate swaps, 10 day FRR on 10 day fixed rate etc.

Swap demand does not go up simply because the Bitcoin price goes down.  It goes up in anticipation that the price will go up, which is (presumably) more likely when the price is down. Traders are only borrowing the funds and with that the bitcoins that they 'buy'.  The only way to make money with swaps not to hold the bitcoins, but to sell them for more at a later date. The 'TO DA MOON!' people are using their own funds.

The swap rate goes down when the price is stagnate due to lenders undercutting the FRR trying to get their money into the hands of the few traders willing to take it or replacing currently existing swaps for cheaper ones.

When the price plummets, the swap rate doesn't drop, it evaporates.  Traders close their positions and return the money to the swap pool. In effect, the rate goes negative.  Traders are choosing to lose money now so they don't lose much more money later.  The swap can be 'sold' by the trader simply by closing it, they do not need to find a 'buyer'.

The 2, 5, 10 day swap rate would be interesting to look at.  I reasons don't think it would work is that 1) swap duration is one sided, a trader can close it at will and is not required to carry it for it's full term and 2) a trader can jump from swap to swap without closing their position and with no penalty.

The price Delta might not work, but without the will of Bitfinex to explore it we will never know.

"1) swap duration is one sided, a trader can close it at will and is not required to carry it for it's full term and 2) a trader can jump from swap to swap without closing their position and with no penalty."

This is why they are paying you...they want the right to use your funds to enable a position, and they want the right to close that position early. In exchange, you get the rate that you select, or you can get a variable rate based on a metric that we provide. So, swap provider receives his agreed upon rate, trader gets the option to enter a position, but not the obligation to do so. If the possibility of early closure is very annoying, the rate should be higher to reflect this.

Basically, there is typically X demand for swaps, and Y supply. a situation where X is greater than Y is not usual. So, given the entire pool of funds in Y, if you want YOUR swap to be taken with a higher probability, you should price it lower. This "undercutting" thing is basic price discovery.
Currently there is around 1.2 million in requested swaps at rates lower than currently offered. The current "spread" is 0.0752% by 0.0806%, the FRR is 0.0844%, pretty far from the highest rate someone has offered to pay. I also notice that the shorter the term, the higher the rate demanded and the lower the rate offered, which is interesting.

I still feel like people aren't understanding the purpose of this market, to enable margin trading. It doesn't exist in a vacuum to enable passive investors to generate good returns, though I think that is a by product. So, it seems that many people want a "savings account", and while it is possible to try and use the deposit account this way, via the FRR and autolend, you will not do as well as someone who is actively managing their positions. You will have funds sitting unused, as is currently the case with the over 3 million USD offered at the FRR. So basically, the more you put in the more you can get out, but only in the context of what the market is willing to bear.

[mjr]

Can we please agree though, because this is basic, that you cannot "improve" something, by making it not exist anymore?

Seriously ? No I do not agree.
As a doctor would you rather have a sick patient with a disease that you are able to control rather than a healthy patient ? I guess maybe it makes sense because you can get more money from the patient, is that maybe what you meant ?

OK, I have a sick patient, I should kill him so he is no longer sick? Or should I treat his disease? That is the analogy here. We said "The calculation of the FRR is not optimal, how can we improve it". People have suggested getting rid of it. That is not improving the FRR, that is "killing the patient".

[mjr]

...~25% YEARLY is considered LOW  WTF!?!

Until the market crashes is a way that Bitfinex didn't fathom or that the swap engine cannot keep up with and you lose half your principle.  Everyone seems to forget that bit.

That is the point of a free market. You get to decide at what rate you will take on a certain level of risk, which you also have to quantify. This is exactly why a fund doesn't work, but a market does. I think that our track record at protecting swap providers continues to grow stronger, and as we are growing, it makes sense that people are starting to trust us with more of their money. I think that USD swaps are a pretty great value, even at their current rates, but that is just my opinion.

Yes, but a free market does not have de facto, system forced price point does it?  Something you have steadfastly refused to fully address.  This 'market' is controlled in the same manner that Fed exerts control; by adjusting rate of the single largest pool of money available.  The Fed has the Discount Rate and Bitfinex has the FRR.

I'm not going to debate this anymore.  You originally ask for ideas on how to improve the FRR.  The general conclusion was to best way to fix it was to remove it. It was not the answer Bitfinex wanted.  If I look at the situation from your point of view I can see the somewhat perverse logic in it.  The FRR serves Bitfinex well and hopefully soothes some guilt you have about the treatment of the leveraged traders. 

So be it, the FRR is not going to go away, but, I would ask for some intellectual honesty on Bitfinex's part and quit trying to portray the swap market as even remotely 'free'.

I currently can see an offer, and a bid. The FRR is not remotely close to the bid. It is in no way standing in front of the 61 offers that are currently in front of it, AND not being taken.

"The general conclusion was to best way to fix it was to remove it."

You are the only one who has concluded this. I, personally, think that statement makes no sense. You could say "The way to improve THE SWAP MARKET is to get rid of the FRR.", but you cannot say "The way to improve the FRR is to remove it." That is not an improvement to the FRR, the FRR no longer exists, therefore it cannot be improved.

Again, you are arguing that to improve the swap market, we should follow your suggestion. While appreciated, we never asked that question. We asked how to improve the FRR, and forgive me if I look for answers to that question.

[mjr]

Well, I personally like the FRR (I'm lazy...), it was already changed from its previous iteration and surely can be tweaked even more. I wonder which factors to still use other than the current swaps in use to make it react even faster? Weighted average of the fixed price swaps of just the last 24h? 1h? 12h?

After all, the FRR was already "accelerated" significantly after traders complained that the old calculation (which was something like the last 13 days of FRR + current swap rates or so) went down too slow after a spike in demand, making their positions expensive. Since positions now can be comfortably swap their swaps, maybe a move in the opposite direction could be better? Make FRR react slower again?

I wouldn't mind that much if it were going away, then I'd have to invest a day or so to audit, customize + deploy a bot and that's it.

Yes, that is what I don't understand, why don't more people just write a bot? It is very simple to do, and it can ensure that your funds are always being used. There are many people who would simply take whatever the best rate requested, because anything > nothing. I'm thinking of writing a bot just to see how well it would work, and what sort of return I could get compared to using the FRR. I personally agree with you though, and I have always been fine with just using the FRR, and I feel like this discussion has been railroaded by people who want to fundamentally change the products we offer. There has even been suggestions to shut down the entire swap market, let bitfinex pick a rate, and then all funds receive the weighted average of the returns or something. I appreciate the effort some put in, but that is in no way going to happen. So, I appreciate your perspective, and the fact that you have seen the evolution of the FRR over time, and understand its purpose. Hopefully, the latest tweak will make it more useful.

[QwertyCore]

Can we please agree though, because this is basic, that you cannot "improve" something, by making it not exist anymore?

Seriously ? No I do not agree.
As a doctor would you rather have a sick patient with a disease that you are able to control rather than a healthy patient ? I guess maybe it makes sense because you can get more money from the patient, is that maybe what you meant ?

OK, I have a sick patient, I should kill him so he is no longer sick? Or should I treat his disease? That is the analogy here. We said "The calculation of the FRR is not optimal, how can we improve it". People have suggested getting rid of it. That is not improving the FRR, that is "killing the patient".

Wow!  Do you really believe this?

Killing the patient is analogous to closing the swap market and no one has suggested that. Removing the FRR is not killing the patient, it is removing the disease.

The patient hosts the disease.  Removing the disease does not is any way remove the host.

[mjr]

Hello,
I have an account with Bitfinex.com and was using Bluestacks with Google authenticator. But I have a hard drive crash and need to have the 2 FA reset. So I can log back in and make some trades. I did contact support a couple days ago. Any help would be greatly appreciated!
Regards,
Brian

okay, since there isn't

Same here, email sent a week ago --> no answer yet

Any update about this?

I asked specifically if you guys could provide some more info? I don't even have the email address to search for your email. That being said, support has said they do not have any backlog.

okay, I provided a pretty good summary above and since there doesn't sound like a backlog.
My email was titled "lost Google authenticator key". I'll be glad to provide any details in regards to my account and trading activity.
Thanks for your time,
Brian

Hey Brian,

I found the email, it looks like it was responded to. I'm not sure if there was an issue after that. Specifically, John asks you to send the request from the email associated with the account, this is one of security measures in place to ensure that only the account holder can make a change to 2FA settings. I am looking into this further, but it appears, since John asked for an email from the address registered with the account, that the email you used was not it. Could you try to send an email to support from the other email address you mentioned in your email?

I will check the support emails, and make sure to hurry this along, but it appears that we are just waiting on an email from the email address associated with the account.

-Josh

[mjr]

Can we please agree though, because this is basic, that you cannot "improve" something, by making it not exist anymore?

Seriously ? No I do not agree.
As a doctor would you rather have a sick patient with a disease that you are able to control rather than a healthy patient ? I guess maybe it makes sense because you can get more money from the patient, is that maybe what you meant ?

OK, I have a sick patient, I should kill him so he is no longer sick? Or should I treat his disease? That is the analogy here. We said "The calculation of the FRR is not optimal, how can we improve it". People have suggested getting rid of it. That is not improving the FRR, that is "killing the patient".

Wow!  Do you really believe this?

Killing the patient is analogous to closing the swap market and no one has suggested that. Removing the FRR is not killing the patient, it is removing the disease.

The patient hosts the disease.  Removing the disease does not is any way remove the host.

Again, you are mixing levels. You are seeing the patient as the swap market, you are answering the question "How can I heal the patient?". We are not seeing the patient as the swap market, we see the patient as the FRR. We are asking, "How can I heal the patient?".

The fact that you are having a conversation, that is in no way the same as the conversation that we are having, shows why there is so much confusion.

I understand that that is the question you want to answer, but it is not the question we asked. This is what I have tried to explain, over and over, that you are answering a question, and providing a solution to a question that we are not asking. We asked how we could improve the FRR, not how we can improve the swaps market. I understand that you, and others, may have suggestions on a wide range of topics, and I'm sure they are well-thought out and probably very useful, but in this specific case, we are looking to answer the question "How can we improve the calculation of the FRR?".

So, for example, getting rid of the FRR is not a good answer to the question that we are actually asking. Saying something like, "Weighting it to take into account more recent activity more than past activity." IS a good suggestion, or at the very least, answering the question we asked, and participating in the conversation that we are involved in.

[QwertyCore]

Can we please agree though, because this is basic, that you cannot "improve" something, by making it not exist anymore?

Seriously ? No I do not agree.
As a doctor would you rather have a sick patient with a disease that you are able to control rather than a healthy patient ? I guess maybe it makes sense because you can get more money from the patient, is that maybe what you meant ?

OK, I have a sick patient, I should kill him so he is no longer sick? Or should I treat his disease? That is the analogy here. We said "The calculation of the FRR is not optimal, how can we improve it". People have suggested getting rid of it. That is not improving the FRR, that is "killing the patient".

Wow!  Do you really believe this?

Killing the patient is analogous to closing the swap market and no one has suggested that. Removing the FRR is not killing the patient, it is removing the disease.

The patient hosts the disease.  Removing the disease does not is any way remove the host.

Again, you are mixing levels. You are seeing the patient as the swap market, you are answering the question "How can I heal the patient?". We are not seeing the patient as the swap market, we see the patient as the FRR. We are asking, "How can I heal the patient?".

The fact that you are having a conversation, that is in no way the same as the conversation that we are having, shows why there is so much confusion.

I understand that that is the question you want to answer, but it is not the question we asked. This is what I have tried to explain, over and over, that you are answering a question, and providing a solution to a question that we are not asking. We asked how we could improve the FRR, not how we can improve the swaps market. I understand that you, and others, may have suggestions on a wide range of topics, and I'm sure they are well-thought out and probably very useful, but in this specific case, we are looking to answer the question "How can we improve the calculation of the FRR?".

So, for example, getting rid of the FRR is not a good answer to the question that we are actually asking. Saying something like, "Weighting it to take into account more recent activity more than past activity." IS a good suggestion, or at the very least, answering the question we asked, and participating in the conversation that we are involved in.

Wow!  Just absolutely, unbelievably, freaking WOW!

You win, I give up.

[sleger]

Can we please agree though, because this is basic, that you cannot "improve" something, by making it not exist anymore?

Seriously ? No I do not agree.
As a doctor would you rather have a sick patient with a disease that you are able to control rather than a healthy patient ? I guess maybe it makes sense because you can get more money from the patient, is that maybe what you meant ?

OK, I have a sick patient, I should kill him so he is no longer sick? Or should I treat his disease? That is the analogy here. We said "The calculation of the FRR is not optimal, how can we improve it". People have suggested getting rid of it. That is not improving the FRR, that is "killing the patient".

Ok so to continue on the analogy, you have a mass murderer who committed a genocide and plans to commit more, people tell you to not save him, and you decide to make every effort to save him anyway, although the rest of the world would rather not have him on earth ?

We do not want you to improve FRR, we want to get rid of FRR.



*EDIT : I read after your other reply to someone else, and it is clear, the FRR is Ebola, everyone acknowledges it, you could eradicate it, but instead your are trying to get us to help you to make it less dangerous. Well, no thanks.

[mjr]

Can we please agree though, because this is basic, that you cannot "improve" something, by making it not exist anymore?

Seriously ? No I do not agree.
As a doctor would you rather have a sick patient with a disease that you are able to control rather than a healthy patient ? I guess maybe it makes sense because you can get more money from the patient, is that maybe what you meant ?

OK, I have a sick patient, I should kill him so he is no longer sick? Or should I treat his disease? That is the analogy here. We said "The calculation of the FRR is not optimal, how can we improve it". People have suggested getting rid of it. That is not improving the FRR, that is "killing the patient".

Ok so to continue on the analogy, you have a mass murderer who committed a genocide and plans to commit more, people tell you to not save him, and you decide to make every effort to save him anyway, although the rest of the world would rather not have him on earth ?

We do not want you to improve FRR, we want to get rid of FRR.



*EDIT : I read after your other reply to someone else, and it is clear, the FRR is Ebola, everyone acknowledges it, you could eradicate it, but instead your are trying to get us to help you to make it less dangerous. Well, no thanks.

Hmm, nice hyperbole...Ebola or Mass Murderer.

Either way, what you meant to say was YOU do not like the FRR, and you don't have to offer funds at the FRR. You can offer swaps at whatever rate you like. It isn't "dangerous" and currently, there is quite a spread between rates people are willing to take, and rates people are offering. I can find two or three comments just in the last two pages of people who LIKE the FRR. So, not EVERYONE is against it. Either way, if you don't like it, don't use it. If rates are too low, you don't have to offer swaps. That, again, is the point of a market, which is what we have, a market for swaps. It isn't a fund, it doesn't exist to bring the returns you may want, but it is an option for those who do want to use it.

The main issue, in my opinion, of those who dislike the FRR, is that they want something different from what reality currently offers. I for example, want an iPhone that has a one week battery life. Unfortunately, that is not an option. Markets don't give you what you want, they allow you to choose the best option available. So, the fact that the FRR is too popular (if no one used it, would we even have this discussion), means that a lot of people like that option. We are tweaking it, to make a popular tool more useful. Again, if you don't like it, build a bot and manage your swaps manually, I believe you will probably get a better return over time.

[2586]

Again, you are mixing levels. You are seeing the patient as the swap market, you are answering the question "How can I heal the patient?". We are not seeing the patient as the swap market, we see the patient as the FRR. We are asking, "How can I heal the patient?".

The fact that you are having a conversation, that is in no way the same as the conversation that we are having, shows why there is so much confusion.

I understand that that is the question you want to answer, but it is not the question we asked. This is what I have tried to explain, over and over, that you are answering a question, and providing a solution to a question that we are not asking. We asked how we could improve the FRR, not how we can improve the swaps market. I understand that you, and others, may have suggestions on a wide range of topics, and I'm sure they are well-thought out and probably very useful, but in this specific case, we are looking to answer the question "How can we improve the calculation of the FRR?".

So, for example, getting rid of the FRR is not a good answer to the question that we are actually asking. Saying something like, "Weighting it to take into account more recent activity more than past activity." IS a good suggestion, or at the very least, answering the question we asked, and participating in the conversation that we are involved in.

Are you fucking serious? Why are you playing word games with us? If you're insisting on framing the debate as "how can we improve the FRR, regardless of whether it's good for the platform?" instead of "how can we improve the platform?", then YOU ARE ASKING A WORTHLESS QUESTION. Don't fault us for being generous in our interpretations rather than outright assuming that you're an idiot.

I like how you try to paint QwertyCore as the only one suggesting the removal of the FRR when MANY OF US HAVE AGREED WITH HIM.

[0x3d]

Can we please agree though, because this is basic, that you cannot "improve" something, by making it not exist anymore?

Seriously ? No I do not agree.
As a doctor would you rather have a sick patient with a disease that you are able to control rather than a healthy patient ? I guess maybe it makes sense because you can get more money from the patient, is that maybe what you meant ?

OK, I have a sick patient, I should kill him so he is no longer sick? Or should I treat his disease? That is the analogy here. We said "The calculation of the FRR is not optimal, how can we improve it". People have suggested getting rid of it. That is not improving the FRR, that is "killing the patient".

Yeah, right... Despite what you wrote after this post I'm going to stand by Qwerty's (and probably others) side and say: Removing the FRR from patient swap-market (aka leverage-*FUND*ing) is removing cancer from the patient, I don't see how that would be removing the patient.

Cancer blocks communication between cells - those too unfrequented soon die off, they leave the market of available cells in that body, so to say. Not enough cells left and the patient dies.

Applied to the FRR: it blocks the communication between swap-providers - which of course translates to communcation between cells on a larger scale.

Now I don't know the numbers, I'm throwing darts which may be off by a mile but could you maybe share these stats with us? How much of (percentage-)growth has BFX seen during the past 12 months:
  1) in number of users
  2) in invested capital
  3) and in amount of swap provided

Have these numbers correlated over time or is one of them diverging to the south?

Without trying to be rude, to me the real patient here is BFX itself. And I'm not saying you're not listening to us, the opposite has often been the case, but we're just trying to be the hobby-doctors you're asking us to be so will you please let us do our job and let us discuss freely and quit telling us to use a band-aid when the patient has cancer?

Edit: Typo

Also, if you're referring to my proposals as removing the FRR entirely, nope: converting the swap-market into a "fund" is turning the FRR (and only the FRR) into what is currently the entire swap-market, only the numbers would be based on other factors (of which I talked at length). The noise around the FRR may be the real cancer here after all. Oh the pointlessness

[Vagnavs]

Hello,
I have an account with Bitfinex.com and was using Bluestacks with Google authenticator. But I have a hard drive crash and need to have the 2 FA reset. So I can log back in and make some trades. I did contact support a couple days ago. Any help would be greatly appreciated!
Regards,
Brian

okay, since there isn't

Same here, email sent a week ago --> no answer yet

Any update about this?

I asked specifically if you guys could provide some more info? I don't even have the email address to search for your email. That being said, support has said they do not have any backlog.

okay, I provided a pretty good summary above and since there doesn't sound like a backlog.
My email was titled "lost Google authenticator key". I'll be glad to provide any details in regards to my account and trading activity.
Thanks for your time,
Brian

Hey Brian,

I found the email, it looks like it was responded to. I'm not sure if there was an issue after that. Specifically, John asks you to send the request from the email associated with the account, this is one of security measures in place to ensure that only the account holder can make a change to 2FA settings. I am looking into this further, but it appears, since John asked for an email from the address registered with the account, that the email you used was not it. Could you try to send an email to support from the other email address you mentioned in your email?

I will check the support emails, and make sure to hurry this along, but it appears that we are just waiting on an email from the email address associated with the account.

-Josh

I'm sorry, I had to have 2FA disabled on Bittrex as well.. I got the emails confused and yes you guys did contact me that day. Sorry about the inconvenience..
Regards,
Brian

[freakbits]

To put this as simply as possible, market for swaps is driven by the rising price of bitcoins, not the cost of swaps.  Can we agree on this?

No we can't, both are obviously responsible for the market. And the swap fee also plays a part in it.
On a side note, stop your immature troll-style postings please, I doubt your rage crap will have positive effect on convincing the Finex guys of anything.