Crisis in Argentine

[BitAddict]

Currently they're worse than cyprus, the inflation in the last 10 years is completely insane. And it doesn't look like is going to stop.

[Voodah]

Hi everyone,

I'm from Argentina. I personally think most of you are being too optimistic. The reality is that even if BTC were to gain mainstream support here (which it does not have, actually nobody even knows what BTC is here), there are extreme (unsurmountable?) barriers to entry, mainly regarding btc acquisition.

Argentina, a country:

+ in technical default
+ going through hyperinflation
+ where we can not legally buy dollars (or any other currency)
+ whose banking system is closed to the world (via exuberant fees)
+ full on corrupt (almost dictatorial) gov' (our Secretario de Comercio Interior Guillermo Moreno holds "meetings" with both feet and a loaded gun above the desk, also the pupeteer behind our crippled economy,  fixed currency rates and official gov' money laundering schemes)

The following is the most efficient way to acquire BTC here (I'll let you be the judge of whether it's "easy" as claimed):

1.Acquire USD through black market (at higher rate) (FEE loss #1)
2.Deposit USD to VirWox through CC or Paypal (FEE loss #2)
3.In VirWox: USD > Linden dollars (FEE loss #3)
4.In VirWox: Linden dollars > BTC (FEE loss #4)
5.Withdraw BTC from VirWox (FEE loss #5)

Of course, pray you have an old VirWox account.. if not, you are capped at 20-50 usd a day, making it so that to be able to buy a SINGLE (1) BTC you need to make 2 or 3 deposits, doubling or tripling the 5 fees above). Also, as a new VirWox user, you'll be happy to find out that BTC withdrawal is a 72hs process with a "manual step" on their side.

Would you want me to buy some BTC for you at these rates?

Our situation is akin to the more known Ciprus case. Our countries are the ones who would benefit most from BTC, but unfortunately at the same time, they are the countries with the most difficulties acquiring
them.

[Lohoris]

1.Acquire USD through black market (at higher rate) (FEE loss #1)
2.Deposit USD to VirWox through CC or Paypal (FEE loss #2)
3.In VirWox: USD > Linden dollars (FEE loss #3)
4.In VirWox: Linden dollars > BTC (FEE loss #4)
5.Withdraw BTC from VirWox (FEE loss #5)

Why on Earth should you go such a complex way?

You can use localbitcoins much easier (paying directly with pesos), and even if you don't, I'm pretty sure there are many easier methods (though of course less easy than here).

[ph111]

+ full on corrupt (almost dictatorial) gov' (our Secretario de Comercio Interior Guillermo Moreno holds "meetings" with both feet and a loaded gun above the desk, also the pupeteer behind our crippled economy,  fixed currency rates and official gov' money laundering schemes)

  Wow he sounds like a nice guy, at least you have sexy girls just use silk road he can help you find the supply

[Voodah]

1.Acquire USD through black market (at higher rate) (FEE loss #1)
2.Deposit USD to VirWox through CC or Paypal (FEE loss #2)
3.In VirWox: USD > Linden dollars (FEE loss #3)
4.In VirWox: Linden dollars > BTC (FEE loss #4)
5.Withdraw BTC from VirWox (FEE loss #5)

Why on Earth should you go such a complex way?

You can use localbitcoins much easier (paying directly with pesos), and even if you don't, I'm pretty sure there are many easier methods (though of course less easy than here).

The localbitcoins issue and other (darker) alternatives:

Ideally, local exchangers should be the way BUT remember we have a black market dollar. Thus we have an official dollar rate 1 usd = 5~ pesos and a "blue dollar" (black market) rate of 1usd = 8-9~ pesos.

Local sellers are obviously selling at blue dollar prices, so that makes it really really costly (borderline scammy).
If one could find an open heart altruist btc magnate to sell at official rate, that's jackpot.

A second more realistic scenario, is based on money exchange arbitrage and not a btc thing itself, but it's possible and it is being done, a lot.

In such a scenario I can buy stuff for you on the internet at a (new) credit card dollar rate (official rate + 25%, this is forced by gov' on visa, master, etc.), and you give me btc. Now I've got some BTC and I can hoard and hope for the future; or I could try and do some arbitrage selling in black market, but of course if acquiring btc was hard, imagine how hard it will be to get some liquid USD from my btc, to go and sell in BM.

I have recently found a loophole, where I get a web debit card (mastercard) with a valid ACH, to which I should withdraw my BTC to USD exchange. I then must buy a plane ticket, travel abroad, go to an ATM, withdraw my USD, smuggle them back in and sell in black market.

Of course, after all of these hassles, fees, travel costs, and the inherent criminality of it all.... gains are minimal to non-existant. Risk is uber-high.

EDIT: Realistically, the overall best investment for anyone here (or elsewhere) would actually be to start large scale ASIC mining farm, given we are paying 1/8 the electricity costs. But you would have to be very very very lucky to a) get an avalon unit (at it's official price, not the 10-20x resell price they are going for) and b) smuggle them from the US to Arg.

[chufchuf]

Question to Argentinians-

What do you think of btc.uy and btcglobal, they as good as they claim?

and how do you think argentinians will stomach btc's volatility, is there any precedent where they engaged in some wildly fluctuating value without caring because the losses were far bigger in their national currency, do they like a bit of a gamble or are they more looking for sleep at night? they do pay massive premiums to buy dollars in the black market, no, so maybe they couldnt care less?

[lucas.sev]

Haha I love how we want a country to go bankrupt so that we get another bubble within 2 months of last one 

[chriswilmer]

Hi everyone,

I'm from Argentina. I personally think most of you are being too optimistic. The reality is that even if BTC were to gain mainstream support here (which it does not have, actually nobody even knows what BTC is here), there are extreme (unsurmountable?) barriers to entry, mainly regarding btc acquisition.

Argentina, a country:

+ in technical default
+ going through hyperinflation
+ where we can not legally buy dollars (or any other currency)
+ whose banking system is closed to the world (via exuberant fees)
+ full on corrupt (almost dictatorial) gov' (our Secretario de Comercio Interior Guillermo Moreno holds "meetings" with both feet and a loaded gun above the desk, also the pupeteer behind our crippled economy,  fixed currency rates and official gov' money laundering schemes)

The following is the most efficient way to acquire BTC here (I'll let you be the judge of whether it's "easy" as claimed):

1.Acquire USD through black market (at higher rate) (FEE loss #1)
2.Deposit USD to VirWox through CC or Paypal (FEE loss #2)
3.In VirWox: USD > Linden dollars (FEE loss #3)
4.In VirWox: Linden dollars > BTC (FEE loss #4)
5.Withdraw BTC from VirWox (FEE loss #5)

Of course, pray you have an old VirWox account.. if not, you are capped at 20-50 usd a day, making it so that to be able to buy a SINGLE (1) BTC you need to make 2 or 3 deposits, doubling or tripling the 5 fees above). Also, as a new VirWox user, you'll be happy to find out that BTC withdrawal is a 72hs process with a "manual step" on their side.

Would you want me to buy some BTC for you at these rates?

Our situation is akin to the more known Ciprus case. Our countries are the ones who would benefit most from BTC, but unfortunately at the same time, they are the countries with the most difficulties acquiring
them.

Here in the United States, I don't have a lot of incentives to mine bitcoins... but I think if I was in Argentia, I'd be fairly motivated to build a big mining rig. Actually, here's what I would do... since ASICs are hard to come by in Argentina, I would mine Litecoins with as many GPUs as I could get my hands on and then trade them for bitcoins. OK, it's complicated, but in dire circumstances...

[majamalu]

http://listado.mercadolibre.com.ar/bitcoin

[Prophet]

There are always willing travelers/tourists who need to exchange money, it would be a good idea to advertise on localbitcoins.

you have the pesos, they have BTC, good trade.

The best way of course is to mine, after all, If you have a good used video card it is time to start mining; Do not mine litecoins! you will earn far less than just mining BTC directly at this moment.

If you mine with a 5870 for a month you will earn guaranteed 120 USD. if you mine litecoin it will be 40 USD.

Then distribute the BTC to the people for the calculated cost of inflation and your exchange fee. NO illegalities, no hassle, just time and a little effort.

[superkawaii]

argentinian girls are really really hot

[Voodah]

Question to Argentinians-

What do you think of btc.uy and btcglobal, they as good as they claim?

and how do you think argentinians will stomach btc's volatility, is there any precedent where they engaged in some wildly fluctuating value without caring because the losses were far bigger in their national currency, do they like a bit of a gamble or are they more looking for sleep at night? they do pay massive premiums to buy dollars in the black market, no, so maybe they couldnt care less?

Argentinians are USD addicted right now, in a forced way.

Inflation is over 100% in the last two years but salaries in pesos have not adjusted accordingly (maybe 30/40% increase).

All our economy is now tourism dependent, we attract lots and lots of Americans, Europeans, Chinese, you name it. Everybody loves it here, and as some have dutifully noted :p we do have maybe the best women in the world ( for reference, i've been in the us and all around western europe ). As result all consumer prices are indexed and tailored against the USD and tourists.

Acquisition power for locals is at very low levels right now, and you got whole sectors of economy in a stale state. An example is real estate. Rents are doing ok (at high costs), but there are no sales.
Land owners are locked in a mentality where they bought at our golden age of "convertibilidad" 1 usd = 1 peso, and prices have only gone up since, always in USD.

So take for example someone like myself, almost 30 with a decent job. A tiny 1 room apartment at a decent area is upwards of 100k usd. At our current of 1 usd = 9 pesos, I need to almost become a millionaire before I can move in to my first own home. Remember, banks are not extending credit, and we have no such thing as your mortgage and double or triple mortgage scammy thingy you got in the US. It looks like I will be renting for a long time.

So that's USD for everyday living, but there's another important reason for USD craze here. The 2001 bank runs are still fresh in everyone's mind. Banks here, are simply not trusted hated.
At that time lots and lots of people lost most of their savings. And more recently the gov' completely looted the 40bn in the retirement companies (and shut them down in favor of the monopolist gov' controled ANSES ). Now people have no savings, and no future. USD is being stored under the matress, "a la gold".

If BTC finds a better oiled way to arbitrage between pesos, USD and btc itself, it will be very attractive to argentinians. As it stands now, there are lots of barriers to entry.

I've only recently found btc.uy but they were not officially live yet. Are they now?

I haven't heard of btcglobal but I'll check em out.

[d5000]

Inflation is over 100% in the last two years but salaries in pesos have not adjusted accordingly (maybe 30/40% increase).

 

It's about 50% (25%/year). See http://inflacionverdadera.com.  It's very high though, no need to exaggerate.

Anyway: Why is this in the "Speculation" subforum? This has nothing to do with the Bitcoin price. Should be in "Politics & Society", "Economy" or "Off Topic".

[anu]

It looks like I will be renting for a long time.

You won't be.....

If BTC finds a better oiled way to arbitrage between pesos, USD and btc itself, it will be very attractive to argentinians. As it stands now, there are lots of barriers to entry.

... if you solve that problem.

PM me if I can be of any help (sitting in the EU)

[Kupsi]

You should start to sell soccer players in BTC instead of Euro/USD

[2_Thumbs_Up]

Of course, after all of these hassles, fees, travel costs, and the inherent criminality of it all.... gains are minimal to non-existant. Risk is uber-high.

This is where bitcoin can come in. Smuggling bitcoins is really low risk compared to USD. Of course, the hassles, fees and travel costs are still an issue. But if someone is traveling from the US to Argentine anyway for whatever reason, buying some BTC beforehand could be a really good deal. If you ever visit the states you could look at BTC as an alternative to USD without the big risks of getting caught.

[Ivanhoe]

You should start to sell soccer players in BTC instead of Euro/USD

It's called football. Americans.....

[Kupsi]

You should start to sell soccer players in BTC instead of Euro/USD

It's called football. Americans.....

I know. Called it soccer so the US people would know what we're talking about. Some of them have trouble with mBTC, football etc  

There is a mailing list for trade of BTC in Argentina: http://wiki.eudemocracia.org/en/bitcoin
Found it in this blog post: http://thebluemarket.wordpress.com/2012/10/18/bitcoin-dollars-and-pot-banging-protests-in-argentina/

[syn999]

thanks for the ideas and brahah
my buds and I were deciding to open an exchage
semm Argentina would be the best choice but also a worst choice

[BitcoinAshley]

Local sellers are obviously selling at blue dollar prices, so that makes it really really costly (borderline scammy).
If one could find an open heart altruist btc magnate to sell at official rate, that's jackpot.

...
What are you talking about? The rest of the world knows that your 'official' peso/dollar exchange rate is flat-out wrong, the government is lying to you. Something is worth what people are willing to pay for it - so while you might be able to get a very limited amount for the "official rate" through "official channels," the rate you can get an unlimited amount for on the black market is as close as you can get to the 'real' discovered price. Just because the word "official" is in front of the "official exchange rate" doesn't make it legitimate.

Inflation is 25% not 10% so why do you hope/expect to find someone willing to exchange USD as if inflation were 10%... You'd have to find some pretty stupid people.

Anyways.

Argentinians are used to buying USD on the black market so I have no doubt that they can easily become accustomed to buying BTC on the black market - and trust me, no one's going to do that wacky Virwox linden dollars thing - OTC is the way to go, whether it's IRC or IRL. Like I said, if you're already used to buying USD from a "friend" and stuffing it under your mattress, buying BTC the same way is not going to be a stretch as it would be in many other countries.

That said, it'll be a while before we see any real demand from Argentina. While the dollar is relatively stable, they'll be buying dollars just because it's familiar and easy. As wopwop pointed out, you can not only buy BTC a couple days ago at $93 and wake up today and have it be $102... you can also buy them at $102 and wake up a few days later and have them be $93. The volatility is not appeasing, even though the long-term trend beats any fiat currency in existence.

Same thing happening in Venezuela - annualized monthly inflation is 40%, current YoY is ~35%, also there is a toilet paper shortage
inb4 "lol their just not doin' socializm rite - if they did tru socializm it wud totally werk"