Yes, bitcoin is going up, Yes it is going down, how can that be??

[amihh]

Some say bitcoin is downtrending and I'm fine with that (even though I have bitcoins in my paper wallet)
Others say it is going up.

Some say the news from China are bad and cause a major downtrend and others say this is good news, once people understand how china is not the main influencer it will be stronger than ever.

I wish I could use options on BTCUSD, I don't mean binary options, that's not it.
Plain vanilla options like stock options are what I use to make nice profits in the short term. I only invest in Bitcoins for the long term (5 years)

If there were options on BTCUSD, it would open up a whole world of possibilities, you could profit when the market moves without the need to predict the direction, or profit from expected volatility changes... its a whole new world, but that's in the distant future I guess.

Back to the present: Up or Down, which way is it?

Just for fun, here are two charts from a few minutes ago, in one bitcoin is trending up and in the other it is trending down!
http://chartly.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/btc-dn.png

http://chartly.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/btc-up.png

[piramida]

If there were options on BTCUSD, it would open up a whole world of possibilities, you could profit when the market moves without the need to predict the direction, or profit from expected volatility changes... its a whole new world, but that's in the distant future I guess.

Simple solution - get money on exchange, start a bot that would trade volatility, profit. I do that, many people do that, and it pays well from all the price running there and back. Also helps stabilize the price it a little, of course there has got to be much more of that to make it stable enough.

[amihh]

Piramida: any recommendation for a good robot?

How does the robot trade volatility? I can't wrap my head around the concept. Is it a transparent algorithm where you understand the logic or is it a black box where you have to trust the developer?

Does it have any parameters you can tweak?

[adpinbr]

I would like to know more too

[Bobsurplus]

Me too, more on the btcrobot please.

[tearfereon]

Do not trade if you dont know what you are doing, chances are high you will be loosing

[Holdaaja]

I like holding more. But maybe with bot I could trade too, but i haven't find good one yet.

[oda.krell]

I'm not sure if you're serious OP, or maybe I'm missing something deeper here, but you basically just discovered that there are different trends across different time frames, no?

[Einewton]

amihh,
Yeah man, It's all about how you look at the trends... If you look at it from 2009 to now, it's definitely gone up. But if you look at the last week, you'll see a whole different story.


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I like holding more. But maybe with bot I could trade too, but i haven't find good one yet.

I've only heard of private bots doing REALLY good with trustworthy developers. Other bots that are public to purchase don't seem to work very well, or none at all. I'm in the same boat as you Holdaaja... Holding... When the price decides to sky rocket from $110 to $500 then from $500 to $1000, holding will turn the best profits over any bot.

I think in the end, when all is said and done, holding or using bots get you in the same spot, you are playing a risk either way.

[amihh]

@oda.krell - I'm never sure myself if I'm serious...

If you look at it from 2009 to now, it's definitely gone up. But if you look at the last week, you'll see a whole different story

@Einewton - Some people seem to disregard this simple truth and jump straight to a discussion without framing their point of view, thus entering pointless arguments with others looking at the same instrument, BTCUSD on the same exchange and at the same time.

[piramida]

Piramida: any recommendation for a good robot?

How does the robot trade volatility? I can't wrap my head around the concept. Is it a transparent algorithm where you understand the logic or is it a black box where you have to trust the developer?

Does it have any parameters you can tweak?

I use this one, just posted it: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=376352.0

If you know or can hire a programmer, you can implement your own logic, this one here works good for me. It's for MtGox, through a simple to use opensource goxtool that is used for various trading bot strategies. You will have to create API key for trading in your Gox panel and add it to the bot. You need to rent your small server from some VPS provider so that the bot would be trading 24/7, here it is $5 per month, can't beat that:  DigitalOcean

Range trading is very simple - you buy below current price and sell above, inside some preset range. You split your range in lines, where you would be buying/selling. You only need to adjust the range when you believe market conditions changed. Mine right now is 450-900, if we break 900 (and the bot would've sold all btc by then) I will adjust it to be 650-1350 and the bot will buy some btc on a swing down and continue range trading, it would quickly balance btc with fiat again.

It does not try to guess where the price would go. Just buy 480 - sell 520, rinse repeat, so profiting from any volatility inside a range. The smaller the range you set (and the more money you get on gox) - the bigger the trades it makes, so more yield.