If you're not out, get out.

[Nagle]

I'd change the topic to "If you're not in, get in."
...

Please, keep making predictions

It's even more interesting if you go back further in Technomage's posts: "We'll be back to $13-14 by end of week. Know how I know?"  "I seriously doubt a price lower than $9 unless there is a further decrease in rate of adoption and more bad news."  --  Technomage, August 5, 2011.

[Technomage]

It's even more interesting if you go back further in Technomage's posts: "We'll be back to $13-14 by end of week. Know how I know?"  "I seriously doubt a price lower than $9 unless there is a further decrease in rate of adoption and more bad news."  --  Technomage, August 5, 2011.

Nothing wrong with my prediction there, just need to read the important part. We've had plenty of bad news and further decrease in the size of the economy. Too early to say just yet, but this month could be the one where the degrowth levels off completely. Next month at the latest. What we've seen now is nothing other than a massive bubble bursting.

This is the graph I use when talking about the size of the economy, btw: http://pi.uk.com/bitcoin/charts/n-transactions

[YoYa]

I was right. You were wrong. Now suffer.

Oh my.......that says more about you then you'll ever want to admit. But ultimately should bitcoin fail, you'll lose your outlet.

On the other hand.....should you care to engage the people here, you might get something more satisfying such as the discussion this thread has generated.

Ultimately we are all adults responsible for our actions and the risks we take. If people choose to place money in a risky investment such as bitcoin, and then add further to that risk by not actively managing their investment(holding) meaning they can't protect themselves against fall's in value.......then isn't it solely their responsibility?

At all times during my involvement with bitcoin, I have known the risk of total loss, and that risk remains. However I choose to embrace and live with that risk because as an IT professional I understand the technology and see it as worth the risk.

I am responsible.

I choose bitcoin of my own volition and there was no ponzi salesman involved.
Should I lose my money, I'll still have my health and my friends and family will not be any worse off for my choice.

I should suffer because I am willing to undertake a risk of my own choosing that you disagree with?

And everything Chodpoda said..... +1^1000

[Bigpiggy01]

Oh my.......that says more about you then you'll ever want to admit. But ultimately should bitcoin fail, you'll lose your outlet.

On the other hand.....should you care to engage the people here, you might get something more satisfying such as the discussion this thread has generated.

Ultimately we are all adults responsible for our actions and the risks we take. If people choose to place money in a risky investment such as bitcoin, and then add further to that risk by not actively managing their investment(holding) meaning they can't protect themselves against fall's in value.......then isn't it solely their responsibility?

At all times during my involvement with bitcoin, I have known the risk of total loss, and that risk remains. However I choose to embrace and live with that risk because as an IT professional I understand the technology and see it as worth the risk.

I am responsible.

I choose bitcoin of my own volition and there was no ponzi salesman involved.
Should I lose my money, I'll still have my health and my friends and family will not be any worse off for my choice.

I should suffer because I am willing to undertake a risk of my own choosing that you disagree with?

And everything Chodpoda said..... +1^1000

+1

[cloon]

Bitcoin/USD, last 3 months. Any questions?

Bitcoin is over. If you're not out, get out. The last ones to leave will be the worst off.

I've been saying for months that this was a speculative bubble, a pyramid scheme. I said that when bubbles pop, they pop all the way. There were replies like "troll" and "hater".  "The bitcoin's value will inevitably increase." (Bazil). "Regular use of Bitcoins will pick up pace, it's inevitable." (Goodlord666). There are still people writing comments like that.

I was right. You were wrong. Now suffer.

lol you only want to buy cheap coins
longterm is intact!

[molecular]

And everything Chodpoda said..... +1^1000

+1^1000 = +1

Oh, and YoYa, please change your profile picture. After having seen the bitcoin-related videos of this person (example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ko5lOc4nsac), I cannot take your posts seriously, even though I know you're not him. ^^

[Cluster2k]

lol you only want to buy cheap coins
longterm is intact!

How long does a graph have to keep going down before the short term becomes long term?  Sure, bitcoins were once worth a few cents each, now they're worth $6.  Fantastic.  We're in a massive bull market.  Only problem is they were worth $30+ a few months ago.  Anyone who got bitcoins before March is probably still smiling.  The rest are rather unhappy.

It all depends on the time period you're willing to choose.  For example, Citigroup's share price is actually stable and there's nothing wrong with the stock.  The company has no problems... if you're willing to compare the share price today to what it was 20 years ago.  The stock hit $500+ in the meantime, but we shouldn't be worried by that.

http://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE:C

[mp420]

lol you only want to buy cheap coins
longterm is intact!

How long does a graph have to keep going down before the short term becomes long term? 

My long term outlook will change if BTC stays under $4 for a month. This would, in my opinion, signify that bitcoin's long term adoption rate has weakened substantially.

Still, this will not mean BTC won't be worth $100 or $1000 or more in 10 years.

And if BTC stays above $5 for the rest of the year this will not mean bitcoin will not ultimately fail.

[Technomage]

My long term outlook will change if BTC stays under $4 for a month. This would, in my opinion, signify that bitcoin's long term adoption rate has weakened substantially.

Still, this will not mean BTC won't be worth $100 or $1000 or more in 10 years.

And if BTC stays above $5 for the rest of the year this will not mean bitcoin will not ultimately fail.

+1

This is pretty much what I think as well. With the current fundamentals (namely the size of the economy), I find a stable price below $5 very unlikely and if that were to happen it would signify bad things in my mind. A price below $4 for a month would make me a doomsday-bear.

So far the market has shown very strong bullish signs at below $5 and fairly bullish at below $5.5, at $6 the interest for buying seems to have died. This is where we're at, what happens next is interesting. I speculated on what could happen in the "$/BTC Time Series Analysis" thread.

[grod]

Calling a bottom again?  I'm down with that.  Please deposit more money and catch this falling knife again, I've mined another coin to replace the one I sold at $6. =)

Deepbit is not losing much hashing power at all, which means almost everyone still mining has power as cheap if not cheaper than my 4.6 cents/kwhr (or about a buck eighty in pure power to make a BTC).  We'll mine another 210,000+ coins to sell over September, never fear!  $1.80 to $5 is still profitable.  $1.80 to $4 is still profitable.   $1.80 to $2 is still profitable.  And heck, looking at namecoin, I'd say people will still mine at $1.80 to sell at $1.25.

After that, well, depends on whether difficulty drops or not.

[Technomage]

Calling a bottom again?  I'm down with that.  Please deposit more money and catch this falling knife again, I've mined another coin to replace the one I sold at $6. =)

Deepbit is not losing much hashing power at all, which means almost everyone still mining has power as cheap if not cheaper than my 4.6 cents/kwhr (or about a buck eighty in pure power to make a BTC).  We'll mine another 210,000+ coins to sell over September, never fear!  $1.80 to $5 is still profitable.  $1.80 to $4 is still profitable.   $1.80 to $2 is still profitable.  And heck, looking at namecoin, I'd say people will still mine at $1.80 to sell at $1.25.

After that, well, depends on whether difficulty drops or not.

How stoned will one have to be to post something like this? Current miners do not drive the price. The profitability of mining or the network hashing power have no effect on the BTC/USD price. The price does affect them, but not vice versa.

I'll try to explain this so that it's understood. Every month, since Bitcoin started, the network has created 210 000 new coins. This will continue to happen for a little less than a year. The profitability of mining or the network hashing power has NO EFFECT ON THIS.

So we can see that there is a constant inflation rate regardless of anything and miners will be selling coins just like they have been selling coins in the past. Regardless of the fact that they sell coins at a constant pace, the price has gone all over the place. It has gone up, down, up, down and way up and way down. The effect miners cause is pretty much constant.

I'm not done yet. To put up some numbers to clearly illustrate the whole point, I checked the 30 day volumes of the 10 biggest markets from Bitcoin Charts. And by the way, this is not even close to the whole amount of coins sold because there are other ways to obtain/sell coins. The number I came up with is 1 374 000.

So how many coins are miners selling? That is unknown, some sell none, some sell everything and some save a portion. I like to usually call 50% but let's say for kicks that it's as high as 70%, and I can't think how in the world it could be higher, we come up with 147 000 miner coins sold within a 30 day period, on average.

The result is that we come up with a percentage which is a little shy of 11%. So the effect of all the miners in total is a whopping 11%. The other 89% of price movement comes from other sources, such as speculators, traders, investors, early adopters etc.

And this was calculated with the conservative 70% coins sold estimate. You can of course change that estimate and calculate again but the result will always be that miners have the smallest effect of all the types of players trading BTC/USD. You can also argue that the price affects how miners sell coins. That is true, for example I haven't sold a single mined coin after the price hit the current range and will not be selling anything in the short term because the expectation for a rise in the next few months is significant, and I'm in no hurry.

For the people who already sell 100% I'm pretty sure there's nothing that can make them sell more.

[grod]

How stoned will one have to be to post something like this? Current miners do not drive the price. The profitability of mining or the network hashing power have no effect on the BTC/USD price. The price does affect them, but not vice versa.

7200 coins a day is $1,000,000 dollars worth of bitcoins a month available to be sold at $5.  If you don't understand how requiring TWELVE MILLION DOLLARS a year to keep bitcoin at $5 influences prices, well, I can see why you've had 100% failure to predict major bitcoin pricing trends so far, and I have had far more success.

I'll try to explain this so that it's understood. Every month, since Bitcoin started, the network has created 210 000 new coins. This will continue to happen for a little less than a year. The profitability of mining or the network hashing power has NO EFFECT ON THIS.

And yet, as bitcoin mining became insanely profitable 75% of the current mining power joined and started selling as opposed to hoarding.  Another way to look at it: before May, less than 20% of mined bitcoins were sold.  After May, that percentage spiked WAY higher as people who got into this for dollars, not bitcoins, tried to pay for their investment -- people who currently make up vastly more of the network than the early guys.

The result is that we come up with a percentage which is a little shy of 11%. So the effect of all the miners in total is a whopping 11%. The other 89% of price movement comes from other sources, such as speculators, traders, investors, early adopters etc.

Ever hear of velocity of money?  It doesn't matter that the same coin may have been traded multiple times that month, the fact remains.  Every month several million dollars worth of bitcoins were added to the supply.  Unless there was a corresponding increase in demand (and there hasn't) predictable things happened to pricing.

That is true, for example I haven't sold a single mined coin after the price hit the current range and will not be selling anything in the short term because the expectation for a rise in the next few months is significant, and I'm in no hurry.

For the people who already sell 100% I'm pretty sure there's nothing that can make them sell more.

I've been selling even at current prices and can now buy back lower.  Just like I've been doing ever since June.  We can agree to disagree -- you can speculate expecting higher prices in spite of technicals and fundamentals indicating the exact opposite is more likely, I'll continue speculating expecting lower prices.  Let's see who comes out ahead "long term."  Just because I have no long position now doesn't mean I can't switch to a bullish strategy when it's clear we're on an uptrend, and having MORE dollars to do that with rather than fewer seems like a good thing.

[grod]

Oh, and one more thing.  I never denied that bitcoin value is 100% derived from speculation.  With absolutely zero revenue and a $1000/hour cost to run the thing by definition it can't be anything else.  The question is: what kind off factors are influencing the mindset of said speculators at the moment?  IMO the requirement for a large influx of cash from new greater fools is currently one of the biggest.  Possible instability and flakiness of mtgox is good runner up.

As far as trading volume -- consider how much volume is generated by tradebots on mtgox.

[Technomage]

7200 coins a day is $1,000,000 dollars worth of bitcoins a month available to be sold at $5.  If you don't understand how requiring TWELVE MILLION DOLLARS a year to keep bitcoin at $5 influences prices, well, I can see why you've had 100% failure to predict major bitcoin pricing trends so far, and I have had far more success.

The success of our predictions is an ad hominem argument (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem) which is a failure in argumentation. Also your attempt at changing the coin amount again to 7200 and moving to a yearly number doesn't change any of the calculations I did in my last post. I didn't say miners' coins don't have any effect, I said they have a small effect. Although I should probably talk about current miners because all coins are originally mined.

And if you don't think the same calculation applies, then think again. The monthly transactions in dollars from the 10 biggest trading sites is over 10 million, which is over 120 MILLION DOLLARS a year, "omg". This is just now, in Bitcoin's infancy. At this time next year this issue will be even less significant because there will be only 25 BTC per block.

Ever hear of velocity of money?  It doesn't matter that the same coin may have been traded multiple times that month, the fact remains.  Every month several million dollars worth of bitcoins were added to the supply.  Unless there was a corresponding increase in demand (and there hasn't) predictable things happened to pricing.

This is true and obvious. In a declining economy an inflation of this sort will obviously "help" a price drop, but that's not the why, it's the what. Miners are selling coins, selling coins, selling coins, all the time. They might hold and sell more coins at certain times but still, the price moves mostly because the demand drops, traders and speculators decide to exit, etc.

If Bitcoin was based on some kind of ever increasing inflation scenario, then I'd be willing to say the inflation itself is actually the cause of the price dropping.

I've been selling even at current prices and can now buy back lower.  Just like I've been doing ever since June.  We can agree to disagree -- you can speculate expecting higher prices in spite of technicals and fundamentals indicating the exact opposite is more likely, I'll continue speculating expecting lower prices.  Let's see who comes out ahead "long term."  Just because I have no long position now doesn't mean I can't switch to a bullish strategy when it's clear we're on an uptrend, and having MORE dollars to do that with rather than fewer seems like a good thing.

I have no problem with this. It's a good strategy if it works for you. I've made some coins trading as well, but mostly I'm not trading. Overall I'm a little bit down counting in fiat but I'm up significantly in coins. Now I'm mostly just holding and actually investing more when I can decide the correct point to buy. My interest is in the long term situation and investing according to that. I've only traded on a couple of clear mid-term trends, I've not moved on short-term for a long time, not my thing. It's usually too stressful.

[Technomage]

As far as trading volume -- consider how much volume is generated by tradebots on mtgox.

Well, there are traders behind the trading bots. It's those traders, then, that move the price. But this is somewhat true that a portion of the volume means nothing, it's just constant back and forth for a very short term profit. How much of the volume is generated by this super short term trading is a good question. I have no clue but I'd certainly like to know.

[tvbcof]

Well, there are traders behind the trading bots. It's those traders, then, that move the price. But this is somewhat true that a portion of the volume means nothing, it's just constant back and forth for a very short term profit. How much of the volume is generated by this super short term trading is a good question. I have no clue but I'd certainly like to know.

The ultimate result will be as it is for many other markets, that trading will be transferred from the hands of humans to their 'trusty' servants the bots... Instead of a foot race it will be a drag race with the greasers and gearheads vying for a testosterone rush with their finely tuned machines instead of the plodding, doddering gladiators... That is all.

Got any insights or guesses about where we are on that path, and/or what the curve looks like (that you wish to share on this public forum?)

[zby]

7200 coins a day is $1,000,000 dollars worth of bitcoins a month available to be sold at $5.  If you don't understand how requiring TWELVE MILLION DOLLARS a year to keep bitcoin at $5 influences prices, well, I can see why you've had 100% failure to predict major bitcoin pricing trends so far, and I have had far more success.

The success of our predictions is an ad hominem argument (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem) which is a failure in argumentation. Also your attempt at changing the coin amount again to 7200 and ...

7200BTC per day is the correct estimation.  You have 50BTC per 10 minutes - that is 6 * 50BTC = 300BTC per hour and 300 * 24 = 7200 per day.

[Nagle]

Oh, and one more thing.  I never denied that bitcoin value is 100% derived from speculation.  With absolutely zero revenue and a $1000/hour cost to run the thing by definition it can't be anything else.  The question is: what kind off factors are influencing the mindset of said speculators at the moment?  IMO the requirement for a large influx of cash from new greater fools is currently one of the biggest.  Possible instability and flakiness of mtgox is good runner up.

I've been saying that since June 11, 2011, three days after the bubble burst and the price had dropped from $30 to $17. "There's no revenue model here. All growth comes only from new investors. This is a bubble in its pure form."

It's been a long, slow slide for months now. Look at the current chart at the head of this topic. As I wrote there, "Any questions?"

[zby]

...
I've been saying that since June 11, 2011, three days after the bubble burst and the price had dropped from $30 to $17. "There's no revenue model here. All growth comes only from new investors. This is a bubble in its pure form."
...

Well - there is a revenue model - it is the same as with any other currency - or with any other payment system, the system enables new trades each one of them generates some profit.  Of course nobody even tries to come up with numbers for this - in that sense I agree that this is a bubble.

[P4man]

Put another way, who fucking knows what will happen!?  It's fascinating to speculate about, but any sort of "return-to-mean, ldo" hypothesis, intrinsic value hypothesis or other chart-whisperer hypothesis probably has no basis here.  We need to think way, way outside of those boxes because the supply and demand functions of Bitcoin don't answer to the same fundamentals we are accustomed to seeing in other commodities.

Amen. The whole notion that $4 or $5 is cheap while $30 would be high is, quite frankly, laughable. Its not a stock you can measure against P/E ratio's, its not a national currency you can measure against gross domestic product. There really isnt any yardstick.

Or maybe there is, its the amount of trade conducted with BTC. Any sustainable demand for BTC will come from trade (not speculation). At the moment, there is almost none. You cant buy a bloody thing with it, and next to no one uses it buy goods or services. As such, even $5 for a bitcoin today is probably way too high. $4.9 of that is speculation But its anyone's guess how much real world trade will be conducted using bitcoins over the next years. You can guess that fairly well with euro's or dollars, but no one can even have a clue  about BTC trade volume in 2013 let alone 2020. And that is what you need to know to make at least an educated guess about what BTCs should be worth. Give me that number and Ill tell you if $0.05 or $50,000 is high or low.