SEEMS LIKE LARGE BTC HOLDERS TRYING TO KEEP PRICE AROUND $800

[dynodog]

Seems that the price of btc has maintained right around the $800 level on all exchanges for a fairly long time (except for Mtgox) - and it is doing so a little bit too conveniently.  With the stock market making big moves and various big news stories coming out about Turkey, Argentina, BTC china accepting deposits again, etc, you would think there would be bigger moves.  My guess:  the large btc holders are trying to reduce volatility in btc to remove this stigma about it.  They do so by capping rises and putting a floor on dips.  Manipulation is manipulation.  Let the market take it where it wants to go.

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[Holliday]

That's not manipulation. Manipulation is when one group has a different set of rules than another group.

[Dalmar]

Seems that the price of btc has maintained right around the $800 level on all exchanges for a fairly long time (except for Mtgox) - and it is doing so a little bit too conveniently.  With the stock market making big moves and various big news stories coming out about Turkey, Argentina, BTC china accepting deposits again, etc, you would think there would be bigger moves.  My guess:  the large btc holders are trying to reduce volatility in btc to remove this stigma about it.  They do so by capping rises and putting a floor on dips.  Manipulation is manipulation.  Let the market take it where it wants to go.

China is irrelevant until Feb 6-7th when either deposits actually come through or PBOC bans again. Feb 6-7th is the actual 'Jan 31st'.

[GigaCoin]

there's certainly a pattern where the price recovers the moment it goes below $800,  even with strong sell offs. This has been the case for the past 30 days now. I don't know if it's manipulation or just a lot of people buying.

[Roy Badami]

If the price moves... it's "manipulation".  If the price doesn't move, it's "manipulation".

Not saying manipulation never occurs, but I suspect that most of what people put down to manipulation is just markets being markets.

roy

[Bobsurplus]

Why would I want to keep the price at $800?

Say I have 1000 BTC, I'd want it earning daily, not sitting and collecting dust.

[Bobsurplus]

If the price moves... it's "manipulation".  If the price doesn't move, it's "manipulation".

Not saying manipulation never occurs, but I suspect that most of what people put down to manipulation is just markets being markets.

roy

So true.

[MNDan]

If the largest holders of bitcoins decided they wanted to stabilize the market, this is what it would look like. Coins quietly coming into the marketplace anytime the price looks to be rising significantly above $800. It's good for them, good for bitcoin, and bad for speculators. At some point their supply will dry up - then it's showtime!

[rdmk]

Seems that the price of btc has maintained right around the $800 level on all exchanges for a fairly long time (except for Mtgox) - and it is doing so a little bit too conveniently.  With the stock market making big moves and various big news stories coming out about Turkey, Argentina, BTC china accepting deposits again, etc, you would think there would be bigger moves.  My guess:  the large btc holders are trying to reduce volatility in btc to remove this stigma about it.  They do so by capping rises and putting a floor on dips.  Manipulation is manipulation.  Let the market take it where it wants to go.

China is irrelevant until Feb 6-7th when either deposits actually come through or PBOC bans again. Feb 6-7th is the actual 'Jan 31st'.

This.

Without subscribing to the end of the world fud, any effect of the CNYear will happen then. Right now everyone's showing their relatives about bitcoin.

[MatTheCat]

If the largest holders of bitcoins decided they wanted to stabilize the market, this is what it would look like. Coins quietly coming into the marketplace anytime the price looks to be rising significantly above $800. It's good for them, good for bitcoin, and bad for speculators. At some point their supply will dry up - then it's showtime!

I have been watching markets like a hawk in the past couple of weeks and I see it rather the other around. They aint fighting against upward buying pressure, it is the downward selling pressure that they are attempting and largely succeeding in standing in the way off.

Why would I want to keep the price at $800?

Say I have 1000 BTC, I'd want it earning daily, not sitting and collecting dust.

Say I had 100K BTC. I would prefer it to be earning daily whilst I sat on my fat arse doing fk all, but say I knew for sure that Bitcoin was already overinflated. Say I knew for sure that fresh capital simply wasn't coming into the market and say I knew that a stable Bitcoin was vital to Bitcoin related business ventures that I may have going which in the long run could prove infinitely more lucrative than any gains from sitting hoarding Bitcoins. In such a scenario, I would put everything I had into manipulating the market to hold within a stable range, moulding market to inhibit buyers being able to meet sellers (we seen a bot algorithm in action on Stamp and Gox doing just that earlier this evening), and using my own wealth to absorb any selling pressure.

I believe that these markets are being held up artificially high for purposes that may not be all that obvious or straightforward and certainly, In order to instigate the last crash, it took a 3000 BTC sale within about 5 minutes to ignite the market into freefall. I watched it happen. I would speculate that there might be some kind of 'whale war' going on right now in Bitcoin and this is totally dominating the price discovery action.

tinfoil hat time.

"ooh, somebody actually thinks that there might be some kind of market action going on that isn't totally apparent for all to see, lets reach for the tin-foil hats"

GTF outta here u retarded mainstream clown.

[billyjoeallen]

Seems people with deep pockets think anything below $800/BTC is cheap. Maybe they are right.

[AltorXP]

Why would I want to keep the price at $800?

Say I have 1000 BTC, I'd want it earning daily, not sitting and collecting dust.

The major BTC holders want to lower volatility, so more people trust, and buy bitcoin, which could make the price much higher than the $1,000 level

[jermwerty]

The major BTC holders want to lower volatility, so more people trust, and buy bitcoin, which could make the price much higher than the $1,000 level

*bingo

$800 is the new $6 mark (post $27 crash) and new $100 mark (post $270 crash)...  We could be stuck here for 1-18months (remember it took from June 2011 - Feb 2013 to hit $27 then break $20 barrier again....)

[Tirapon]

The major BTC holders want to lower volatility, so more people trust, and buy bitcoin, which could make the price much higher than the $1,000 level

*bingo

$800 is the new $6 mark (post $27 crash) and new $100 mark (post $270 crash)...  We could be stuck here for 1-18months (remember it took from June 2011 - Feb 2013 to hit $27 then break $20 barrier again....)

18 months is far too long, it will be quicker this time.

[m_murfy]

The major BTC holders want to lower volatility, so more people trust, and buy bitcoin, which could make the price much higher than the $1,000 level

*bingo

$800 is the new $6 mark (post $27 crash) and new $100 mark (post $270 crash)...  We could be stuck here for 1-18months (remember it took from June 2011 - Feb 2013 to hit $27 then break $20 barrier again....)

18 months is far too long, it will be quicker this time.

The time between large upwards impulses does seem to be decreasing.
Are we in the middle of the next one already perhaps?

[Lloydie]

Seems that the price of btc has maintained right around the $800 level on all exchanges for a fairly long time (except for Mtgox) - and it is doing so a little bit too conveniently.  With the stock market making big moves and various big news stories coming out about Turkey, Argentina, BTC china accepting deposits again, etc, you would think there would be bigger moves.  My guess:  the large btc holders are trying to reduce volatility in btc to remove this stigma about it.  They do so by capping rises and putting a floor on dips.  Manipulation is manipulation.  Let the market take it where it wants to go.

I just came on here to post this exact same thought and found this thread right at the top.

I speculate that large holders are getting the message that bitcoin is too volatile and are buying and selling bitcoins to maintain $800.  The other theory I have is that the Bitcoin Investment Trust has issued guidance to its trader to buy bitcoins if it gets near $800.

The bitcoin purchases are probably absorbing bitcoins being dumped by retail companies selling their bitcoins into the market.

[sprot]

I THINK YOU'RE RIGHT

[Elwar]

I believe it is hovering around this price precisely because it has been at that price for a while and is now seen as "the price". So people who think the price should go down a lot when bad news hits are surprised when the price drops and people buy it up pushing the price back to 800ish. Then people are surprised when it does not skyrocket on good news when it starts going up and people start selling and shorting because they know the price will return to 800.

There are two major things holding the price down. China and the FBI. Once those are out of the way it may jump again...but not until something big knocks it out of the range where people believe it will return to 800. Last time it hovered around 125 for a long time for that reason. The China exchanges knocked it up to 200, then as it started falling back down it took another jump pushing past 260 which left all thoughts of 125 behind.

[Lloydie]

I believe it is hovering around this price precisely because it has been at that price for a while and is now seen as "the price". So people who think the price should go down a lot when bad news hits are surprised when the price drops and people buy it up pushing the price back to 800ish. Then people are surprised when it does not skyrocket on good news when it starts going up and people start selling and shorting because they know the price will return to 800.

There are two major things holding the price down. China and the FBI. Once those are out of the way it may jump again...but not until something big knocks it out of the range where people believe it will return to 800. Last time it hovered around 125 for a long time for that reason. The China exchanges knocked it up to 200, then as it started falling back down it took another jump pushing past 260 which left all thoughts of 125 behind.

Interesting. Thanks for the contribution. Re: FBI, I'm not worried about the 144k coins for the reason that 1.35 million coins are going to be mined over next twelve months. Moreover, 120k of those coins are being disputed.

Re: China. That I'm slightly worried about, as it is entirely possible that the govt bans bank to bank transfer for bitcoins. However, after the initial shock of the ban, I think Btc china will find another way around it. If they have to send money couriers in and out of the FTZ, I think they will.

I guess I'll keep some fiat on hand in case china bans bank to bank transfers.

[banaltcoin]

i need a raise to $5000 then a drop to $2000, so i can make some $$$, the current market situation is bad for investment, money in bitcoin is stucked, $0 profit, even worse than the Bank saving interest

[Miz4r]

i need a raise to $5000 then a drop to $2000, so i can make some $$$, the current market situation is bad for investment, money in bitcoin is stucked, $0 profit, even worse than the Bank saving interest

Actually during times of stability it's often a good time to buy. And wtf, the price is stable for a month or so and you start comparing bitcoin to Bank savings? Seriously sell your coins and get the hell out of here and don't come back please.

[Dalmar]

Actually during times of stability it's often a good time to buy. And wtf, the price is stable for a month or so and you start comparing bitcoin to Bank savings? Seriously sell your coins and get the hell out of here and don't come back please.

Actually in stable periods historically bitcoin always tended to slide downwards as speculators get bored of it. Only when they see high monthly/weekly returns do they all pile in again.

[Miz4r]

Actually during times of stability it's often a good time to buy. And wtf, the price is stable for a month or so and you start comparing bitcoin to Bank savings? Seriously sell your coins and get the hell out of here and don't come back please.

Actually in stable periods historically bitcoin always tended to slide downwards as speculators get bored of it. Only when they see high monthly/weekly returns do they all pile in again.

Proof please? Looking at historical data I have more often seen an increase in price after a period of stability than a decrease. Either way stability is good for bitcoin.

[banaltcoin]

I am holding half a million dollar of bitcoin at current price, if i give this $$$ to my bank investment manager and join a low risk wealth management plan, i could get around %7 income per year which would be $500000 * %7 / 365 * 30 =  $2876 per month, therefore i hope bitcoin price move !

[Lloydie]

Actually during times of stability it's often a good time to buy. And wtf, the price is stable for a month or so and you start comparing bitcoin to Bank savings? Seriously sell your coins and get the hell out of here and don't come back please.

Actually in stable periods historically bitcoin always tended to slide downwards as speculators get bored of it. Only when they see high monthly/weekly returns do they all pile in again.

Proof please? Looking at historical data I have more often seen an increase in price after a period of stability than a decrease. Either way stability is good for bitcoin.

Ignore dalmar, he is not worth it.

[Lethn]

It could be manipulation but I think more likely is that there is such a large volume of money coming in and traders that soon enough the people who own lots of coins aren't really going to matter all that much anymore a lot of people were predicting back when Bitcoin was $50 that the price would stabilise when more volume came in.

[Dalmar]

Proof please? Looking at historical data I have more often seen an increase in price after a period of stability than a decrease. Either way stability is good for bitcoin.

Spring/Summer of 2013 is a great example. Weekly declines after a perceived ''return to normal''..

[vabtc]

Historically, bitcoin has stable more than it has been volatile. 2012 anyone? 

Also, bitcoin was NOT created to be a fiat pump/dump machine like stocks and people who treat as one are clearly not seeing the long term picture here and just don't get bitcoin. I didn't get to where I am by trading, I did it by making a decision in 2011 to buy and hold bitcoin for at least 4 years, no matter what happens.

[MatTheCat]

Some people are clinging to a long gone bull market.

Yeah...precious few here whose 'analysis' is anything more than an expression of how they hope things are or will be.

It gets quite tiring sifting through all these dirge know-all comments almost as boring as it is sitting analysing a Bitcoin chart that refuses to move because deep pocketed forces mostly don't want it to move. Right now, they need to put their resources into making sure it doesn't move down, but that isn't to say that they won't do the same to prevent it moving up if the organic market forces wanted to take it up. As a speculator, this state of affairs sucks. Of course, there is nothing to say that these forces will succeed in their price holding operation. Bitcoin is still very much the wild west and nothing is set out in stone, yet.

Anyone who states that the manipulators are preventing Bitcoin from moving up, just haven't been looking very closely at the charts in recent times. Study the charts, and even better still, try to trade the movements, and you will soon gain an intuitive grasp of how the bias of the trading algorithms are configured. It took a 3000 BTC sell-off (on Stamp) within 5 minutes to break the algorithms and trigger a sell off last week, it will probably take much more than this next time.

Historically, bitcoin has stable more than it has been volatile. 2012 anyone?  

Also, bitcoin was NOT created to be a fiat pump/dump machine like stocks and people who treat as one are clearly not seeing the long term picture here and just don't get bitcoin. I didn't get to where I am by trading, I did it by making a decision in 2011 to buy and hold bitcoin for at least 4 years, no matter what happens.

Well that is what it has turned into. It has been pumped, and pumped, and then pumped so more. Not seen so much of the dumping yet though and when/if we do, I will do my utmost to ensure that my capital doesn't get dumped with it.

[pera]

Seems that the price of btc has maintained right around the $800 level on all exchanges for a fairly long time (except for Mtgox) - and it is doing so a little bit too conveniently.  With the stock market making big moves and various big news stories coming out about Turkey, Argentina, BTC china accepting deposits again, etc, you would think there would be bigger moves.  My guess:  the large btc holders are trying to reduce volatility in btc to remove this stigma about it.  They do so by capping rises and putting a floor on dips.  Manipulation is manipulation.  Let the market take it where it wants to go.

lol "manipulation" SEEMS LIKE YOU WANT TO BUY CHEAPER 

[Sindelar1938]

Speculation does not help
Wait and see what happens

[zoinky]

I am holding half a million dollar of bitcoin at current price, if i give this $$$ to my bank investment manager and join a low risk wealth management plan, i could get around %7 income per year which would be $500000 * %7 / 365 * 30 =  $2876 per month, therefore i hope bitcoin price move !

Then go do that... I think your viewpoints are all skewed.

[igorr]

goodbye bitcoin,

[Lloydie]

Still hodling at $800.  Pretty amazing stability.  A bit too amazing if you ask me.  Still, it's a good thing. 

[seleme]

Seems that the price of btc has maintained right around the $800 level on all exchanges for a fairly long time (except for Mtgox) - and it is doing so a little bit too conveniently.  With the stock market making big moves and various big news stories coming out about Turkey, Argentina, BTC china accepting deposits again, etc, you would think there would be bigger moves.  My guess:  the large btc holders are trying to reduce volatility in btc to remove this stigma about it.  They do so by capping rises and putting a floor on dips.  Manipulation is manipulation.  Let the market take it where it wants to go.

lol "manipulation" SEEMS LIKE YOU WANT TO BUY CHEAPER 

Pera, looks like you joined wonderful bull camp these days

[m_murfy]

I've HODLed my coins through the past 3 bubbles and I can say I'm a happy HODLer at this point.
And I've just bought another 10 btc at the $800 mark to add to my stash, and put between 5-10% into Nxtcoin as a leverage play.
HODL tight, the bulls will be back on parade soon.  

[billyjoeallen]

Who say's it's BTC hodlers stabilizing the price? Maybe it's new money buying the dips. I suspect they may be new to Bitcoin but very experienced traders. Wall Streeters. They may be trying to keep the price stable until they work their deals to buys huge dark pool hordes and miner stashes. That's what I would be doing if I was them.

[Lloydie]

Who say's it's BTC hodlers stabilizing the price? Maybe it's new money buying the dips. I suspect they may be new to Bitcoin but very experienced traders. Wall Streeters. They may be trying to keep the price stable until they work their deals to buys huge dark pool hordes and miner stashes. That's what I would be doing if I was them.

no one. one of my theories is that the BIT has instructed its trader to buy at near $800.  Else, coinbase is not dumping when price is near $800.

[mgburks77]

Not a large holder but I bought some btc when the price hit $800 this afternoon. Just seemed like a good deal and i wanted to get some peer coin so I did it.

[TERA]

Zomg stable prices it must be a conspiracy. It can't be supply and demand. The whales are out to steal my day trading profits. They hate me.

[glendall]

Guys the market is too big for all the whales to be planning some sort of concentrated effort at manipulating the price so particularly around the world.

The bitcoin economy is not like the Federal Reserve fiat economy where this actually does happen, where you have a few dozen people setting the monetary policy for the world based on their own personal believes.  No, thank Satoshi, we have an actual free money market!

Any 'manipulation' in a free market like this is good manipulation.  Because.....any one is free to manipulate it, it is not run by a few rich bastards. It's not a monopoly like fiat currencies all pegged to the USD which is created with no backing by two companies passing IOU bonds to one another.

There is no secret cabal of old-bit miners setting any agenda.  Too many people are playing in this market, and it is too global for that. Maybe back in the days when Gox was king, there could have been some effective manipulation . But I can not believe there would be any way to effectively do this now, unless you owned like, I dunno, a quarter of all bitcoin or something.

[Lloydie]

Sure it's possible.  The other side of this is USD.  Most of the transactions are happening via BitPay, Coinbase, Bitstamp.  Coinbase or BitPay can opt to stop selling coins when it gets near $800.

[windjc]

Not a large holder but I bought some btc when the price hit $800 this afternoon. Just seemed like a good deal and i wanted to get some peer coin so I did it.

Yeah, you're not really suppose to exist based on theories of Bears.

[MatTheCat]

Zomg stable prices it must be a conspiracy. It can't be supply and demand. The whales are out to steal my day trading profits. They hate me.

U have a tendency to jump into posts with a "I knew it all along, I am so smart attitude"

However, in my last price prediction thread, whilst bitcoin was at $800, I predicted a pump/surge up to the $825-$835 level. You put your tuppence worth in, something along the lines of "Yawn, Bitcoin will stay at $800 for a long time".

You were wrong, I was dead right, again.

Will you now admit that you don't actually ever know what you are talking about?

Guys the market is too big for all the whales to be planning some sort of concentrated effort at manipulating the price so particularly around the world.

Who says that 'all the whales' are manipulating. Perhaps it is just one consortium who is active at the moment. Perhaps all the rest are just sitting, holding, and watching with amusement/boredom. Perhaps when another whale with a different agenda decides to make a move one way or the other, the whole ball game will change.

One thing for sure, is that without strong guiding hands, this market would not be behaving in this way.

[oda.krell]

Zomg stable prices it must be a conspiracy. It can't be supply and demand. The whales are out to steal my day trading profits. They hate me.

U have a tendency to jump into posts with a "I knew it all along, I am so smart attitude"

However, in my last price prediction thread, whilst bitcoin was at $800, I predicted a pump/surge up to the $825-$835 level. You put your tuppence worth in, something along the lines of "Yawn, Bitcoin will stay at $800 for a long time".

You were wrong, I was dead right, again.

Will you now admit that you don't actually ever know what you are talking about?

Guys the market is too big for all the whales to be planning some sort of concentrated effort at manipulating the price so particularly around the world.

Who says that 'all the whales' are manipulating. Perhaps it is just one consortium who is active at the moment. Perhaps all the rest are just sitting, holding, and watching with amusement/boredom. Perhaps when another whale with a different agenda decides to make a move one way or the other, the whole ball game will change.

One thing for sure, is that without strong guiding hands, this market would not be behaving in this way.

For someone who, just a few posts above, feels justified to rip others a new one for "pretending to know it all", you sure like to pretend to know it all yourself ("anyone who doesn't see price is being propped up artificially is an IMBECILE I tell you" /paraphrase). No, no, don't strain yourself, I already know your answer: you're objectively right, the others are delusional bulls. It's just that simple

[dynodog]

Hope these "guiding hands" know what they're doing.  My guess is that while they have good intentions, they have no idea what the unintended consequences of their actions are.  Yes, less volatility is an ultimate goal, but bitcoin is so young, and they better be careful to not extinguish the fire by trying to control it.  Big moves to the upside should be taking place when major currency problems in various countries exist - that was one of the fundamental reasons that bitcoin was created (to provide an alternate currency or store of wealth so that people were not crushed by governments who print money at will).  Bitcoin is not just about a new way to move money around at a lower cost.  When currency problems arise (like they are big time in Argentina and Turkey), I would expect to see rallies in bitcoin.  It's almost like if Cyprus happened right now, the price would not budge bc these guiding hands think they know best.

[akujin]

I bought at 796.8 and i'm thinking about selling it now at 800... Just enough to pay for the 0.4% trading fee i lost.. LOL!
Seems like btc-e is not getting any higher than 800  

[davidgdg]

The major BTC holders want to lower volatility, so more people trust, and buy bitcoin, which could make the price much higher than the $1,000 level

My head hurts 

[MatTheCat]

For someone who, just a few posts above, feels justified to rip others a new one for "pretending to know it all", you sure like to pretend to know it all yourself ("anyone who doesn't see price is being propped up artificially is an IMBECILE I tell you" /paraphrase). No, no, don't strain yourself, I already know your answer: you're objectively right, the others are delusional bulls. It's just that simple

Yeah I must admit, I am also a bit of an opinionated cocknose. But in my defence, the majority of my calls on Bitcoin have been pretty good since I have taken an investment interest in Bitcoin, and much of my unpalatable behaviour has involved me being in heated arguments with bull-tards who are pouring scathing derision and criticism on moves and calls that I am making, which turn out to be dead right, going right back to the ridicule that I took from the Bitcoin Nutters on here when I stated I was selling $1100 btc at a loss in order to minimise damages (btc still in $1000 range).

Right now, I am not making any calls on Bitcoin because I have no confident notion of what it is going to do next. I am not shorting Bitcoin and I certainly am not going long Bitcoin. The present market action is having the effect of keeping fresh speculative money away whilst providing no real reason for existing speculative capital to flee Bitcoin. This might all just be an entirely coincidental unintendend consequence of 'innocent' market action, but it is well known that there are whale consortiums out there who have business interests that are frying much bigger fish than merely upping the nominal value of their Bitcoin holdings. The sheer volume of times that the negative aspects of Bitcoins high volatility or the need for stability was mentioned by some of these consortiums in the NY hearings should tell anyone with a modicum of sense (yup, I am at it again) that if these entities with broader Bitcoin business interests who are seeking a stable Bitcoin price think that they can engineer it via a dominant presence on the exchanges, then they are certainly going to attempt to bring it about. Wouldn't you do the exact same if you were in there position?

Of course, this doesn't mean that whoever is trying to hold the Bitcoin price in this range will succeed as there may be other more powerful whale entities out there with different plans. Indeed, the hands which are holding Bitcoin in place may only be doing so on a short term basis before allowing the market to do its own thing. Who could possibly know? One thing I do know is that for the past week, Bitcoin has been more stable than the precious metals and many actual currencies. This is clearly not a natural state of affairs.

[Lloydie]

New "floor" seems to be $780. Around 4000 coins dropped to achieve that. So around $3.6 mill to move a $10 billion market down, or 0.036% of market cap. Most people appear to be hodling. Big players have very much outsized impact. I am somewhat comforted knowing they have millions invested in the success of bitcoin. Could be why andreesen didn't buy more than a single coin.

[MatTheCat]

New "floor" seems to be $780. Around 4000 coins dropped to achieve that. So around $3.6 mill to move a $10 billion market down, or 0.036% of market cap. Most people appear to be hodling. Big players have very much outsized impact. I am somewhat comforted knowing they have millions invested in the success of bitcoin. Could be why andreesen didn't buy more than a single coin.

I wouldn't be speaking so confidently about that if I were you. Perhaps those 4000 BTC was the wall of defence wall put up by the 'hold Bitcoin at $800 society'. Certainly the Bid wall on Bitstamp has been decimated in size whilst the Ask wall remains pretty much the same as it always was. Any further large selling volume like what was seen today will send Bitcoin crashing down.

Earlier on today I wouldn't have made a call either way on Bitcoin, now I would say it must surely go down from here.

[Lloydie]

I'm not confident at all. I acknowledge I'm speculating with limited info. Thanks for your thoughts though. I also think it might fall. Roughly one day's worth of mined coins is enough to drop the market 2.5%.  On the other hand, the BIT is buying up coins. Overall, I would still say the tendency is for people to hoard rather than dump. The merchant expansion and motivation to "encourage" merchants is having more of a short term impact for now. But I think people will go back to hoarding soon once the novelty of online retailers cools somewhat. Afterall, how many bed sheets do I really need?

[Lloydie]

I think one of the reasons people have a negative reaction to you, mat the cat, is your tendency to say "it must surely go down from here". What makes you so sure? Do you have confirmed sources?

So, I tend to ignore that and assume you are desperately trying to manipulate the price down so you can buy cheap coins. This just makes you come off looking desperate and not credible, in my eyes, even if you have something valuable to add.

[MatTheCat]

I think one of the reasons people have a negative reaction to you, mat the cat, is your tendency to say "it must surely go down from here". What makes you so sure? Do you have confirmed sources?

So, I tend to ignore that and assume you are desperately trying to manipulate the price down so you can buy cheap coins. This just makes you come off looking desperate and not credible, in my eyes, even if you have something valuable to add.

It is the fault of the English language. We lack a proper subjunctive case for our verbs.

P.S. I have been mostly bearish since early December and it has to be said, I have mostly been right and am thousands of pounds richer because of it.....and yeah, looking at the charts now, I am sure. If am wrong then y'all get to laugh and point at me next week when Bitcoin is at $850 or whatever.

[Lloydie]

Plus I know from past interactions you mentioned your circumstance and the fact that you are a trader, so overall I can see you are keen for the market to move in the direction you want it to move. However, please note that no one here, individually, really has the money to move the Btc markets anymore. The big guys will do what the big guys want to do. The small guys will be influenced but won't make a difference.

PS: don't use the word sure at all. No one can be sure. By using the word sure, you are flagging to everyone you are, essentially, unreliable.

[MatTheCat]

PS: don't use the word sure at all. No one can be sure. By using the word sure, you are flagging to everyone you are, essentially, unreliable.

I was trading both ways for a short time, but I have decided that I don't trust the only exchange that I know of, where I can short sell, so now I am just looking for long opportunities or rather, thee long opportunity. If had option of shorting Bitcoin at the moment, I would short Bitcoin at $789 on Bitstamp, right now. To do that, I would need to be pretty sure......I would however place stop losses at $800, just incase.

[Lloydie]

There right there, the stop loss, proves you are not sure! 

[MatTheCat]

There right there, the stop loss, proves you are not sure!  

ok.

If I had 10K right now that I was being forced to place on Bitcoin and wasn't allowed to cash it in for another week minimum, with no sitting on the sidelines allowed, I would be going short without giving the long bet even a second thought.

It is true, there are seldom times when I am 100% sure.

[Lloydie]

But you don't have 10k, and there is a reason why that is. Sorry to be blunt but one cannot know what happens tomorrow, let alone a week. 

[MatTheCat]

But you don't have 10k, and there is a reason why that is. Sorry to be blunt but one cannot know what happens tomorrow, let alone a week.  

I actually have 20K (USD) allocated to my Bitstamp account. I would like to say that probably 8-10K of that is profit from Bitcoin trades but that would be bullshit. I have totally fkn burned money on absolute shit since I started getting small windfalls through Bitcoin. So all that money is my own hard earned cash, and I aint away to piss it out on Bitcoins in what seems like to me, a very shaky market destined for some considerable down time yet.

[Lloydie]

That's ok. I know someone who did the opposite of you. He didn't have $20k but borrowed it. He bought 5000 coins and he is headed for a year long travel/holiday/work trip. I know who I'd rather be in one year's time. Bitter and twisted, wishing for markets to drop or busily building bitcoin businesses and enjoying life?  . You decide.

[MatTheCat]

That's ok. I know someone who did the opposite of you. He didn't have $20k but borrowed it. He bought 5000 coins and he is headed for a year long travel/holiday/work trip. I know who I'd rather be in one year's time. Bitter and twisted, wishing for markets to drop or busily building bitcoin businesses and enjoying life?  . You decide.

Yeah yeah yeah.

Woulda, shoulda, coulda.

I have got over the fact that I have had every opportunity to be a Bitcoin millionaire by now, but amn't, quite some time ago. Good for your mate. He took a huge risk in doing what he did and now he is made for life. If I spent that 20K USD on Bitcoin's right now, I could buy about 30 btc, which by early March might well be worth just about 8K (or maybe even less). How far around the world could I travel for -$12K USD?

[Lloydie]

I see the difference between him and you as follows: he understood the market dynamics and made a wise (and bloody lucky) decision to hodl.  You kept trading and wasted your opportunity because you didn't see what he saw.  So, what's the lesson we can all learn from this?  Understand the long term market dynamics.  AFAIK, he is still keeping Btcs.  The bitcoin market is still very early stage.  See www.bitcoinpulse.com.  The only thing worse than missing the first boat is missing the second.

[MatTheCat]

I see the difference between him and you as follows: he understood the market dynamics and made a wise (and bloody lucky) decision to hodl.  You kept trading and wasted your opportunity because you didn't see what he saw.  So, what's the lesson we can all learn from this?  Understand the long term market dynamics.  AFAIK, he is still keeping Btcs.  The bitcoin market is still very early stage.  See www.bitcoinpulse.com.  The only thing worse than missing the first boat is missing the second.

What are you talking about?

My first truly speculative Bitcoin was bought at around $720 in late November 2013. If I simply bought and held I would right now be staring at no more than a 1.5K USD profit. That would be a terrible state of affairs! I have made thousands trading Bitcoin, most of it on the way up cos any fool can make money in an upward market. It is when the prevailing trend is going the other way that things become a bit trickier. Until just a few weeks ago I never even had a clue what the MACD was, but that still never prevented me from recognising the top was in and a nasty correction was on it's way.

How could I see this whilst the majority on here were claiming that we would never see sub $1000 Bitcoin again or debating whether Bitcoin would be $1500 or $2000 by Jan 2014? Is it because I possess some inate ability to read markets? Or was it cos it was just plain fkn obvious and most posters on here are fkn idiots, which is why I get so spitting mad reading all their fluffy wishful and baseless drivel.

[Lloydie]

Current fluctuations are no big deal IMHO, I think in one year everything will sort itself out.  The only thing I'd say is get some Ltc just in case Gavin wants to play robocop.

[raid_n]

What are you talking about?

My first truly speculative Bitcoin was bought at around $720 in late November 2013. If I simply bought and held I would right now be staring at no more than a 1.5K USD profit. That would be a terrible state of affairs! I have made thousands trading Bitcoin, most of it on the way up cos any fool can make money in an upward market. It is when the prevailing trend is going the other way that things become a bit trickier. Until just a few weeks ago I never even had a clue what the MACD was, but that still never prevented me from recognising the top was in and a nasty correction was on it's way.

How could I see this whilst the majority on here were claiming that we would never see sub $1000 Bitcoin again or debating whether Bitcoin would be $1500 or $2000 by Jan 2014? Is it because I possess some inate ability to read markets? Or was it cos it was just plain fkn obvious and most posters on here are fkn idiots, which is why I get so spitting mad reading all their fluffy wishful and baseless drivel.

I actually have 20K (USD) allocated to my Bitstamp account. I would like to say that probably 8-10K of that is profit from Bitcoin trades but that would be bullshit. I have totally fkn burned money on absolute shit since I started getting small windfalls through Bitcoin. So all that money is my own hard earned cash, and I aint away to piss it out on Bitcoins in what seems like to me, a very shaky market destined for some considerable down time yet.

You know when I first came to this forum I thought your posts were interesting and you were genuinely interested in Bitcoin.
Lately all you seem to be saying is "ZOMG manipulation!!!" (only if it does not fit your predictions, right? ) and "I knew it all it is obvious anyone not seeing it is a moron".

I can't tell if this is because in reality you are a Bull in a Bear's hide hoping for a better BTC position or if you are just frustrated and jealous of the lucky ones that believed in Bitcoin at an early stage.

It seems to me that you are a gambler and that greed may take the better of you.
You laugh at 1.5k USD profit because, as the superior trader that you see yourself, you'd have made gazillions in the same time.

In reality if you really were that good at trading you'd take a massive loan, make it all back within a short period of time and then brag to us about your riches.
But the truth is that you have no fucking idea like most of us.

[MatTheCat]

In reality if you really were that good at trading you'd take a massive loan, make it all back within a short period of time and then brag to us about your riches.
But the truth is that you have no fucking idea like most of us.

Except more often than not, I am right and you guys are all wrong.

I realise that the market goes two ways, most of you only want to think think of 'choo choo motherfucker', post unfunny HODL memes, or *FACEPALM* jpegs when someone disagrees with you all, like what I got hit with when I first reversed from my predominantly bullish to predominantly bearish position way back when Bitcoin was still over $1000.

I am quite happy stating that I don't care about Bitcoin, and only care about my profit margins in the same way I could state the same thing about BP if I had invested in BP stocks, or JPMorgan if I was holding their stocks. Actually, it would probably be a good thing for society if these stocks went to zero and these companies disappeared out of business. I would say the same thing about Bitcoin. It has nothing to do with liberty or punching out against the establishment for the little guy. It is a nasty pernicious 100% trackable method of digital payment that has already been completely cornered by just a handful of entities, with a structure of future dispersion, that is guaranteed to exacerbate this 'problem' insomuch as it wasn't intended by design all along.

Thankyou for suggesting that my trading skills are so good that I should take out a loan, but I think I will pass on that. See, these markets are cornered markets and in recent times, they have been totally dominated by the big hitters, something which has more likely than not always been the case except when everyone else is getting rich from it, nobody cares. Anyone watching closely can see this. There have been fantastic efforts to hold the price and providing no other whale entity had nothing to say against this, these efforts would succeed and still might succeed albeit at a lower price range. For most of the past 2-3 weeks, the price has been holed up in an unfeasibly narrow zone and it has taken some very large BTC dumps to tip the scales against the price holding algorithms. For the previous weeks slide down to $725, it took a 3000 BTC sell off on Bistamp within a 5 minute period. Yesterday, it took at 1500 BTC sell off within 1 minute to dismantle the humongous Bid wall, resulting in a bit of price slippage. Ask yourself, who is piling up these massive Bid/Ask walls and whose bot keeps pushing the spot price away from the weight of the genuine market? And then who is coming along with a hundreds or thousands of coins and dumping them all at once?

So you are right, like most people, I have no fucking idea. To be able to predict Bitcoin at the moment you need to be a mindreader and I can't read minds and even if I could, I wouldn't know whose mind to read in order to get an understanding of what is in store for Bitcoin. But at least I am able to stand back and see the wood for the trees without needing photographic evidence and a signed confession from the wood, stating that it is infact a wood, and not just a bunch of random trees. Perhaps the narratives that I apply to the market action aren't wholly correct, but who cares. As long as they continue to serve me right, that is all that matters to me. After all, one has got have an opinion and as you may have noticed, I always have an opinion.

As an aside from my admission of not feeling that I can really call Bitcoin at the moment, anyone who had taken Tech Analysis 101, would confirm that Bitcoin charts are very bearish and if you were forced to place a bet on it right now, it would have to be a short.

[Miz4r]

Except more often than not, I am right and you guys are all wrong.

Ah yes ofcourse, the good old Dunning-Kruger effect. If you stopped antagonizing every single person who says something bullish and paint them all with the same brush maybe you'd see that most of us are actually perfectly aware that the price could go both ways, but we don't always agree on which way the price is most likely to go next. And we aren't all perma-bulls or perma-bears either. There are always bulls and bears around, however you seem to focus only on the bulls and whenever the price goes down a bit you say 'Hah I told you so I am right and you are wrong! Look at my short I'm making thousands of dollars!!'. And when the price goes back up you make a thread complaining about bots and manipulators holding the price up when it should go down. I really think you have an unhealthy obsession here.

As an aside from my admission of not feeling that I can really call Bitcoin at the moment, anyone who had taken Tech Analysis 101, would confirm that Bitcoin charts are very bearish and if you were forced to place a bet on it right now, it would have to be a short.

Actually no. Even professional Technical Analysts are rarely all in agreement and I have seen both bullish and bearish TA from actual professional traders for the short term. Would you say that those who are bullish simply don't understand TA 101 even though they are professionals and have made their living as a trader for many years now?

[MatTheCat]

Except more often than not, I am right and you guys are all wrong.

Ah yes ofcourse, the good old Dunning-Kruger effect. If you stopped antagonizing every single person who says something bullish and paint them all with the same brush maybe you'd see that most of us are actually perfectly aware that the price could go both ways, but we don't always agree on which way the price is most likely to go next. And we aren't all perma-bulls or perma-bears either. There are always bulls and bears around, however you seem to focus only on the bulls and whenever the price goes down a bit you say 'Hah I told you so I am right and you are wrong! Look at my short I'm making thousands of dollars!!'. And when the price goes back up you make a thread complaining about bots and manipulators holding the price up when it should go down. I really think you have an unhealthy obsession here.

It is hard not to develop a hyperphobic reaction against a lot of the idiot users on this site...It is a bit like being stuck in a shopping mall getting your mind bombarded with advertisements telling you to eat junk food, buy lots of stuff you don't need, etc .....but yeah, I need a break from this. It isn't healthy.

But certainly lots of dodgy shit going on Bitcoin land right now....Bitcoinwisdom is down (not good, I wouldn't be trading anything if I never had access to this), Bitfinex hacked, probably a lot of people been robbed there, huge dumps on Gox and also on Stamp.

but erm, just all normal every day market action, nothing to see here, move along people.

EDIT: Between 6th Jan and 28th Jan, we had an extended descending triangle. This is a bearish indicator. It sez so on page 101 of Martin Prings 'TA Explained' book. I got in a 'debate' with the usual retards on this forum over this. I stated in most cases, we could expect a market break down from this. I was met with the usual jibes and some cherry picked out of context examples of Bitcoin going North after a similar formation in the past. Within the next day or two, Bitcoin broke down beneath the important support level. Now we are pressing and indeed dipping below this $765 support level once again...bearish or bullish? C'mon, seriously?

[igorr]

BTC quickly losing popularity.

View Screen Capture

View Screen Capture

[meanig]

BTC quickly losing popularity.

MtGox quickly losing popularity.

[raid_n]

@Mat

Try to step back and take an objective look at what you are postulating:

Some ominous "whale entity or entities" have a "hidden agenda" to hold the value of BTC at a certain, arbitrary USD value.
Need I remind you that whenever Bitcoin fluctuates as hell it is also other/the same "whale entities" (I kind of like that term) causing it...

There is often a grain of truth in many far fetched ideas but under this assumption any logic breaks down completely.
Price didn't do what you expected? -> the whale entity didn't like it
Price did what you expected -> did the whale entity approve?

From this we can argue that the whale entity is the reason PayPal is not yet accepting BTC because, well it is the whale entity right?

Do you see where I am going here? You try and pinpoint non-determinism in price prediction to a single factor (the whale entity).
There is no such thing as a foolproof market prediction. The moment it were to exist it would invalidate itself.

I don't trade so maybe I view things differently.  This is just how it looks to me.

Oh, and just to get you thinking on something. If in fact there is such a thing as a whale entity you could start predicting its behavior.
This reduces your entire problem back down to where you started. Predicting the market accurately and reliably

[igorr]

Why BTC want infiltrates into someone else's house ? (PayPal, Skrill, Bank of China, Bank of Russia , .... )

The answer is simple, because the BTC is parasite.
PayPal says, in my house my rules !!!

[MatTheCat]

Oh, and just to get you thinking on something. If in fact there is such a thing as a whale entity you could start predicting its behavior.
This reduces your entire problem back down to where you started. Predicting the market accurately and reliably

The fact that you even make such an assertion leaves us with no midway ground upon which we can discuss this further.

Last thing I will say is that in very low volume times, I have tried to push the market in a way that I wanted. At first i seemed to succeed, but their was bigger boys that had different ideas and I took a slapping and had to fold my hand. If I am a tiddler and I can think like this and even successfully affect the flow of the market up to a point, whales certainly think like this and certainly attempt to affect the market in a way that suits them. The extent to which they succeed or not is another matter (dependant on actions of other whales).

[dyask]

That's not manipulation. Manipulation is when one group has a different set of rules than another group.

No ....
When price doesn't do what I want it to do it is manipulation.   

[cryptoanarchist]

That's not manipulation. Manipulation is when one group has a different set of rules than another group.

+1

Bitcoin can't be "manipulated". A lot of folks on here are pretty clueless about how the market works.

[MatTheCat]

Bitcoin can't be "manipulated". A lot of folks on here are pretty clueless about how the market works.

Wot are you talking about? If owned 100'000 BTC, and had 10 million USD liquidity on the exchanges are you trying to tell me that I couldn't pimp this market around like a bitch. I could ramp or crash this market however I saw fit, at least until some bigger whales came along and moved against me. But if I was the biggest whale (i.e. 'Satoshi'/NSA/CIA), then I push this market any way I wanted and nobody would have the power to stand in my way.

Or perhaps I am missing something. Perhaps you are a grade A Free Markets 101 student. Please enlighten me how the utterly cornered Bitcoin market can't be manipulated?

[Edward50]

Bitcoin can't be "manipulated". A lot of folks on here are pretty clueless about how the market works.

Wot are you talking about? If owned 100'000 BTC, and had 10 million USD liquidity on the exchanges are you trying to tell me that I couldn't pimp this market around like a bitch. I could ramp or crash this market however I saw fit, at least until some bigger whales came along and moved against me. But if I was the biggest whale (i.e. 'Satoshi'/NSA/CIA), then I push this market any way I wanted and nobody would have the power to stand in my way.

Or perhaps I am missing something. Perhaps you are a grade A Free Markets 101 student. Please enlighten me how the utterly cornered Bitcoin market can't be manipulated?

Just wanted to point out that I played around in some alt coins with what I would consider not a lot of coins, but still a reasonable amount. I was surprised at how easy it is to manipulate the market. Bitcoin price can still be very easily manipulated even at these levels with a reasonable but not a substantial amount of money.

Just my 2 cents.

What you are seeing with bitcoin is that the price is too high and unsustainable. It can not really move that much higher at this point. You basically have nobody buying as the price is way too high. You have a lot of people just sitting on a mountain of bitcoins who are still waiting for the price to go much higher.

I think what is also holding the price up lately is Mt. Gox. Mt Gox. used to be the biggest exchange and I am sure a lot of people have their money tied up in there. Eventually they will get their money out or something will happen and this will cause everything to fall. I think we are seeing this now. Mt Gox. was probably a reason why bitcoin price held up so well.

What I think will happen is once the price falls to $600's level that will be when people start to panic more and start to think maybe I should get out now before it goes even lower. If I was sitting with bitcoins at $800, now they are $600's and the price was not able to go above $800 for weeks, I would panic and not want to sit with bitcoins.

It will be interesting to see, I sold my bitcoins weeks ago in anticipation of a big price fall. I am surprised the price is holding up, but it seems to get weaker and weaker.

[MatTheCat]

It will be interesting to see, I sold my bitcoins weeks ago in anticipation of a big price fall. I am surprised the price is holding up, but it seems to get weaker and weaker.

As per the theme of this thread. A lot of people are looking at the market action and get the feeling that powerful hands are trying to hold Bitcoin in place. I would be one of those who subscribe to this view. Under normal market conditions, they have been succeeding, however along comes another whale and drops 2000 BTC all at once. And this keeps happening. Just when we get to a wall that seems like it should prove a major support level, along comes another whale and drops a big pile of BTC into it. Yes, there are those whale entities in whose interests it was to stabilise Bitcoin within a certain price range (the higher the better I would imagine), but there are also whale entities who want to see the price go much lower. These aren't just cash-ins or panic sell offs we are seeing. These are well timed mass sell-offs, designed to negatively twist market sentiment at key points in the chart development

Right now, we have a very large buy-in wall at $725. In a truly 'free market' situation, this would be such an obvious buy-in opportunity, but I am not buying in as I fear that there might be another Behemoth sitting at his PC ready to dump another 500 BTC or whatever and send Bitcoin crashing further. Going by the ultra low 'recovery' volume we have seen so far, it seems I am far from the only one who feels this way. If anyone wants to call this market action 'free market', then I would hate to hear their definition of a cornered manipulated market.

[adamstgBit]

It will be interesting to see, I sold my bitcoins weeks ago in anticipation of a big price fall. I am surprised the price is holding up, but it seems to get weaker and weaker.

As per the theme of this thread. A lot of people are looking at the market action and get the feeling that powerful hands are trying to hold Bitcoin in place. I would be one of those who subscribe to this view. Under normal market conditions, they have been succeeding, however along comes another whale and drops 2000 BTC all at once. And this keeps happening. Just when we get to a wall that seems like it should prove a major support level, along comes another whale and drops a big pile of BTC into it. Yes, there are those whale entities in whose interests it was to stabilise Bitcoin within a certain price range (the higher the better I would imagine), but there are also whale entities who want to see the price go much lower. These aren't just cash-ins or panic sell offs we are seeing. These are well timed mass sell-offs, designed to negatively twist market sentiment at key points in the chart development

Right now, we have a very large buy-in wall at $725. In a truly 'free market' situation, this would be such an obvious buy-in opportunity, but I am not buying in as I fear that there might be another Behemoth sitting at his PC ready to dump another 500 BTC or whatever and send Bitcoin crashing further. Going by the ultra low 'recovery' volume we have seen so far, it seems I am far from the only one who feels this way. If anyone wants to call this market action 'free market', then I would hate to hear their definition of a cornered manipulated market.

do you even know what QE is?

[MatTheCat]

do you even know what QE is?

I have a vague idea. Please enlighten me oh wise one with your American libertarian dogma on Fed money printing and explain it's relevance to this discussion.

[adamstgBit]

do you even know what QE is?

I have a vague idea. Please enlighten me oh wise one with your American libertarian dogma on Fed money printing and explain it's relevance to this discussion.

well you keep saying bitcoin market is highly maniplauted

you think 1-3% interest rate is free market action?

QE is literally pumping billions of freshly created money out of thin air a week into the stock market to keep it from imploding.

that is manipulation!

[MatTheCat]

well you keep saying bitcoin market is highly maniplauted

you think 1-3% interest rate is free market action?

QE is literally pumping billions of freshly created money out of thin air a week into the stock market to keep it from imploding.

that is manipulation!

Damn right it is. It is manipulation on a immense scale that actually represents the foundations of the global petrodollar economy.

But how does that change the fact that Bitcoin is a cornered market and likely to become even more cornered as time goes on?

[adamstgBit]

well you keep saying bitcoin market is highly maniplauted

you think 1-3% interest rate is free market action?

QE is literally pumping billions of freshly created money out of thin air a week into the stock market to keep it from imploding.

that is manipulation!

Damn right it is. It is manipulation on a immense scale that actually represents the foundations of the global petrodollar economy.

But how does that change the fact that Bitcoin is a cornered market and likely to become even more cornered as time goes on?

death and taxes

[davidgdg]

Bitcoin can't be "manipulated". A lot of folks on here are pretty clueless about how the market works.

Wot are you talking about? If owned 100'000 BTC, and had 10 million USD liquidity on the exchanges are you trying to tell me that I couldn't pimp this market around like a bitch. I could ramp or crash this market however I saw fit, at least until some bigger whales came along and moved against me. But if I was the biggest whale (i.e. 'Satoshi'/NSA/CIA), then I push this market any way I wanted and nobody would have the power to stand in my way.

Or perhaps I am missing something. Perhaps you are a grade A Free Markets 101 student. Please enlighten me how the utterly cornered Bitcoin market can't be manipulated?

Undoubtedly a large holder of BTC (or anything else) can move the market by selling. And a large buyer can move it by buying. But how does the fact that they have moved the market enable them to make some special profit that is not available to the rest of us?

The only thing I can think of is that the big seller  takes out a separate leveraged short position before he starts selling  and closes it as he completes selling. Is that what you have in mind? (but how practical is that in the BTC market, given the lack of a developed futures market?)

[eoJ]

Bitcoin can't be "manipulated". A lot of folks on here are pretty clueless about how the market works.

The only thing I can think of is that the big seller  takes out a separate leveraged short position before he starts selling  and closes it as he completes selling. Is that what you have in mind? (but how practical is that in the BTC market, given the lack of a developed futures market?)

Well, there's stuff like Plus500, that's a legitimate company that offers leveraged Bitcoin/Litecoin shorting.

[MatTheCat]

Undoubtedly a large holder of BTC (or anything else) can move the market by selling. And a large buyer can move it by buying. But how does the fact that they have moved the market enable them to make some special profit that is not available to the rest of us?

The only thing I can think of is that the big seller  takes out a separate leveraged short position before he starts selling  and closes it as he completes selling. Is that what you have in mind? (but how practical is that in the BTC market, given the lack of a developed futures market?)

Investors are a bit like school playground arselickers, in that they always try to align themselves with the prevailing attitudes or fads (trade momentum). Often, there is a kid (or kids) who pack way heavier a punch than all the rest who have an entourage of supporters/arselickers, ready to bend and fold to suit the whims of this schoolyard bully, in order that they don't end up on the wrong side of him and take a beating. If all the other kids acted in unison against the school yard bully however, it would be he who took the whipping, but this tends not to happen in the schoolyard or in life in general. The only way the influence of a schoolyard bully can be normalised is if other equally heavy kids enter the school playground.

Going back to Bitcoin, using his much greater buying and selling power, a Bitcoin bully can easily sway the buying and selling decisions of all the market arse-lickers. He can trick the market arselickers into buying after he has ramped the market, selling after he has plunged the market, or into not selling or buying much at all, if that should suit his purposes. He can get away with this indefinitely, so long as no bigger bullies come into the market.

[mgburks77]

Know exactly what you mean

Try trading in one of the smaller exchanges with a pretty decent bankroll where you can move the price a bit. You can literally watch the exchange price being manipulated back to around what's on the other exchanges.

[igorr]

all mining company has left of the game, and bitcoin is lost investors, its game over

[mgburks77]

well one thing is for sure, there is a lot more than what meets the eye going on with crypto currencies. it's not as much of a free market as I'd hoped lol

[MatTheCat]

well one thing is for sure, there is a lot more than what meets the eye going on with crypto currencies. it's not as much of a free market as I'd hoped lol

Yeah...aside from Bitcoin being a totally cornered market. Aside from the possibility that Bitcoin is/was an NSA initiative to begin with, and aside from the fact that the exchanges (where the price is determined) are totally unregulated and for the most part all seem rather dodgy, there are these technical issues that very few people truly understand and the associated implications of Bitcoin being announced as 'hacked' in some way over night. Just cos some Bitcoin devs put out a public statement saying that everything is fine, doesn't necessarily make it so. History is littered with cases of collapsed institutions and reassuring public statements that preceded the event.

It would be a bit similar to the gold trade in the middle ages, if we could assume that there was ever any real fear amongst holders of Gold, of alchemists discovering the forumla to turn lead into gold. If there were ever any rumours in circulation that some alchemist had achieved this, the gold market would be awaiting events to occur (or not occur) with bated breath.

[mgburks77]

I wouldn't be surprised at all if crypto turns out to be a covert US effort to make the USD and the current failed reserve currency system obsolete and replace it with a digital currency protocol that they have built all kinds of controls and backdoors into.

That's pretty much what they did with electronic computer and phone networks, why not do the same thing with electronically implemented financial networks?

Why do this though?:

The Bitcoin could work in much the same way that the Keyne's Bancor was supposed to work to mitigate the Triffen dilemma. China has been pushing to institute special drawing rights to negate the negative effects on the rest of the world of using the US domestic currency as the world's reserve currency (possible only due to the so-called Triffen dilemma). The USD's use as the world's reserve currency allows the US to keep borrowing and printing dollars while the negative effects of doing so are diverted into various externalities that the rest of the world absorbs, thus allowing the USG and the economy it controls to benefit from devaluing it's own currency. However the jig is up and the world is demanding SDR.

However, what if instead of the Bancor or SDR, which the US would not control, a digital substitute that was controllable was instituted as the unit of international monetary exchange? China and Russia would never go for it unless the USG wasn't behind the currency. Thus the tale of Satoshi Nakamoto is born.

It would be a work of near-genius if that was what was going on.

[MatTheCat]

It would be a work of near-genius if that was what was going on.

Neat little alternative paradigm but that might just be one of many possible aspects or avenues for the NSA to put out a digital currency which they secretly control, be it through back doors or even simply by owning a controlling stake in the system.

We know that the crypto-algorithms used in Bitcoin were developed by US intelligence and we know that the NSA were researching crypto-currencies before most people had even heard of the internet. The more I think about it, the more likely I think it is that Bitcoin was created by a branch of NSA or something similar other than by some lone Japanese cryptographic maverick. As I have already said, these institutions have all the funding, all the expertise, all the resources, and all the motivation to continually be at the avant-garde of technological innovation.

[mgburks77]

It would be a work of near-genius if that was what was going on.

Neat little alternative paradigm but that might just be one of many possible aspects or avenues for the NSA to put out a digital currency which they secretly control, be it through back doors or even simply by owning a controlling stake in the system.

We know that the crypto-algorithms used in Bitcoin were developed by US intelligence and we know that the NSA were researching crypto-currencies before most people had even heard of the internet. The more I think about it, the more likely I think it is that Bitcoin was created by a branch of NSA or something similar other than by some lone Japanese cryptographic maverick. As I have already said, these institutions have all the funding, all the expertise, all the resources, and all the motivation to continually be at the avant-garde of technological innovation.

Yeah, cryptography is without a doubt the provenance of intelligence agencies and
one person can't create something like that, frankly the idea that an anonymous individual created it is ridiculous. Simply doing enough testing to get a barely functional prototype out in the wild would require 1000s of man hours. I dismiss that notion out of hand.

Consider this, economic activity is a form of communication, it's how one segment of society signals its needs for resources to another segment of society. Just as we aren't going back to the pony express to communicate over distance we aren't turning our back on the idea of digital currency. It's going to happen, just as the widespread adoption of other major technical developments was a foregone conclusion, the only question is how. Clearly very few organizations have or can acquire the specialized resources necessary for such an effort, this means a state is behind it.

I've been thinking about why an intelligence agency would do such a thing and I think the theory I outlined is a good possibility. We've been misusing keynesianism by using our own domestic currency, for the reasons previously stated, as the world's reserve currency instead of instituting an objective international unit of account, such as Keyne's Bancor. This allows us to devalue our own currency while continuing to borrow yet defer the negative effects to the rest of the world by imposing very expensive external costs on the rest of the world's economic development via repressive economic scheming coupled with interventionism to counter resistance. This "guns and butter" principle is the basis of our economic philosophy for domination of global markets. However, the new financial system that began with the Nixon shock and came out of the demise of Bretton Woods is starting to break down and has resulted in an economic meltdown of epic proportion. This is causing big problems to emerge, politically speaking.

Introducing a new electronic international unit of account that is rigged with backdoors would solve a host of problems in the the economic and diplomatic arenas, yet allow US to maintain covert control if things go south.

So...it's gotta be a gag, however, Russia and China obviously didn't buy it because both banned cryptos as soon as they figured out what was going on.

Still digital currency isn't going away, and for this I am extremely interested in it and think it can be of use. All this doesn't mean that cryptos don't have all of the possibilities being imagined now. We just need one that is provably not compromised by any state agency.

[davidgdg]

Undoubtedly a large holder of BTC (or anything else) can move the market by selling. And a large buyer can move it by buying. But how does the fact that they have moved the market enable them to make some special profit that is not available to the rest of us?

The only thing I can think of is that the big seller  takes out a separate leveraged short position before he starts selling  and closes it as he completes selling. Is that what you have in mind? (but how practical is that in the BTC market, given the lack of a developed futures market?)

Investors are a bit like school playground arselickers, in that they always try to align themselves with the prevailing attitudes or fads (trade momentum). Often, there is a kid (or kids) who pack way heavier a punch than all the rest who have an entourage of supporters/arselickers, ready to bend and fold to suit the whims of this schoolyard bully, in order that they don't end up on the wrong side of him and take a beating. If all the other kids acted in unison against the school yard bully however, it would be he who took the whipping, but this tends not to happen in the schoolyard or in life in general. The only way the influence of a schoolyard bully can be normalised is if other equally heavy kids enter the school playground.

Going back to Bitcoin, using his much greater buying and selling power, a Bitcoin bully can easily sway the buying and selling decisions of all the market arse-lickers. He can trick the market arselickers into buying after he has ramped the market, selling after he has plunged the market, or into not selling or buying much at all, if that should suit his purposes. He can get away with this indefinitely, so long as no bigger bullies come into the market.

I'm not sure the metaphor really explains anything.

[MatTheCat]

I'm not sure the metaphor really explains anything.

Markets follow the trend. In cornered markets, the big players are the trend. If they know this, and they know that they can use their buying or selling power to push all the small flies in a certain direction, they can do so and then take the rug out from under everyone elses feet.

Take the bounce back from $520. How do you know that the whale(s) who bought the first 3000 coins to take price up to $600, weren't selling them again all the way up to $712, to suckers who were piling in on the rally that the whales had created.

Is it really so hard to understand?

[igorr]

now 800 usd is history

[akujin]

I bought at 796.8 and i'm thinking about selling it now at 800... Just enough to pay for the 0.4% trading fee i lost.. LOL!
Seems like btc-e is not getting any higher than 800  

LOL! I'm glad I sold before the crash! Jajajaja! 

[chesthing]

I wish I was that quick, took me until $758 to wake up, good for you. Hope you bought back in the low 4's and doubled your coins.