Will privacy and merchant adoption fuel the next price rise?

[Jet Cash]

Everybody is talking about ETFs, but I don't believe that they will be the fuel for the next price rise. As Bitcoin moves further towards being a store of wealth, and merchant adoption increases as secondary services like the lightning network stabilise, they seem more likely to trigger the increase in value. The price of Bitcoin seems to be cyclic, and to add a zero to the price every two years. I think we have missed the chance in the current cycle, but the one due in the summer of next year looks to be on target. Will the current enhancements arrive in time to fuel the next parabolic price increase?

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[boyknightvn]

I think yes. Blockchain technology have a lot of advantage in the next Revolution, a thing that this technology wanting that is Application, it need a reality application in our life. If we see that Blockchain technology have any progressing to complete itselft, I think the price will be pump because the investor expect a good future of this technology

[dothebeats]

Most people are already banked on the notion that ETFs will bring much better gains that's why they have already forgotten about the bigger potential of merchant adoption as a game changer. Everyone thinks that institutional investors' money is the sole thing that can carry us to higher highs while ignoring the fact that this market would be teeming with life once merchants bother to chime in to the party. Perhaps we will not see sudden surge in price like what most of us are expecting, but it will take us into a pretty solid baseline which, I think is more important than an unstable and shaky high price.

[aoluain]

I also think merchant adoption will add fuel to the fire so to speak, but it
will be a gradual thing. I cannot see a block of merchants accepting BTC
payments in the very near future, it could take years because i think the
market volatility is not favourable to merchants.

[BQ]

While Bitcoin undeniable has followed a regular movement, both price-wise and people saying it was a "scam", I wonder if the next run up really will be related to Bitcoin/payment adoption, now that the "ICO bubble" burst and the market is flooded by alot of similar coins, I think as you mentioned there'll not be an extra zero these two years, instead we'll continue having many many coins/tokens slowly bleed out and die, and then actual adoption of utility-"industrial like" crypto projects will be the start of the next run in general. How many times have people heard bitcoin/crypto is crashing, and it never does, but now it's not as "easy" as just buying btc compared to what it was a few years ago   

[Don Pedro Dinero]

I don’t think privacy will have much to do with it. You can see Monero, for example, it’s been there for a while but it’s sometimes not even in the top ten (currently the 10th at CMC). However, I agree with @dothebeats and @aoluain that merchant adoption will be a key factor. The day I can go with a friend to a shop, and show him how I pay with bitcoin, as I was talking about this morning, there will be a booming, both in terms of adoption and of price in fiat terms.

[seoincorporation]

Everybody is talking about ETFs, but I don't believe that they will be the fuel for the next price rise. As Bitcoin moves further towards being a store of wealth, and merchant adoption increases as secondary services like the lightning network stabilise, they seem more likely to trigger the increase in value. The price of Bitcoin seems to be cyclic, and to add a zero to the price every two years. I think we have missed the chance in the current cycle, but the one due in the summer of next year looks to be on target. Will the current enhancements arrive in time to fuel the next parabolic price increase?

I see the cyclic pattern in bitcoin too, as you say, every 2 years, but they are factors who bring the mega bumps. Remember the first time it hit $1k proves shows it happen because bots was manipulation the markets, then it crash hard, takes it some time but the drop was from $1k to $250... and people doesn't stop trash talking about btc. Then the past bump, and people was amazed with btc again, and now days wesee lot of people who buy at $20k and now they lose big money. As you say for those ones will take some time to recover their invest.

 I don't think the magic will happen in the summer of the next year, i would predict December of 2019 as the next bump, but only time can talk. And answering the topic main question i would say no, the factor who will be the next price rise will be some whales in the market. To change the price we need to see a damn big volume in trading and merchant adoption will not bring that big volume.

[Airbuxf]

I think you've stated a very reasonable point here and I agree with it. We don't need ETF's, didn't need them before and look what happened in 2017 and even previous years.

[tomahawk9]

I don't think privacy will help fuel the next big increase in price. The general public doesn't care about privacy or anonimity, they're looking to make money with Bitcoin, some other people are looking at bitcoin as an asset that provides store of value before the next financial crisis hits us.

But like some users have already said, I think adoption will be the main trigger for the next big rally in Bitcoin. Just having merchans adopting Bitcoin as payment will be enough to create a snowball effect and before you know it, everyone is using BTC. Forget institutional money or privacy, I think once the lightning network goes full mainstream (probably in the next two years) we'll see tons of new money entering the Bitcoin ecosystem which will gradually make the btc price go up way past its last ath.

[krishnapramod]

There was a spike in merchant adoption between 2012 and 2015, but I guess after that and couple of bull runs, Bitcoin moved further towards a store of value than medium of exchange. Last year's scalability issues combined with usual volatility did cause some big merchants/businesses to drop Bitcoin as a payment option.

Yeah, LN could enhance the usability factor, transactions costs/speed and make Bitcoin a better payment option for merchants, but volatility is still a concern. IMO, merchants accepting Bitcoin through intermediaries and converting it immediately don't really count towards adoption, but still something than nothing.

Merchant adoption is definitely the key factor, but right now with less than 1% of the world population using Bitcoin and user's/consumers having a holding mentality, the demand for Bitcoin as a store of value or FOMO'ers getting hyped would be more than merchant adoption/medium of exchange, at least for the next year or so, IMO.

[mansilkroad]

Most people are already banked on the notion that ETFs will bring much better gains that's why they have already forgotten about the bigger potential of merchant adoption as a game changer. Everyone thinks that institutional investors' money is the sole thing that can carry us to higher highs while ignoring the fact that this market would be teeming with life once merchants bother to chime in to the party. Perhaps we will not see sudden surge in price like what most of us are expecting, but it will take us into a pretty solid baseline which, I think is more important than an unstable and shaky high price.

Yes we should definately leave the Bitcoin price to the pople not single institutions. It always had a decentralised nature and let's leave it like that.

[bitart]

My 2 cents:
None of the above mentioned factors would cause a raise in the price of bitcoin if the regulation will ban it simply (or won't ban, but just will over regulate it).
I know that bitcoin has not been banned yet (and won't be banned in the EU, in the USA, just in some special countries), but banks are really against bitcoin everywhere (but not against the blockchain technology). As long as banks are closing accounts involved in wire transfers from/to bitcoin exchanges, you can't be sure that your money will arrive when you want to cash out your bitcoins... Bitcoin debit cards has been deactivated by VISA, so that's another closed door. Localbitcoins needs KYC, so it's not easy to cash out for those people who prefer bitcoin because it's unregulated, they simply won't be able to cash out as easily as before (before 2017, when these restrictions were put in place, parallel with the parabolic raise of the bitcoin price).
I know that these restrictions are good for the people who are unfamiliar with bitcoin but want to take a huge profit with a little investment, so they won't be able to invest in bitcoin and lose their investment too easy, but it's not so good for merchants who just don't want to risk their income... I know that merchants can use some service providers to exchange bitcoin payments on the fly, when the customer has paid the price of the item/service with bitcoin, but this won't help bitcoin to circulate in the economy...
This problem (the cash-out) can be solved by applying the KYC and AML regulations on all the exit points of the blockchain, where you can exhange your bitcoins to fiat, in this case the regulators will be happy to let you pay in bitcoin at every merchant (e.g. Japan). If an exchange wants to apply the KYC and AML things, they have to become regulated by e.g. the country's central bank. If they are regulated, and applied the KYC and the AML policies, they have to be able to restrict/stop those bitcoin transactoins which don't meet the requirements of these policies... In this case bitcoin's original idea will fail and will become 'just' another kind of digital fiat, so I don't really know what will be the optimal solution for bitcoin now...

[pooya87]

~ the current enhancements ~

are you hinting at Schnorr?

in any case the only way price goes up is with more adoption and it only stays up with more merchant adoption. all these "enhancements" are great but it takes time for them to start being used. for instance i do believe that LN will not be used that much until it is meaning some day one of the big ones like an exchange would start implementing it and then the LN usage will go through the roof in less than a month as others follow.
so we need that kind of trigger to happen and that can be the ignition for the big rise to come. although this is not the only reason that can lead to a rise. even without these "enhancements" bitcoin is still the only decentralized currency in the world with scarce supply.

[jseverson]

I'd like to note that the wild ETF optimism resulted in a $2k increase. That may have been a temporary rise because of hype, but there's no denying that it can affect prices. We won't know for sure at this point, considering how bleak the ETF chances of approval are.

I don't know about privacy since it seems to be an afterthought for a lot of people, but I'd say merchant adoption will certainly help. It eliminates the need for conversion which would result leave crypto users with more time and more money. It also makes crypto easier to spend, if nothing else.

Technological improvements don't seem to have any immediate impact on the market in general, as shown by SegWit activation and the Lightning Network beta release. I could easily see that changing in the future though, especially for front-end-ish improvements.

[Barrycuda007]

There is a lot of benefits in the next revolution in blockchain technology. If we see blockchain technology has progress i think the price will be the pump. because people always hope for better on his technology.

[coinpedia240]

If we see blockchain technology has progress then the price will be increasing and make secure investment. it will be ensure profit because of the investor always hopes for a better future. they have trust of this technology.

[hatshepsut93]

Everybody is talking about ETFs, but I don't believe that they will be the fuel for the next price rise. As Bitcoin moves further towards being a store of wealth, and merchant adoption increases as secondary services like the lightning network stabilise, they seem more likely to trigger the increase in value. The price of Bitcoin seems to be cyclic, and to add a zero to the price every two years. I think we have missed the chance in the current cycle, but the one due in the summer of next year looks to be on target. Will the current enhancements arrive in time to fuel the next parabolic price increase?

Yes, I believe that the last years rally was fueled by SegWit and Lightning, investors saw that Bitcoin is not stale and outdated and actually makes real and solid progress, unlike altcoins. So, any further improvements will also boost the price, plus we'll have a new halvening soon, so a new parabolic rally is very likely, although I don't expect it to be as big as the previous one (x20), the new ATH will probably be 50-60k.

[SummerHamster]

you point out a logical thing. i agree with you. this etf decesion effect most in the price rise of bitcoin. sec should announced a decesion immediately.

[HistoryVampire]

I think, depending on only in ETF there is less chance of increasing the price of Bitcoin. Because its price changes is a normal matter. Its price decreases for a specific period every year and then increases later.

[avikz]

Everybody is talking about ETFs, but I don't believe that they will be the fuel for the next price rise. As Bitcoin moves further towards being a store of wealth, and merchant adoption increases as secondary services like the lightning network stabilise, they seem more likely to trigger the increase in value. The price of Bitcoin seems to be cyclic, and to add a zero to the price every two years. I think we have missed the chance in the current cycle, but the one due in the summer of next year looks to be on target. Will the current enhancements arrive in time to fuel the next parabolic price increase?

Neither ETF nor lightening network will help in increase the price in longer term. However, if you really want to see long term and stable growth, merchant adoption is the key!

Majority of the ETFs that were proposed to SEC were synthetic in nature. The only exception is Winklevoss ETF. Synthetic means no physical bitcoins will be purchased and stored, so no impact on the market. Winklevoss is still under consideration but I don't see much hope there.

LN is a technical upgradation of the network. Think logically, if there is no place to use your money, what will you do even with a billion dollars in your wallet? So LN is most likely not impact the price for long. A short impact will be there but that will not last long.

The only key to growth is merchant adoption. When bitcoin can be used directly for purchasing goods and services, people will realize the value of it. Otherwise it will just remain an underground currency and everytime you want to realize its value, an exchange to fiat will be needed. The change has already started but expanding at a very slow rate. It will take time, but will happen eventually. The day we will be able to buy our daily goods with bitcoin, we won't have to look back!