If the banksters and governments held 90% of the Bitcoin supply, what now?

[Wind_FURY]

Would it be fair enough to assume that the project has failed, or failing?

90% of Bitcoin being held by an oligarchy of the elite, a cartel of banks, and by governments working together might turn Bitcoin into their "playground".

[1714189050]

1714189050

[1714189050]

1714189050

[1714189050]

1714189050

[Trupik]

If by "supply" you mean "newly minted coins", then Bitcoin is finished. If anyone has 51% it is bad, but if it is government specifically, then RIP Bitcoin, I will be dumping and going for Dogecoin.

[OmegaStarScream]

I don't see that happening honestly. I mean more and more people are joining the bitcoin scene every day, buying bitcoin and "hodling". The Banksters don't want to get people rich so If they decide to control most of the coins, they'll have to make a lot of people rich (fiat) in the process (since its a matter of supply and demand). Not to mention that there will always be people who don't want to sell.

[zenhu]

well for sure they gonna control it, if they just want to shut it down it will be waste of energy and money if they mine it that need some crazy setup to gain a ton of BTC circulation and if they bought it that gonna need lot of money too. if they really do that thing and sell all of the BTC together so the price dump they still lost lots of money cause they bought it at an expensive price

[randythered]

I don't see that happening honestly. I mean more and more people are joining the bitcoin scene every day, buying bitcoin and "hodling". The Banksters don't want to get people rich so If they decide to control most of the coins, they'll have to make a lot of people rich (fiat) in the process (since its a matter of supply and demand). Not to mention that there will always be people who don't want to sell.

But everyone has a different definition of rich. If they knew that one day they would champion bitcoin then they'd also be aware that would greatly increase the price. Paying a surplus at current price levels might look like a very cheap deal 10 years from now. And as much as you're right and there will always be people who don't want to sell I think they're a small minority, most people have a price, especially those who are maybe a little older and have a few more commitments. Right now bitcoin isn't as easily spent as fiat and some people will want to spend some of their accumulated wealth while they still have chance instead of holding bitcoin for the benefit of future generations.

[franky1]

some think it is not a possibility. but think about it
imagine a merchant has $1m. and pays 20%  business tax  ..... IRS now has $200k
imagine the merchant then pays out salaries
the 800k goes to staff.. those staff then pay their income tax of 20%(160k)..... IRS now has $360k
staff spend the left over $640k to merchants


imagine merchants has $640k. and pays 20%  business tax($128k)  ..... IRS now has $488k
imagine the merchant then pays out salaries
the 512k goes to staff.. those staff then pay their income tax of 20%(124k)..... IRS now has $612k
staff spend the left over $388k to merchants

repeat repeat

.. now imagine the foolish notion of paying taxes in bitcoin. to give bitcoin to the IRS

[franky1]

now after showing the math that the IRS could easily accumilate alot of % of hoard.
there ar also things like lightning factories, which USERS put in X and as the funder circle around in circled from factory to channel, get spent(user holds less) and settled back to factory with users having less.. and repeat repeat repeat

to a point where general public only hoard 10% left overs
the end result is that although alot of coin is now hoarded.. the network CODE has not changed.

the main thing would be the devs changing the CODE to benefit the IRS/LN factory merchants who have most of the spend ability decisions.

EG if 20 main merchants/exchanges said no to a new CODE change. then the code change shouldnt happen. because pools wont use a code that means they cant spend their coins with the top merchants.
users wont spend their coins using a code change which doesnt allow them access to merchants.

so what you will find is users and pools usually follow the money and follow the main merchants decision that allows the users/miners to be able to continue using their coins..
there no point accepting code which stops your spending habits. and no point denying code which merchants do adopt, again preventing spending if you oppose the merchants

so the oligarch would get merchants on their side and then get bitcoin code changes implemented that benefit the oligarchy and main merchants

[Red-Apple]

If by "supply" you mean "newly minted coins", then Bitcoin is finished. If anyone has 51% it is bad, but if it is government specifically, then RIP Bitcoin, I will be dumping and going for Dogecoin.

bitcoin is not a shitty PoS coin that if you have a large portion of the supply you can control the coin. it is PoW and the 51% that you have heard is talking about hash rate not supply!

[franky1]

now with all that said...
i am not worried about "government". its the corporate elite that are corrupt. EG wall street caused 2007 not government
wall street strong armed government for bail out.. the government didnt plan to screw people

(P.S i am not a fan of government but open minded to stand back and see the big picture then step forward to point out the real flaw)

so its corporate/capitalist control thats more of a concern than govrnment (people still drank beer in prohibition, so dont worry about government)

we have seen its corporations that raise fee's and get greedy.

..
it doesnt actually require hoarding most coins to control things. it actually involves controlling people. (merchants and devs)
the code acceptance deciders

pools and users are not deciders. they are followers.
pools have to make blocks that fit the rules. and the rules(devs) have to fit the needs of the main group that will accept payment and offer products and services(merchants)

[Trupik]

If by "supply" you mean "newly minted coins", then Bitcoin is finished. If anyone has 51% it is bad, but if it is government specifically, then RIP Bitcoin, I will be dumping and going for Dogecoin.

bitcoin is not a shitty PoS coin that if you have a large portion of the supply you can control the coin. it is PoW and the 51% that you have heard is talking about hash rate not supply!

Yes, that is why I mentioned "newly minted coins" - whoever mints them, has the hashpower, and if someone has 51% of it then the situation can be bad. It happened before with one of the pools having more than 51% and nothing bad happened.

[avikz]

Would it be fair enough to assume that the project has failed, or failing?

90% of Bitcoin being held by an oligarchy of the elite, a cartel of banks, and by governments working together might turn Bitcoin into their "playground".

It's not about 90%, if a particular agency controls 51% of an asset (be it bitcoin or anything else) then that agency receives the controlling power over that asset. Similarly if 51% of total bitcoin supply stays with a single entity, it will certainly become a playground for them and we common people will just be a small part of their game! This rule implies to not only bitcoin but on any asset, be it gold or anything else!

Also I see Franky raised a very valid question here by showing the bifurcation of taxing system! Even though it is a hypothetical scenario, but if we pay taxes using bitcoin, we will essentially hand over the controls to the taxing authority! However, this is how the world and our social system functions, we don't even have an escape pod available! Either we comply intentionally or we will be forced to comply! A radically different social and economical system may save us from such wrongdoings, but that looks like a distant dream, at least as of now!  

[davis196]

Would it be fair enough to assume that the project has failed, or failing?

90% of Bitcoin being held by an oligarchy of the elite, a cartel of banks, and by governments working together might turn Bitcoin into their "playground".

The banksters and the governments will have to spend 180 billions US dollars, in order to purchase 90% of all bitcoins.Do you think that they will ever spend that amount?It would be way cheaper for them to just ban bitcoin,instead of buying it.If they ever decide to buy such large amount,the bitcoin price might skyrocket to the moon in just 1 hour.What if the bitcoin sellers refuse to sell?

[franky1]

Yes, that is why I mentioned "newly minted coins" - whoever mints them, has the hashpower, and if someone has 51% of it then the situation can be bad. It happened before with one of the pools having more than 51% and nothing bad happened.

all pools can do is decide to include or exclude particular transactions.
if they even dared to submit a block that doesnt fit the rules. that block gets rejected in 2 seconds.
pools are not rule setters. they are followers. and it doesnt matter how much electric/hashpower they have.. a rule break is a rul break no matter what

[jseverson]

The project is to provide a peer-to-peer cash system, so one or two entities holding 90% of it won't automatically mean failure. It's still going to work as intended. They're going to have massive influence, if not outright control of the prices, but they'd also have the most to lose -- that may incentivize them to play nice.

For idealists who wish to escape their grasp over the financial system, yes.

So I guess it depends on what the project is for you. Not that I think this scenario will ever happen.

[franky1]

The project is to provide a peer-to-peer cash system, so one or two entities holding 90% of it won't automatically mean failure. It's still going to work as intended. They're going to have massive influence, if not outright control of the prices, but they'd also have the most to lose -- that may incentivize them to play nice.

For idealists who wish to escape their grasp over the financial system, yes.

So I guess it depends on what the project is for you. Not that I think this scenario will ever happen.

hoarding 90% of coin is hoarding.. inaction.. meaningless. EG has the 2009 stash of coins influenced anything.. nope.

as for spending the coin to influence. if it was done just to market crash.. then so be it. once a hoarder spends, they are out. and new people buy coin at discount. so win for the buyer. thats just price drama and not network control.
market crashing the price is just temporary drama and not a permanent uncorrectable change

but code changes which merchants accept is a uncorrectable change..

the only way a 90% hoarder can influence is to incentivise merchants and devs by paying them bribes to do things a certain way. and pay them privately away from market influence thus not affect the price and keep the merchants and devs interested in changing things.

but all in all it circles back to the main change makers. merchants and devs, as they have the ultimate control. pools and users are just followers

[biskitop]

all that can happen. either the government, the bank, or maybe even whales that hold 90% of bitcoin and have the potential to make the game as they wish. for example when the market is down now.

[Bttzed03]

Would banksters and governments really spend that much to accumulate 90% of the possible max supply (21M)?
I do not think any institution is liquid enough to sustain that.   

[dothebeats]

If by "supply" you mean "newly minted coins", then Bitcoin is finished. If anyone has 51% it is bad, but if it is government specifically, then RIP Bitcoin, I will be dumping and going for Dogecoin.

The term '51%' in bitcoin is referring to the amount of hashing power percentage that could potentially 'fork' off the main chain and start doing its own copy of transactions from a single divergence point (the time when the 51% of the hashing power decides to create its own chain) and has nothing to do with owning bitcoins at all. Anyway going back, if people found out that the banks and the governments are owning more than what they have, it's either they're gonna dump on the market pretty hard or just continue with the flow, thinking that they have the big and the 'good guys' on board. With the present market, most of the people are in it for the profit and not the virtue bitcoin enthusiasts once had, so you can expect that these new people will think like an investor playing in conventional trading assets. Also, 90% is a huge sum to hold; volume and liquidity would be an issue if they are really owning that large of an amount.

[Renal]

the project will never fail, but what happens now is that the price of crypto is not stable so it is difficult to predict which projects will develop.

[hermankoles]

if that happens there are still many other crypto that we can make as a substitute for bitcoin and become the basis of the value for users to pair against the coin, not again on bitcoin.
and this must be held firmly by all crypto owners to fight the injustices and games they play