Big buy just now

[jothan]

The priced topped at 6.75, leaving a noticeable .60 btc hole in the offer/demand curves.

What now ?

[byronbb]

140k bullet. This is the goatse of spreads....

[cypherdoc]

duking it out.

[jothan]

140k bullet. This is the goatse of spreads....

It certainly was quite a show on Mtgoxlive, in more ways than one.

[incraft3817]

[jothan]

Thanks, but my guitar is already tuned pretty nicely.

[bittenbob]

This is classic bitcoinca. Whenever the price moves too much in one direction bitcoinica executes large buys or sells as positions get liquidated. Its really a snowball effect and how we got up here so quickly.

[jothan]

This is classic bitcoinca. Whenever the price moves too much in one direction bitcoinica executes large buys or sells as positions get liquidated. Its really a snowball effect and how we got up here so quickly.

I almost zhoutonged myself too, I'm long and I had to do an emergency deposit.

[jothan]

Sheesh, another one.  

[bittenbob]

all I know is little old organic me could harvest $0.20 swings on laggy ass mtgox


MOAR!!!

I feel no need to put myself at extra risk and give someone else more money at bitcoinca. I have only ever traded on mtgox.

[adamstgBit]

theory! we are being manipulated
 
what looks like big buys are actually big sells

notice the spike down



it would appear the seller sells into the bid walls, and then buys 0.1 bitcoin on the ask side.... making it look like a big buy with high vol. when in fact it was a big sell with very little vol. shooting up the price again.

[notme]

The upswings were much higher volume overall than the downswings.  I watched them all.

[notme]

I suspect there were multiple players in that

Clearly... there was significant volume on both sides, but the bulls won out through higher volume.  The price rise is legit IMHO.

[jothan]

it would appear the seller sells into the bid walls, and then buys 0.1 bitcoin on the ask side.... making it look like a big buy with high vol. when in fact it was a big sell with very little vol. shooting up the price again.

The buy came first. Watched it live.

I confirm, the buy nearly obliterated the asks up to 6.80.

[adamstgBit]

[zhoutong]

Again, it's pretty clear that someone left some "insufficient funds" sell orders while buying.

I watched the whole thing live too, the sell simply came too quickly.

I wonder why Mt. Gox left such orders open at all, did any real-world exchanges do that?

[zhoutong]

I suspect there were multiple players in that

What I don't understand is this. The buy comes first, clearing out quite a bit of asks. Then, when there is no volume in that range, a large sell comes, most of it at prices lower than where the buy started. Does someone get off on losing money?

If it's done by a single person, then yes, the guy will lose money. So most likely it's accidental.

[notme]

That's just disagreement.  Low volume order book + disagreement = Giant candle with little final movement.

Your manipulation concern is valid at times in this market, but this is not one of those instances.

[jothan]

Again, it's pretty clear that someone left some "insufficient funds" sell orders while buying.

I watched the whole thing live too, the sell simply came too quickly.

I wonder why Mt. Gox left such orders open at all, did any real-world exchanges do that?

If that's what the guy did, he provided a lot of liquidity to himself.

[M4v3R]

The uptrend line was intact, we bounced from it perfectly. That means that short term we are bullish as never.

[adamstgBit]

[jothan]

The uptrend line was intact, we bounced from it perfectly. That means that short term we are bullish as never.

Yup, the slow but not-quite-steady recovery line is intact, it would mean that the current demand, however small, is able to support this price increase.

I was starting to despair after the last price drop, you just made my day (saturday, I think).

[Serge]

 

resistance will keep it sane!

[jothan]

Um, ya, I'm going to have to sort of disagree with you there.

[adamstgBit]

 

[old_engineer]

I suspect there were multiple players in that

What I don't understand is this. The buy comes first, clearing out quite a bit of asks. Then, when there is no volume in that range, a large sell comes, most of it at prices lower than where the buy started. Does someone get off on losing money?

If it's done by a single person, then yes, the guy will lose money. So most likely it's accidental.

+1 on accidental - the Mt. Gox UI/ordering process makes this too easy. Though one might be tempted to say that bitcoin attracts trading n00bs, fat finger trades are not uncommon in the real world, either.

Perhaps the most famous story of a Fat Finger Trade would be that of a trader in Japan who fat fingered a trade in a newly listed company. He meant to sell one solitary share of a company (J-COM) for 610,000 Yen. Instead he entered a trade to sell 610,000 shares for 1 Yen. What’s even more strange is that there were only 50,000 shares publicly listed in J-COM, but the exchange let the order process.

It is estimated that the loss incurred was about $225 million (USD).

But bitcoinica creates volatility with programmed logic, and on this point too, the stock market isn't any better, with the 2010 flash crash causing 10% drop in 4 minutes, resulting in

A stock market anomaly, the major market indexes dropped by over 9% (including a roughly 7% decline in a roughly 15 minute span at approximately 2:45 pm eastern time on May 6, 2010[46][47]) before a partial rebound.[5] Temporarily, $1 trillion in market value disappeared.[48] While stock markets do crash, immediate rebounds are unprecedented. The stocks of eight major companies in the S&P 500 fell to one cent per share for a short time, including Accenture, CenterPoint Energy and Exelon; while other stocks, including Sotheby's, Apple, and Hewlett-Packard, increased in value to over $100,000 in price

It seems our new crypt-currency trading system has some of the same misfeatures as traditional trading systems.

[deepceleron]

Again, it's pretty clear that someone left some "insufficient funds" sell orders while buying.

I watched the whole thing live too, the sell simply came too quickly.

I wonder why Mt. Gox left such orders open at all, did any real-world exchanges do that?

You mean an "oops, your BTC are now all our fees?"

[Sitarow]

Actually this can be used as a good tool.

Lets say you set a buy at $6. And you presently have a few sells at lets say $7. You can create further sell/shorts at $7 before your orders at $6 get met.

When your buy orders at $6 get filled, you are now able to auto-sell at $7 when the market moves there.

[zhoutong]

Actually this can be used as a good tool.

Lets say you set a buy at $6. And you presently have a few sells at lets say $7. You can create further sell/shorts at $7 before your orders at $6 get met.

When your buy orders at $6 get filled, you are now able to auto-sell at $7 when the market moves there.

Yeah, it makes sense. But well, now we have Bitcoinica for this, and it's even better. :-)

[teflone]

Thanks, but my guitar is already tuned pretty nicely.

I thought that too!  ha