Is shorting BTC possible?

[stic.man]

I have been trying to time any emails to him with respect to the fact that he is porbably 13 or 14 hours ahead of me so that may be why I have been fortunate with quick responses.

[1714912748]

1714912748

[1714912748]

1714912748

[1714912748]

1714912748

[cypherdoc]

I have been trying to time any emails to him with respect to the fact that he is porbably 13 or 14 hours ahead of me so that may be why I have been fortunate with quick responses.

the exchange is a 24/7 service with problems that could happen while he's sleeping.  let me put it a different way:  we  all love btc b/c its a distributed network with redundancy built in to prevent a takedown.  mtgox is the antithesis of this.  why should we depend on one person?

[xf2_org]

I have been trying to time any emails to him with respect to the fact that he is porbably 13 or 14 hours ahead of me so that may be why I have been fortunate with quick responses.

the exchange is a 24/7 service with problems that could happen while he's sleeping.  let me put it a different way:  we  all love btc b/c its a distributed network with redundancy built in to prevent a takedown.  mtgox is the antithesis of this.  why should we depend on one person?

This is a fair point, and one day, we hope bitcoin will be big enough to profitably support an exchange with 24/7 support.  Right now, mtgox is bitcoin's "big" exchange... and you can see that the definition of "big" is quite small.

MagicalTux lives in Japan, so it is likely that he is asleep when you're awake, and vice versa.

[cypherdoc]

no one wants him to succeed more than me.  in fact i'm a huge supporter of his judging from the volume i do with him.  i'll shut up happily when he gets his act together.

[wb3]

Possible but not practical. You would need to have some one loan(give an option) you the stock, BTC, (for a fee) with a promise of returning them at a future date. Then if the BTC falls you can buy them at a lower price an return the BTC to the owner.

Basically Margin accounts. Buy on credit. This will not happen in a system with anonymity. Or it shouldn't. However, it could be possible between exchanges but that would be scary.

Lets see how it would work,

You pay me 1 BTC / per month to control 1000 BTC that I won't really give you (I just credit it to you). If the value of the BTC goes down. Buy back the 1000BTC and repay me the 1000 BTC. You reap the difference in the exchange. I never really risked anything.

IRL, I would give you the 1000BTC as a loan, if the value falls, you buy another 1000 BTC at the cheaper exchange, pay back the loan and keep the difference, (minus the fees).

Shorting is gambling, but a little better, it is gambling with OPM (other peoples money). And that is not done with anonymity, people want to know who's nose to bleed.

[2_Thumbs_Up]

Lets see how it would work,

You pay me 1 BTC / per month to control 1000 BTC that I won't really give you (I just credit it to you). If the value of the BTC goes down. Buy back the 1000BTC and repay me the 1000 BTC. You reap the difference in the exchange. I never really risked anything.

IRL, I would give you the 1000BTC as a loan, if the value falls, you buy another 1000 BTC at the cheaper exchange, pay back the loan and keep the difference, (minus the fees).

Shorting is gambling, but a little better, it is gambling with OPM (other peoples money). And that is not done with anonymity, people want to know who's nose to bleed.

I already explained how I believe it could work in post #5 of this thread. Basically, you don't lend them to me and let me sell them. You sell them for me (on the open market), while holding my dollars "hostage" and let me decide when to buy them back. This way you are simply gambling with your own money, since if you are wrong, the lender is still in full control and will force you to buy back the BTC if the exchange rate gets too high.

[cypherdoc]

Lets see how it would work,

You pay me 1 BTC / per month to control 1000 BTC that I won't really give you (I just credit it to you). If the value of the BTC goes down. Buy back the 1000BTC and repay me the 1000 BTC. You reap the difference in the exchange. I never really risked anything.

IRL, I would give you the 1000BTC as a loan, if the value falls, you buy another 1000 BTC at the cheaper exchange, pay back the loan and keep the difference, (minus the fees).

Shorting is gambling, but a little better, it is gambling with OPM (other peoples money). And that is not done with anonymity, people want to know who's nose to bleed.

I already explained how I believe it could work in post #5 of this thread. Basically, you don't lend them to me and let me sell them. You sell them for me (on the open market), while holding my dollars "hostage" and let me decide when to buy them back. This way you are simply gambling with your own money, since if you are wrong, the lender is still in full control and will force you to buy back the BTC if the exchange rate gets too high.

shorting is done by the shorter.  it has to be controlled by the one doing the shorting b/c the timing is critical.  if you leave it up to the one who owns the coin you'd have no control of when he executes the trade.  suppose you asked me to short btc for you today and i decided to do it this morning instead of this afternoon.  you'd already have lost a bunch.

[2_Thumbs_Up]

Lets see how it would work,

You pay me 1 BTC / per month to control 1000 BTC that I won't really give you (I just credit it to you). If the value of the BTC goes down. Buy back the 1000BTC and repay me the 1000 BTC. You reap the difference in the exchange. I never really risked anything.

IRL, I would give you the 1000BTC as a loan, if the value falls, you buy another 1000 BTC at the cheaper exchange, pay back the loan and keep the difference, (minus the fees).

Shorting is gambling, but a little better, it is gambling with OPM (other peoples money). And that is not done with anonymity, people want to know who's nose to bleed.

I already explained how I believe it could work in post #5 of this thread. Basically, you don't lend them to me and let me sell them. You sell them for me (on the open market), while holding my dollars "hostage" and let me decide when to buy them back. This way you are simply gambling with your own money, since if you are wrong, the lender is still in full control and will force you to buy back the BTC if the exchange rate gets too high.

shorting is done by the shorter.  it has to be controlled by the one doing the shorting b/c the timing is critical.  if you leave it up to the one who owns the coin you'd have no control of when he executes the trade.  suppose you asked me to short btc for you today and i decided to do it this morning instead of this afternoon.  you'd already have lost a bunch.

Not if you were a server that responded instantly.

Read post #5 again. I really don't see the issues with that implementation. It leaves the shorter in control of the timing and the other part in control of the risk.

[wb3]

Lets see how it would work,

You pay me 1 BTC / per month to control 1000 BTC that I won't really give you (I just credit it to you). If the value of the BTC goes down. Buy back the 1000BTC and repay me the 1000 BTC. You reap the difference in the exchange. I never really risked anything.

IRL, I would give you the 1000BTC as a loan, if the value falls, you buy another 1000 BTC at the cheaper exchange, pay back the loan and keep the difference, (minus the fees).

Shorting is gambling, but a little better, it is gambling with OPM (other peoples money). And that is not done with anonymity, people want to know who's nose to bleed.

I already explained how I believe it could work in post #5 of this thread. Basically, you don't lend them to me and let me sell them. You sell them for me (on the open market), while holding my dollars "hostage" and let me decide when to buy them back. This way you are simply gambling with your own money, since if you are wrong, the lender is still in full control and will force you to buy back the BTC if the exchange rate gets too high.

So you send me say $1000 dollars, and I don't give you the BTC. I just convert the BTC for you. Then you decide when you get to buy back the BTC that I didn't give you but will when you buy them back.

OK, deal.

But I won't buy the BTC, ahead of time, I will just say I did. You will have the $1000 dollar credit, still.  Then when you want to buy the BTC, I will then buy the BTC and give them to you.

I will do this for a fee of 1%, plus I get the interest on the $1000. Of course the fee will be consistent with the DTC (Days to Cover)

Your not really shorting anything, because I am just waiting for your next order before I take action. I will be shorting with you basically but I can't lose. I would even give you an ∞ DTC in case BTC doesn't fall for a 5% / mo

You would still make the difference profits cause I will pass that on to you for a zero sum, so from your point of view you won the bet. From my point of view, I say make another bet.

All the exchange would have to do is match your funds incase of an increase. In which case in reality, your short position is my PUT position. Either way I PUT it to you.