nrd525 Market Tracker

[exstasie]

A related theory is that alt-coins were more useful when there was less bitcoin margin trading as one of their most important features was speculation, and speculation with higher volatility than bitcoin. I agree with this point, however as I think that the change in the ability to use margin trading with bitcoin is less than others think - I think alt coins will still have a role to play.  Notably, there isn't anywhere currently that a retail US investor can do margin trading on bitcoin without violating terms of service (unless I'm mistaken).

US traders can margin trade on Kraken, up to 5x. That's about it. Otherwise they can try to squeak by through VPN on Bitmex, Deribit, Bitfinex. Over time, KYC requirements (to restrict margin trading for US traders or to comply with new FATF/national AML laws) will make these services fewer and further between. US investors are also being significantly restricted from ICO/IEO/STO token markets due to US securities laws.

So with retail margin trading and token markets becoming so restricted for US investors, I think old school altcoins will benefit. They won't be forgotten in the next bubble.

[1714967563]

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[1714967563]

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[nrd525]

Ooh did Kraken launch margin trading in 2015?  For some reason I've never registered with them.  Views Kraken homepage. LOL!!!!!  No wonder...

...

People typically talk of a potential 80% correction.  The last one was 84% and a 90% correction is also possible.  Heck we could even do 92%-95% (or ultimately a death spiral of 99%+).  And there is a big difference between buying the bottom of a 80% vs 85% correction (though not so big if you think we'll go up by 20x).

[nrd525]

I am not a fan of Bitcoin and other Cryptocurrencies, which are not money, and whose value is highly volatile and based on thin air. Unregulated Crypto Assets can facilitate unlawful behavior, including drug trade and other illegal activity....

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1149472282584072192

[nrd525]

I think Dollar Cost Averaging is a great idea.  However, my non-bitcoin income is roughly equal to my expenses... So it isn't for me.  I guess I could have dollar cost averaged after selling some of my other assets into bitcoin the first time I invested.  I guess I still have some assets that I could sell and cost average into bitcoin with. 

[nrd525]

Robinhood doesn't allow withdrawals of crypto!  What idiots!  Why would anyone use it?

[nrd525]

Three month long patterns with a similarish (maybe very ish) look
1) April 1 to May 1
2) May 13 to June 12
3) June 25 to ... July 24?

Look similar IF you apply an increasing downward slope to them (within the 30 day period - so you'd adjust the 30th day of the 3rd pattern to be a lot lower vs the 1st day of the 3rd pattern, whereas in the 1st pattern the 30th day would be higher than the first day).  Ok, so I'm mostly making this up as I go along (lol), but the first period was upward sloping, second was only slightly upward sloping, and the third period was downward sloping.

Though it looks more like we're going to 8k.  

Nouriel Roubini is an angry and nervous person but of course that might be why they picked him for this stupid debate - so that he could butcher a set of good points.  I'm interested in Arthur Hayes main case for bitcoin - a privacy currency which he thinks isn't as popular as it could be as people aren't valuing their privacy.  But could be big in the future.  Is bitcoin going to be a relative private currency (as the exchange hackers get away with their money - so far) or is it going to be a giant ledger where everyone can track everyone?  So far I've heard both cases: 1) that criminals love bitcoin and 2) that police love bitcoin.  Someone needs to do research papers on this subject!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qlZukhN_C6c

The debate fails to get into key points, like should rich people (aka accredited investors) be assumed to be smarter or in need of less protection because they are rich?  The Madoff ponzi would point to no (though personally I'm ok with rich people losing all their money, I just don't want it to go to other rich people or ponzis - I'd rather have it go somewhere useful).

And what kind of regulation of crypto currency regulation is desirable?  What is possible?  (It'd be fascinating to see Arthur's take on this).

[nrd525]

I'm totally confused as to the impact of Libra. There is no chance at all that you'd be able to exchange Libra for other crypto currencies without doing full KYC AML.  There is no chance that FB would let you exchange Libra for other cryptocurrencies.  Libra will take at least one year for it to even come out in alpha, and more likely won't ever release.  It'd be centralized and probably a (mostly) stable coin, not a crytpocurrency.

Why do people think it would do increase the number of crypto users?

[exstasie]

I'm totally confused as to the impact of Libra. There is no chance at all that you'd be able to exchange Libra for other crypto currencies without doing full KYC AML.  There is no chance that FB would let you exchange Libra for other cryptocurrencies.

Last I heard, they were in talks with Gemini and Coinbase about listing it.

You apparently need to do full KYC just to use Libra at all, whether you're transferring $1 or $10,000. So yeah, they won't approve its listing on any exchanges that don't mandate full KYC. If non-approved exchanges list it, Facebook et al can just shut that shit down since it's a permissioned network.

Why do people think it would do increase the number of crypto users?

Proximity to cryptocurrency, awareness, hype. I'm not sure what to expect though really.

[nrd525]

My cat and I have decided that this is the "happy purring cat" phase of the market cycle, where you should have accumulated by now and are just sitting with a happy purring cat on your lap and watching your screen while the price goes up.

If the price falls too fast in a pullback, the cat should attack your computer screen to kill the bears.  This is the "Attack the Dip" phase.

[nrd525]

NVT signal is very bearish. Best case (historically) looks like a 50% decline from the top - so to 6900ish.
https://charts.woobull.com/bitcoin-nvt-signal/

[nrd525]

BTC market share at 67.8% on Coinmarketcap - a new local high since April 2017.

Bounced off 12k (11.8k now).

[exstasie]

NVT signal is very bearish. Best case (historically) looks like a 50% decline from the top - so to 6900ish.
https://charts.woobull.com/bitcoin-nvt-signal/

Interesting. How do you read that indicator exactly? When I look at Willy Woo's explanation, he says 150+ is overbought and 45- is oversold. Has this been revised or is this a different derivative indicator? It looks like we're currently at 66.

I'm looking at his Twitter and having trouble deciphering his sentiment at the moment too.

[nrd525]

I think he is referring to another of his indicators, as this NVT one has peaked at 142 since 2012.  And he's got a highlighted range of 40-70 on it as being "normal".  So on this indicator we've declined from around 112 to 66.

[nrd525]

I found 4.6 clams in an old wallet from 2014!  A couple months ago they were worth $17 each, but now only $3.50.  Very strange that they are one of the few alt-coins to have exceeded their January 2018 peak (of course with a low market cap anything is possible!).

I learned that 1) downloading the entire clam blockchain is not worth it (even with the 3 GB boostrap.dat file it looked like it would take 80 hours, running one of my cpu cores at 100%).

2) You can send transactions without synching with the chain.  This applies to other cryptos as well. The only risk is that you have to be sure that you have the coins to send.

I didn't find a lightweight clam wallet that runs on desktop.

[nrd525]

Starting around 20 minutes, Willy Woo is arguing that NVT Signal isn't as valuable because there are more bitcoins held on exchanges. But his second graph (Bitcoin Supply) shows the opposite is true over the past year (I saw this myself and then Tone Vays points it out at 28 minutes)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsPPcVL32sI

He might be in a long position and biased.  Or maybe the exchanges where bitcoins are being held aren't in his Bitcoin Supply chart.

But whether or not the Bitcoin Supply is decreasing if more bitcoins are on exchanges or being traded in non-blockchain methods, the decline in the NVT signal would be gradual. Instead we're seeing it peaking at normal levels, and rapidly falling. 

So I don't buy his argument. What do other people think about the NVT Signal?  Does it still matter?  What are other analysts saying?

[nrd525]

Also, bitcoin dominance isn't going to 90%.  I'd be very happy with 80%.

[nrd525]

Bullish Factors

• Global economy at peak of bull cycle
• Global (long term and also short term) interest rates at historical (50-60 year) lows
• Lightning Network will allow low transaction fees
• Transaction fees are around $0.50-$1 (room to grow)
• Bitcoin market share at 69%
• Bitcoin ecosystem is healthy - no talks of additional forks, no new controversial splits in the community
• US / China trade war (currency part of it, not the actual impact on global economy)
• Republicans are unlikely to overly-regulate crypto currency and are likely to hold a majority at least in the Senate post 2020
• Use case for speculation is solid.  Bitcoin is digital gold for gamblers.
• More ways to speculate on bitcoin (CME, CBOE, additional futures)
• 2020 Halvening (May 2020)
• ETF hasn't happenned yet, but seems likely in the next 1-5 years
• At 11.7k now, we are very bullish uptrend from 3.2k bottom

Bearish Factors

• Global recession is coming (ex. US unemployment rate of 3.6% hasn't been sustained since 1960 or before without a recession)
• Low rates fuel bubbles (property, crypto, stock, art, etc)
• Lightning's volume is insignificant
• Google Search Trends are lagging price (and lower than in the 2017 bull market)
• NVT signal turned bearish, and the other 5-7 times it did this we got at least a 50% plunge
• IRS increased interested in collecting capital gains
• We might have exited the bear market prematurely (inadequate damage to ICOs, altcoins, self-fulfilling prophecy of another bull market is too good to be true)
• No major use cases for bitcoin other than speculation (transactions, remittances, the nonsense about being your own bank -- all not that useful)
• Centralized stablecoins (or even just USD payment systems) are better suited for beating credit cards
• Blockchain is falsely equated to the internet as a revolution in something - not true!
• Lack of premiums in non-US exchanges (ex. in the past we had China premiums in 2013 and Korea in 2017)

Indeterminate Factors (risk?)

• Mt Gox bankruptcy returns some of the coins
• Regulators haven't taken a strong position on ICOs
• Satoshi identity(ies) is not known. Potentially owns 1 million btc.
• Unresolved situation for small transactions where you are responsible for capital gains if they buy coffee
• Unregulated stable coins like Tether (could be scams, regulatory crackdown -- ex. research papers on correlation between printing new Tethers and price increase in bitcoin)
• Facebook Libra coin
• https://alternative.me/crypto/fear-and-greed-index/  (doesn't seem so useful longterm, needs more data)
• GBTC premium - https://crypto.neotechdevs.com/GBTC.jsp?chart=year#charts
• Hacks, scams, ponzis

[nrd525]

This just hit an all-time low of 5 (since staring in Feb 2018).
https://alternative.me/crypto/fear-and-greed-index/

[figmentofmyass]

This just hit an all-time low of 5 (since staring in Feb 2018).
https://alternative.me/crypto/fear-and-greed-index/

how well has that indicator performed in the past? any update on willy woo's NVT signal?

the chart is tough to read right now. these two guys have been pretty accurate in the past several months and are both bearish:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5140701.msg52220767#msg52220767
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5128394.msg52084317#msg52084317

[nrd525]

This guy is forecasting a recession.  Pretty technical video.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V7zEXiqiiqA

I'd be interested to see people on the other side doing a similar level of analysis and saying things are going great.