whales are stupid

[odolvlobo]

I'll conclude with the fact that money does not make you smart, and not having any doesn't make you stupid. It also doesn't take a genius to get rich, even the ethical way. The majority of rich people I know are NOT rich because they worked hard and earned it. At the end of the day, those rich people likely see me as one of the stupid ones, but I am OK with that.  

This, most people that got rich come from early money distributions (just like rich bitcoin people). Once you inherit 5 millions, it's HARDER to lose them than to keep them.

If you are born in middle class, chances are you'll be stuck there, let alone being legit poor. A breakthrought through the class you are born at is nothing but luck. Working hard and saving = you may become a millionaire, but you'll get to enjoy it where, in the cementery? what a joke.

According to Forbes, 273 of the 400 richest people in the U.S. earned their way onto the list. A minority inherited their money.

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[ibminer]

You wanted a free market, you got it. Free markets are not kind. 

It's not the market, it's the people in it. A free market could be the greatest & kindest place on Earth if everyone on the planet were kind and had good morals and ethics. 

How incredibly dumb is that logic? That's the same as saying, a communist system could be the greatest & kindest place on Earth if everyone on the planet were kind and had good morals and ethics. 

See? everything can work IF everyone on the planet were kind and had good morals and ethics, IF.

It may sound the same but I think a communist system is an entirely different conversation..... your comparing a socioeconomic system with a financial market and I am not sure I can find the logic in that.

[ANTIcentralized]

I'll conclude with the fact that money does not make you smart, and not having any doesn't make you stupid. It also doesn't take a genius to get rich, even the ethical way. The majority of rich people I know are NOT rich because they worked hard and earned it. At the end of the day, those rich people likely see me as one of the stupid ones, but I am OK with that.  

This, most people that got rich come from early money distributions (just like rich bitcoin people). Once you inherit 5 millions, it's HARDER to lose them than to keep them.

If you are born in middle class, chances are you'll be stuck there, let alone being legit poor. A breakthrought through the class you are born at is nothing but luck. Working hard and saving = you may become a millionaire, but you'll get to enjoy it where, in the cementery? what a joke.

According to Forbes, 273 of the 400 richest people in the U.S. earned their way onto the list. A minority inherited their money.

This number is really misleading because many rich people will work hard, and invest their money in order to create additional money/wealth for themselves via their own business ventures. I would argue that a good portion of the 127 of the 400 richest people would be on the list of top 400 richest people regardless if they inherited their money or not.

Take Bill Gates for example, his family was very rich prior to him starting Microsoft, he was the beneficiary of a multimillion dollar trust fund. Today he is the country's 2nd richest person.

[ibminer]

The Forbes article has no value to me, anyone can hand select 600 "strong candidates", narrow it down to 400, and be able to spin the percentages whichever direction they want. I realize there are a group of people who everyone expects on these lists, and they have no choice to put them on, but I fear there was bias amongst the "Forbes 400 Team" doing the article. I would also argue there are people who don't want to be in the public eye that are not on the list.

Aside from all of that, focusing on the "Top XXX" group of anything shouldn't prove a thing. Especially only 400 people, but I guess its entertaining to read. 


http://www.forbes.com/sites/kerryadolan/2014/09/29/inside-the-2014-forbes-400-facts-and-figures-about-americas-wealthiest/

This is the 33rd year of the flagship Forbes 400.  Though we’ve been at it a long time, it’s still always a challenge. Our reporters dig deep. This year we started with a list of more than 600 individuals considered strong candidates and then got to work.

Of course, we don’t pretend to know what is listed on each billionaire’s private balance sheet, although some candidates did provide paperwork to that effect.

Some billionaires who preside over private companies were happy to share their financial figures, but others were less forthcoming. A few even threatened to sue. To value these businesses we coupled revenue or profit estimates with prevailing price-to-revenue or price-to-earnings ratios for similar public companies.

[porcupine87]

they are giving bitcoin a bad name. price will go down long term because of these disgraceful whales.

what's with the whales who buy large volumes of coins?

[findftp]

they are giving bitcoin a bad name. price will go down long term because of these disgraceful whales.

Whales are smart, therefor they are whale!
Make yourself a whale with these cheap prices and buy them all!

[red-jet]

No real whale would be in it for a quick trade. The quote about the ascii arms race peaking seems pot on. No new cheap coin.

Few years before quantum computing picks up the baton.

If I was whaley I'd monitor the ascii's extremely closely - once reach 10% below 'peak coin' - id begin subtly dumping for 2 years.

Then buy it all up before the next wave of tech is due.

But I is not a whale. I'm not even from Wales.

[acsalles]

i do not think they are stupid, this is a free market and people will and have the right to decide based on individual interests. It's the rule of the game and what counts at the end is the holistic approach combined with a long-term analysis.

[Rassah]

From my experience and stuff I have an opinion on, people who understand money and business become rich, most coming from middle income, and not inheriting that money. Those who do not understand money and business (especially budgeting, investments, and other basic household financial skills), either never get rich due to mishandling their money and spending or borrowing too much, or if they do become rich, either through inheritance or winning the lottery, very quickly lose all those millions and end up in a worse debt than if they hadn't gotten that money (known as the Lottery Curse). If you want to be rich, or at least well off, Step 1 is learn some basic finance, like compound interest, investments, how to calculate debt and interest payments, and how to budget. This should be required teaching in schools, but is pretty much never taught, so people grow up living paycheck to paycheck, and 75% end up reaching retirement with less than $60k to their name.

[Unbelive]

I'll conclude with the fact that money does not make you smart, and not having any doesn't make you stupid. It also doesn't take a genius to get rich, even the ethical way. The majority of rich people I know are NOT rich because they worked hard and earned it. At the end of the day, those rich people likely see me as one of the stupid ones, but I am OK with that.  

This, most people that got rich come from early money distributions (just like rich bitcoin people). Once you inherit 5 millions, it's HARDER to lose them than to keep them.

If you are born in middle class, chances are you'll be stuck there, let alone being legit poor. A breakthrought through the class you are born at is nothing but luck. Working hard and saving = you may become a millionaire, but you'll get to enjoy it where, in the cementery? what a joke.

According to Forbes, 273 of the 400 richest people in the U.S. earned their way onto the list. A minority inherited their money.

This number is really misleading because many rich people will work hard, and invest their money in order to create additional money/wealth for themselves via their own business ventures. I would argue that a good portion of the 127 of the 400 richest people would be on the list of top 400 richest people regardless if they inherited their money or not.

Take Bill Gates for example, his family was very rich prior to him starting Microsoft, he was the beneficiary of a multimillion dollar trust fund. Today he is the country's 2nd richest person.

But he was so lucky. What if he would be born in Africa?
Would his trust found helped him to get where he is now?
Would he have trust found at all?

[Rassah]

But he was so lucky. What if he would be born in Africa?
Would his trust found helped him to get where he is now?
Would he have trust found at all?

I don't think the comparison is whether certain regions have more access to wealth than others. That's a given. The question is, do some people in some regions have an unfair advantage over others, or is wealth the product of some individuals working harder and smarter to obtain it.

If Bill Gates was born in Africa, he probably would have tried to get an education in some American or European university (there were lots of people from Nigeria and other places in the universities I attended), and the end result may have still been similar, though it would have been harder for him to reach it.

[TheLoser]

They are very pleasurable. You know who you are.

[galdur]

Probability that any given altcoin will ever amount to anything = 0.001%

Probability of success in selling them short all the time = 99.999%

[odolvlobo]

But he was so lucky. What if he would be born in Africa?
Would his trust found helped him to get where he is now?
Would he have trust found at all?

The question is not valid. If he were born in Africa, he wouldn't be Bill Gates, he would be someone else. You are implying that a lottery was held and some lucky person was selected to be born as Bill Gates.

[Eisenhower34]

But he was so lucky. What if he would be born in Africa?
Would his trust found helped him to get where he is now?
Would he have trust found at all?

I don't think the comparison is whether certain regions have more access to wealth than others. That's a given. The question is, do some people in some regions have an unfair advantage over others, or is wealth the product of some individuals working harder and smarter to obtain it.

If Bill Gates was born in Africa, he probably would have tried to get an education in some American or European university (there were lots of people from Nigeria and other places in the universities I attended), and the end result may have still been similar, though it would have been harder for him to reach it.

Well if Bill Gates's situation was exactly the same with the exception of where he lived (in africa vs in the US) then things would have turned out very differently. The trust fund would need to stay as without it, you cannot make an apple to apples comparison (although you could argue that the trust fund could be much smaller so it could finance a similar standard of living as his "real" trust fund was able to support).

I would say that he would likely not be in the same position as he is in now as he would almost certainly not have had access to the technology that was available in the US when he started Microsoft in africa, which would mean he could never have created windows/dos. I would say that the chances of him starting Microsoft would be even greater if his trust fund was the same size as "US" bill gates had because such a trust fund would be able to sustain a much better standard of living in africa and he would have no real incentive to work for a living and start any kind of a career