Bitcoin as a Retirement Account

[Whitehouse]

Sounds like a terrible idea unless you diversify.

This is not a terrible idea because everyone in this world need retirement fund so they can live happily and one more thing that I can add is bitcoin always make a new variation and people nowadays are start to use it as a new kind of payment in this era of technology

Assuming everyone needs a retirement fund to be happy (which is something I disagree with), wouldn't it be a terrible idea to only have Bitcoin in that said fund?

What if all my savings are exclusively BTC (i.e no diversification) and they turn out to be worthless in 10, 20 or 40 years, how am I suppose to live happily?

Everyone needs a retirement fund because what the hell are you going to live on once you retire if you have nothing to pay the bills with or your rent? Using the word happy may have confused you but you certainly need a fund to be comfortable or to survive at least and if you don't have one you certainly wont be happy starving on the streets.

[aso118]

Sounds like a terrible idea unless you diversify.

This is not a terrible idea because everyone in this world need retirement fund so they can live happily and one more thing that I can add is bitcoin always make a new variation and people nowadays are start to use it as a new kind of payment in this era of technology

Assuming everyone needs a retirement fund to be happy (which is something I disagree with), wouldn't it be a terrible idea to only have Bitcoin in that said fund?

What if all my savings are exclusively BTC (i.e no diversification) and they turn out to be worthless in 10, 20 or 40 years, how am I suppose to live happily?

then you put 50% only and be happy anyway, no one said tu put everything you have in bticoin

but bitcoin still looks to have more chance to grow than dying, so even 66%-75% would be a good bet

If you have 20+ years left to retire, even a couple of bitcoins put away may be enough.
If you lose, you don't lose much.

[GreenStox]

If this gets approved by the government (ironic), then the bitcoin price will definitely go to the moon!

[johnyj]

Average guy: 1% of his portfolio
IT guy: 5%
IT and finance aware guy: 10-20%
Bitcoiners: At least 50%
Gamblers: 100%

[GreenStox]

Average guy: 1% of his portfolio
IT guy: 5%
IT and finance aware guy: 10-20%
Bitcoiners: At least 50%
Gamblers: 100%

I got 25% only in bitcoin, and the rest of my money it is in high risk bank savings (getting 1.5% interest only).

I do own a little bit of farm land and have a family house that is rented out.

[operrajunk74]

Will support this thread as I feel that it can be great idea to have an bitcoin as retirement account. If I hold good amount of bitcoins then definitely it can be prove as a better investment, again you cannot neglect the risk factor but hopefully bitcoin will do better in future.

[aso118]

Average guy: 1% of his portfolio
IT guy: 5%
IT and finance aware guy: 10-20%
Bitcoiners: At least 50%
Gamblers: 100%

Right now
Average Guy: What is Bitcoin?

If you are planning to hold it till retirement (assuming you are not knocking on the doorsteps of retirement), then 1% is a sizable amount, considering the riskiness of Bitcoin.

[GreenStox]

Average guy: 1% of his portfolio
IT guy: 5%
IT and finance aware guy: 10-20%
Bitcoiners: At least 50%
Gamblers: 100%

Right now
Average Guy: What is Bitcoin?

If you are planning to hold it till retirement (assuming you are not knocking on the doorsteps of retirement), then 1% is a sizable amount, considering the riskiness of Bitcoin.

1% ,that is too small. What else you would hold greek bonds or financial stocks? Those are 1000x more risky at the moment than bitcoin.

The 30 year bullish bond markets will collapse soon, and then people will regret why they didnt bought bitcoin instead.

[maartenhaha]

Average guy: 1% of his portfolio
IT guy: 5%
IT and finance aware guy: 10-20%
Bitcoiners: At least 50%
Gamblers: 100%

I got 25% only in bitcoin, and the rest of my money it is in high risk bank savings (getting 1.5% interest only).

I do own a little bit of farm land and have a family house that is rented out.

NEVER give up houses and farmland, that's gold you have there, besides coffee, chocolat and water the primal things human need, wait and see in 10/15 years, you'll see, so never sell property but rent it out and keep accordenly, to value price and inherit laws per country, that sum of money stowed away to give your children to buy the inherit taxes of so it keeps in the family.

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a retirement funds... don't sell everithing in 1 go, lol  just sell monthly what you need to live on or that little + on your pension income or need a vacation? a nice present for someone not be greedy and all in 1. that way prises could be/stay stable wright?


edit: sorry i mean rent out, not rent. english is not my first language..

[GreenStox]

NEVER give up houses and farmland, that's gold you have there, besides coffee, chocolat and water the primal things human need, wait and see in 10/15 years, you'll see, so never sell property but rent it out and keep accordenly, to value price and inherit laws per country, that sum of money stowed away to give your children to buy the inherit taxes of so it keeps in the family.

------------------

a retirement funds... don't sell everithing in 1 go, lol  just sell monthly what you need to live on or that little + on your pension income or need a vacation? a nice present for someone not be greedy and all in 1. that way prises could be/stay stable wright?


edit: sorry i mean rent out, not rent. english is not my first language..

I must sell the family house because its in shitty shape , but i dont sell the farmland, that is really worth it. But i think bitcoin has much higher ROI, so i`d buy more of it later on.

Luckily there is no inheritance tax in my country (at least that, otherwise i`m taxed 80%).

[Amph]

Average guy: 1% of his portfolio
IT guy: 5%
IT and finance aware guy: 10-20%
Bitcoiners: At least 50%
Gamblers: 100%

Right now
Average Guy: What is Bitcoin?

If you are planning to hold it till retirement (assuming you are not knocking on the doorsteps of retirement), then 1% is a sizable amount, considering the riskiness of Bitcoin.

1% ,that is too small. What else you would hold greek bonds or financial stocks? Those are 1000x more risky at the moment than bitcoin.

The 30 year bullish bond markets will collapse soon, and then people will regret why they didnt bought bitcoin instead.

i think that too, i would say 5% for average guy, they know about bitcoin, they are just to afraid to invest

and i would rise to 10% for IT guy, the rest are about ok

[The Sceptical Chymist]

Bitcoin is a global currency.  Total market cap is in the low billions of USD.  How are you going to tie up enough bitcoins for YEARS to allow a significant number of people to retire on?  Not going to happen, even if people were stupid enough to want to do something like you suggested.  No offense.

[aso118]

Bitcoin is a global currency.  Total market cap is in the low billions of USD.  How are you going to tie up enough bitcoins for YEARS to allow a significant number of people to retire on?  Not going to happen, even if people were stupid enough to want to do something like you suggested.  No offense.

Total market cap is in the low billions of USD now. You do not know how much they will be worth in 20 years.

[GreenStox]

Bitcoin is a global currency.  Total market cap is in the low billions of USD.  How are you going to tie up enough bitcoins for YEARS to allow a significant number of people to retire on?  Not going to happen, even if people were stupid enough to want to do something like you suggested.  No offense.

Total market cap is in the low billions of USD now. You do not know how much they will be worth in 20 years.

Bitcoin is a global currency.  Total market cap is in the low billions of USD.  How are you going to tie up enough bitcoins for YEARS to allow a significant number of people to retire on?  Not going to happen, even if people were stupid enough to want to do something like you suggested.  No offense.

Population of Earh will triple in the next 20 years, the amount of labour generated will be alot, and that 0.01% that uses bitcoin now, might be 1 billion people in 20 years.

Bitcoin will go viral, i`m sure of that.

[The Sceptical Chymist]

Bitcoin will go viral, i`m sure of that.

There are sooooo many ifs that you have factored, perhaps wrongly, into your surety. 

But my response was to btc being useful for a retirement account.  I called it a currency.  Is it a currency or an investment? 

If it's a currency, then the best thing for it would be price stability.  In that case, btc would be absolutely horrible to sock away for retirement, because inflation would eat it away--and I mean inflation of fiat, because I do not expect the major currencies to collapse in our lifetimes, and since things are priced in fiat and btc is largely purchased with fiat, btc is tied to fiat.  I could be wrong. 

If it's an investment, what justifies it's price?  It represents no earnings as a stock does, or debt like a bond does.  It's major advantages are as a currency: it's quick to transmit and the fees are very low.  It's not even a physical thing like precious metals, art, or stamps. 

You might be sure btc will go viral, but I'm not so sure it'll be around in 20 years.  Again, I could be totally wrong.

[johnyj]

Bitcoin will go viral, i`m sure of that.

There are sooooo many ifs that you have factored, perhaps wrongly, into your surety.  

But my response was to btc being useful for a retirement account.  I called it a currency.  Is it a currency or an investment?  

If it's a currency, then the best thing for it would be price stability.  In that case, btc would be absolutely horrible to sock away for retirement, because inflation would eat it away--and I mean inflation of fiat, because I do not expect the major currencies to collapse in our lifetimes, and since things are priced in fiat and btc is largely purchased with fiat, btc is tied to fiat.  I could be wrong.  

If it's an investment, what justifies it's price?  It represents no earnings as a stock does, or debt like a bond does.  It's major advantages are as a currency: it's quick to transmit and the fees are very low.  It's not even a physical thing like precious metals, art, or stamps.  

You might be sure btc will go viral, but I'm not so sure it'll be around in 20 years.  Again, I could be totally wrong.

Inflation of fiat money is exactly the reason you should use bitcoin as retirement savings, since it is anti-inflation, or even better, deflation. Its purchasing power would increase long term wise. A 100% increase in 4 years time frame seems to be guaranteed due to reward halving every 4 years

As for investment, at a higher level of abstraction, all the investment is about growing your purchasing power. You receive some stock dividend or bond interest, but if those income and principal added together still bring you less purchasing power (due to hyperinflation), then that is a bad investment. However, if you hold bitcoin and its purchasing power doubled or even quadrupled during a hyperinflation, that's a good investment

It is difficult to imagine where is the bitcoin's value established upon. Again, at a higher level of abstraction, value is all about trust, as long as there are some people trust bitcoin and willing to accept bitcoin in exchange for other valuables, it has some people backing it with real world resources. Although those backing is very distributed, they are all volunteer, which is very different from a government-backed-currency (typically forced upon its citizen domestically). Some day in 2009, north Korean government decided to abandon its currency and go for a new one, no one could against it and people with lots of cash saving lost a fortune. But for all the bitcoiners around the world to abandon the bitcoin at the same time is very unlikely if not totally impossible. From this point of view, bitcoin's value also comes from its non-political nature

[aso118]

Inflation of fiat money is exactly the reason you should use bitcoin as retirement savings, since it is anti-inflation, or even better, deflation. Its purchasing power would increase long term wise. A 100% increase in 4 years time frame seems to be guaranteed due to reward halving every 4 years

I would be disappointed if Bitcoin just managed to hold its purchasing power or increases marginally in the long term. I would put aside a small amount of money, be willing to take a hit if it disappears, but also expect a substantial return if it takes off. With large scale adoption, Bitcoin's price can take off and we as reasonably early adopters, may be rewarded.

[manselr]

Inflation of fiat money is exactly the reason you should use bitcoin as retirement savings, since it is anti-inflation, or even better, deflation. Its purchasing power would increase long term wise. A 100% increase in 4 years time frame seems to be guaranteed due to reward halving every 4 years

I would be disappointed if Bitcoin just managed to hold its purchasing power or increases marginally in the long term. I would put aside a small amount of money, be willing to take a hit if it disappears, but also expect a substantial return if it takes off. With large scale adoption, Bitcoin's price can take off and we as reasonably early adopters, may be rewarded.

It will obviously go up, it's simply math and literally unavoidable. It's a matter of when, and having the balls to sell at peaks to buy back later. Insanely risk tho, you never know when a peak is going down or it will continue.

[Xenoph0bia]

If I am holding a good amount of bitcoins in my wallet then this would a better option to have it as an retirement account as i guess the value of bitcoin will raise in the future and holding good bitcoins will make your retirement life safe and secure so i think its an great option.

[johnyj]

Inflation of fiat money is exactly the reason you should use bitcoin as retirement savings, since it is anti-inflation, or even better, deflation. Its purchasing power would increase long term wise. A 100% increase in 4 years time frame seems to be guaranteed due to reward halving every 4 years

I would be disappointed if Bitcoin just managed to hold its purchasing power or increases marginally in the long term. I would put aside a small amount of money, be willing to take a hit if it disappears, but also expect a substantial return if it takes off. With large scale adoption, Bitcoin's price can take off and we as reasonably early adopters, may be rewarded.

If bitcoin is officially regulated and well accepted like any other foreign currency, then the adoption will explode. However it is also possible that it will never gain a clear status from the government (Due to anonymity and no issuer), thus there will be less and less new people adopt bitcoin (Those who are geeky and brave enough to ignore the government directive are almost all on board now). And that will make the user base grow very slow. If the user base do not increase quickly, then 100% return in 4 years is already a quite good number