What is the minimum price of Bitcoin?

[sgk]

I read an interesting article about how low Bitcoin's price can get.
When everybody talks about how HIGH can it go, it is interesting to analyze how LOW it can go.

This past year we have seen countless articles asking how high Bitcoin may go, Could Bitcoin reach $10,000?, $100,000? or the even more common, Could Bitcoin Reach $1 Million?

This is no doubt an interesting question (one that gets even me giddy, dreaming of my future nest egg) but it is an all too easy article to write and one that borders on click baitery.

Asking the How High Can it Go question misses the point however and ignores free market economics in trying to answer it, what we should be asking is How Low Can it Go?

Every price in an open market is defined in this way, if a producer of any commodity is able to find a cheaper means of production (images of greedy fat cats be dammed) they will immediately pass the largest portion of these savings as possible onto the consumer in hopes of grabbing a larger share of the market, poising themselves for better long term returns.

Most of the How High authors begin with a premise of, if Bitcoin could take even a small percentage of Business X, we would see $x billions flow into the system. $x billions divided by the 21 million Bitcoin gives us a value of $10,000 a coin! And this is just a small percent of one market!

Instead we need to see it from the market position of, what is the most efficient price? In this frame we would be asking, if Bitcoin takes a percentage of Business X, we seen $x billions flow into the system, what would be the minimum price of each Bitcoin to allow the system to still function after absorbing these new "customers"?

Ideally each Satoshi would be valued at its minimum price, and every liquid Bitcoin would be in use.

If we are generous and assume the market needs $100 million in liquid Bitcoin every day with 10 million Bitcoin we have a minimum value of $10. Again, this is an especially generous assumption that each Satoshi transacted can only be used once per day, and that a large percentage of transactions are not simple 0 or low fee trading. Even at Bitcoin's all-time high transaction volume of $250,000,000 we still only require a price of $25 using our "one time use" Bitcoin model.

In conclusion, it wastes the time and efforts of intelligent people to daydream about how high a price may sore, and we rarely see investors in other markets ask questions such as, what if everyone in China bought just one iPhone? and it is equally masochistic to do so with Bitcoin.

Source:
http://www.thegreenminute.org/bitcoin.html

[shulio]

I read an interesting article about how low Bitcoin's price can get.
When everybody talks about how HIGH can it go, it is interesting to analyze how LOW it can go.

The price of bitcoin is not something that can be predicted easily because it is very vollatile. I will say and imagine that bitcoin would be at zero value but it is not likely and the lowest it could be will be at 1 bitcoin pegged at 1 USD since in the future it might be use as a currency, so it needs to have a stable value

[louise123]

I read an interesting article about how low Bitcoin's price can get.
When everybody talks about how HIGH can it go, it is interesting to analyze how LOW it can go.

The price of bitcoin is not something that can be predicted easily because it is very vollatile. I will say and imagine that bitcoin would be at zero value but it is not likely and the lowest it could be will be at 1 bitcoin pegged at 1 USD since in the future it might be use as a currency, so it needs to have a stable value

The price of Bitcoin CANNOT be predicted.
Many factors come to play, like supply and demand and of course those with the means and reasons to tamper with the price.

[Snail2]

The bullshit is strong in this one: http://www.thegreenminute.org/bitcoin.html

IMO the lowest and highest values are determined by supply and demand, what's the price where mining is still profitable and how much "free" money we have on the market to buy those coins. Services available in the bitcoin economy, new money flowing in, plus the price related "beliefs" of people who are trading it are also important factors.

[afbitcoins]

I dont' undersand the analysis, for a start how can you get a cheaper means of production of bitcoin? The difficulty will automatically adjust to keep production steady and at predefined rate. Another trouble with that analysis is that bitcoin also gets value from other things than just the number of transactions. Maybe its just me ..  

[minerpumpkin]

I dont' undersand the analysis, for a start how can you get a cheaper means of production of bitcoin? The difficulty will automatically adjust to keep production steady and at predefined rate. Another trouble with that analysis is that bitcoin also gets value from other things than just the number of transactions. Maybe its just me ..  

The number of transactions doesn't really affect the Bitcoin price at the moment. The transaction fees are still relatively low, and often even no-fee transactions are being included in a block. You can get a cheaper method of obtaining BTC by lowering your electricity costs, mining in Mongolia, or Iceland makes sense. And you can build more effective miners (better ASIC chips)

[mrhelpful]

If bitcoin was $10, then wouldnt it be used constantly? Promoting everyday use similar to a credit card concept.

Only since the price value has gone up, there isnt much of the everyday mico transactions, but if the value was such low like that why would we want to compete something that people already see no benefit plus re-education.

[spazzdla]

I read an interesting article about how low Bitcoin's price can get.
When everybody talks about how HIGH can it go, it is interesting to analyze how LOW it can go.

The price of bitcoin is not something that can be predicted easily because it is very vollatile. I will say and imagine that bitcoin would be at zero value but it is not likely and the lowest it could be will be at 1 bitcoin pegged at 1 USD since in the future it might be use as a currency, so it needs to have a stable value

LMAO, 2015.. BTC can't be zero but it could be $1..

LOL you're serious too arn't you.. dear god.

[thejaytiesto]

Theoretically, zero is indeed the minimum. Realistically, it's far from zero, it will never go to zero again, for obvious reasons. The question is, whats the lowest it can get, realistically? well, nobody can know. What I think is 200-ish is really low in 2015, and a great opportunity to stack up.

[RodeoX]

I think this a good question also. I'm not sure about their numbers, but at least they are making a math based attempt to discover a price which minimally supports the network as it exists today. As mentioned above, it could go lower if mines start collapsing.

[manselr]

Like it has been said before.. it's stupid to think it can go to 0. There are billonaires invested in Bitcoin for the very long term, guys like Winklevoss twins look at it for 10+ years, they will never let it go low enough that it becomes a serious problem.

[mrhelpful]

I only see a collapse, if everyone just decides to ditch the coin if something similar to some huge annoucnment like some huge enterprise have discovered a way to do the same thing without having the whole bitcoin thing making our coin value of zero.

But, thats really small percent even that happening at all.

I mean its 2 ways, if its not accept publicly, its going to be more towards for online gambling sites to use it to money launder which has significant value as long people holds it. Which they already heavily use anyways.

[jehst]

I don't think it will go below double digits. I'd really be surprised to see under $20.

$10 is what happens when the US declares possession of bitcoin illegal punishable by years in prison.

[Amph]

it should be the same price before the big wave started, the willy wave, we might call it in this way

it was around $50-$100, but i'm still pretty sure we won't fall below 100-150, because it's something that has to do with mining, we can't fall to much because of this...

[minerpumpkin]

I don't think it will go below double digits. I'd really be surprised to see under $20.

$10 is what happens when the US declares possession of bitcoin illegal punishable by years in prison.

I don't think we'll go anywhere near those levels. Just look at the drop in late 2011! Everyone predicted $1 per coin and lower. We've just seen major resistance at $230. Things are changing and it is getting more and more difficult for bears and shorters to continue their game of dump-and-gain.

[minerpumpkin]

it should be the same price before the big wave started, the willy wave, we might call it in this way

it was around $50-$100, but i'm still pretty sure we won't fall below 100-150, because it's something that has to do with mining, we can't fall to much because of this...

Even without the gox/willy bubbles, we would have seen at least some kind of growth, most likely also one exponential in nature, even if it wouldn't be this steep. I think it's safe to say that we won't go below $100 this time. Even $200 will be difficult to reach again, in my opinion!