Bitcoin Take?

[ChiefRocka]

Bitcoin disrupts gold
Ethereum disrupts financial services
There will be others...

[suzzer99]

Originally Posted by CanadianChief

When you sell do you just put it in USDT and keep it on an exchange? I’m trying to figure out the best way for me to do this. Do most people just try to sell at the high point and then convert to USDT so that the value holds and then buy back in when/if the coin tanks?

USDT is very likely a ponzi scheme (the short term kind that actually blow up, not the long term US govt kind that can outlive multiple generations). The fired their auditor recently, which is never a good sign. And concerns about tether is what caused a lot of this crash.

https://tonyarcieri.com/the-tether-conundrum

[Hog's Gone Fishin]

Originally Posted by CanadianChief

When you sell do you just put it in USDT and keep it on an exchange? I’m trying to figure out the best way for me to do this. Do most people just try to sell at the high point and then convert to USDT so that the value holds and then buy back in when/if the coin tanks?

Yes, i'm just going to leave it in the exchange. If it was a shitload I'd put it in an outside wallet.

[suzzer99]

You realize USDT = tether right? It's not USD. It's supposedly backed up in reserves somewhere by actual US dollars. But no one's verified that and they just fired their auditor. IE - it could all go poof.

You really should read the article I posted above. Also here's a link to them confirming they fired their auditor: https://www.coindesk.com/tether-conf...tor-dissolved/

[Hog's Gone Fishin]

Originally Posted by suzzer99

You realize USDT = tether right? It's not USD. It's supposedly backed up in reserves somewhere by actual US dollars. But no one's verified that and they just fired their auditor. IE - it could all go poof.

Doesn't matter. Goldman Sachs just came out and said all Cryptos are going to zero. So theres that.

[suzzer99]

Why not cash out your USDT to actual USD until you're ready to reinvest? I'd feel safer holding any crypto vs. USDT right now. At least there's potential for upside with the other cryptos. With USDT it's either nothing happens, or something bad happens.

[Hog's Gone Fishin]

Originally Posted by suzzer99

Why not cash out your USDT to actual USD until you're ready to reinvest? I'd feel safer holding any crypto vs. USDT right now. At least there's potential for upside with the other cryptos. With USDT it's either nothing happens, or something bad happens.

On Coinbase it says it's US Dollars not USDT

[CanadianChief]

I am unable to cash out on Coinbase in Canada. That option is not available to me at this time; so they say. I've been trying to buy on Coinbase and move to GDAX but it doesn't look like that's an option for me either.

[suzzer99]

Originally Posted by Hog's Gone Fishin

On Coinbase it says it's US Dollars not USDT

That's probably ok then. Bitfinex (or wallets connected to them) is the one paying out in USDT apparently.

But I wouldn't fully trust coinbase either. It only takes a few days to withdraw and reinvest. I'd rather have my money sitting in my bank.

A whole lot of libertarians are in the process of learning the hard way how all those pesky regulations sprang up in the first place. (See everything that happened before the 20s)

[Hog's Gone Fishin]

m

Originally Posted by CanadianChief

I am unable to cash out on Coinbase in Canada. That option is not available to me at this time; so they say. I've been trying to buy on Coinbase and move to GDAX but it doesn't look like that's an option for me either.

You should move to the US, everything works better here. Then move back July 1 when rec weed is legal.

[CanadianChief]

Originally Posted by Hog's Gone Fishin

m

You should move to the US, everything works better here. Then move back July 1 when rec weed is legal.

I would be dead if I moved to he US in a matter of weeks. Was just there for a a hockey tournament and bought a 66 oz bottle of Vodka for $9.95. That’s crazy cheap with bad results.

I’m hearing they might be postponing the weed legalization by another 8-12 weeks depending on how fast the provinces get their shit together.

[Garcia Bronco]

I hear Monero is the best...is that true?

[vailpass]

Originally Posted by CanadianChief

I would be dead if I moved to he US in a matter of weeks. Was just there for a a hockey tournament and bought a 66 oz bottle of Vodka for $9.95. That’s crazy cheap with bad results.

I’m hearing they might be postponing the weed legalization by another 8-12 weeks depending on how fast the provinces get their shit together.

Atta' boy.

[lewdog]

$20 Bitcoin?

http://time.com/money/5136184/econom...facebook_money

[ChiefRocka]

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-b...-idUSKBN1FP2KO

"The growth of the Internet will slow drastically, as the flaw in 'Metcalfe's law'–which states that the number of potential connections in a network is proportional to the square of the number of participants–becomes apparent: most people have nothing to say to each other! By 2005 or so, it will become clear that the Internet's impact on the economy has been no greater than the fax machine's." - Nobel prize award winning economist Paul Krugman

[Eleazar]

Vanguard’s chief economist: ‘Decent probability’ that bitcoin goes to zero
By Ryan Vlastelica
Published: Feb 8, 2018 11:42 a.m. ET

Add Vanguard to the growing list of major Wall Street institutions that are skeptical of bitcoin.

Joe Davis, Vanguard’s global chief economist and the head of its investment strategy group, weighed in on the world’s largest digital currency, expressing enthusiasm about bitcoin’s underlying technology but extreme bearishness about the cryptocurrency itself.

“I see a decent probability that its price goes to zero,” he wrote in a blog post. While bitcoin has largely trended higher over the past 12 months, recent trading in the notoriously volatile security has been decidedly lower. Bitcoin last traded at $8,587.65, up 13% on the day. The digital currency was trading under $1,000 a year ago, but it has sharply declined from a peak near $20,000 hit in December. The gains have led to a surge in interest in bitcoin and other digital currencies; Davis wrote that he’s been asked about bitcoin more than any other topic over the past few months.

Davis gave a mixed verdict on whether bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies should even qualify as currencies, noting that while they can act as a unit of account, they functioned poorly as stores of value.

Bitcoin’s “price volatility undermines its adoption, as fewer vendors will accept a currency whose value can fluctuate so dramatically,” he wrote, adding that he would only give “a qualified yes” on whether bitcoin could act as a medium of exchange. He noted that while some vendors accepted cryptocurrencies as payment, only a few did, “and recent volatility will only discourage increased adoption.”

The comments echoed a recent report by Morgan Stanley, which argued that bitcoin was a long way from replacing Visa V, -3.03% or Mastercard MA, -2.74% as a payment system. The investment bank noted that credit cards were far more widely accepted than cryptos, and that the networks they use could process thousands of transactions a second. Currently, bitcoin takes several minutes to clear and settle a single transaction, and the fees are higher.

“Even if cryptocurrencies qualify for niche purposes [as currencies], their prospects seem dubious,” Davis wrote. “The greatest threat is central banks, which have begun to research blockchain-based currencies and impose regulations on exchanges.”

Vanguard’s economist also dismissed the value of cryptocurrencies as an investment, calling this use case “weak.”

“Unlike stocks and bonds, currencies generate no cash flows such as interest payments or dividends that can explain their prices,” he wrote, adding that while national currencies derive their prices based on the economic activity of their underlying country or region, crypto prices “are generally not based on economic fundamentals.”

“To date, their prices have depended more on speculation about their eventual adoption and use. The speculation creates volatility that, ironically, undermines their value as a currency. With no cash flows and extreme volatility, the investment case for bitcoin is hardly compelling.”

Like other analysts, Davis distinguished between bitcoin and blockchain, the decentralized ledger technology that cryptocurrencies run on. Many bitcoin skeptics see great potential in blockchain, even while they remain bearish on cryptos themselves.

In October, UBS wrote that blockchain “is likely to have a significant impact in industries ranging from finance to manufacturing, health care, and utilities,” and said it was “akin to investing in the internet in the mid-nineties.” The investment bank speculated that blockchain could add as much as $300 to $400 billion of annual economic value globally by 2027. Separately, HSBC called blockchain—along with the parallel trend of “cashlessness”—one of its biggest themes for 2018.

Blockchain has already started to be adopted by a variety of industries and companies, including Vanguard, which said it would use the technology to share data between index providers and market participants, believing this could result in its index funds more efficiently and accurately tracking their benchmarks.

“Although cryptocurrencies are built using a blockchain, they are not necessarily tied to the value of blockchain applications that may improve the cost, speed, and security of executing transactions or contracts,” Davis wrote. “Bitcoin is an investment in blockchain in the same way that Pets.com was an investment in the internet.”

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/va...ero-2018-02-08