Rollercoasters can be a lot of fun, but this is not typically where you want to get on the ride...
Wow here we are just a bit over 1 month after this graph and BTC is at $9,675.00US!
Rollercoasters can be a lot of fun, but this is not typically where you want to get on the ride...
Wow here we are just a bit over 1 month after this graph and BTC is at $9,675.00US!
Yep - still growing. You may also note that Ethereum is also increasing, though still at a relatively low rate.
How many Tulip Bulbs can one buy with a Bitcoin?
Most new technologies with any value are exploited. Fiat currencies are stolen all the time from lending institutions, or anytime for that matter. Gold has been plundered since it was used as a currency. Fiat currencies have also been subject to the bigger problem of counterfeiting, at least up until recently. As I understand the new bills are arguably harder to counterfeit but none the less the technology is not immune.Bitcoin (in)security and large thefts, one recent $64 million one. Since 2011, $15 billion has been stolen from digital currency exchanges alone. Start at 18:08 in this video:
[video=youtube;JnZM9VY86_w]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JnZM9VY86_w[/video]
THIS is HUGE. If I owned any, I'd convert them to gold as they peaked in value.
"Coinbase has lost an opportunity to block a U.S. tax investigation on their customers. The company is now compelled to hand over information on all members with more than $20,000 worth of Bitcoins in their Coinbase wallets, which covers 14,355 users as of this time."
Anyway they can. legal or not. they will just write new laws or tax codes in the governments benefit.How does the US government benefit from the Bitcoin frenzy?
I wasn't predicting where bitcoin is going. No one can with any certainty.While I have enjoyed reading your informed posts over the years, your statement that it has peaked seems like a guess at best. Just curious about your track record in predicting investment markets? Personally mine sucks.
I wasn't predicting where bitcoin is going. No one can with any certainty.
I stated that the ability to easily convert bitcoins to gold is huge because this is the first time this is possible according to what I've read. Gold has sustained value over time whereas bitcoin, in my opinion, is in a mania bubble and is HIGHLY volatile. IF I -MINED- bitcoins (personally, I would NEVER -BUY- bitcoins due to their extreme volatility and my belief that they're in a speculative bubble), I would convert them over to gold at each point I believed they had peaked. Of course, one can only GUESS at the peaks.
Right now, graphics cards for PCs are overpriced because so many people are buying them to legally mine "free money". Unfortunately, many are doing this based upon what I believe to be an inflated value of the coins meaning that if and when that value drops their expensive mining rigs will LOSE money by virtue of power consumption alone. These are the default settings for hashing power, power consumption, and power cost on this web page which calculates mining profitability:
https://www.cryptocompare.com/minin...it=GH/s&PowerConsumption=1293&CostPerkWh=0.12
Look at the HUGE hashing power requirements for the more mature bitcoin blockchain in comparison to the other cryptocurrencies.
Also, there's this:
The Bitcoin Whales: 1,000 People Who Own 40 Percent of the Market
A few massive investors can rock it with a shrug
8 Dec 2017
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/arti...1-000-people-who-own-40-percent-of-the-market
And these analyses:
Digital Currencies Are ALL A Scam
https://www.theburningplatform.com/2017/06/17/digital-currencies-are-all-a-scam/
Why Cryptocurrencies Will Never Be Safe Havens
https://mises.org/blog/why-cryptocurrencies-will-never-be-safe-havens
Not cheap and the few times I've checked for the most popular and, supposedly, most powerful brand - not in stock. Anyway, the fundamental flaws of cryptocurrencies detailed at the "All are a scam" link are pretty hard to refute.However BTC is primarily mined with an ASIC appliance today.
We at Coinbase couldnt be more excited by the explosion of interest in digital currencies. The last few weeks has seen an unprecedented increase in the price of digital currencies. More people are engaging with our platform than ever and that bodes well for the future of the digital currency. At the same time, it does create extreme volatility and stress on our systems. We take this very seriously and wanted to share some important thoughts.
Were continuing to invest heavily to scale our platform
Over the course of this year we have invested significant resources to increase trading capacity on our platform and maintain availability of our service. We have increased the size of our support team by 640% and launched phone support in September. We have also invested heavily in our infrastructure and have increased the number of transactions we are processing during peak hours by over 40x.
There may be downtime which can impact your ability to trade
Despite the sizable and ongoing increases in our technical infrastructure and engineering staff, we wanted to remind customers that access to Coinbase services may become degraded or unavailable during times of significant volatility or volume. This could result in the inability to buy or sell for periods of time. Despite ongoing increases in our support capacity, our customer support response times may be delayed, especially for requests that do not involve immediate risks to customer account security. You can read more in our Coinbase User Agreement.
Be an educated investor
We also wanted to remind customers of some of the risks associated with trading digital currency. Digital currencies are volatile and the prices can go up and down. Due to the rapidly changing price of digital currencies, some customers may not have sell limits that are sufficient relative to the value of total digital currency they are storing on Coinbase. Sell limits are one of the many measures Coinbase takes to protect client accounts and assets.
As a proactive measure, we encourage customers to check the following items on their accounts:
- Ensure your email address is properly receiving all communications and notifications from Coinbase. To learn more about ensuring email delivery, please refer to this support article.
- Ensure your two-factor authentication is updated and functional. If you have recently switched mobile devices, your two-factor authentication needs to be properly migrated to the new device. In addition, please migrate from SMS two factor to Google Authenticator to enhance the security on your account, if you have not already done so. To learn more about two-factor authentication, please refer to this FAQ.
- Familiarize yourself with your buy and sell limits. They can be found here.
- Complete any pending identity verifications. During times of significant volatility, ID verification may become degraded or unavailable. To learn more about identity verification on Coinbase, please refer to this FAQ.
- Expect payments to take the maximum number of days indicated when making a deposit or withdrawal.
Stay up to date
We will continue to update customers for our website, our status page, in our apps, via email, on our blog and on Twitter.
We will keep you informed
We are committed to safety, security and transparency. We are working tirelessly to provide the best service and support but we cant promise perfection during the periods of extraordinary demand. We will continue to do our best to keep our customers informed.
Thank you,
The Coinbase Team
Except, of course, for the HFTs who won't even be going through Coinbase:...and the resulting delays (and losses) that could ensue.
The issue discussed in that video is the insecurity of bitcoins UNLESS your compromisable info is AIR GAPPED - not attached to any network. With credit and debit cards at least you have protection against fraud and theft. With bitcoins, you don't. I have nothing against bitcoins, but beyond the main problem I have with them right now because of my belief they may be in a speculative bubble, I don't like the idea of having large sums stolen from me via a few keystrokes from somewhere else in the world with no real recourse if that happens.Most new technologies with any value are exploited. Fiat currencies are stolen all the time from lending institutions, or anytime for that matter. Gold has been plundered since it was used as a currency. Fiat currencies have also been subject to the bigger problem of counterfeiting, at least up until recently. As I understand the new bills are arguably harder to counterfeit but none the less the technology is not immune.
I wish you continued good luck. Far too much of a gamble for me.I'm pretty happy, right now, with the five Litecoin I bought yesterday.
How many Tulip Bulbs can one buy with a Bitcoin?
Trouble is, even mutual funds are far more risky than they should be because stock values are not based entirely upon performance of the relevant corporations as they had been before the Fed began destroying the price discovery mechanism ("what is this stock REALLY worth") by artificially spiking the market at every dip via financial manipulations even to the point of bailing out using taxpayer-liable debt those companies that DESERVED to fail due to their own bad choices while also creating a huge "moral hazard" where corporations making bad choices aren't the ones who pay when those choices go bad. This has created "The Fed has your back, so buy the dip" phenomena while also destroying the ESSENTIAL element that makes capitalism so superior - the Darwinian force of failure via bankruptcy of corporations that deserve to fail, those bankruptcies also very importantly extinguishing debt, thereby resetting the inherently exponential debt growth curve to a manageable slope. Smaller corporations still fail, of course, but huge ones are not allowed to do so due to political influence and claims of systemic risks of allowing them to fail. However, as even Greenspan has said, in a capitalist system, too big to fail is too big to allow to continue to exist when they make mistakes and deserve to fail, preferably breaking them up before they pose a systemic risk.I'd rather stick with steady investment in low-cost mutual funds than much higher risk/higher return investments.
"Bitcoin is sitting at $16,674 at the time of writing, after rocketing from $1,000 to more than $19,000 in the course of this year. Those types of eye-catching numbers (and the resulting media hype) are bound to draw the interest of casual folk. But, unless you've got money to burn (like Bitcoin billionaires, and Zuck's Harvard-era nemeses, the Winklevoss twins), most analysts will tell you the same thing: steer clear of the hyper-volatile currency. (Even those dabbling in it have lost tons of cash to cyberattacks on Bitcoin wallets).
Still, it seems some people aren't paying heed. A bunch of wannabe investors are even going so far as to take mortgages out to buy bitcoin, while others are running up credit cards and turning to equity lines. That's according to securities regulator, Joseph Borg...."