Bitcoin

Starfox

Masterpiece
Messages
2,602
Reaction score
5,317
Location
Costa Blanca, Spain, zone 10b
USDA Zone
10b
Back then it was as simple as go to the sit, download and install a program on your computer for free, and just leave it running and connected to the internet.

You still can, to a degree. It´s what I have just set up and it´s mining at the moment. Only tiny amounts though, like 4 cents a day but if my laptop had better specs it would be more. I´m honestly surprised by it as my PC isn´t up to it. If I can set it up anyone can.
 

Bonsai Nut

Nuttier than your average Nut
Messages
12,420
Reaction score
27,859
Location
Charlotte area, North Carolina
USDA Zone
8a
The difference being that those currencies are anchored by first world economies worth trillions of dollars. Bitcoin as a store of value is not anchored by anything. It is a closed purse that appreciates in value based on more people depositing funds in it. In order to "make money" in bitcoin you have to "take it" from someone else (more or less - with minor exceptions), with the earlier depositors making the most money from the latest depositors - assuming that they can eventually run for the exits and convert their bitcoins back into real currency before the bottom falls out. And oh the irony - many of the early bitcoins have been been lost and cannot ever be recovered - which is perhaps a good thing because otherwise bitcoin might have already died a horrible flaming death.

Note your graph... US dollar versus the Peso... and the fact that over the course of a month you saw perhaps 1.5% fluctuation. The Peso isn't a very good example because the Mexican economy is so frail. I used to trade FOREX US dollar versus Japanese Yen. Unlike trading bitcoin, when you are trading foreign currencies you are interested in the relative strengths of their economies, actions by their central banks, actions regarding international trade, and hedging against foreign exchange risk. Bitcoin it is all about... what? Greed and the social media posts of a handful of individuals - all of whom benefit from being in front of whatever market movements they hype.

Can you make money in bitcoin? If you know what you are doing. The same can be said for people who play blackjack in Vegas. You can also lose it all. I prefer to invest versus gamble. If I can't understand (or predict) market movements - I'm not interested. As Warren Buffet has said numerous times - if you can't understand what moves a market, don't invest in it. I can understand bitcoin... which is why I am baffled by people continuing to dump funds into it. At this point I have to assume instead of early adopters who understood what they were doing, the people late to the party are just momentum traders... meaning they don't really know what they are doing and only hope to pick up the scraps left by others.
 
Last edited:

Forsoothe!

Imperial Masterpiece
Messages
6,878
Reaction score
9,248
Location
Michigan
USDA Zone
6b
The difference being that those currencies are anchored by first world economies worth trillions of dollars. Bitcoin as a store of value is not anchored by anything. It is a closed purse that appreciates in value based on more people depositing funds in it. In order to "make money" in bitcoin you have to "take it" from someone else (more or less - with minor exceptions), with the earlier depositors making the most money from the latest depositors - assuming that they can eventually run for the exits and convert their bitcoins back into real currency before the bottom falls out. And oh the irony - many of the early bitcoins have been been lost and cannot ever be recovered - which is perhaps a good thing because otherwise bitcoin might have already died a horrible flaming death.

Note your graph... US dollar versus the Peso... and the fact that over the course of a month you saw perhaps 1.5% fluctuation. The Peso isn't a very good example because the Mexican economy is so frail. I used to trade FOREX US dollar versus Japanese Yen. Unlike trading bitcoin, when you are trading foreign currencies you are interested in the relative strengths of their economies, actions by their central banks, actions regarding international trade, and hedging against foreign exchange risk. Bitcoin it is all about... what? Greed and the social media posts of a handful of individuals - all of whom benefit from being in front of whatever market movements they hype.

Can you make money in bitcoin? If you know what you are doing. The same can be said for people who play blackjack in Vegas. You can also lose it all. I prefer to invest versus gamble. If I can't understand (or predict) market movements - I'm not interested. As Warren Buffet has said numerous times - if you can't understand what moves a market, don't invest in it. I can understand bitcoin... which is why I am baffled by people continuing to dump funds into it. At this point I have to assume instead of early adopters who understood what they were doing, the people late to the party are just momentum traders... meaning they don't really know what they are doing and only hope to pick up the scraps left by others.
Ditto. The common folk getting in are making believe they understand the process, a lot like people who drive really fast think they have the skills and understanding of a race driver. It is a Ponzi scheme and there is wall, somewhere... And that's even if the central banks don't out-law it and it becomes a store of value only acceptable in the Maldives. I predict that when one, single country outlaws it and holders there begin the run, it won't stop.
 

ShadyStump

Imperial Masterpiece
Messages
5,890
Reaction score
9,735
Location
Southern Colorado, USA
USDA Zone
6a
The difference being that those currencies are anchored by first world economies worth trillions of dollars. Bitcoin as a store of value is not anchored by anything. It is a closed purse that appreciates in value based on more people depositing funds in it. In order to "make money" in bitcoin you have to "take it" from someone else (more or less - with minor exceptions), with the earlier depositors making the most money from the latest depositors - assuming that they can eventually run for the exits and convert their bitcoins back into real currency before the bottom falls out. And oh the irony - many of the early bitcoins have been been lost and cannot ever be recovered - which is perhaps a good thing because otherwise bitcoin might have already died a horrible flaming death.

Note your graph... US dollar versus the Peso... and the fact that over the course of a month you saw perhaps 1.5% fluctuation. The Peso isn't a very good example because the Mexican economy is so frail. I used to trade FOREX US dollar versus Japanese Yen. Unlike trading bitcoin, when you are trading foreign currencies you are interested in the relative strengths of their economies, actions by their central banks, actions regarding international trade, and hedging against foreign exchange risk. Bitcoin it is all about... what? Greed and the social media posts of a handful of individuals - all of whom benefit from being in front of whatever market movements they hype.

Can you make money in bitcoin? If you know what you are doing. The same can be said for people who play blackjack in Vegas. You can also lose it all. I prefer to invest versus gamble. If I can't understand (or predict) market movements - I'm not interested. As Warren Buffet has said numerous times - if you can't understand what moves a market, don't invest in it. I can understand bitcoin... which is why I am baffled by people continuing to dump funds into it. At this point I have to assume instead of early adopters who understood what they were doing, the people late to the party are just momentum traders... meaning they don't really know what they are doing and only hope to pick up the scraps left by others.
Devil's advocate: Your argument here is based on trading currencies based on their relative value to one another as that value fluctuates, not unlike trading bonds.
However, that is not the purpose of, or even where currencies derive their value from. It's meant to be traded for goods and services.
Start using your Bitcoin in the supermarket more frequently than on the exchange market, and now it's value has that economic backing you were talking about, and also on a global scale. Theoretically, if a cryptocurrency is used for everyday purchases in enough quantity by enough people, it should have greater long term stability than most conventional currencies.
 

leatherback

The Treedeemer
Messages
13,937
Reaction score
26,876
Location
Northern Germany
USDA Zone
7
Devil's advocate: Your argument here is based on trading currencies based on their relative value to one another as that value fluctuates, not unlike trading bonds.
However, that is not the purpose of, or even where currencies derive their value from. It's meant to be traded for goods and services.
Start using your Bitcoin in the supermarket more frequently than on the exchange market, and now it's value has that economic backing you were talking about, and also on a global scale. Theoretically, if a cryptocurrency is used for everyday purchases in enough quantity by enough people, it should have greater long term stability than most conventional currencies.
Could not have said it better.

Of course, there are a few challenges (It is too volatile now to make it realistic for purchasing goods at a large scale, and processing transactions is still too costly). But indeed, that is the future vision one could have with these coins. In fact, that is the picture being painted. IF this takes place and BTC is the currency used, valuations in the 1M are not unrealistic in the next decades. Which would be a 30 fold increase. That would be nice as retirement fund. Then again.. 6-9% return on investment in managed funds is a whole lot less risky. On the fence myself.
 

Forsoothe!

Imperial Masterpiece
Messages
6,878
Reaction score
9,248
Location
Michigan
USDA Zone
6b
Yes, confidence that your store of value will be accepted at its cost to you is what defines worth. I'm not sure if that is different from the "One greater fool" theory, or not. Maybe the difference is government mandating use and acceptability?
 

Bonsai Nut

Nuttier than your average Nut
Messages
12,420
Reaction score
27,859
Location
Charlotte area, North Carolina
USDA Zone
8a
Start using your Bitcoin in the supermarket more frequently than on the exchange market, and now it's value has that economic backing you were talking about, and also on a global scale. Theoretically, if a cryptocurrency is used for everyday purchases in enough quantity by enough people, it should have greater long term stability than most conventional currencies.
Yeah sure... good luck with that 15 minute average transaction time to buy a loaf of bread. The tech is not, and never was, designed to be used for everyday transactions. It was developed to be an anonymous store of value outside of the central banking system.

So who needs an anonymous store of value outside of the central banking system? Let's see... organized crime and tax dodgers. Not people going to the supermarket - who can use a VISA card easier, faster, with lower transaction cost and value-added services.

And you really think that there is going to be 'someone' there to rescue bitcoin if a major exchange gets hacked and $450,000,000 disappears, or if the Chinese get pissed at the US and hijack the blockchain by flooding it with transactions (when they already provide 70% of the power to maintain it) wiping out the entire bitcoin blockchain by creating fake withdrawals to drain all the stored value? It is not a currency... and is recognized by the IRS as an unsecured asset. In other words... like a collectible Barbie doll that some people think might be worth a lot of money, but then one day isn't.
 
Last edited:

Bonsai Nut

Nuttier than your average Nut
Messages
12,420
Reaction score
27,859
Location
Charlotte area, North Carolina
USDA Zone
8a
By the way, just in case people don't understand, when I say bitcoin is an unsecured asset, I mean that YOU are responsible for its security. That is why so many have disappeared. I was talking to one of my nephews who used to mine bitcoin (about five years ago) and I asked what happened to his bitcoin, and he said his exchange got hacked and it's all gone. He had avoided transferring his balance from the exchange into his personal wallet because of all of the factors that normally keep you from transferring your bank account balance to your mattress at home.

Of course, US bank deposits are insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp up to $250,000 per depositor. Bitcoin exchanges usually aren't insured, and they definitely aren't insured by the Federal gov't. So when you accidentally throw out your hard drive with $127,000,000 of personal wallet codes... it is gone for good with no hope of recovery. And if you keep your $127,000,000 in an exchange that gets hacked, it is gone for good with no hope of recovery. And if the blockchain gets hacked and you lose $127,000,000 to an evil foreign entity, it is gone for good with no hope of recovery. LOL - do you detect a trend here?

And the more valuable bitcoin becomes, the more likely it is that nefarious organizations are willing to spend millions and millions (if not billions and billions) to compromise it. Since you don't know who is holding all the strings to the blockchain, you don't really know how secure it is. The assumption is that the security is based on a random distribution across the world. But as transactions become more and more expensive to process, the processors are quickly aggregating to the regions where electricity is cheapest - because you now lose money if you mine bitcoin in the developed world where electricity is more costly. That is why the blockchain is being maintained out of rural China where they have cheap coal, polluting power plants, and cheap land to put up cheap buildings to run cheap mining infrastructure. Do you want China managing your retirement savings? I don't.
 
Last edited:

Forsoothe!

Imperial Masterpiece
Messages
6,878
Reaction score
9,248
Location
Michigan
USDA Zone
6b
Well, I'm a bandwagon kind of guy so I guess it's time to get off my ass and issue a better clyptocurrency. Herewith the first unit, in paper of course so our customers can carry more without getting holes in their pockets, -we can't have leaks!
MM w2.JPG
The back of the bill is as close to gold as you're going to get...
MM back w1.JPG
I'm taking orders now. We take PayPal and large cardboard boxes of cash. (I have go cut the lawn, but you can PM me if you have a really big investment to make)
 

leatherback

The Treedeemer
Messages
13,937
Reaction score
26,876
Location
Northern Germany
USDA Zone
7
Well, I'm a bandwagon kind of guy so I guess it's time to get off my ass and issue a better clyptocurrency. Herewith the first unit, in paper of course so our customers can carry more without getting holes in their pockets, -we can't have leaks!
View attachment 376548
The back of the bill is as close to gold as you're going to get...
View attachment 376549
I'm taking orders now. We take PayPal and large cardboard boxes of cash.
Why?
Why take a serious discussion about pros and cons to this?
 

Starfox

Masterpiece
Messages
2,602
Reaction score
5,317
Location
Costa Blanca, Spain, zone 10b
USDA Zone
10b
Any recommendations for a trading platform? As guess if I did look into it further I’d need some sort of buy/sell software. Preferably something that deals in more than just Bitcoin under crypto currencies.

Nobody has addressed this yet so best advice is to really do some reading up on it all prior to making any decisions. That said it can be pretty simple to set up.
Also, it depends.

Depends on exactly what it is you want to do. If it's just simply buying a few euro of crypto for shits and giggles then you need a wallet for holding the coin and an exchange for buying, selling or trading them. Software like Coinbase and Exodus offer both wallet and exchange and are often recommended for beginners., others are available and if you decide to go deeper then it may be better to research other options. But you can have coin in like 10 minutes after setting up, it is easy. They also do trade many different coins.
May not be the best time to buy right now as it's all tanking, but buy the dip or wait to see how low it gets.

Also research your choices, some are greener than others for example and they mostly all work in different ways.

If you want to invest seriously then take better advice than a bonsai forum, lol.

That said if you are wary of putting money into it then you can always look at mining. This has the potential to be as complicated and expensive as you wish it to be but there are very easy and cheap options available if you have a relatively modern laptop or pc.
Hands down the easiest way is to sign up at Nicehash, download the software(you will need to make an exemption in win defender and you AV) and install it and it will do all the work for you. It is free to set up and fees are taken as you get paid. It picks the best coin to mine based on your CPU and GPU and off you go. Once you have mined a certain amount, around 30 cents of coin then you will get paid into your Nicehash wallet, they also have an exchange to trade and etc... but it is recommended to routinely move your earnings to another more secure wallet.

A lot of what you can make depends on you hardware, a full blown gaming pc make make you a few dollars a day, a crappy i3 based laptop(like mine) a few cents per day but it is an excellent way to get you a little bitcoin. But you only get paid on Nicehash in bitcoin, you may be mining any number of cryptos but they only payout in btc which isn't the end of the world really for a beginner. It's as simple as clicking a button while you re online using your laptop/pc.
There are other mining platforms available but NH seems to be the most user friendly and efficient. You can of course mine specific cryptos if your hardware permits but then you need to be able to setup all the things that NH automatically does for you.

I would advise reading up on all the options before making any decisions though, the above is all rather simplified.
 

Forsoothe!

Imperial Masterpiece
Messages
6,878
Reaction score
9,248
Location
Michigan
USDA Zone
6b
Cryptocrime is going to usher cleptocurrencies out the door muy pronto, so ~investors~ and I use the word advisedly, are going to be left holding the bag when the world's central bankers stop the music. Get careful guys... get out while the getting's good! If you're old enough to remember how banana republics controlled their currencies in war-time and the old days, proclamations that a new currency would take effect in 24 hours and everyone had to go to the bank to exchange the old certificates for new by the deadline forced everyone to present themselves to the authorities to get the new currency because it would be worthless after the deadline. Anyone with more money than they're supposed to have, like black marketers and enemies of the regime lost the cash they couldn't trade-in on time. That's the origin of, and why the world uses whatever is the reserve currency of choice is rather than that of their own country. Every central bank in the world will receive a windfall when the bad guys holding trillions in magic money goes poof! Somebody will invent a new word to immortalize the event. History in the making!
 

Starfox

Masterpiece
Messages
2,602
Reaction score
5,317
Location
Costa Blanca, Spain, zone 10b
USDA Zone
10b
Literally nobody: ..........

The crypto world: 'Here are some Bonsai NFT's'


 

Forsoothe!

Imperial Masterpiece
Messages
6,878
Reaction score
9,248
Location
Michigan
USDA Zone
6b
Literally nobody: ..........

The crypto world: 'Here are some Bonsai NFT's'


WTF? The Ghost of Bubbles Past!
 
Last edited:

Forsoothe!

Imperial Masterpiece
Messages
6,878
Reaction score
9,248
Location
Michigan
USDA Zone
6b
Ditto. The common folk getting in are making believe they understand the process, a lot like people who drive really fast think they have the skills and understanding of a race driver. It is a Ponzi scheme and there is wall, somewhere... And that's even if the central banks don't out-law it and it becomes a store of value only acceptable in the Maldives. I predict that when one, single country outlaws it and holders there begin the run, it won't stop.
I was wrong. El Salvador, vacation paradise leads the world's economies into the klyptocurrency black hole.
 
Last edited:

Forsoothe!

Imperial Masterpiece
Messages
6,878
Reaction score
9,248
Location
Michigan
USDA Zone
6b
The rest of the crooks better start moving fast because the world's federal banks are getting jealous, and there is only one reason to have a currency that isn't traceable: screwing governments out of their take. They don't take that lightly.
 

Starfox

Masterpiece
Messages
2,602
Reaction score
5,317
Location
Costa Blanca, Spain, zone 10b
USDA Zone
10b
Pocket money compared to traditional scams however.


Guess we should do away with currency altogether.

This looks like a similar modus operandi really. It all depends on how much of it they manged to convert or mix because those coins are now blacklisted and can't be traded. All coins are very traceable, every transaction is available to see in a public ledger but it's the identity of the wallets that is much harder to find, especially when they go to extremes to hide their ID and disappear.

Meanwhile in 2 weeks I have over 20 euro in my wallets and not put a single cent in.
 

Forsoothe!

Imperial Masterpiece
Messages
6,878
Reaction score
9,248
Location
Michigan
USDA Zone
6b
Kleptocurrency in toto is ~$1.4 trillion (I think at the peak) which will be a new record for de-bubbling. Nobody knows how or when of course, and these things (implosions) have a tendency to be connected to other events that are only tangentially related, like a black swan. China could start a war to capture Taiwan causing the destruction of the Taiwan economy and their banks causing western banks allied with Taiwan and Hong Kong banks to have a liquidity crisis and selling large positions of Klypto causing a world-wide cascade. Or something like that where one can not have predicted it. The worst sell-offs are always cascade events where someone with a big position needs to put their finger in the dike and finds the hole is bigger than their finger. When selling cover a catastrophic need, you have to sell what you can get enough money for, not what you want to get rid of. Like the Barings Bank failure that came out of nowhere.
 
Top Bottom