Bitcoin on the rise

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Ego
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Re: Bitcoin on the rise

Post by Ego »

The future of investing. :lol:
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-41082388

Fast-food chain Burger King has launched its own crypto-currency, called WhopperCoin, in Russia.

Customers will be able to claim one coin for every rouble (1.3p) they spend on the Whopper sandwich.

Ivan Shestov, head of external communications at Burger King Russia, said the scheme turned the Whopper into an "investment vehicle"

NPV
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Re: Bitcoin on the rise

Post by NPV »

A few questions for those knowledgeable on cryptocurrencies:

1. Has anyone seen any good 101-type introductions to investing (i.e. speculating) in cryptocurrencies? An ideal material I would be looking for is a recent article by someone knowledgeable on crypto and trustworthy saying "here are the 10 cryptocurrencies I am most long and here is why".

2. What is the most secure, easy and cheap way to trade them? Is there an "Ameritrade for altcoins" where I can go and buy/sell a wide range of coins (at least the couple dozen most popular ones from herehttps://coinmarketcap.com/all/views/all/)?

3. What are the main cryptocurrencies discussion forums?
Last edited by NPV on Fri Sep 01, 2017 6:47 pm, edited 1 time in total.

NPV
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Re: Bitcoin on the rise

Post by NPV »

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GandK
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Re: Bitcoin on the rise

Post by GandK »

The problem with cryptocurrencies is the phase they're in. It's like the Internet of the late 80's/early 90's. Blockchain is an impressive new technology but no one knows all the possible implementations yet, of which currencies are only one. Investing in CCs today is like trying to choose between, say, MySpace and Facebook in the early days of both. One - probably only one - of the contenders will come out on top and be adopted by a quarter of humanity, but we none of us have any way of knowing which one, or if the eventual winner has even shown up to the fight yet.

G and I own a handful each of Bitcoin, Ethereum and Litecoin recreationally, in case one of them happens to go to the moon. We buy through Coinbase.

Personally I think BTC and ETH will continue climbing rapidly in the short term, specifically until 6-9 months after their upcoming [soon to be approved by the SEC, it sounds like] ETFs launch, at which time Joe Investor will pour into these two coins. The Joes of this world won't buy cryptocurrencies until they can get them the "normal" way, through their brokerage. When they can, I expect both coins to go up sharply. After that honeymoon period is over, though, I'd say owning either coin in significant amounts is speculative to the point of being irresponsible. The technology is just too young. And that's before we get to the fact that the world's governments are unlikely to stand by quietly and allow private organizations to take control of currency, one of their largest sources of social control. When Bitcoin et.al. get big enough to move the dollar, expect Uncle Sam to step in. On behalf of the people, of course.
Last edited by GandK on Fri Sep 01, 2017 7:41 pm, edited 1 time in total.

DSKla
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Re: Bitcoin on the rise

Post by DSKla »

Coinbase or Kraken are major exhpchanges for Americans. Not sure what country you're buying from.

Like GandK said, don't invest more than you can afford to go busto with. In addition to the ETF launch and hard fork updates which may drive the price, I think on the off chance that one of the major global currencies suddenly experiences a loss of faith, and if that happens before your government puts the clamps down, you could see some wild increases. It seems like a middle term investment. Long enough to benefit from some volatility, but not so long it becomes impossible to legally purchase or withdraw them.

But don't take investment advice from me. Years ago my friend tried to talk me into buying $700 bitcoin, and I laughed at him, said the bubble peaked at $1200 before falling back down, and that it would slowly wither away. If anything, do the opposite of what I advise.

bryan
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Re: Bitcoin on the rise

Post by bryan »

The one thing I'm considering now is selling most of my "Bitcoin Cash" (hard fork from Bitcoin a month or so ago.. so if you owned some BTC back then, you automatically own the same coins on the new fork as well). It's at $615/BCH and I think it should be worth ~$0/BCH.

https://bitcointalk.org/ has had the most discussion historically. There is probably some other forum for ICO talk.

>here are the 10 cryptocurrencies I am most long and here is why... couple dozen...

This is probably the wrong way to think of it at this point in time.. most of these are absolutely worthless. There are probably not even 10 that are interesting and not a complete scam. Bitcoin/Litecoin are the winners with momentum for value store and value exchange (i.e. digital gold/cash, hedge against nation states and not correlated with other investments like stocks, bonds) while Ethereum is succeeding due to having ICOs and lots of developer buy-in. Zcash and Monero for a more private version of BTC/LTC. If you want to get into anything other than BTC/LTC/ETH you need to do actual research and search out the criticisms that others have shared online (probably on bitcointalk).

Zeran
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Re: Bitcoin on the rise

Post by Zeran »

1. Has anyone seen any good 101-type introductions to investing (i.e. speculating) in cryptocurrencies? An ideal material I would be looking for is a recent article by someone knowledgeable on crypto and trustworthy saying "here are the 10 cryptocurrencies I am most long and here is why".
You are asking to be scammed. If you want to invest in something read about it, understand it, firgure out it's value proposition. If the price is less than the value it will provide you can buy it, else steer clear.
2. What is the most secure, easy and cheap way to trade them? Is there an "Ameritrade for altcoins" where I can go and buy/sell a wide range of coins (at least the couple dozen most popular ones from herehttps://coinmarketcap.com/all/views/all/)?
The cheapest easy way is to buy some Bitcoins and then send them to an exchange like hitbtc and poloniex. They both only require an email to sign up, then you can purchase a huge range of alt coins and ICO tokens.
3. What are the main cryptocurrencies discussion forums?
Biggest forum on in the crypto space:
https://bitcointalk.org/

Then there are the subreddits
/r/bitcoin /r/litecoin /r/ethereum /r/cryptocurrencies etc..

NPV
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Re: Bitcoin on the rise

Post by NPV »

Thanks guys. Here is something that could trigger a crash BTW: https://techcrunch.com/2017/09/04/china ... nned-icos/

bryan
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Re: Bitcoin on the rise

Post by bryan »

Surprised none of y'all have posted in this thread in the last 24 hours! Up ~20% on the week, 60% on the month.

Big moves in price usually means big news coming out soon. If no big news, then it just means a lot more capital coming in (either main street or wall street, I would guess the later).

Curious what % others think is "too much" for a BTC/crypto-currency allocation in a portfolio? I have usually suggested people to have ~5% (which might look like 15-50% today if no re-balancing has been done.. how often to re-balance such a volatile (mostly upwards so far..) asset?).

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Seppia
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Re: Bitcoin on the rise

Post by Seppia »

For me, anything above 0% is too much.
I don't know if bitcoin is a bubble that will burst or if it's the best thing since sliced bread, but I definitely know it's not for me.
It has been comfortably sitting in my personal "TOO HARD" pile for a few years.

BRUTE
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Re: Bitcoin on the rise

Post by BRUTE »

when/if institutional money starts flooding in, brute predicts an easy 10-100x. maybe for the last time.

jacob
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Re: Bitcoin on the rise

Post by jacob »

I'm at 0% and will stay that way until some government picks up such a blockchain currency and at least 10% of the entire population starts using it. At that point, I might buy into theirs.

Back in 2004, there was something called Liberty Dollars, which looked like a pretty cool idea. You could exchange regular dollars for silver coins denominated in USD and spend them like normal coins. If the USD inflated, the liberty dollars would be revaluated automagically. There was some simple algorithm for this. Recall that silver has traded all the way up to $40+/oz within the past decade.

Unfortunately, the idea was so good that the feds went after the founder and locked him him. The coins looked at bit too much like the official ones in form or function.

I also recall as the virtual gold sites.

So even if it sounded like a great idea, I'm glad I moved too slow to actually buy into it. It would have been a pain in the ass to be left holding the bag on something that's ultimately challenging a very profitable government "business". There's any number of ways they can make your financial life miserable via tax-reporting laws. Therefore I prefer to keep it simple.

Hankaroundtheworld
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Re: Bitcoin on the rise

Post by Hankaroundtheworld »

jacob wrote:
Sat Nov 04, 2017 2:41 pm
With all respect, if you compare the current 200 billion market of more than 1000 crypto currencies and related new business models with this single liberty silver experiment, then I am a bit surprised. Normally you are much more thorough in your research, and if you research what is going on with Blockchain based solutions, I am sure you will come to a better conclusion

bryan
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Re: Bitcoin on the rise

Post by bryan »

Also the whole thing about Bitcoin being the technical breakthrough that disallows such easy censoring/block/destruction/control/risk, making it the de facto first digital money for the internet.

But @jacob is mostly right regarding making things difficult if it is politically desirable to do so. Also the "Tobin tax" drawback.. the assumption is that it will be solved by some number of different mechanisms, but not in the actual Bitcoin protocol. We'll see. Like I said, I was more excited about Bitcoin a few years ago than today.

jacob
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Re: Bitcoin on the rise

Post by jacob »

@Hank - I'm waiting for this stuff to crystallize into tax law. That is my main concern.

As far as investments go, I tend to lean towards the most boring stuff possible. I can get the fun of quick 6000% gains with OTM options of thinly traded anything if I wanted but given my investment-temperament, that's almost the last thing I want. I realize that not all cryptocurrencies are the same size, but dividing 200B with 1000 gets 200M and that's barely a midcap company these days. So which currency to choose? I dunno. But that doesn't matter anyway. For me, it's just outside my sphere of competence and hassle-tolerance.

Hankaroundtheworld
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Re: Bitcoin on the rise

Post by Hankaroundtheworld »

@Jacob : Fair enough. I just do not think that it happens so often that we are looking at a worldwide innovation that creates a total new global market. 200 billion is perhaps not a lot yet, but the market is still shaping up. Last time we had this major wave was in the 90's (with Internet as the main driver), and now we have Blockchain as the main driver (which you can see as the new protocol layer on top of existing Internet protocol layers). You will see some hickups on the road because governments want to regulate this "beast", but it cannot be stopped anymore. It is not just the money and the gains, it is the excitement of innovation and related transformations. As for selection of related investment, you are right, it takes a bit of time to follow and study it to pick the winners. However, you can also keep it simple, put 1% of your money in Bitcoin, and let it grow the coming 3 years. For 2017, I can tell you, my best performing investment asset was Cryptocurrencies, above 100k Euro profit (and my initial investment is already taken out, so zero risk). My prediction for coming years, with the high valuation of the current Stock market (and perhaps looming major correction), I am almost certain, this Crypto asset will remain the best performing one :-) (other than using your own skills of course, to lower your spendings or create multiple (passive) income streams, to stay in ERE fashion)

liberty
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Re: Bitcoin on the rise

Post by liberty »

If I go to a shop and see something costs €5 I have a meaning of how cheap/expensive it is. With BTC I don't know before I have checked the current BTC/USD(or other stable currency). Also shops need to update their price instantly if they use BTC. So useless atm, but this might be solved in the future. There will come something better...

I'm considering buying some BTC (as a pure speculation - it's not an investment), then use trend following to see when to sell...

7Wannabe5
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Re: Bitcoin on the rise

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

Why do I envision a post-apocalyptic scene featuring thin ragged children huddled around the periphery of an AntMiner2037 in a futile attempt to gain enough warmth to avoid the inevitable blackfinger?

I asked my super-wealthy rags-to-riches friend about bitcoin, and he answered by relating a parable that ended with somebody buying a sealed barrel full of stinky dead fish and somebody else saying "Right, those there are trading fish. I never said those were my eating fish."

Hankaroundtheworld
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Re: Bitcoin on the rise

Post by Hankaroundtheworld »

Haha, I guess it will take some time before people see beyond Bitcoin, and understand the underlying technology and possibilities. Anyway, let's talk end of 2018 :-)

ether
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Re: Bitcoin on the rise

Post by ether »

My two cents:
Bitcoin is a lot like cash. It enables two untrustworthy parties to trade without a government or middleman knowing the details.
Once the UI, stigma, and transaction fees improve you will start to see the domination of credit/debit cards start to decline in commerce.

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