Does anyone invest in Bitcoin?

[Fueri]

And another, more focused on bitcoin specifically.

Bitcoin is near a level that could start a 47% correction, but some see it headed to $6,000


She's using fibonacci sequences, calling a bottom for bitcoin towards the end of this year...

Right, wrong, who knows, obviously.

And of course if we see one of the various efforts succeed to get sec approval for btc and ethereum trading, or one of the various intetnational efforts, such as the japanese effort to bring these to the FOREX market, succeeds, those fundamental market shifters will throw these right out the nearest window.

YMMV, of course.

 

[Fueri]

Ethereum to start trading on Chinese exchanges today.

Price is jumping on that news. Analysts expect a substantial bump once those exchanges open trading


Given the voracious appetite of the Chinese for bitcoin, I'd agree.

China is expected also next month to allow loosening of some restrictions it had placed on exchanges in terms of withdrawal of digital currency, as they had been limiting that due to fears of people moving assets out of the country via bitcoin movement....

 

[danielpalos]

I probably will, when I can establish a petty cash fund for that purpose.

 

[Toddsterpatriot]

I am. Some of my coworkers are starting to wake up as well. Around the world people in the know are trading their fecal covered parchment paper for cryptocurrencies. As fiat currencies lose value, Bitcoin rises. For the second year in a row, forth time in five years Bitcoin is the worlds best performing currency.

Copy paste the link.

Bitcoin: Top Performing Currency For a Second Year in a Row

Yes, chainletters do well at the beginning.

 

[Luddly Neddite]

ah i refused the risk.....we would have had millions or lost it all by now...bitcoins came about due to the silk road which has been closed..they were used for illegal activities and still are...they exist in a digital world only.....and can be taken quickly

Same here. If I were younger and wanted long term returns, I might. But, back then, I did really well with real estate. I have a good friend who partnered with me, still buying and selling and doing well. So that's probably what I'd do again.

But, we're in a good place, good income from past investments so not interested.

 

[Fueri]

Ethereum topped 320 today on the news that China and Russia are experimenting with digitizing their currencies utilizing the ethereum protocol, among other things.

Russia and China May Digitize Their Currencies With Ethereum

 

[MarathonMike]

Ethereum topped 320 today on the news that China and Russia are experimenting with digitizing their currencies utilizing the ethereum protocol, among other things.

Russia and China May Digitize Their Currencies With Ethereum

I posted a question for you today. What do you think is behind this surge? Is it the upcoming Bitcoin blockchain split that is driving Bitcoin owners into Ethereum or is it mostly new investors coming in?

 

[Fueri]

Ethereum topped 320 today on the news that China and Russia are experimenting with digitizing their currencies utilizing the ethereum protocol, among other things.

Russia and China May Digitize Their Currencies With Ethereum

I posted a question for you today. What do you think is behind this surge? Is it the upcoming Bitcoin blockchain split that is driving Bitcoin owners into Ethereum or is it mostly new investors coming in?

Sorry, i didn't see it.

I think some of bitcoins scaling issues, which is driving the hard fork or split is hurting bitcoin. Transaction fees and processing times are way up, so it's use as a currency is being hampered.

That said, I think most of this is due to an influx of new money moreso than what's going on with bitcoin. That can be seen by the market caps of cryptos in general, which are skyrocketing across the board, as well as the fact that bitcoins price is also rising.


Here's bitcoins market cap chart. You'll see its nearly vertical.

Bitcoin Market Capitalization Chart


People are not fleeing bitcoin, but they are also pouring money into other cryptos, with ethereum being the largest receiver of that influx and already overtaking >50% of bitcoins market cap.

Heres a site listing various coin market caps

CryptoCurrency Market Capitalizations


Here's a chart on total crypto market cap

Global Charts | CryptoCurrency Market Capitalizations

That ^^^ thing is insane. Lot of new money pouring in from individuals and institutional investors. See also the volume along the bottom axis. That has exploded as well.

 

[HenryBHough]

Forget bitcoins.

Tulips!

They were as popular and profitable at one time as are bitcoins today - really overdue for a comeback!

 

[MarathonMike]

Ethereum topped 320 today on the news that China and Russia are experimenting with digitizing their currencies utilizing the ethereum protocol, among other things.

Russia and China May Digitize Their Currencies With Ethereum

I posted a question for you today. What do you think is behind this surge? Is it the upcoming Bitcoin blockchain split that is driving Bitcoin owners into Ethereum or is it mostly new investors coming in?

Sorry, i didn't see it.

I think some of bitcoins scaling issues, which is driving the hard fork or split is hurting bitcoin. Transaction fees and processing times are way up, so it's use as a currency is being hampered.

That said, I think most of this is due to an influx of new money moreso than what's going on with bitcoin. That can be seen by the market caps of cryptos in general, which are skyrocketing across the board, as well as the fact that bitcoins price is also rising.


Here's bitcoins market cap chart. You'll see its nearly vertical.

Bitcoin Market Capitalization Chart


People are not fleeing bitcoin, but they are also pouring money into other cryptos, with ethereum being the largest receiver of that influx and already overtaking >50% of bitcoins market cap.

Heres a site listing various coin market caps

CryptoCurrency Market Capitalizations


Here's a chart on total crypto market cap

Global Charts | CryptoCurrency Market Capitalizations

That ^^^ thing is insane. Lot of new money pouring in from individuals and institutional investors. See also the volume along the bottom axis. That has exploded as well.

What about Russia and China digitizing their currency using Ethereum as the "backbone"? How likely do you think that is?

 

[Fueri]

Forget bitcoins.

Tulips!

They as popular and profitable at one time as are bitcoins today - really due for a comeback!

Microsoft, intel, JP Morgan, BP, Samsung, ING, Citi and a host of others, such as the people's bank of china, are investing in these particular tulips.

The price likely is forming a bubble in the overall crypto market, as most people have no clue what they're investing in, but the tech is here to stay. Very little doubt about that.

 

[Fueri]

Ethereum topped 320 today on the news that China and Russia are experimenting with digitizing their currencies utilizing the ethereum protocol, among other things.

Russia and China May Digitize Their Currencies With Ethereum

I posted a question for you today. What do you think is behind this surge? Is it the upcoming Bitcoin blockchain split that is driving Bitcoin owners into Ethereum or is it mostly new investors coming in?

Sorry, i didn't see it.

I think some of bitcoins scaling issues, which is driving the hard fork or split is hurting bitcoin. Transaction fees and processing times are way up, so it's use as a currency is being hampered.

That said, I think most of this is due to an influx of new money moreso than what's going on with bitcoin. That can be seen by the market caps of cryptos in general, which are skyrocketing across the board, as well as the fact that bitcoins price is also rising.


Here's bitcoins market cap chart. You'll see its nearly vertical.

Bitcoin Market Capitalization Chart


People are not fleeing bitcoin, but they are also pouring money into other cryptos, with ethereum being the largest receiver of that influx and already overtaking >50% of bitcoins market cap.

Heres a site listing various coin market caps

CryptoCurrency Market Capitalizations


Here's a chart on total crypto market cap

Global Charts | CryptoCurrency Market Capitalizations

That ^^^ thing is insane. Lot of new money pouring in from individuals and institutional investors. See also the volume along the bottom axis. That has exploded as well.

What about Russia and China digitizing their currency using Ethereum as the "backbone"? How likely do you think that is?

I don't know, really. Hard to say what the likelihood is, but the fact that they're looking at it more than casually is interesting. People are viewing this in some ways as the next wave in fintech, so some countries are attempting to seize the advantage.


ING recently ran an oil trading desk based on ethereum, which drastically improved speed and cut overall costs by ~30%. That has nothing to do with the china/Russia currency issue, but it highlights the speed and efficiency that has so many people hopping on this stuff.

 

[Fueri]

ah i refused the risk.....we would have had millions or lost it all by now...bitcoins came about due to the silk road which has been closed..they were used for illegal activities and still are...they exist in a digital world only.....and can be taken quickly

Same here. If I were younger and wanted long term returns, I might. But, back then, I did really well with real estate. I have a good friend who partnered with me, still buying and selling and doing well. So that's probably what I'd do again.

But, we're in a good place, good income from past investments so not interested.

Long term isn't a requirement. These markets are up hundreds of times, as in 4x, 5x over the last few months.

Ethereum is up 17% today, and about 500% in the last 60 days or so, something like 3000% this year. You're set, that's cool too, obviously. I am absolutely not trying to sell anyone on anything here.

I see this as a watershed moment, like the dot com boom, when the world is shifting in a fundamental way towards these technologies. I could be totally wrong, of course, but I'm still in an investment phase in my life, so I'm in....

 

[MarathonMike]

ah i refused the risk.....we would have had millions or lost it all by now...bitcoins came about due to the silk road which has been closed..they were used for illegal activities and still are...they exist in a digital world only.....and can be taken quickly

Same here. If I were younger and wanted long term returns, I might. But, back then, I did really well with real estate. I have a good friend who partnered with me, still buying and selling and doing well. So that's probably what I'd do again.

But, we're in a good place, good income from past investments so not interested.

Long term isn't a requirement. These markets are up hundreds of times, as in 4x, 5x over the last few months.

Ethereum is up 17% today, and about 500% in the last 60 days or so, something like 3000% this year. You're set, that's cool too, obviously. I am absolutely not trying to sell anyone on anything here.

I see this as a watershed moment, like the dot com boom, when the world is shifting in a fundamental way towards these technologies. I could be totally wrong, of course, but I'm still in an investment phase in my life, so I'm in....

At this point I'm treating my investment like casino money. This is so speculative but I agree there are indications that blockchain technology could be a game changer. When you have entities like the Royal Chinese Mint evaluating the technology, this is more than just a play toy or Tulip bulbs.

 

[Fueri]

Price analysis on ethereum for those that may be interested.


ETH/USD Weekly Forecast: Big Week For Ether

 

[MarathonMike]

I guess we'll see. I remember plenty of stock reviews like that back in the pre dot.com bubble days. This is pretty remarkable though, I must say.

 

[MarathonMike]

Just an observation: Average 24 hour trading volume on ETH in US dollars went from ~100 million 2 weeks ago to over 1 billion since then.

 

[MarathonMike]

Fueri, what is the risk to a blockchain getting bogged down with tons of buggy smart contracts being uploaded by noobs like me? What is the risk of a blockchain being hacked, like a smart contract that self replicates itself i.e.

 

[Fueri]

Fueri, what is the risk to a blockchain getting bogged down with tons of buggy smart contracts being uploaded by noobs like me? What is the risk of a blockchain being hacked, like a smart contract that self replicates itself i.e.

Scaling is a problem with any blockchain, as can be seen with Bitcoin's scaling problem

There are, however, differences between Bitcoin and Ethereum in the way changes are implemented.

Bitcoin utilized a change protocol whereby any given change has to be adopted by a certain percentage of miners (I think its 75%) before it takes place. Problem here is that as mining has become more concentrated across a fewer number of large scale mining operations, those people have too much say and in some cases hold so much of the percentage that they have a virtual veto over such changes. This has caused bitcoin to bog down in terms of doing something about its issue, as consensus is a great concept but in practice it's difficult.

Ethereum is different in that it has no such limitations. If the core group decides to do it, they do it. When Ethereum implemented a hard fork they let folks vote, and then went right ahead and did what they wanted to do despite overriding that vote.

And the Ethereum dev team has a plan for scaling. See here: Ethereum's Creator Proves Blockchain Scaling Vision is No Joke - CoinDesk


In terms of hacking, the basis of the technology is it's security protocol. I'm not going to say it's unhackable, because who knows what tech comes out tomorrow that might make it possible, but it's pretty close. The only means I'm aware of is called a 51% attacks which is a situation that could occur if one mining group controlled more than 50% of the hashrate. this is purely hypothetical and most, if not all, major BTC mining pools have stated they will not deploy enough hashrate to mine >50% for this reason.

It is:

"51% attack refers to an attack on a blockchain – usually bitcoin's, for which such an attack is still hypothetical – by a group of miners controlling more than 50% of the network's mining hashrate, or computing power. The attackers would be able to prevent new transactions from gaining confirmations, allowing them to halt payments between some or all users. They would also be able to reverse transactions that were completed while they were in control of the network, meaning they could double-spend coins."


Read more: 51% Attack | Investopedia 51% Attack


to brute force a crack it would take an ubelievable amount of time and computing power to yield a single key, much less crack the entire network, which I'm not sure is even possible.

For those calculations on time and power see here Time and energy required to brute-force a AES-256 encryption key. • r/theydidthemath




the security is quantum leaps beyond what we're using right now and is one element that has people so excited about this from corporations to the Defense Dept. people are jacked up in some cases solely based on the security element.

 

[danielpalos]

I can't establish a petty cash fund for that purpose, at the moment; so, I may wait to see how it, "shakes out".