There used to be stories about how people sold their 650 bitcoins for $12 each and regretted it when it hit $22k.

Now they're gonna be regretting selling their bitcoin at $22k when it is worth $1M each.

My question is why is btc even popular again now?!

Gold is also up, and houses, and stocks. Actually, they aren't really - it's just that money is down because the governments are printing it en masse while the economy is down so that it doesn't produce the goods and services that usually back up our paper money.

Everyone who has money tries to put into anything that can't be readily printed. That would look like inflation, but it doesn't because that money doesn't arrive at ordinary people and instead stays in the financial sphere.

If you heard it is rising, it means it will fall again. Of all the places, if bitcoin rise is talked in devrant,many have already heard it.

It will most likely crash (to an extent) like it did when it past the £22k and perhaps stay in the £17-18k range before shooting up again.

@Fast-Nop
Houses are up here because of foreign oligarchs stashing money in our real estate markets. Basically houses are 2020s art.

Dramatization
Putin: "One art, please."

Bitcoin is the interesting intersection of something people don't understand, marketed to people who like to feel like they know the secret.

It's basically flat earth currency.

@Fast-Nop funny, being afraid of inflation so they put their assets into a virtual currency which could literally be inflated infinitely at the touch of a button.

@AlgoRythm The problem is that pressing this button would cause a lot of machines to mine new Bitcoins, and that has real electricity cost.

@Fast-Nop energy companies always turn out to be the winners smh

The tech behind crypto currency is fascinating enough. But bitcoin in particular makes no sense. The more I get to see about how it has value the less and less it makes sense to me. It seems to be appreciated in terms of how scarce it is since there are a set number of bitcoins in existence, thus the rarity of it increments its value.

Does that alone make sense to you as to why it has value? don't worry, neither does to myself, my org's CFO lols at the concept (but like myself appreciated the tech behind it) because really, initially, the idea that "mining" a transaction through processing power should be rewarded with value just makes 0 sense to everyone.

I sweat a lot every day from working out, that energy I am using, it should have some monetary value <--- this is the value of mining to me.

Again, the technology is cool, there are some interesting concepts behind blockhain tech, but value to bitcoin makes no sense to me.

@AleCx04 It has value not only because it is scarce, that's only the necessary condition. It has value because enough people agree to that AND it is scarce.

That's no different with gold. By far most of the gold that is around isn't used in anything useful.

Yeah, really - we use a lot of energy and chemicals to extract it from the ground, ship it around the world, and then tuck it away underground again, this time as gold bars in safes.

Why? Because humanity has loved gold for millienna to the point of considering it worth of murder and war so that it's reasonable to assume that this love for gold will not suddenly stop.

Actually, even money lives from the "agree to that" part. Once that trust is gone, a currency implosed.

I can get a blowjob from a hooker for Euros only because she trusts that Euros will make her coke dealer hand her over the white powder, and he does that because he trusts that Euros will be accepted at the blackjack table.

@Fast-Nop That last portion sounded awfully accurate my man. 10/10 will definitely party with you one day

!!politics

The world is worried Biden, Harris, Waters, Warren, AOC, etc. are going to follow through with their economic promises and drive the US dollar so far into the ground it’ll arrive in China.

Crypto is a better bet because if the dollar crashes and your capital is elsewhere, you’ll have made a small fortune as you can sell your crypto later for significantly more USD than you originally bought it for.

@Root
Crypto exchanges have no real protections against fraud, nor any means of adding them since users are predominantly anonymous. They can fall victim to front-running, insider trading and any scam that has been regulated out of feasibility in the last 30 years. Also due to anonymity, large crypto holders can engage in market manipulation simply by selling coins between n anonymous wallets and effecting the price.

There's also the reality that since it's routinely used for illicit purposes, governments will eventually take notice.

Tl;dr it's a safe investment if you're comfortable with playing monetary musical chairs

Preemptive edit: a large number of exchanges allow you to ignore KYC if you stay under a certain amount of volume a day. People exploiting these holes distribute the transactions across n wallets. It is possible to remain entirely anonymous on most exchanges.

@Root You won't make a small fortune, just retain the one you have, because everything else will also rise in price.

@Fast-Nop Yes, but perhaps not to the same degree. And you will certainly have more capital than those who did not move their money to something more stable.

However, existing large purchases will have a significant discount regardless. My house might be tremendously easy to pay off :)

@SortOfTested 🤷🏻‍♀️
Regulations are strangulation.
I agree about fraud and scams; caveat emptor and all. I honestly don’t care about the rest.

@Root
I'm honestly interested:

The pump and dump and front running scams of the 70s and 80s were ended by regulation. Hedge funds and banks were complicit in the act and therefore had no interest in stopping it.

Given that, what's the alternative to regulation that would have stopped them?

Because idiots exist.

@SortOfTested I make money off pumps and dumps because they’re a thing that exists. I don’t have any feelings about them, though I would not manipulate the market in that way if I was able.

The charts make a pump/dump pretty obvious because that pair is doing something that looks very out of place and has exaggerated organic growth. Finding the tops isn’t difficult either.

I’d everything is tightly regulated and controlled, there are fewer opportunities. Fewer risks, too, but I’m not adverse to risk.

I prefer a more chaotic market. There are more opportunities, more volatility, and it’s so much more interesting.

@Root
So you're fine with pump and dump, and feel there should be nothing precluding it.

Second half of the question: How would you stop front running from happening?

@Root But take care, banks have learnt about hyper inflation. Many house loans can actually be cancelled by the banks even if you always pay the rates - unless you have precluded that explicitely in the contract, which usually costs a little more interest rate. At least, that's how it is over here, but your legislation may be different.