Bitcoin Cracks $5000

[Gaddafi Duck]

Money is consensus. Maybe if Blankfein says it how it is you will listen

Nah, Bitcoin isn't money because it's not even being used as money. People aren't buying coffee with Bitcoins because the transaction costs are far too high. It's far cheaper and efficient to use dollars.

People mistake Bitcoin's price going up as validation that it's a currency. It isn't. So there's really no purpose of holding a currency if you're not using it and cannot use it for everyday purchases. So, why do people hold Bitcoins? Because the price is going up. Because ICOs require Bitcoins to participate. So it's all speculation-driven.

So, if Bitcoin is too expensive to use in everyday commerce, then what's the point of it? Holding a digital-nothing? As I said, there are many benefits to owning a digital house. There's no taxes, no maintenance, etc. But, it doesn't satisfy the purpose of a "house". So, if a digital currency cannot be used for coffee because of high transaction costs, what's the point of holding a digital "currency"? Because it goes up? Not a good reason. A speculative answer rooted in nothing fundamental.

[Gaddafi Duck]

You sound like that lame Hulu documentary that was full of worthless bull$#@! which claimed that the bitcoin bubble burst a few years ago.

No doubt you will be saying the same thing when a bitcoin is worth $100k, $500k.. "Oh, it's just a bubble, guys!!"

When tulip bulbs bought an acre of land, that was crazy. Then it bought 12 acres and was equal to a decade's worth of a skilled craftsman's labor. It was even crazier then. When tulip bulbs were equal to an annual salary, it was a bubble. When it was equal to 10 years of your salary, it was a bigger bubble, and then it burst.

Judging by the fact that you're suggesting Bitcoin will be worth $500k tells me you won't cash out. The person who argued when tulips were 10x an annual salary that it was going to 20x. Only, it reverted to rationality.

Bitcoin doesn't even function as a currency because it's too expensive and too inefficient to transact with. So, if I cannot use Bitcoins to buy coffee because of the cost, then what's the point of holding it? You might as well buy digital houses. So what if you cannot live in them? They have many benefits real homes do not. If Bitcoins are too expensive and slow to use in everyday commerce, so what? The point of digital currency isn't to actually use it to buy things---it's to park your wealth and watch it go up. The greater fool theory, if you will.

[anaconda]

When tulip bulbs bought an acre of land, that was crazy. Then it bought 12 acres and was equal to a decade's worth of a skilled craftsman's labor. It was even crazier then. When tulip bulbs were equal to an annual salary, it was a bubble. When it was equal to 10 years of your salary, it was a bigger bubble, and then it burst.

Judging by the fact that you're suggesting Bitcoin will be worth $500k tells me you won't cash out. The person who argued when tulips were 10x an annual salary that it was going to 20x. Only, it reverted to rationality.

Bitcoin doesn't even function as a currency because it's too expensive and too inefficient to transact with. So, if I cannot use Bitcoins to buy coffee because of the cost, then what's the point of holding it? You might as well buy digital houses. So what if you cannot live in them? They have many benefits real homes do not. If Bitcoins are too expensive and slow to use in everyday commerce, so what? The point of digital currency isn't to actually use it to buy things---it's to park your wealth and watch it go up. The greater fool theory, if you will.

You can buy however much BTC you want. You can buy fractions of a coin. The real issue is flight from phony paper money and engaging in anonymous transactions.

[Gaddafi Duck]

You can buy however much BTC you want. You can buy fractions of a coin. The real issue is flight from phony paper money and engaging in anonymous transactions.

Only, it's not anonymous. "Here, online merchant, are some Bitcoins. Mail the goods to this [my home] address."

Suuuuuper anonymous transaction And then stored on the digital records of these merchants is "ABC [with their home address] paid X number of Bitcoins for Good Z"

Furthermore, Bitcoin offers pseudonymity not anonymity. This is the critical issue with Bitcoin enthusiasts. They fundamentally don't embrace the fundamentals. Bitcoin is too expensive to use everyday, it takes too long to process a transaction, and too many embrace the falsehood that Bitcoin is "anonymous". It isn't.

Bitcoin is a social network, not a currency. Bitcoin enthusiasts are confusing the fact that Bitcoin is going up with validation that, "A-HAH! It's a CURRENCY!" People aren't buying Bitcoin because they're using it as a currency. They're buying it because it's going up, and because the ICO market is bubbly. That's analogous to buying a house because home prices are going up---not because you're actually going to live in the house. What's the point of a digital currency if you never use it to buy stuff?

Sounds like, from these debates, the Bitcoinists buy and hold Bitcoin with no intention of selling (why pay high transaction fees for a coffee and wait an hour for the transaction to process, especially when Bitcoin is going to be worth $500,000?" So Bitcoinists aren't even using Bitcoin as a currency but as a speculative instrument. Similar to the bubble parable surrounding "trading sardines". "These sardines aren't meant for eating---they're TRADING sardines"

[Mordan]

Nah, Bitcoin isn't money because it's not even being used as money. People aren't buying coffee with Bitcoins because the transaction costs are far too high. It's far cheaper and efficient to use dollars.

Do you use Gold coins to buy coffee? is Gold money?

[Gaddafi Duck]

Do you use Gold coins to buy coffee? is Gold money?

I personally don't because it's illegal to do so. However, gold is actually "something" and has been used as money. Also, central banks hold massive reserves of gold, for "tradition" of course

Contrasted with Bitcoins, which is not "money," I think because people begin with the premise that it is money is why people insist Bitcoin is a "currency" but it really isn't. If transaction costs are so high and people cannot use it for everyday purchases, is it really money?

So Bitcoin isn't used as money. And people have it in their head that because Bitcoin has gone up means its purpose as a digital currency is being validated. That's the implied conclusion you made in your head. You mistake a rising price for argument validation. But if your argument is digital currencies are alternatives to dollars, then that should mean Bitcoin offers what dollars do not. But, it doesn't. From what I can tell, Bitcoin takes an hour to process and validate a transaction completely, and the costs are astronomical with fees.

Seems like the Pony Express of digital payments with much higher costs.

[Gaddafi Duck]

I think it's obvious Bitcoin enthusiasts are confusing and conflating a rising Bitcoin price with validation that Bitcoin is a currency. Those are entirely separate concepts. People are buying Bitcoin because it's going up---not because it's being used and in demand for buying Christmas toys and weekly gas station purchases and groceries.

This tells me Bitcoin is a very dangerous speculative bubble. Remember when people with no jobs bought 8 homes a decade ago? They never intended to live in the homes---many didn't even consider renting them out. They bought them because they could sell them a year later for tens of thousands more to someone who would pay more than they did. Exactly the same with Bitcoin. When homes are bought for reasons not to be lived in, that's a red flag. Likewise, when people buy a currency with no intention of using it as a currency, you have to wonder what purpose it then serves?

Then you toss in the fact that all this central bank inflation has driven people to bidding up utilities to 50x P/Es, Amazon with low profits to 200x P/E, it stands to reason helpless speculators wander into a hot market like Bitcoin. This is typical behavior exhibited in bubbles. It all bursts.

[kfarnan]

A currency has no store of value. So it's not a real currency. The whole economy is speculation. So, you don't buy PM"S, stocks. It's all speculation that things will be more valuable in the future.

[anaconda]

A currency has no store of value. So it's not a real currency. The whole economy is speculation. So, you don't buy PM"S, stocks. It's all speculation that things will be more valuable in the future.

well spoken

[ClaytonB]

Yeah, a bank account gives you legal right to notes that are actually used in commerce and taxes. Unlike Bitcoins which take 10+ minutes to verify a transaction, and up to an hour to complete? And the transaction fees on Bitcoins are outrageous--prohibitively expensive to use for everyday purchases.

Soon, Lightning Networks will be available and transactions will be able to complete instantaneously with fully verified security. Transaction fees have spiked on occasion but most of the issue is that people are using wallets that do not correctly calculate the minimum fee they need to pay, so the end up overpaying. At the height of the last demand spike a week ago, most people did not need to pay more than about $7 in order to get their transaction through quickly but many people were paying $20 or even more. Of course, a sustained $7 tx fee is insane but if you average out Bitcoin's tx fees over the 3 months to a year, they are somewhere in the $0.25-0.50 range per basic transaction (i.e. a simple payment + change).

[Gaddafi Duck]

A currency has no store of value. So it's not a real currency. The whole economy is speculation. So, you don't buy PM"S, stocks. It's all speculation that things will be more valuable in the future.

Erm...a currency should have a store of value. What's the point of holding something that the next day may collapse 30%? Bitcoin does this regularly.

Stocks aren't speculation---I mean, it's called "valuation". Sure, speculation occurs, but you can actually value a stock as it represents a real business. Bitcoin represents a digital "currency" that's not even used as a currency. So it's a "digital"...$8000 for a piece of digital. Might as well start selling $100,000 digital houses. No one need live in it just as nobody need to use Bitcoin as a currency. People will just own digital currencies to own them, just as they'd own digital homes. Why live in digital homes? Why use digital currencies? Buy and hold...and hope to sell to a greater fool!

But hey, in the Tulipmania, tulip bulbs went at 10x a skilled craftsman's salary. So who knows, maybe it will go to $500,000. It'd be just as dumb as dumping a year's salary into a tenth of a tulip bulb in the 17th century.

[kfarnan]

Price and value aren't the same thing. the dollar has lost most of it's value. Until, the dollar collapses, it will be accounted for. And No, tulips aren't in limited supply.

[anaconda]

$8325

[anaconda]

$8363

[anaconda]

$8394

[anaconda]

$8400

[anaconda]

$8443

[devil21]

I'm surprised the corrections earlier didn't seem to last that long. The crash after hitting $1200 the first time took 2 years to recover. The dip to $5000 barely slowed the climb.

Why are you surprised? It's obvious the bitcoin markets are running algo'ed side by side with the stock market. None of the bitcoin crowd ever comments on how the CBs can easily buy up the crypto market with printed cash the same way they do with stocks and bonds.

[anaconda]

$8510

[anaconda]

$8600

[TheTexan]

$8600

#bubble

Totally gonna pop soon

And then after it pops it will go to 20000

[anaconda]

$8725

[anaconda]

#bubble

Totally gonna pop soon

And then after it pops it will go to 20000

What's the dip/trough before the sprint to 20000?

[RonPaulIsGreat]

Why are you surprised? It's obvious the bitcoin markets are running algo'ed side by side with the stock market. None of the bitcoin crowd ever comments on how the CBs can easily buy up the crypto market with printed cash the same way they do with stocks and bonds.

Maybe you'll get lucky and they'll start buying gold to!

[anaconda]

$8800

https://www.coinbase.com/charts

[anaconda]

$8902

[TheTexan]

What's the dip/trough before the sprint to 20000?

To 11000 then 7800 then 17000 then 14000 then 20000

u heard it here first

[anaconda]

$9000

[anaconda]

$9080

I saw it jump up $82 in about 3 minutes I think.

[anaconda]

To 11000 then 7800 then 17000 then 14000 then 20000

u heard it here first

I predicted $6000 by Thanksgiving on 8/31/17 when it was around $4800 or something. So a bolder estimate like yours seems good.