Bitcoin and Crypto Thread

Bitcoin is software - also a network, that is upgraded constantly since its inception. Just like TCP-IP has been updated over time to be more efficient. Nothing has replaced TCP-IP because doing so would mean destroying arguably the most valuable network humanity has ever built, and rebuilding a new one from nothing.
It's interesting that you can simultaneously claim that Bitcoin is a "discovery" that is completely outside of the control of mankind and governments, existing ethereally only as pure math... and then also claim that the Bitcoin network is being constantly upgraded by a core group of developers and miners. It's almost as if you constantly shift the goalposts and talk out of both sides of your mouth in regards to what exactly Bitcoin is and does. The nature of fire and electricity do not change, as they are fundamental properties of the universe. Gold does not change, as it is an element of matter. If Bitcoin is capable of change, it is not immutable, it is not permanent and it is not outside of anyone's control.
The chances of some "better bitcoin" replacing the Bitcoin network are close to 0.
And yet thousands of intelligent, dedicated and well-connected people are currently working tirelessly toward this end. Why? Because they have a very strong financial incentive to do so. The money made in crypto is disproportionately made by the early adopters, and thus people are incentivized to constantly create and hype new crypto projects. This is the entire basis behind shitcoins. And ironically, when Bitcoin maxis encourage governments to get into the crypto space, all they are really doing is accelerating Bitcoin's demise. You got a taste of this very plainly yesterday when Trump signed the EO that explicitly mentioned "digital assets" and not "Bitcoin" by name. No one really cares about Bitcoin except those in the Bitcoin cult. Everyone else just wants to make money, and Bitcoin is just a vehicle for doing so, one that can and will be discarded when it is no longer of use.
Just because you don't value it, doesn't mean it has no value. Everything has the value that humans place on it - water has no value to someone who lives at a lake, but is worth more than its weight in gold to someone in the middle of the Sahara. Get this "intrinsic value" BS out of your head.
The fundamental difference is that water - like other things with intrinsic value - has utility. You can drink it. You can water plants to grow food with. You can swim in it. You can bathe in it. Bitcoin has zero utility besides selling it to someone else for more than you paid for it. If you cannot sell Bitcoin to someone else at a higher price, it is worse than useless.
 
The fundamental difference is that water - like other things with intrinsic value - has utility. You can drink it. You can water plants to grow food with. You can swim in it. You can bathe in it. Bitcoin has zero utility besides selling it to someone else for more than you paid for it. If you cannot sell Bitcoin to someone else at a higher price, it is worse than useless.
Money has utility. It can be used to buy water, plants, and food. Money has more utility than any other good, because it can be traded for any other good.

Money is not a shared delusion or faith…any more than an airplane is based on faith or belief.

You can believe that your car will fly and maybe convince others that it will, but that won’t make it an airplane or capable of flight.

“Belief” in Bitcoin does not make it or allow it to function as money. Believing oranges are money and convincing others that oranges are money, will not allow oranges to perform the same functions of money.

Maybe you don’t believe airplanes are real, or you don’t know how to fly one, but that does not somehow negate the utility of airplanes.
 
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First of all, it's technology. It's software. And technology is in a constant state of flux and improvement.
The USD is also technology, as is seen via its digital aspect (most of it) in SWIFT. It's "worthless" but you play its game and stump for it, another contradiction in your person and logic.
Bitcoin has already been technologically improved upon substantially by other cryptos, and if cryptocurrency actually does manage to stick around as a concept, there is no reason to think that Bitcoin will remain preeminent decades into the future, especially as its mining rewards decrease towards nothingness.
Then why is BTC getting stronger, as opposed to weaker or less adopted over time? This is why it's hard to take you seriously when you point out things that are verifiably irrelevant. According to you, something else has been created that is improved or better. OK, then why aren't people using it? It's a laughable assertion that we all already know is incorrect, according to this thing called reality.
It has no connection whatsoever to the real world, and it never will, because it is utterly useless as an asset.
It has no connection to the real world but the man whose business has the most assets under management in the entire world speaks glowingly about it, and also it had the most successful rollout in ETF history, destroying the gold ETF rollout. Care to address that reality for something supposedly useless? I bet you know more about finance and what people do, or should, invest in than Larry Fink. It's funny, as there are more prominent investors, not just him, that know it's valuable. Yet you tell us otherwise. If I'm nice, I find that weird - one could call it delusional as well.
And in the short term, the more expensive Bitcoin becomes, the less potential there is for future gains.
That's what someone says who has missed out already, and will continue to miss out. I've met tons of friends like this, that also didn't listen to me years ago.
There is a religious element to it, as if they're repeating catechisms and Bible verses in the face of a demon questioning their faith
Money is profoundly moral, that's why. It's not faith. It's pointing out the reality that something you support at least in some ways, fiat, is profoundly immoral and absolutely has the actual demons backing it.
Why the current economic elite, who control most of the assets on the planet, would happily hand them over in exchange for entries on a distributed spreadsheet is never really explained. "It's just inevitable," they say. "All will bend the knee to Bitcoin!"
As above, why are all the biggest investors, nation states and now banks holding BTC? It's literally happening as we write this, which is funny to me that you keep this charade going.
Give it up guys, Scorpion is doing God's work and running circles around your JQ-inspired financial logic.
If he were, I wouldn't have just destroyed his points in this post, something I've done at least 10x before.
It's interesting that you can simultaneously claim that Bitcoin is a "discovery" that is completely outside of the control of mankind and governments, existing ethereally only as pure math... and then also claim that the Bitcoin network is being constantly upgraded by a core group of developers and miners.
If you're a simpleton about what decentralization and consensus is, then you can try pick things out that are specious, like here.
And yet thousands of intelligent, dedicated and well-connected people are currently working tirelessly toward this end. Why? Because they have a very strong financial incentive to do so.
Yes, and they can't dethrone BTC, something you don't point out. Funny, I wonder why?
No one really cares about Bitcoin except those in the Bitcoin cult.
Except all the most successful investors in the entire world. I guess those don't matter to you.
Who is the real cult here?
 
Then why is BTC getting stronger, as opposed to weaker or less adopted over time?

It has no connection to the real world but the man whose business has the most assets under management in the entire world speaks glowingly about it, and also it had the most successful rollout in ETF history, destroying the gold ETF rollout. Care to address that reality for something supposedly useless? I bet you know more about finance and what people do, or should, invest in than Larry Fink. It's funny, as there are more prominent investors, not just him, that know it's valuable.

That's what someone says who has missed out already, and will continue to miss out.

As above, why are all the biggest investors, nation states and now banks holding BTC?

Yes, and they can't dethrone BTC

Except all the most successful investors in the entire world
Anyone else notice that basically all Blade Runner says is variations of, "Oh yeah, well if Bitcoin is bad/fake/gay/doomed to fail then why does the price keep going up, smart guy?" This is despite the fact that none of my criticisms are focused on the current price of Bitcoin. But since Bitcoin is a Ponzi token that only exists to be unloaded in a future bag holder, the price is all that matters to the Bitcoin maxi.

The fact that the line keeps going up is not an argument, since the line cannot continue increasing indefinitely, and indeed has gone down drastically many times in the past. But you're well aware of this fact, and when the next bear market hits you will immediately downplay the current USD price and pivot to the familiar old "1 BTC = 1 BTC" talking point.

It's all so tiresome.
 
Who is the real cult here?

If you have something to say then let's talk about it, don't just be upset because someone has a different opinion than you.

I own bitcoin, not nearly as much as others I know but uniformly for all of them it's the same thing.....just a speculation investment. If I told any of them the things you say about it they would look at me like I have 3 heads and change the subject because they don't want to be rude. So when scorpo says that's all it is then I agree and so does everyone I know that owns any of it in real life. Which is why I said he was dead on.
 
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Money has utility. It can be used to buy water, plants, and food. Money has more utility than any other good, because it can be traded for any other good.

Money is not a shared delusion or faith…any more than an airplane is based on faith or belief.

You can believe that your car will fly and maybe convince others that it will, but that won’t make it an airplane or capable of flight.

“Belief” in Bitcoin does not make it or allow it to function as money. Believing oranges are money and convincing others that oranges are money, will not allow oranges to perform the same functions of money.

Maybe you don’t believe airplanes are real, or you don’t know how to fly one, but that does not somehow negate the utility of airplanes.



I believe.


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Anyone else notice that basically all Blade Runner says is variations of, "Oh yeah, well if Bitcoin is bad/fake/gay/doomed to fail then why does the price keep going up, smart guy?" This is despite the fact that none of my criticisms are focused on the current price of Bitcoin. But since Bitcoin is a Ponzi token that only exists to be unloaded in a future bag holder, the price is all that matters to the Bitcoin maxi.
That's not at all my argument, but it certainly doesn't hurt that price keeps going up. If you read what I have wrote I talk about the realities of the greatest investors and nation states even, increasing in their allocation and supporting the points we've made that talks about BTC as money and an increasingly promising or useful asset. You guys seem to reference all sorts of things that I don't say, but it's curious that you can't/won't say boo about Larry Fink, Paul Tudor Jones, Stan Druckenmiller, etc. Instead I'm supposed to listen to what Francis's friends may or may not say. Ha, ok.
since the line cannot continue increasing indefinitely,
As long as fiat does and we zoom out, yes it can.
If you have something to say then let's talk about it, don't just be upset because someone has a different opinion than you.
I'm not upset at all. You guys (most recently scorpion) used the word delusion, but I pointed out that the denying what the ETFs have done and what Larry Fink say is absolute delusion, especially when the network is expanding and the value of BTC is obviously increasing, and has been. I'm not sure what one is basing "Blade Runner and chance vought are wrong" on, since every single thing we talk about is in reality, correct. The onus is on you guys. We're telling someone that football team X is great, because it continues to win, over and over again. You guys say they suck, but when we say, then why do they keep winning? And you basically say, "because we said so". Who exactly is delusional here? At some point, one has to be honest about performance, no? Who wants to choose investments or other things in life that don't perform? It's bizarro world here sometimes.
So when scorpo says that's all it is then I agree and so does everyone I know that owns any of it in real life.
Here's another type of issue, or one of the issues we have in this exchange on the thread. This isn't an argument.
 
If you read what I have wrote I talk about the realities of the greatest investors and nation states even, increasing in their allocation and supporting the points we've made that talks about BTC as money and an increasingly promising or useful asset. You guys seem to reference all sorts of things that I don't say, but it's curious that you can't/won't say boo about Larry Fink, Paul Tudor Jones, Stan Druckenmiller, etc. Instead I'm supposed to listen to what Francis's friends may or may not say. Ha, ok.
This is also not an argument, and is a clear cut example of the appeal to authority fallacy.
We're telling someone that football team X is great, because it continues to win, over and over again. You guys say they suck, but when we say, then why do they keep winning?
That's not really what you guys are saying, though. You aren't saying that your football team is great and will keep winning. You're saying that your football team is so great they will transcend the game of football entirely, march on Washington, take over the U.S. government and proceed to usher in a golden age of mankind. Meanwhile we're just like, "Whoa there, I thought we were talking about football?"
At some point, one has to be honest about performance, no? Who wants to choose investments or other things in life that don't perform?
It will perform well until it doesn't. If Bitcoin hadn't suffered several precipitous crashes already in its short history, this would be a more compelling argument. The more popular Bitcoin becomes, the more scrutiny it receives, and the more calamitous the downstream effects of its inevitable crashes and bear markets. People who trade Bitcoin wisely or who have managed to HODL for long periods have indeed made gains with it (well played to them). But the average guy who inevitably FOMOs in during the bull markets always ends up wrecked, and after being burned badly will usually have no more interest in playing the Bitcoin game.

The reality is that most people have no interest in buying or owning Bitcoin. You aren't early. Bitcoin is mature at this point, and there is no realistic long term prospect for millions of future investors to start pouring in and buying six-figure Bitcoin. This is why the maxis have pivoted and now try to make the case that governments and large corporations should be buying Bitcoin. They already lost the investing public, the vast majority of whom view Bitcoin as either far too risky or as simply a scam. So now the game is trying to bypass the public completely and lobby politicians to spend taxpayer money to pump Bitcoin, and convincing shyster CEOs to load up their companies with debt to purchase Bitcoin for... reasons that no one can quite explain.

This is very obviously not going to end well. The public is not going to go along with this plan. It's basically impossible to defend spending government money on Bitcoin or other crypto, and any politician or party who wants to die on that massively unpopular hill will simply be handing their rivals a huge cudgel with which to bludgeon them into electoral oblivion.
 
That's not at all my argument, but it certainly doesn't hurt that price keeps going up. If you read what I have wrote I talk about the realities of the greatest investors and nation states even, increasing in their allocation and supporting the points we've made that talks about BTC as money and an increasingly promising or useful asset. You guys seem to reference all sorts of things that I don't say, but it's curious that you can't/won't say boo about Larry Fink, Paul Tudor Jones, Stan Druckenmiller, etc. Instead I'm supposed to listen to what Francis's friends may or may not say. Ha, ok.

As long as fiat does and we zoom out, yes it can.

I'm not upset at all. You guys (most recently scorpion) used the word delusion, but I pointed out that the denying what the ETFs have done and what Larry Fink say is absolute delusion, especially when the network is expanding and the value of BTC is obviously increasing, and has been. I'm not sure what one is basing "Blade Runner and chance vought are wrong" on, since every single thing we talk about is in reality, correct. The onus is on you guys. We're telling someone that football team X is great, because it continues to win, over and over again. You guys say they suck, but when we say, then why do they keep winning? And you basically say, "because we said so". Who exactly is delusional here? At some point, one has to be honest about performance, no? Who wants to choose investments or other things in life that don't perform? It's bizarro world here sometimes.

Here's another type of issue, or one of the issues we have in this exchange on the thread. This isn't an argument.

Let me give you a piece of advice one man to another, disagreeing with someone is fine, having a different opinion is fine, even insulting someone okay whatever sometimes we as men are passionate about that they believe.

But to act like you're more intelligent or better than someone simply because they have a different opinion than you is cause for automatic dismissal even if you agree with them and someone you just can't deal with business wise and personally. I don't think you're a bad guy but from what I've read you're very young, this is something you will learn. It's also why you didn't understand why you received a ban for your behavior.
 
They already lost the investing public, the vast majority of whom view Bitcoin as either far too risky or as simply a scam. So now the game is trying to bypass the public completely and lobby politicians to spend taxpayer money to pump Bitcoin, and convincing shyster CEOs to load up their companies with debt to purchase Bitcoin for... reasons that no one can quite explain.
The problem is this doesn't align with the facts:


About 18% of GenZers own stocks and 20% own cryptocurrency, according to the 2024 Policygenius Financial Planning Survey released on Tuesday. For reference, 33% of Boomers own stocks and just 5% own crypto.

The up and coming younger generation (people aged 18 - 35) increasingly (over time) prefer crypto over stocks and real estate. Just as at some point last century you saw a handover from bonds being the dominant investment to stocks becoming the dominant investment and that changed with the newer generations loading up on stocks. This time you are seeing a similar shift towards crypto (including bitcoin).

You have to remember that many people who are 18 - 30 today grew up paying with fiat (e.g. U.S. dollars) to acquire digital tokens or digital items in video games (roblox bucks, mincecraft currency, World of Warcraft gold, League of Legends Riot Points, etc) so for these people buying Bitcoin or Ethereum, etc really isn't such a stretch.

Also no matter how much we all point it out to him Scorpion keeps acting like the only people using Bitcoin (and crypto in general) are speculators and drug dealers. Yes those are se cases of crypto but there are many other use cases also.

For example in Argentina millions of ordinary people use U.S. dollar stable coins to circumvent the capital controls, currency controls and banking restrictions on U.S. dollars (nobody wants to hold onto Argentinian pesos). And in countries like Iran, Russia and Venezuela people use Bitcoin for remittance payments and to settle international transactions, etc. Somebody who wants to expatriate to another country and move 6 figure sums without dealing with all the banking regulations (and fees) can just buy bitcoin stick it on a hard wallet and board their flight to the new country. People fleeing their country during times of war might face problems transporting 6 figure sums of physical cash or gold bullion across the border but they can easily transit that Bitcoin (or other crypto) across the border.

Even within the same country (Australia) if I want to send somebody $1 million dollars in fiat due to transaction limits I would have to go to a bank branch fill out paperwork and then wait hours (or possibly a day) for it to settle and pay a wire transfer fee (around $20 U.S dollars) or I could send somebody a million dollars of Bitcoin and pay a few dollars in gas fees and they would receive it probably 10 minutes later. And there would be no paperwork.

Not to mention that currently there are already bonds and other real world assets that have been tokenized onto crypto networks such as Ethereum. I mean isn't it revolutionary if in the future all stocks, bonds, etc will trade 24/7 in a decentralized manner (by being tokenized onto crypto)? That is a huge upgrade in terms of liquidity and convenience. Not to mention settlement will only take minutes instead of days. In most countries currently stocks trade on a T +2 settlement system meaning it essentially takes 3 days to settle the transaction which is extremely archaic.

Also in terms of decentralized finance crypto is also a revolution. You can post your Bitcoin or Ethereum, etc on defi networks as collateral and almost instantly be able to borrow fiat against it. How many weeks (and not to mention paperwork and fees) would it take you to remortgage you house to get additional cash? It typical takes 4 weeks or longer for the whole process from application to approval to settlement. Hardly convenient. Also crypto allows peer to peer lending and borrowing thus eliminating the margin of middlemen like banks. Also there are betting markets (such as Polymarket) that are peer to peer cutting out the middleman (bookmaking companies).

Also smart contracts such as Ehtereum can be used to settle real estate transactions, etc again cutting out a lot of middle men and making transactions cheaper and faster. Obviously its still in the early innings but within another 10 years it will be commonplace for real estate and car and boat purchases etc to be settled using smart contracts.

At this point in the race Bitcoin is winning in the field of crpyto in terms of store of value and money but other cryptos may end up winning in other niches (betting, decentralized finance, NFTs, tokenization of real world assets, smart contracts, etc). Or it could also happen that all the other stuff ends up migrating to Bitcoin operating on layer 2s over Bitcoin. Its always hard to predict the future.

Even for example payroll could be overhauled in the future and payroll departments could be much smaller with smart contracts paying employees daily and with fast settlement (instead of the standard 1 - 2 business days for traditional banking) because its crypto.

Are you somehow not seeing that the banking system (and by extension fiat which is joined at the hip to the banking system) is a bloated dinosaur ripe for disruption/extinction?

If at some point in the future Bitcoin adoption and network effect start going into reverse etc then it can be questioned but for now it seems to be winning the race for becoming the king of store of value and money. If that changes in the future then I can reconsider allocating to a different asset. But just as with stocks if you buy a winning company and it keeps winning (increasing its sales and profits and market share) then you keep holding it and if it starts getting leapfrogged by competitors then you look at selling. No need to be dogmatic. Currently Bitcoin transaction levels and the number of wallet addresses continue to grow at a good rate so no reason to jump ship yet. Network effect is an important component of what gives money its value. Network effect is also what gives things on the internet their value. Zillow is valuable to sellers of houses because they know a lot of buyers are looking at the listings and its valuable to buyers because it has a lot of listings. People download Whatsapp and Telegram because they know a lot of their friends and family are likely to have it, etc. Its the same with Bitcoin people want it because they know other people will want Bitcoin and thus it will be liquid to transact in, etc.
 
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About 18% of GenZers own stocks and 20% own cryptocurrency, according to the 2024 Policygenius Financial Planning Survey released on Tuesday. For reference, 33% of Boomers own stocks and just 5% own crypto.

The up and coming younger generation (people aged 18 - 35) increasingly (over time) prefer crypto over stocks and real estate. Just as at some point last century you saw a handover from bonds being the dominant investment to stocks becoming the dominant investment and that changed with the newer generations loading up on stocks. This time you are seeing a similar shift towards crypto (including bitcoin).
Zoomers are still young and most of them don't even have established careers yet, so they haven't opened up 401ks or other investment accounts. It's a lower barrier to entry to get involved with crypto. You will see those numbers diverge over the next 5-10 years as Zoomers grow up and start buying stocks and most of them get rug pulled on their crypto "investments" one too many times.
Also no matter how much we all point it out to him Scorpion keeps acting like the only people using Bitcoin (and crypto in general) are speculators and drug dealers. Yes those are se cases of crypto but there are many other use cases also.

For example in Argentina millions of ordinary people use U.S. dollar stable coins to circumvent the capital controls, currency controls and banking restrictions on U.S. dollars (nobody wants to hold onto Argentinian pesos). And in countries like Iran, Russia and Venezuela people use Bitcoin for remittance payments and to settle international transactions, etc. Somebody who wants to expatriate to another country and move 6 figure sums without dealing with all the banking regulations (and fees) can just buy bitcoin stick it on a hard wallet and board their flight to the new country. People fleeing their country during times of war might face problems transporting 6 figure sums of physical cash or gold bullion across the border but they can easily transit that Bitcoin (or other crypto) across the border.
These are extreme edge cases, but sure, I can see the use of crypto for these people. But crypto having a small use case is a far cry from, "Bitcoin will replace the USD and become the bedrock of the new financial and banking system."
Even within the same country (Australia) if I want to send somebody $1 million dollars in fiat due to transaction limits I would have to go to a bank branch fill out paperwork and then wait hours (or possibly a day) for it to settle and pay a wire transfer fee (around $20 U.S dollars) or I could send somebody a million dollars of Bitcoin and pay a few dollars in gas fees and they would receive it probably 10 minutes later. And there would be no paperwork.
You seem completely oblivious to the fact that there are good reasons to introduce these bottlenecks and hurdles in the banking system, and that maximum efficiency is not the most important consideration in banking and finance. Security, accuracy and privacy are much more important than transaction speed (especially for large account values), as is having safeguards against money laundering and other criminal activity.
I mean isn't it revolutionary if in the future all stocks, bonds, etc will trade 24/7 in a decentralized manner (by being tokenized onto crypto)? That is a huge upgrade in terms of liquidity and convenience. Not to mention settlement will only take minutes instead of days. In most countries currently stocks trade on a T +2 settlement system meaning it essentially takes 3 days to settle the transaction which is extremely archaic.
And yet somehow the world has managed to get along just fine with such archaic inconveniences. As I said above, faster and decentralized is not necessarily better than slower and centralized when it comes to banking.
Also in terms of decentralized finance crypto is also a revolution. You can post your Bitcoin or Ethereum, etc on defi networks as collateral and almost instantly be able to borrow fiat against it. How many weeks (and not to mention paperwork and fees) would it take you to remortgage you house to get additional cash? It typical takes 4 weeks or longer for the whole process from application to approval to settlement. Hardly convenient. Also crypto allows peer to peer lending and borrowing thus eliminating the margin of middlemen like banks. Also there are betting markets (such as Polymarket) that are peer to peer cutting out the middleman (bookmaking companies).
Oh great, that's exactly what the world needs: more ways to borrow and gamble. But to be fair, gambling is literally the only realistic long term application of crypto, so it is indeed something of a use case, albeit a socially negative one.
Obviously its still in the early innings but within another 10 years it will be commonplace for real estate and car and boat purchases etc to be settled using smart contracts.
Definitely calling bullshit on this. No one with half a brain is going to make major asset purchases utilizing an immutable blockchain with zero fraud protection. Keep dreaming.
Even for example payroll could be overhauled in the future and payroll departments could be much smaller with smart contracts paying employees daily and with fast settlement (instead of the standard 1 - 2 business days for traditional banking) because its crypto.
Payroll and other white collar jobs are much more likely to be overhauled by AI than anything to do with crypto. Only a vanishingly small number of people (aka morons) would elect to be paid in crypto rather than the currency they pay their taxes and rent with. This is another fantasy use case.
Are you somehow not seeing that the banking system (and by extension fiat which is joined at the hip to the banking system) is a bloated dinosaur ripe for disruption/extinction?
Easier said than done. The banking system evolved over centuries and will not be replaced overnight, despite its flaws. For whatever advantages crypto possesses, it also has its own drawbacks, with the difference being that those weaknesses are only just beginning to be exploited and understood. And many of them are inherent to the technology itself (i.e. an immutable blockchain with irreversible transactions, zero fraud protection and a public ledger offering no privacy) and cannot realistically be addressed.
If at some point in the future Bitcoin adoption and network effect start going into reverse etc then it can be questioned but for now it seems to be winning the race for becoming the king of store of value and money. If that changes in the future then I can reconsider allocating to a different asset. But just as with stocks if you buy a winning company and it keeps winning (increasing its sales and profits and market share) then you keep holding it and if it starts getting leapfrogged by competitors then you look at selling. No need to be dogmatic.
I've never faulted anyone for trading Bitcoin or other cryptos, my criticism has always been of the idea that they have a long term future, and I'm particularly critical of the idea that Bitcoin will in any way replace the USD.
Currently Bitcoin transaction levels and the number of wallet addresses continue to grow at a good rate so no reason to jump ship yet.
From what I understand this is not actually true and those numbers peaked in either the 2017 or 2021 bull market. But I could be wrong about that.
 
You aren't early. Bitcoin is mature at this point, and there is no realistic long term prospect for millions of future investors to start pouring in and buying six-figure Bitcoin.
Posting this for future reference. So when it goes to new ATH again and again, what will you say then? I keep wondering, and I do ask occasionally, when will you finally admit it?
But to act like you're more intelligent or better than someone simply because they have a different opinion than you is cause for automatic dismissal even
I never said I was either more intelligent or better than anyone. The arguments I put forth are of course better and more intelligent, or I wouldn't hold to them. Of course, anyone reading can decide for himself.

Francis, this is the internet. Don't be silly and act as though I walk around looking to pick fights and "burn" people without social awareness. Butthurt people on the internet always say these kinds of things, as if the benefit of the internet isn't precisely that - truth at all costs.
It's also why you didn't understand why you received a ban for your behavior.
I understood perfectly why I was suspended, and it doesn't have anything to do with the fact that I was behaving badly. It has to do with the fact that you and scorpion don't like someone who posts firmly about your consistent claims being unsupported by reality.

By the way, you're probably older than I am, but I'm not "young" in the way you are suggesting, certainly.
The up and coming younger generation (people aged 18 - 35) increasingly (over time) prefer crypto over stocks and real estate.
And he didn't even mention gold, lol
If at some point in the future Bitcoin adoption and network effect start going into reverse etc then it can be questioned but for now it seems to be winning the race for becoming the king of store of value and money. If that changes in the future then I can reconsider allocating to a different asset. But just as with stocks if you buy a winning company and it keeps winning (increasing its sales and profits and market share) then you keep holding it and if it starts getting leapfrogged by competitors then you look at selling. No need to be dogmatic. Currently Bitcoin transaction levels and the number of wallet addresses continue to grow at a good rate so no reason to jump ship yet. Network effect is an important component of what gives money its value. Network effect is also what gives things on the internet their value. Zillow is valuable to sellers of houses because they know a lot of buyers are looking at the listings and its valuable to buyers because it has a lot of listings. People download Whatsapp and Telegram because they know a lot of their friends and family are likely to have it, etc. Its the same with Bitcoin people want it because they know other people will want Bitcoin and thus it will be liquid to transact in, etc.
This is the point I've been trying to impress over and over since it's obvious and literally reality. We who are shining BTC don't have anything to prove, it keeps getting better and better with time. The onus isn't on us. That's what's so weird about the back and forth here.
Easier said than done. The banking system evolved over centuries and will not be replaced overnight, despite its flaws. For whatever advantages crypto possesses, it also has its own drawbacks, with the difference being that those weaknesses are only just beginning to be exploited and understood. And many of them are inherent to the technology itself (i.e. an immutable blockchain with irreversible transactions, zero fraud protection and a public ledger offering no privacy) and cannot realistically be addressed.
It's already more secure and faster.
 
You seem completely oblivious to the fact that there are good reasons to introduce these bottlenecks and hurdles in the banking system, and that maximum efficiency is not the most important consideration in banking and finance. Security, accuracy and privacy are much more important than transaction speed (especially for large account values), as is having safeguards against money laundering and other criminal activity.
Good reasons according to who? The government that wants to control everybody? The reality is that organized crime has plenty of ways to circumvent the system currently. All its doing is reducing the freedom of innocent people. It would be like in the U.S.A. if they made guns illegal to own. All that would happen is that criminals would still owns guns illegally but innocent citizens would not be able to defend themselves.

Crypto is arguably more secure and accurate than fiat and in terms of privacy there are coins like Monero and Zcash and tumblers and various other mechanisms to make it more private than fiat if that is what you wish. You are merely asserting without proof that fiat is more secure and accurate than crypto.

Oh great, that's exactly what the world needs: more ways to borrow and gamble. But to be fair, gambling is literally the only realistic long term application of crypto, so it is indeed something of a use case, albeit a socially negative one.
Again gambling is just one use case. You can post your Bitcoin or Ethereum as collateral and then borrow against it to buy a car, a house or a business etc. You do not have to use the borrowed money to buy more crypto.

Payroll and other white collar jobs are much more likely to be overhauled by AI than anything to do with crypto. Only a vanishingly small number of people (aka morons) would elect to be paid in crypto rather than the currency they pay their taxes and rent with. This is another fantasy use case.
I think a lot of this is to do with the tax laws. If certain crypto currencies become tax free to transact in then more people will for example accept Bitcoin or Ethereum as payment, especially wealthier people who are not living paycheck to paycheck. At the very least a lot of people would gladly accept U.S. dollar stablecoins (which offer higher interest rates when lent out compared to traditional savings accounts by the way) as payment once the infrastructure is more widely rolled out.


And yet somehow the world has managed to get along just fine with such archaic inconveniences. As I said above, faster and decentralized is not necessarily better than slower and centralized when it comes to banking.
The system as it currently stands is just plain idiotic and infuriating. In Australia for example if you own a portfolio of individual stocks you for example you may have logins and accounts with say 4 or 5 share registries and have to fill in forms with all of them. Every time you add a new shares you may have to add banking details (for receiving dividends), and other information. Then on top of this you may have accounts with multiple brokers (because different brokers can have different advantages). Not to mention many of the brokers owned by banks push you into opening bank accounts with them by penalizing you with higher brokerage rates if you don't use their affiliated bank accounts. Now you have additional bank accounts.

And I am not even going to talk about the inconveniences of tax reporting under the current system of equities.

And like I said waiting up to three days for settlement of your share transactions is absurd in this day and age as is the ability to only make a trade during business hours. And a minimum one month period to settle the purchase or sale of a property is also absurd (and the bureaucracy and paperwork nightmare associated with it).

Also the amount of third world countries that have troubles with their property title deeds system and where disputes over property ownership frequently occur is mind boggling. Having these property title deeds on the blockchain and settled by smart contracts would resolve a lot of these issues as the ownership of the property would be indisputable.

People also managed to survive using only paper mail before email was invented. What you are saying is a non-argument. Obviously if something better comes along people will eventually start using it..

All centralization does is give governments and large corporations more control and power over you as an indivudal.

Besides from a systems theory perspective systems that are decentralised are more resistant to exogenous shocks than highly centralised systems are.
Easier said than done. The banking system evolved over centuries and will not be replaced overnight, despite its flaws. For whatever advantages crypto possesses, it also has its own drawbacks, with the difference being that those weaknesses are only just beginning to be exploited and understood. And many of them are inherent to the technology itself (i.e. an immutable blockchain with irreversible transactions, zero fraud protection and a public ledger offering no privacy) and cannot realistically be addressed.
Realistically the banking system doesn't provide all that much fraud protection as it currently stands nor are the transactions reversible in many cases. Many times people send money to scammers and the scammer then withdraws cash from ATMs then disappears or wires the money offshore then its gone forever and the victim never gets their money back. Besides just as credit card companies provide charge backs, fraud protection etc in the crypto ecosystem layer 2 solutions such as lightening network and other mechanisms could eventually offer comparable protection but you still have the option of complete decentralization and immutability by interacting on the base layer if you wish. Crypto at least gives you the choice.

With fiat the only option that gives you decentralization, privacy and complete immutability is physical cash and that can only really be used in physical transactions. No good if you are buying stuff on the internet, etc.

Definitely calling bullshit on this. No one with half a brain is going to make major asset purchases utilizing an immutable blockchain with zero fraud protection. Keep dreaming.
You do realize there are already millions of dollars of t-bills, gold, US dollars, etc tokenized onto Ethereum using smart contracts? So you think Larry Fink is just talking nonsense when he says eventually trillions of dollars of real world assets will be tokenised onto crypto blockchains?

 
From what I understand this is not actually true and those numbers peaked in either the 2017 or 2021 bull market. But I could be wrong about that.
Not true. Obviously during bear markets the figures might dip but the longer term upward trend of increased adoption is still intact for now.

If you are instead referring to percentage growth rates like anything else the the law of large numbers applies and the larger the base number gets the harder it is to maintain the same percentage growth rate but naturally that applies to everything not just crypto.


And mind you that is 13% crypto user growth in 2024 under a hostile regulatory regime. Under the new pro crypto regulatory regime (the U.S. will provide direction and leaderhsip to the rest of the world) crypto user growth should accelerate. No reason with pro crypto regulations worldwide we can't see 15 - 20% compound growth rates in crypto user numbers over the next 10 years.
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Australia Sucks, you seem to have been captured by an extremist libertarian ideology that doesn't allow for governments and large institutions to play any positive role in society whatsoever. This is the sort of binary thinking that sounds good in theory (especially to idealists such as yourself, Blade Runner and chance vought) but which never seems to work out in practice. Idealism and the utopian ideologies that emerge therefrom always fail to account for the moral and ethical shortcomings of human beings that inevitably throw wrenches into the workings of even the most carefully designed system.

The reality is that libertarianism is just as a flawed a societal model as communism on a practical level. It simply doesn't work at scale, and to the degree that it does work, hybrid systems simply work better and will always outcompete it, because they put practical considerations ahead of ideological ones. In other words, they are more concerned with what works best in practice rather than what sounds the most pleasing and elegant on paper. Until you recognize this fact you will continue to spout foolishness about how governments and financial institutions should have no role to play in the banking system, arguments which - despite your obvious intelligence - betray a youthful lack of wisdom and experience in the real world.
 
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