China Bans Cryptocurrency Transactions

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gaddyslapper007
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Re: China Bans Cryptocurrency Transactions

Post by gaddyslapper007 » Wed Oct 20, 2021 11:34 am

Nope…..escape velocity is too great at this point. (There will be more battles….but Bitcoin has already won). You just don’t realize it yet. (Spoiler alert - this isn’t a recent win this happened nearly 5 years ago……it takes time for the main populace to realize this and feel comfortable conforming). People are extremely sheepish. The higher the market cap BTC is the safer it is…..it’s science. No science deniers here I’m sure! ;)
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bitcoininthevp
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Re: China Bans Cryptocurrency Transactions

Post by bitcoininthevp » Wed Oct 20, 2021 1:20 pm

gaddyslapper007 wrote:
Wed Oct 20, 2021 11:34 am
Nope…..escape velocity is too great at this point. (There will be more battles….but Bitcoin has already won). You just don’t realize it yet. (Spoiler alert - this isn’t a recent win this happened nearly 5 years ago……it takes time for the main populace to realize this and feel comfortable conforming). People are extremely sheepish. The higher the market cap BTC is the safer it is…..it’s science. No science deniers here I’m sure! ;)
Id recommend staying vigilant. Advocates should continue to fight on all fronts (legal, financial, technical, social). Also, some bad bug could be lurking behind any corner.
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Re: China Bans Cryptocurrency Transactions

Post by Jack Jones » Wed Oct 20, 2021 2:56 pm

I Shrugged wrote:
Wed Oct 20, 2021 11:09 am
Jack Jones wrote:
Wed Oct 20, 2021 8:27 am
Old head, gold bug, sound money advocate, Ron Paul supporter, Larry Lepard discusses gold, bitcoin, and the deflationary utopia that awaits.

https://talesfromthecrypt.libsyn.com/27 ... rry-lepard
I wish podcasts had transcripts available. I am pretty sure I could skim a transcript of this 83 minute podcast in 10 minutes and get the gist of it.

So, why is gold demonetized?
"Paper gold has been created to great excess."

"There is no monetary premium in gold. If it was trading the way it used to in relation to the money supply it would be $10,000 right now. It costs $1000/oz to mine it, so there's not a big premium there."

Seems like he thinks the gold price is manipulated.
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Re: China Bans Cryptocurrency Transactions

Post by Kbg » Wed Oct 20, 2021 11:09 pm

Xan wrote:
Tue Oct 19, 2021 1:34 pm
vincent_c wrote:
Tue Oct 19, 2021 1:33 pm
People can debate forever on how to measure inflation.

Look, I understand what KBG is saying and arguably it is the most practical way to look at it. But the reason inflation is so confusing is because the same word is used to describe so many different things. Sometimes theoretical, sometimes technical, sometimes practical, sometimes subjective.

I agree with KBG if inflation means "making things more expensive to buy in nominal dollars".
I thought the technical definition of inflation was expansion of the money supply. But that might not be the most useful definition.
No Gyro Team...this is exactly the point I've been trying to make with the Japanese example. Here is the definition of inflation (from the Fed...and is a standard economics definition.)

"What is inflation and how does the Federal Reserve evaluate changes in the rate of inflation?

Inflation is the increase in the prices of goods and services over time. Inflation cannot be measured by an increase in the cost of one product or service, or even several products or services. Rather, inflation is a general increase in the overall price level of the goods and services in the economy."

How we get inflation is a bit complex, but what it is isn't complex at all...and a 1000x over, more money does not equal inflation for the reasons I mentioned earlier. Let me try inverting this and maybe that will help.

We live in an economy with a total of $10 of currency and 10lbs of flour. There is nothing else to buy. Now in our simple world half the flour was lost in a fire. Does the price stay the same because the currency remained unchanged...and we all know the answer to this question. It does not. Flour most likely doubled in price with the fire. And now for another example. The Fed prints $10 new dollars and our fire did not occur but it was found to be contaminated with flesh eating cockroaches and no one wants its. Does the flour double in price...we all know the answer to this question as well. No it does not because there is no demand for it.

A basic Econ 101 graph has two lines; one is supply and one is demand. People who think printing money causes inflation (alone) have a single graph with a supply line on it and that's it. Now to be very clear, I'm not saying money supply has no effect because if something gets scarce and there is more money available then the price can be bid up higher than it otherwise might have been...but pretty much my definition, if isolated, those dollars have been spread around so we are talking nominal vs. real...and if one of those dollars came to me then I don't really care. It's just a bigger number.
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Re: China Bans Cryptocurrency Transactions

Post by Kbg » Thu Oct 21, 2021 10:48 am

vincent_c wrote:
Wed Oct 20, 2021 11:48 pm
You're right if we make one key assumption, which is that inflation is defined by the Fed.

I think we were just stating that different people can use that word in different contexts to mean different things.

Now whether the definition by the Fed is the one that is relevant in the context of how we use inflation to normalize the PP, I think we can discuss this. I would agree that if we are normalizing the PP in a US dollar system then the definition of what is real and what is nominal should go by what the Fed defines as inflation.

However, in practice whether I use that as a ruler for how I measure how inflation affects me personally is a different story.
So what exactly is a PP contextual CPI (inflation index)? What are its components, how is it measured, how is it adjusted?

Should I even care if I spend 97% of my life living in the US?

And indeed, macroeconomics is not microeconomics.
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Re: China Bans Cryptocurrency Transactions

Post by Kbg » Thu Oct 21, 2021 1:52 pm

vincent_c wrote:
Thu Oct 21, 2021 12:37 pm
Kbg wrote:
Thu Oct 21, 2021 10:48 am
So what exactly is a PP contextual CPI (inflation index)? What are its components, how is it measured, how is it adjusted?

Should I even care if I spend 97% of my life living in the US?

And indeed, macroeconomics is not microeconomics.
Since 99% of what I want to accumulate are a particular set of assets (the PP assets), I personally view inflation as the scenario where it requires more dollars to accumulate those assets. I would argue that the reason I wish to accumulate these assets is because I believe that it will in the long run provide me and my heirs with the highest probability of acquiring more actual goods and services (an unknown basket at an unknown time in the distant future).

I would further argue that even those who feel inflation in a different way are just unfortunate because although their cost of living may have gone up or down in an uncorrelated way to my accumulation of these assets, in the long run I am confident that the person who thought they felt things getting less expensive in the short run is actually worse off in the long run.
Trying to wrap my head around what you are saying, so if I got it wrong, apologies in advance.

On your first...I think you have it a bit backward. At a fundamental level saving/investing is nothing more the trading current consumption for future consumption. implicit in this statement is you want to use your money for something real and not to just collect it to see larger numbers in your account. Anyway, you WANT your PP (or whatever saving asset(s) you are putting $$$ into) to INCREASE in real terms every single year. This is the benefit received from saving. If they decreased or stayed flat, saving anything was counterproductive or pointless.

On your second, this is closely related to what I just wrote. You are assuming in this statement that you are getting a real return and thus beneficial to you. We who save ARE making that assumption and historically it's pretty close to fact over longer periods of time. However, in the short term it's strictly a function of deflation or inflation...deflation it pays to wait, inflation it pays to buy now.
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Re: China Bans Cryptocurrency Transactions

Post by Xan » Thu Oct 21, 2021 2:00 pm

Kbg wrote:
Thu Oct 21, 2021 1:52 pm
Anyway, you WANT your PP (or whatever saving asset(s) you are putting $$$ into) to INCREASE in real terms every single year. This is the benefit received from saving. If they decreased or stayed flat, saving anything was counterproductive or pointless.
Perhaps a nit, but even if all my savings options had negative real return, I would still be saving. I don't save in order to have my savings increase in value; I save because I don't have the option to do all my consuming right now. I will need to consume later. Even if it costs me something to consume later, I'll pay it, because I plan to eat in the future.

Now perhaps my "savings" could take the form of grain silos or something if financial saving no longer made sense.
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Re: China Bans Cryptocurrency Transactions

Post by Kbg » Thu Oct 21, 2021 2:09 pm

Xan wrote:
Thu Oct 21, 2021 2:00 pm
Kbg wrote:
Thu Oct 21, 2021 1:52 pm
Anyway, you WANT your PP (or whatever saving asset(s) you are putting $$$ into) to INCREASE in real terms every single year. This is the benefit received from saving. If they decreased or stayed flat, saving anything was counterproductive or pointless.
Perhaps a nit, but even if all my savings options had negative real return, I would still be saving. I don't save in order to have my savings increase in value; I save because I don't have the option to do all my consuming right now. I will need to consume later. Even if it costs me something to consume later, I'll pay it, because I plan to eat in the future.

Now perhaps my "savings" could take the form of grain silos or something if financial saving no longer made sense.
Good point...reality now interjects itself and why financial planning is A difficult and B assumption laden. For example, let's assume you had money on hand to buy a house now and knew you were going to lose money on savings in real terms in the future, then it's a no-brainer, buy the house now. Of course, this doesn't work for food you need in 30 years.
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Re: China Bans Cryptocurrency Transactions

Post by bitcoininthevp » Thu Oct 21, 2021 2:59 pm

I like this take:

You hold a monetary asset to defer an investment or consumption decision into the future.

via https://twitter.com/BitcoinIsSaving/sta ... 4593241089

Whole tweet:

A savings product is any kind of asset whose end-use is not consumption or investment. Examples include bitcoin, dollars, gold. You hold a monetary asset to defer an investment or consumption decision into the future.
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