Cortopassi wrote:I wonder how this compares to oil and gas used to pull gold out of the ground.
Kriegsspiel wrote:
Now, it's gonna take resources to make money, how does bitcoin compare to gold in the resources it takes to "make" it: bitcoin is about 7x more resource-intensive than gold. That's using an "optimistic" number for the energy requirements of bitcoin. Taken from here. But if a bitcoin is worth $6,800 and an ounce of gold is worth $1,275, maybe you could say that bitcoin is only 1.3x as resource intensive ($673 worth of currency created/barrel of oil vs $910 for gold) using the same numbers?
Cortopassi wrote:I wonder how this compares to oil and gas used to pull gold out of the ground.
Kriegsspiel wrote:
Now, it's gonna take resources to make money, how does bitcoin compare to gold in the resources it takes to "make" it: bitcoin is about 7x more resource-intensive than gold. That's using an "optimistic" number for the energy requirements of bitcoin. Taken from here. But if a bitcoin is worth $6,800 and an ounce of gold is worth $1,275, maybe you could say that bitcoin is only 1.3x as resource intensive ($673 worth of currency created/barrel of oil vs $910 for gold) using the same numbers?
Investors who bought Bitcoin just ahead of Thanksgiving certainly have something to be thankful for. Bitcoin prices breached $11,300 Wednesday for the first time, representing a rise of over $3,100 in a week.
It’s a stunning rise for the cryptocurrency, which only just broke the psychologically important milestone of $10,000 hours earlier
snip
... both Nasdaq and Cantor Fitzgerald are looking to launch bitcoin derivatives.
I am sure some people are making out like bandits. And there's probably still a good amount of time to do it even now.
But a huge number of people are going to be screwed. I will not be one of them.
I liked the offhanded comment on gold here, making it sound bad...
“Bitcoin has no underlying rate of return,” said Bogle at a Council on Foreign Relations event on Tuesday, as reported by Bloomberg. “You know bonds have an interest coupon, stocks have earnings and dividends, gold has nothing. There is nothing to support Bitcoin except the hope that you will sell it to someone for more than you paid for it.”
buddtholomew wrote:There's no reason to sell stocks, EVER.
I sell to rebalance, but of course with stocks going up like this it feels funny.
I have also sold individual stocks this year, but since my total stocks (pp + vp) feel so low (40%?), I swapped them out for some Vanguard Total Stock Market. That's something I don't mind buying "at the top."
eufo wrote:I'm waiting for a muggle to ask me about Bitcoin. That's when I'm calling a top.
I get the Harry Potter reference, but does that mean a non investor?
Yes. I have a few friends that fit this mold and always seem to ask about things right as they've hit their maximum exposure. Not sure why I call them muggles... maybe because I feel like I'm magical? Lol!
Don't agree with me too strongly or I'm going to change my mind
eufo wrote:I'm waiting for a muggle to ask me about Bitcoin. That's when I'm calling a top.
I get the Harry Potter reference, but does that mean a non investor?
Yes. I have a few friends that fit this mold and always seem to ask about things right as they've hit their maximum exposure. Not sure why I call them muggles... maybe because I feel like I'm magical? Lol!
And you call them muggles? Sounds like they actually have a bit of magic in them.
Kriegsspiel wrote:Something I was mulling over. Say you're a internet business who accepts btc. A while ago, something that cost a btc would also cost like, $10. Now...
On May 22, 2010, Laszlo Hanyecz paid a fellow early adopter 10,000 bitcoin to order him two Papa John's pizzas. In those days that was more or less a fair-value exchange. Today 10,000 bitcoin is worth $12.8 million or so, and one bitcoin will buy a few more than two pizzas.
How do businesses respond to massive appreciation in a currency? Did all the businesses reduce their prices, in btc, to match what the prices were in dollars (0.00137 btc/$10 as of now)? What if the btc/$ rate drops, and they're left holding btc? All their expenses are in dollars. The only real advantage is that the business could avoid the transaction fee credit companies impose, and the possibility to evade taxes. Accepting btc seems incredibly risky for businesses, unless I'm missing something.
I assume that they immediately convert received bitcoins to dollars. As you say, their expenses are in dollars. Unless they are choosing to speculate in bitcoins by holding them, in which case that's really a separate "business" from the real one.