$10,000+ Bitcoin: How might it get there?
In a recent article, UBS mentioned
The relatively high volume of cryptocurrency turnover, against limited real-world use, suggests that many buyers are seeking speculative gain, never intending to use cryptocurrencies to make a real-world transaction.After doing some digging, I realized that most proponents of the 'Bitcoin Bubble' have one key argument - there is no intrinsic use for Bitcoin.....but is there?
Goldman Sachs recently compared Bitcoin to Gold on characteristics such as Durability, Portability, Intrinsic value and Unit of Account and found that Bitcoin beats Gold on 1 key aspect - Portability. Note that there is a finite amount of Bitcoin that can theoretically be mined.
What do you monkeys think might Bitcoins be used for based on its intrinsic properties? Can it be a special currency for daily intra-bank settlements to meet regulatory ratios? Or can it be a medium for cheap cross-border payments? There are many possibilities for its use and if one of them really come to fruition......$10,000+ Bitcoins might be possible.
The key to bitcoins worth is the fact that there's a finite amount of them. Right now, the total market capitalization of bitcoin is around $70 billion. However, the total value of all liquid assets is roughly $100 trillion. So you could think about bitcoins growth trajectory as really contingent on how much of that it $100 trillion that it (bitcoin specifically, not the blockchain technology itself) will take up in the future. Long term, I don't think a $100k bitcoin or even a $1M bitcoin is potentially that unreasonable; it all goes back to what the supply and demand is.
I agree! The demand for Bitcoins now however is mostly for speculation, that's why there's so much talk about it being a bubble. People do not agree on/know the intrinsic use of Bitcoins.
What do you think might drive demand for Bitcoins besides speculation?
Probably just greater awareness (which is driven by speculation) as more and people realize what blockchain technology is and how it works. Nowadays, I feel that bitcoin is more widely viewed as an actual investment rather than just risky speculation.
An increased amount of people using the currency ..... as a currency.
The same holds true for pretty much any other crypto currency out there, though. As far as I'm concerned, there's a potentially infinite amount of cryptos out there which renders them close to worthless. Guess the market hasn't understood yet that bitcoin is actually infinite; it just goes under different names and, occasionally, specs.
That's what's amazing about all of this. An asset with no intrinsic value, backed by nothing, with high transaction costs, and theoretically as ubiquitous as grains of sand is, proverbial pound for proverbial pound, one of the most valuable assets on Earth. It defies reason. And I want, want, want them!!!
You need to dig deeper behind how and why the forks are done to better understand that not all are created equal, and therefore not in infinite supply. There is great dispute on how the tech should be modified so it can be scaled up and to improve performance.
Think of each forked coin like a company. They all have their own developers supporting them, and also the community support can be very split among them. You wouldn't invest in a company with a shitty team, or shady marketing tactics, or no traction among users/consumers, or all of the above combined. Same goes here for deciding which coins will be successful in the long run.
Look up and follow analysts, traders, developers, and various crpytocurrency founders on Twitter and you will quickly see how split the community can be over forks of bitcoin.
Stocks, for example, have value because of the interest in a company that, at least theoretically, at some point in the future, can/may pay out dividends. I would argue that cryptocurrencies have no underlying intrinsic value, unlike virtually every other asset conceivable, and thus their value is entirely artificial.
I'm challenging you, in a friendly way, to respond to the following assertions and convince me that cryptocurrencies are a legitimate asset and not just 21st century Tulipmania (although, I have always said that timing is everything--even if you don't believe in a stock (Tesla, for example), when you buy and sell is the key, not the underlying fundamentals). I'm seriously open-minded (as in, willing to change my position) and would value a counter-perspective.
Because cryptocurrencies have such volatile value fluctuations they are useless for contracts (which is the primary benefit of real currency, such as the USD--you can be reasonably sure of the approximate future buying power of the currency, unlike Bitcoin where a contract with future delivery is essentially pointless);
Because cryptocurrencies have such large transaction costs they are of little value for buying and selling, relative to their "government" peers;
Because cryptocurrencies have such high transaction costs and long time delays (3-5 business days) for executing the transactions, they are weirdly illiquid investments relative to other financial assets;
The currency platforms are decentralized, unsecured, widely hacked, and with no ability to insure in case of loss of digital access to your currency, unlike virtually any traditional financial investment;
https://www.wired.com/story/i-forgot-my-pin-an-epic-tale-of-losing-doll…
https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg23631503-300-bitcoin-what-a-wast…
In other words, cryptocurrencies produce...literally nothing of value, not even in theory. Like I said, that doesn't mean Bitcoin isn't an amazing investment (I would use the word "speculation") today; it just means that if there is no intrinsic value of the asset then at some point (whether that's 1 year or 1,000 years) the chickens will come home to roost when the "market"--eventually--recognizes that the cryptocurrencies have literally no intrinsic value.
Fuck me, I typed out a really long response, and it has vanished. AndyLouis it posted and then when I reloaded the page it was gone. Any way to recover it? If so please PM it to me.
I think the problem is that you're generalizing the flaws of Bitcoin, to all crypto currencies. Look at coins like Litecoin, Vertcoin, NAV: they all have very low transaction costs, only a few cents, and are a lot faster than Bitcoin, usually from a few seconds to a couple minutes. Omise GO, for example, can log roughly 1 million transactions per second, whereas Visa, by contrast, can do roughly 2000 per second. This makes many crypto currencies great and efficient for everyday buying and selling.
Secondly, the currency platform's decentralization provides protection, because no third party can ever shut it down. There are many news stories of people having their currencies hacked when it's kept on unreliable exchanges, but there are no stories, and it's not possible, to have your crypto currency hacked if you keep it on a hardware wallet, like a Ledger Nano S for instance. Further, even a software wallet provides very strong protection. The majority of people who have been hacked haven't been following protocol: keep your coins in a wallet, ideally an offline hard wallet.
Your argument that crypto currencies produce nothing of value just isn't true. Look at current payment processors, and how they have ridiculous delays, high fees, and oftentimes abuses of power -- PayPal comes to mind -- and then look at coins like Vertcoin, Litecoin, and DASH, which provide an innovative solution. This is the intrinsic value, the fact that many crypto currencies are, if not a great store of value, then an improvement to existing payment processors.
Further, look at how block chain technology is being used in cryptos to more directly create value. MOD has created hardware that tracks the temperature of medicines, and then reports this info through a block chain, without the need for employees or expensive refrigerated trucks, and this will save the pharmaceutical industry hundreds of millions per year. The tech works, and has been tested by esteemed universities, and they have 41 partnerships lined up. This token, similar to a security, is paying out dividends at some point in the future, after they break even, and this gives MOD value. Then look at WaltonChain, which is working on literally revolutionizing the RFID space, automating retail stores through chips that detract from your coin balance when you walk out, and doing away with employees, putting an end to counterfeit items, and ensuring efficiency in the supply chain space. This is real value being produced.
To start, if you don't like the idea of a peer-to-peer decentralized global currency, then no one is going to convince you otherwise. To better understand the tech, read Bitcoin inventor Satoshi Nakamoto's 2008 white paper. It's not long, and everyone should read it even if you don't understand every detail. This is where it all started.
SmartThinker made great points that I also expressed in my previous write-up that disappeared, so I will be brief in my response. I'm always happy to discuss each further:
Agreed, but these are growing pains. Less than half a percent of the global population has adopted cryptocurrencies, the same rate that email was adopted in 1994. We have a long way to go in terms of adoption before volatility subsides.
Not all cryptocurrencies have large fees. Bitcoin should not be used for transactions, and anyone who knows what they are doing doesn't often use Bitcoin to move values of digital currency. Look at the coins SmartThinker mentions, he took the words out of my mouth.
Simply incorrect. The longest Bitcoin has taken me to move was a few hours, and that was during times of high congestion. Lightning Network is supposedly coming before the end of this year which will make tx times very fast.
Also not true. That I know of no blockchain, or private key to a wallet has ever been hacked. Private keys have been stolen from their locations on computers, but that is a local security problem, not a tech problem. Same with exchanges. Read posts in this thread between Praesto and myself where we talk about security. Hacks of personal computers and attacks on exchanges are going to happen, but blockchain tech itself is not hackable.
By it's very structure, it does not need to be insured, and that is a major part of the point. Read Satoshi's white paper I linked to above. Edit: I just came across this article describing an insurance for holdings on an exchange. I'm sure this concept will grow as adoption grows: https://bitcoinmagazine.com/articles/umbrella-cryptocurrency-insurance-…
It seems like you might have done very limited research. Bitcoin transactions are very expensive and slow, economically not worth it.
Just google search 'cost of bitcoin transaction' or any variation you would like. Also for it to be fully mined takes a very long time as opposed to a debit/credit card system.
It's also important to realize humans don't shit gold and there's a finite amount of gold too. The argument that bitcoins are finite is crap because it can be broken down into satoshis, which one could argue makes it no more finite than water or gold. In other words, 1 Bitcoin could be 1 ton of Gold where as .00001 bitcoin could be 10 pounds of gold.
I think that people are investing in BTC for 3 main reasons, in order of importance: 1. Return potential -- this is a self-feeding cycle, whether based on speculation, limited quantity, or whatever else. Mostly I think it's driven by momentum and spreading adoption, essentially a self-fulfilling prophecy.
2. Store of value (vs gold and other traditional vehicles, but potentially with greater upside). This is a close 2nd. 3. It's different enough to be interesting, yet not so different to be completely foreign and crazy. Basically, the more people recognize what it is and the more they see others invest, the more they will allocate some small portion of their portfolios just for exposure.
Are we in a bubble? Possibly. The truth is no one knows, and people are willing to take the risk of marginal exposure. The more people are willing to do this, the stronger the demand, the higher the adoption rate, the better the recognition, and so it goes. Personally, I think this is different from events like the tulip mania because people aren't (at least from my conversations in the industry) generally taking on huge exposures.
Is this not the definition of a mania? #1 driver of investment is return potential?
I think Japan 's adoption of Bitcoin is a good precursor to what is to come in the future overall of the cryptocurrency/blockchain market.
Another thing to consider is Bitcoin is 55% of the (as of this writing) approximately $170B market cap made of 1100+ cryptos, which is attracting the attention of highly speculative investors looking for the next Google, Oracle, etc. based on altcoin blockchain tech, and traders just looking for a quick flip. You usually need to buy into those opportunities trading fiat for Bitcoin or Ethereum. So this is also driving up the price along with speculative buyers sticking to just Bitcoin.
Worst case, and very likely scenario is the altcoin bubble deflates at the same time speculative interest in Bitcoin dies, causing the value to absolutely tank. The two move together most of the time, and we've already experienced tens of billions in valuation fluctuate in as short as a weeks time. Extreme volatility. However, I don't think we are close to the time of a full-on crash yet as the dotcom bubble was a $1.7 trillion market and we aren't yet at $200B. Blockchain use reaches past what the dotcom era provided.
We might be nearing the top of the 5th wave of an Elliot Wave pattern, so there could be a healthy retrace coming. Regardless, 10k Bitcoin will happen before 2018. Volatility will begin to subside when it reaches 100k.
Are you all in on Bitcoin? I don't speculate the value of bitcoin much but 10K by year end is a pretty good return. Wondering how strongly ti believe that with your portfolio?
Pretty much. I've netted more returns in the past 5 months I've been buying and trading altcoins/bitcoin than I did holding stocks the past 5 years, and I'm a shitty trader. The volatility swings can make you sweat a bit, but once you go through the first few it's not so bad.
If BTC had no intrinsic value, then what does that make government-issued fiat currency? Or Gold? What a ridiculous statement for someone to make.
Alts markets have been interesting but somehow I've still made more in my equities portfolio...
BTC isn't going anywhere, it has seniority at this point.
I'm glad you brought up seniority, if you look at it from a medium of exchange POV, government-issued fiat currency or gold have the seniority over BTC. Just to add, their intrinsic value lies in it's universal adoption as a medium of transaction. If BTC can achieve that, sure we can say that it then has intrinsic value, but as of now, it is still far from it.
Sure, but to be honest I have a more pessimistic view than most (although, of course, given that it’s my view, I think it’s the correct one) regarding the long-term stability and viability of many current national governments and their currencies. As far as I can tell, it’s not as much a question of “if” as it is “when” - gold I don’t discount, but....it’s gold. Nobody takes gold as payment. I can walk into McLaren Newport Beach right now and buy a new 720S with BTC. Is it widespread? Not yet. But for it to become so isn’t really a difficult hurdle to cross. Not hard at all to set up your business to accept crypto as payment, especially BTC.
If it's a bubble, it's only a bubble in the short-term, and there'll be a short-lasted corrective wave but it'll bounce back. I feel very confident about Bitcoin in the long-term.
Hmm....why do you feel confident about it in the long-term though?
I think in the long term BTC will be one of the few cryptos still around. Out of the ~1200 crypto currencies currently in existence, I would say maybe 5 will be around in 5 years. Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Litecoin are three that will be around just because of their communities. Keep in mind that the crypto currencies themselves don't have a lot of use and very little economic benefit currently. The underlying technology is useful but even that has a lot of limits people don't realize.
I agree. I also feel confident about Bitcoin in the long-term. Another question is how to protect my cryptocurrency. Of course, there are a lot of bitcoin wallets, but there have been too many hacks. On the other hand, a review of the lattest wallets showed a good result. Personally I'm going to choose one of them and stop worrying about my bitcoins.
Bitcoin will never get near 10k. It has absolutely no future. We'll look back in 10 years and laugh at how juvenile we were, to believe in such a fantasy.
Before you attack my views, realize two things.
--I love the idea of Bitcoin, and would like to see it succeed. However, central banks will not allow this to happen. And I'm kind of a realist. --Blockchain technology looks very promising. Do not confuse this with the underlying technology with the silly currency.
Came here to say this, if people here do not understand that the power of the US lies in two places (Military and FED) then they should be in another industry. The powers at be will never allow bitcoin to develop wide market adoption. They merely tolerate it now because there is no real benefit to try and bring it under control. It is a haven for criminals who don't pay taxes anyway, so why go after a new technology that allows criminals to be more efficient but also instantly traceable?
If bitcoin gets adopted by a country as their currency, then we might have a real discussion on our hands, until then its just a fun toy to play around with.
Japan has recognized it as legal currency. I don't think any country will replace their existing fiat with an existing blockchain.
what are the chances of this happening in the next 5-10 years?
I'm interested to hear ideas on how the banks will stop it, other than being buddy-buddy with Govt. I think the only way to stop it is if the Govt says it's illegal to use, own, or accept it and even then people will still use it. Algeria and Indonesia are taking this approach.
What the gov’t deems “legal” and “illegal” is slowly but steadily becoming increasingly irrelevant. If only because they’re becoming increasingly powerless to stop it, especially in the digital domain.
I disagree. What, exactly, are the central banks going to do about it?
"Blockchain technology looks very promising. Do not confuse this with the underlying technology with the silly currency."
The classic "Bitcoin is irrelevant but blockchain is important" argument. Unfortunately anyone who uses this argument can't be taken seriously, because it shows a fundamental lack of understanding about the technology.
Bitcoin is the incentive for miners to uphold the global ledger (or blockchain), which keeps the system decentralized, trustless, and immutable. Without the "silly currency" all you have is a private blockchain that is controlled by a central entity. Blockchain without the currency isn't innovation - it's merely a centralized database. The reason why the "blockchain, not bitcoin" argument even exists is because banks are desperately pushing that narrative so as to keep the power in their hands.
Bitcoin is at $7300 now, you really think $10000 is that unattainable? Also, a couple people here are assuming that a country has to replace its fiat currency with Bitcoin in order for there to be mass adoption. Not necessarily true.
Still feel the same today? I'm gonna call bitcoin will be 100k by the end of 2018.
I think 2018 will be the year of institutional money entering the space.
I've got my bank account linked to Coinbase right now. What should I do? Should I pull the trigger? If I pull the trigger I guarantee the currency will collapse because God f^cking hates my investments. I'll do it! I swear to God! I'll do it! I'll invest in Bitcoin and f^ck up everyone's life.
I like the comment "I think 2018 will be the year of institutional money entering the space. "
Update: BTC has hit 10k
I think it hit 10k only on Bithumb, which is South Korea's largest exchange. Price on other exchanges should get there soon though.
Edit: I'm looking at GDAX as the standard for BTC price. Hasn't made it to 10k there yet.
I fucking love this conversation
Bitcoin is a fraud. It is going to zero!
CME Group to add Bitcoin Futures Q4 2017
http://www.cmegroup.com/media-room/press-releases/2017/10/31/cme_group_…
Curious whether CME moves mountains to facilitate this instrument's availability? The price sky rocketed today, not sure if it's connected. Conceptually trying to grasp legitimacy meaning whether its more minor resource dedication to offer a 3rd party service versus something more proprietary/direct
Good question. Curious to see what they come out with.
I plan on ruining Bitcoin for the entire population of the world. Outside of real estate, any investment I touch (stocks, bonds, gold) collapses and leaves me poorer. If I buy Bitcoin tomorrow morning I guarantee everyone in this thread will be significantly poorer in 6 months.
Plot twist. This was posted July 30th, and so far it is eerily accurate. Will be interesting to see how things pan out in the coming weeks. This post is circulating in the crypto community, but no one has confirmed if its a hoax/fud or not.
https://pastebin.com/n0aGBMQr
Will be keeping an eye on hashrates too. https://pool.btc.com/
Update 11/15 - Looks like Roger Ver, Jihan Wu, and their mining cronies attempt to promote Bcash has flopped for the most part. On 11/12 they sold off their BTC into BCC causing major price fluctuations, but BTC price has recovered since. Mining hashrate has moved back to BTC after the BCC mining difficulty adjustment on Nov. 13th took place, as BTC is more profitable to mine again. I don't think this story is completely over, but so far much of the community has shunned bcash and painted these guys in a negative light.
CME Group is pressing forward and will offer BTC futures 2nd week of December.
To the moon!
Can I just say....I called it? HAHA
Litecoin to the moon! HODL your altcoins.
Bitcoin just has the branding and first-mover advantage going for it. I don't know how the developers sleep at night knowing how poorly their coin scales, and I have my doubts about the Lightning Network fixing everything. I think it's only a matter of time before another coin -- perhaps Vertcoin, Litecoin, Monero or NAVCoin -- takes its place. Maybe not next year, but eventually.
John McAfee predicts Bitcoin to $1 Million by end of 2020. He said he'll eat his own dick if it doesn't. Let's hope otherwise.
There are three types of people in the world: People who are happy they bought Bitcoin, people who wish they had bought Bitcoin. And people who are waiting for the whole thing to blow up so they can laugh at the first two people. (I'm that 3rd guy)
Guy #2 and #3 are the same guy. Buy some now and next year you can be guy #1. In 1994 email was adopted by less than half a percent of the global population. In 2017 cryptocurrencies are adopted by less than half a percent of the global population.
And then there's guy #4, who's going to make money off of crypto currency, sell before the bubble bursts, and then laugh at the skeptics who said it would blow up.
What about Ethereum though
Good in concept, but not ready to be used yet. Kik, the messenging app, based their ICO on it (the token is KIN), and they are already talking about moving to another blockchain because ethereum can't support their millions of users. I have been mining ethereum since June, and it has been profitable for me.
Another negative of ethereum is it has its own coding language, solidity, that Vitalik created. This makes it less desirable for adoption when something like Lisk, another similar platform, is in Java.
But I think ETH will hold it's own in the space in the near term.
CME Group launching Bitcoin futures on Dec. 18 http://www.cmegroup.com/media-room/press-releases/2017/12/01/cme_group_…
Lol @ the idiots who keep comparing Bitcoin to stocks. Bitcoin is meant to be an alternative to fiat currency, not shares in a company.
This. It's so annoying to see headlines like "Bitcoin about to pass J.P. Morgan in market cap." Completely different things. The market cap of all currencies is roughly $1 quadrillion, and that's not even an exaggeration. So when I see Bitcoin's market cap -- it has so much room to grow.
Bitcoin is currently the worlds 6th most circulated currency, and it's just getting started. https://cointelegraph.com/news/bitcoin-is-6th-largest-currency-in-the-w…
Right. What the hell is that all about...I don’t get it, doesn’t seem like a hard concept to understand.
bump
Binance crashed yesterday due to heavy FOMO on IOTA. I hopped on it but since reaching $5, it corrected hard. Anyone hodling IOTA or XLM? I'm hoping IOTA jumps to $8 to $10 in the near future.
BUY IOTA
With Bitcoin rising, everyone is dumping altcoins atm. Buy IOTA while its's cheap!
That's what I'm planning to do right now - buy up some altcoins while they are low. Bitcoin won't be going up forever... Right? Right!?
Against Bitcoin / Cryptocurrency for the simple reason that I will never want to buy a bottle of water for 0.00000100245 bitcoins/ethereum/altcoin/ etc.
I believe that people like knowing that a bottle of water is going to cost them $1.25, not some random decimal amount which is hard to remember and maintain - especially as millions / billions of people theoretically start using.
Someone correct me if I'm wrong, I know haven't done my research.
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