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Lots of weak hands in it right now. More scaling debates, ominous US legislation, Goldman Sachs says it looks "heavy." I got out recently - for me it was the di

Lots of weak hands in it right now. More scaling debates, ominous US legislation, Goldman Sachs says it looks "heavy." I got out recently - for me it was the disposition effect [1], but shortly after, one of the more compelling global macro voices that I like to listen to, Raoul Pal, announced that he sold his stake. Makes me bearish long-term. Raoul's reasons were based on the malleability of the protocol and specifically that more than 21M bitcoins can be created at the whim of developers. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disposition_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disposition_effect.

sunshinerag 9y ago
"malleability of the protocol and specifically that more than 21M bitcoins can be created at the whim of developers". This is inaccurate. Though any developers can modify the code to do such thing doesn't mean it will be adopted by the network. There is a distinction between code written and what the network accepts.
Rmilb 9y ago
In what scenario would it be in anyone's interest to raise the maximum total of coins to be created?
- serhei 9y ago
  Hypothetically, if miner profits went into freefall, the alternatives would be to raise tx fees even further (making the network less usable), or to change the protocol to mint more coins. You are correct that the latter would massively discredit the project's original goals, and is therefore unlikely (since it would damage the value of the currency). The network relies on having a large ecosystem of miners to prevent anyone from mounting coordination attacks. Those miners are paid either by new bitcoins (out of the finite supply), or by tx fees.
tradersam 9y ago
> and specifically that more than 21M bitcoins can be created at the whim of developers It really can't be, though.
rhinoceraptor 9y ago
Wouldn't the miners have to actually run the new software in order for the new coin creation to be valid?

sunshinerag 9y ago

"malleability of the protocol and specifically that more than 21M bitcoins can be created at the whim of developers". This is inaccurate. Though any developers can modify the code to do such thing doesn't mean it will be adopted by the network. There is a distinction between code written and what the network accepts.

Rmilb 9y ago

In what scenario would it be in anyone's interest to raise the maximum total of coins to be created?

serhei 9y ago
Hypothetically, if miner profits went into freefall, the alternatives would be to raise tx fees even further (making the network less usable), or to change the protocol to mint more coins. You are correct that the latter would massively discredit the project's original goals, and is therefore unlikely (since it would damage the value of the currency). The network relies on having a large ecosystem of miners to prevent anyone from mounting coordination attacks. Those miners are paid either by new bitcoins (out of the finite supply), or by tx fees.

tradersam 9y ago

> and specifically that more than 21M bitcoins can be created at the whim of developers It really can't be, though.

rhinoceraptor 9y ago

Wouldn't the miners have to actually run the new software in order for the new coin creation to be valid?