9 ms·

God help us. At this point the sane people are staying quiet. The madness is in full swing, a large number of fools are desperate to be parted from their money

by dash2 9y ago

God help us. At this point the sane people are staying quiet. The madness is in full swing, a large number of fools are desperate to be parted from their money, and there is no point trying to stop them. Even on Hacker News, there are no comments below saying "this is stupid". Just "how can I throw my money into this pit?" "I'm planning to build an AI algorithm to throw my money into this pit, can anyone advise?" and "if I throw my money in this pit, will it double or triple over the next week?" Good luck, guys.

thesmallestcat 9y ago
Agreed, I'm considering catching a few falling knives when the inevitable crash happens, but that's about it. Looking at the Bitcoin price chart for the past week/month activates the same part of my brain that prevents me touching unrecognizable, large, red, spiky arthropods.
- etr-strike 9y ago
  History will think of you the same way we think of the Xerox executives handing Apple some of the most important technology of our generation.
  - twayamznacct 9y ago
    Wealthy Elites losing and Wealth Elites gaining, while the normal folk just get to look on in disgust at both. Sounds like the current state of cryptocurrencies for sure.
QAPereo 9y ago
I stopped saying “this is stupid” when I realized that was just a shortcut to a brutal donvoting and inane comments full of either mindless greed or equally mindless ideology. This is a group of people who just know they’re too smart to be left holding the bag...
- Chris2048 9y ago
  So, instead of calling people stupid, you call them greedy and mindless? Is that an improvement?
  - QAPereo 9y ago
    Just being offended is a nonstarter, sorry.
    - Chris2048 9y ago
      What did you intend to start? You think something productive was going to arise from insulting people?
whataretensors 9y ago
The truth is nobody knows what will happen. Meanwhile people who have a risk tolerance and budget keep making money. The 'sane' people have missed out on some of the best returns in history. There is more there than you think, and everyone should investigate for themselves rather than having a knee-jerk reaction.
- ivm 9y ago
  Returns from greater fools? I'd better stay without profits than participate in a pyramid.
  - etr-strike 9y ago
    Plenty of us find value in a currency that isn't controlled by a central authority and isn't subject to inflation. We're betting others who value saving over risking their savings in the stock market will also value such a currency. Plenty of us believe there's potential in programmable money. Certainly more potential than yet-another-social-media-platform-selling-ads. You're welcome to dismiss Bitcoin as a bubble. You don't, however, speak for everyone who finds legitimate reasons to get involved.
    - ivm 9y ago
      Do you mean savings in a single overvalued highly volatile $100bln commodity are more sustainable than savings in the overvalued international market diversified between sectors and countries?
      - etr-strike 9y ago
        Yes. In my opinion the diversified international market is being propped up by coordinated actions by the worlds central banks. These markets lost more than 50% of their value in 2008. Central banks are keeping them afloat at the expense of people trying to simply save their money and not take on debt. Janet Yellen recently expressed concern regarding the amount of debt in the economy. Apparently giving out loans at rates less than inflation causes a lot of malinvestment. Those I know investing in Bitcoin do so because it's the only asset that exists outside the system we have today. It's the escape hatch. The volatility of course concerns us, but we believe in the fundamental ideology and in the long term believe it'll change the world. The monetary policy we have today is, quite frankly, insane.
wyldfire 9y ago
Your argument for why you think it's madness is more constructive than your frustration that others here don't echo your feelings. If you have made your case before on HN, post a link and we can discuss it. If not, please make your case.
kaffeemitsahne 9y ago
>and there is no point trying to stop them. Then don't? I fail to see why you would care so much about anonymous strangers gambling away their money. We've all heard both sides of the argument countless of times, it's not really worth reiterating "it's a bubble!" "it's not, to the moon!" in every slightly related thread.
- ben_jones 9y ago
  I do wonder if a catastrophic hit to bitcoin might shake consumer confidence in other parts of the tech or finance industry.
  - kaffeemitsahne 9y ago
    It could reduce confidence of retail investors, according to Deutsche Bank. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-12-07/deutsche-bank-s-slok-names-30-market-risks-for-2018-worrywarts https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-12-07/deutsche-... #13 on the list.
  - mrb 9y ago
    Bitcoin has already suffered three catastrophic losses in its history. -70%/-80%/-90% in 2011, 2013, 2014. See http://bitcoin.zorinaq.com/price/ http://bitcoin.zorinaq.com/price/ It has always recovered with suprising ease.
    - aphextron 9y ago
      >Bitcoin has already suffered three catastrophic losses in its history. -70%/-80%/-90% in 2011, 2013, 2014. See http://bitcoin.zorinaq.com/price/ http://bitcoin.zorinaq.com/price/ It has always recovered with suprising ease. ...with 10x lower market cap. This is getting out of hand, which is the problem. Complete know-nothings are getting into it now. There are ads on Reddit asking people to invest their IRA in Bitcoin. It's like the whole world has lost its' mind.
- berberous 9y ago
  When the bottom drops out, there will be people who kill themselves, or have seriously damaged their financial lives. If people speaking as a voice of reason can convince at least some of those people to reconsider, or to at least not invest more than they can lose, I view that as a service.
bbctol 9y ago
Last night in a restaurant I overheard the table next to us getting excited about Bitcoin, based on the rumors of friends of friends. At the point when one quizzically said "But you only use it on the Internet? You can't see a broker in person?" we all started recalling that line about when the taxi driver starts giving you stock tips...
- etr-strike 9y ago
  You recalled that line about when the taxi driver starts giving stock tips? Wow, you're so original. No one involved in bitcoin over the last 8 years has heard that one before. What other insights do you have?
  - bbctol 9y ago
    I guess technically I'm one of those people whose been involved in bitcoin over the past 8 years, so the general take is that people who've been interested in bitcoin for a long time generally care about the idea of decentralizing power and allowing truly free exchange more than any particular currency, should recognize that wild speculating on bitcoin can only hurt its effectiveness in achieving these goals (and probably indicates that bitcoin itself isn't the right tool for this in the long run), and should be keeping their head down until the overvaluation passes and we can go back to valuing bitcoin/other cryptocurrencies on their actual merits, rather than because we think we can trick someone in the future into caring about them even more than we do. Thanks for the question!
  - sctb 9y ago
    You've been violating the guidelines a lot, and we have to ask you to please stop and read them: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html. We ban accounts that keep breaking them. We also ban single-purpose accounts that abuse Hacker News with the advancement of an agenda rather than joining in on seeking to gratify one's intellectual curiosity.
Vadoff 9y ago
Then short cryptocurrencies and become a billionaire.
- Top19 9y ago
  That could make it worse. What you’ve described are really just derivatives, which brought down the economy in 2008. An infinite number of bets on a finite amount of resources. Think about it like going to the horse racetrack. Nothing stopping anyone from betting $40 billion on a few horses. Win or lose, a ton of instability will occur once they either need to come up with $40 billion to cover their losses or have someone pay them $40 billion for their winnings.
- samlevine 9y ago
  Assuming someone shorts BTC and it crashes, how are they going to collect when the other parties are likely heavily invested in BTC to begin with?
  - blhack 9y ago
    The people who went long get liquidated into USD by the exchange, and you ACH that USD into whatever account you want to.
    - samlevine 9y ago
      The parent comment suggests becoming a billionaire through a short. The people who bet long are likely leveraged to some extent, and if they have enough of a BTC portfolio to allow a short against them to make you a billionaire it's not unlikely that they just won't have the money to cover the bet. We saw this prior to the Great Recession, and in the 1929 crash too. I'm ignoring the potential for a bank run to complicate matters, just sticking with counterparty risk which is easy to model.
Waterluvian 9y ago
Originally I thought it was going to be an interesting collapse to watch. But it's growing so large as to have real impacts on other parts of the economy that I'm no longer entertained by this.
wils124 9y ago
Ironically, this is now the top comment in this thread. While I’m firmly in the “this is madness” camp, I disagree that there’s a lack of bitcoin skepticism on HN. There’s just also a lot of exhuberance. The skeptic arguments are not especially hard to find or understand. People just get dollar signs and don’t want to hear it.

by dash2 9y ago

thesmallestcat 9y ago

Agreed, I'm considering catching a few falling knives when the inevitable crash happens, but that's about it. Looking at the Bitcoin price chart for the past week/month activates the same part of my brain that prevents me touching unrecognizable, large, red, spiky arthropods.

etr-strike 9y ago
History will think of you the same way we think of the Xerox executives handing Apple some of the most important technology of our generation.
- twayamznacct 9y ago
  Wealthy Elites losing and Wealth Elites gaining, while the normal folk just get to look on in disgust at both. Sounds like the current state of cryptocurrencies for sure.

QAPereo 9y ago

I stopped saying “this is stupid” when I realized that was just a shortcut to a brutal donvoting and inane comments full of either mindless greed or equally mindless ideology. This is a group of people who just know they’re too smart to be left holding the bag...

Chris2048 9y ago
So, instead of calling people stupid, you call them greedy and mindless? Is that an improvement?
- QAPereo 9y ago
  Just being offended is a nonstarter, sorry.
  - Chris2048 9y ago
    What did you intend to start? You think something productive was going to arise from insulting people?

whataretensors 9y ago

The truth is nobody knows what will happen. Meanwhile people who have a risk tolerance and budget keep making money. The 'sane' people have missed out on some of the best returns in history. There is more there than you think, and everyone should investigate for themselves rather than having a knee-jerk reaction.

ivm 9y ago
Returns from greater fools? I'd better stay without profits than participate in a pyramid.
- etr-strike 9y ago
  Plenty of us find value in a currency that isn't controlled by a central authority and isn't subject to inflation. We're betting others who value saving over risking their savings in the stock market will also value such a currency. Plenty of us believe there's potential in programmable money. Certainly more potential than yet-another-social-media-platform-selling-ads. You're welcome to dismiss Bitcoin as a bubble. You don't, however, speak for everyone who finds legitimate reasons to get involved.
  - ivm 9y ago
    Do you mean savings in a single overvalued highly volatile $100bln commodity are more sustainable than savings in the overvalued international market diversified between sectors and countries?
    - etr-strike 9y ago
      Yes. In my opinion the diversified international market is being propped up by coordinated actions by the worlds central banks. These markets lost more than 50% of their value in 2008. Central banks are keeping them afloat at the expense of people trying to simply save their money and not take on debt. Janet Yellen recently expressed concern regarding the amount of debt in the economy. Apparently giving out loans at rates less than inflation causes a lot of malinvestment. Those I know investing in Bitcoin do so because it's the only asset that exists outside the system we have today. It's the escape hatch. The volatility of course concerns us, but we believe in the fundamental ideology and in the long term believe it'll change the world. The monetary policy we have today is, quite frankly, insane.

wyldfire 9y ago

Your argument for why you think it's madness is more constructive than your frustration that others here don't echo your feelings. If you have made your case before on HN, post a link and we can discuss it. If not, please make your case.

kaffeemitsahne 9y ago

>and there is no point trying to stop them. Then don't? I fail to see why you would care so much about anonymous strangers gambling away their money. We've all heard both sides of the argument countless of times, it's not really worth reiterating "it's a bubble!" "it's not, to the moon!" in every slightly related thread.

ben_jones 9y ago
I do wonder if a catastrophic hit to bitcoin might shake consumer confidence in other parts of the tech or finance industry.
- kaffeemitsahne 9y ago
  It could reduce confidence of retail investors, according to Deutsche Bank. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-12-07/deutsche-bank-s-slok-names-30-market-risks-for-2018-worrywarts https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-12-07/deutsche-... #13 on the list.
- mrb 9y ago
  Bitcoin has already suffered three catastrophic losses in its history. -70%/-80%/-90% in 2011, 2013, 2014. See http://bitcoin.zorinaq.com/price/ http://bitcoin.zorinaq.com/price/ It has always recovered with suprising ease.
  - aphextron 9y ago
    >Bitcoin has already suffered three catastrophic losses in its history. -70%/-80%/-90% in 2011, 2013, 2014. See http://bitcoin.zorinaq.com/price/ http://bitcoin.zorinaq.com/price/ It has always recovered with suprising ease. ...with 10x lower market cap. This is getting out of hand, which is the problem. Complete know-nothings are getting into it now. There are ads on Reddit asking people to invest their IRA in Bitcoin. It's like the whole world has lost its' mind.
berberous 9y ago
When the bottom drops out, there will be people who kill themselves, or have seriously damaged their financial lives. If people speaking as a voice of reason can convince at least some of those people to reconsider, or to at least not invest more than they can lose, I view that as a service.

bbctol 9y ago

Last night in a restaurant I overheard the table next to us getting excited about Bitcoin, based on the rumors of friends of friends. At the point when one quizzically said "But you only use it on the Internet? You can't see a broker in person?" we all started recalling that line about when the taxi driver starts giving you stock tips...

etr-strike 9y ago
You recalled that line about when the taxi driver starts giving stock tips? Wow, you're so original. No one involved in bitcoin over the last 8 years has heard that one before. What other insights do you have?
- bbctol 9y ago
  I guess technically I'm one of those people whose been involved in bitcoin over the past 8 years, so the general take is that people who've been interested in bitcoin for a long time generally care about the idea of decentralizing power and allowing truly free exchange more than any particular currency, should recognize that wild speculating on bitcoin can only hurt its effectiveness in achieving these goals (and probably indicates that bitcoin itself isn't the right tool for this in the long run), and should be keeping their head down until the overvaluation passes and we can go back to valuing bitcoin/other cryptocurrencies on their actual merits, rather than because we think we can trick someone in the future into caring about them even more than we do. Thanks for the question!
- sctb 9y ago
  You've been violating the guidelines a lot, and we have to ask you to please stop and read them: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html. We ban accounts that keep breaking them. We also ban single-purpose accounts that abuse Hacker News with the advancement of an agenda rather than joining in on seeking to gratify one's intellectual curiosity.

Vadoff 9y ago

Then short cryptocurrencies and become a billionaire.

Top19 9y ago
That could make it worse. What you’ve described are really just derivatives, which brought down the economy in 2008. An infinite number of bets on a finite amount of resources. Think about it like going to the horse racetrack. Nothing stopping anyone from betting $40 billion on a few horses. Win or lose, a ton of instability will occur once they either need to come up with $40 billion to cover their losses or have someone pay them $40 billion for their winnings.
samlevine 9y ago
Assuming someone shorts BTC and it crashes, how are they going to collect when the other parties are likely heavily invested in BTC to begin with?
- blhack 9y ago
  The people who went long get liquidated into USD by the exchange, and you ACH that USD into whatever account you want to.
  - samlevine 9y ago
    The parent comment suggests becoming a billionaire through a short. The people who bet long are likely leveraged to some extent, and if they have enough of a BTC portfolio to allow a short against them to make you a billionaire it's not unlikely that they just won't have the money to cover the bet. We saw this prior to the Great Recession, and in the 1929 crash too. I'm ignoring the potential for a bank run to complicate matters, just sticking with counterparty risk which is easy to model.

Waterluvian 9y ago

Originally I thought it was going to be an interesting collapse to watch. But it's growing so large as to have real impacts on other parts of the economy that I'm no longer entertained by this.

wils124 9y ago

Ironically, this is now the top comment in this thread. While I’m firmly in the “this is madness” camp, I disagree that there’s a lack of bitcoin skepticism on HN. There’s just also a lot of exhuberance. The skeptic arguments are not especially hard to find or understand. People just get dollar signs and don’t want to hear it.