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What bothers me more than anything in this isn't the existence of Tether and the suspicious behavior of Tether/Bitfinex players... It's that Bittrex and others

What bothers me more than anything in this isn't the existence of Tether and the suspicious behavior of Tether/Bitfinex players... It's that Bittrex and others are attempting to become mainstream and they've accepted these USDT since forever, and they continue to accept them well after the suspicions were public. This is a black stain on the exchanges. It also personally makes me cynical of the entire space. I moved my mainstream coins off of Bittrex and back into GDAX where it seems safer. <rant warning> Why can't profitable exchanges like Bittrex and Kraken self-regulate?? Over and over again the invisible hand of the market is proved to be eclipsed by the visible hammer of the regulator (which can't come soon enough, by the way). </rant>

0wing 9y ago
If Tether is a "scam" backed by nothing, why would other Cryptocurrencies be more valid? It's just software.
- bb88 9y ago
  It's price fixed at the US Dollar. So if I own USDT, I should be able to convert USDT to BTC (e.g.) or paper money. If everyone converts their USDT to paper money, the organization that backs USDT has to refund USDT to dollars. If there aren't enough dollars to cover the price of USDT selling, then the USDT market goes belly up. BTC is buy/sell driven through some kind of exchange so the price can float.
zik 9y ago
Don't ever keep coins on an exchange. Use a hardware wallet. If you don't have them in your possession they're not really your coins and you can get "Goxed" - ie. the world's largest exchange at the time, Mt Gox, disappeared with most of the user funds.
- mancerayder 9y ago
  Yes, all reasonable paranoia. However I do trust Coinbase/GDAX as far as BTC, ETH LTC are concerned. It's a pain to store a few K USD worth of altcoins in my hw wallet (which I'm not even sure supports most of them). What if I'm at work and an event happens that makes me want to sell? The wallet requires an app to be installed. If there's a hint of an issue with Bittrex, I'll trade to ETH and move them to GDAX. Am I being a fool here?
  - scott_karana 9y ago
    You are being a fool. Exchanges have been known to close, be seized, and be stolen from, without warning. Cryptocurrency frees you from needing to trust central banks/exchanges... so why continue to trust them? Especially un(der)regulated ones?! At best, store only the smallest amount you're willing to lose, so you retain some liquidity for sudden trades...
  - frakr 9y ago
    Based on my research it seems like Bittrex allows the trading of Tether and lets people cash out to USD. Poloniex also. Seems like a round about way of getting USD out of Bitfinex.

0wing 9y ago

If Tether is a "scam" backed by nothing, why would other Cryptocurrencies be more valid? It's just software.

bb88 9y ago
It's price fixed at the US Dollar. So if I own USDT, I should be able to convert USDT to BTC (e.g.) or paper money. If everyone converts their USDT to paper money, the organization that backs USDT has to refund USDT to dollars. If there aren't enough dollars to cover the price of USDT selling, then the USDT market goes belly up. BTC is buy/sell driven through some kind of exchange so the price can float.

zik 9y ago

Don't ever keep coins on an exchange. Use a hardware wallet. If you don't have them in your possession they're not really your coins and you can get "Goxed" - ie. the world's largest exchange at the time, Mt Gox, disappeared with most of the user funds.

mancerayder 9y ago
Yes, all reasonable paranoia. However I do trust Coinbase/GDAX as far as BTC, ETH LTC are concerned. It's a pain to store a few K USD worth of altcoins in my hw wallet (which I'm not even sure supports most of them). What if I'm at work and an event happens that makes me want to sell? The wallet requires an app to be installed. If there's a hint of an issue with Bittrex, I'll trade to ETH and move them to GDAX. Am I being a fool here?
- scott_karana 9y ago
  You are being a fool. Exchanges have been known to close, be seized, and be stolen from, without warning. Cryptocurrency frees you from needing to trust central banks/exchanges... so why continue to trust them? Especially un(der)regulated ones?! At best, store only the smallest amount you're willing to lose, so you retain some liquidity for sudden trades...
- frakr 9y ago
  Based on my research it seems like Bittrex allows the trading of Tether and lets people cash out to USD. Poloniex also. Seems like a round about way of getting USD out of Bitfinex.