30 ms·

Imagine that the year is 2011, Bitcoin appears for one of the first times on HN, and someone says "in the future Goldman will trade bitcoin". Ha ha ha ha ha....

by 21 8y ago

Imagine that the year is 2011, Bitcoin appears for one of the first times on HN, and someone says "in the future Goldman will trade bitcoin". Ha ha ha ha ha.... Today, someone (me) says: in the future, first world central banks will hold bitcoin as a reserve among the usual things (dollars, euros, gold, ...)

atomical 8y ago
What does being right about a prediction mean to you?
- 21 8y ago
  I'm not sure what you are asking here. I do trade bitcoin, with an eye towards holding it for a bunch of years, possibly with leverage, so being right would make me money.
  - atomical 8y ago
    You seem quite amused that you were right about a prediction. It must mean something to be right about the future, correct? Some personal achievement?
lern_too_spel 8y ago
Goldman isn't holding Bitcoin itself. They're not stupid.
- Scott_Sanderson 8y ago
  Why would they be stupid to hold the bitcoin themselves? If they don't hold the private keys, then whoever does could lose them.
  - colatkinson 8y ago
    If they hold the Bitcoin themselves, they have to deal with securely holding the keys, compliance, and insurance. If someone else holds them, then this third party has all of these issues while GS will still get some kind of insurance payout if there is a catastrophic loss. Similarly, I doubt that GS commodity traders have warehouses full of gold/silver/oil.
    - tripletao 8y ago
      https://www.reuters.com/article/us-lme-warehousing-idUSTRE76R3YZ20110729 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-lme-warehousing-idUSTRE76... It's pretty common for commodity traders to buy commodity warehouse operators.
  - lern_too_spel 8y ago
    By hold, I mean own. Holding as in holding the actual keys would be another level of crazy on top of that.
jcfrei 8y ago
The fact that central banks still hold gold reserves in developed economies is mostly due to historical reasons and not to back their currencies.
tlrobinson 8y ago
FYI, I think this is the first time it was mentioned on Hacker News: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=463793 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=463793 Sadly no comments. Here's the first post with comments: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=599852 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=599852 "Well this is an exceptionally cute idea, but there is absolutely no way that anyone is going to have any faith in this currency." Heh. Here are my BigQuery queries: https://bigquery.cloud.google.com/savedquery/1243883842:637bd741ee504603ac545baa7e522d1a https://bigquery.cloud.google.com/savedquery/1243883842:637b... https://bigquery.cloud.google.com/results/bq-test-1265:US.bquijob_6fd8382d_16323894ce9?pli=1 https://bigquery.cloud.google.com/results/bq-test-1265:US.bq...
volgo 8y ago
Imagine that the year is 1999, tech stocks are constantly discussed on HN, and someone says "in a few years most of these companies will be gone". Ha ha ha ha ha.... Today, someone (me) says: in the future, most cryptocurrencies will trade at ~$1 per coin (BTC, ETH, ...)
- DINKDINK 8y ago
  >someone (me) says: in the future, most cryptocurrencies will trade at ~$1 per coin Will you sell me a call option?
  - zimablue 8y ago
    Out of curiosity, is there a place to do this with low transaction fees and low counterparty risk?
    - DINKDINK 8y ago
      LedgerX, Deribit, and Coinut all facilitate options contracts.
- mythrwy 8y ago
  Or even $0 per. Because there are no more $ at that point. Only cryptocurrencies. Or something else. No currency we know of lasts forever.
- jokes_on_you 8y ago
  I'd say show me your shorts. Otherwise it's just idle chatter.
lmm 8y ago
In 2011 I was saying "the only thing Bitcoin is actually useful for (as in better than the alternatives) is buying drugs", and people assured me that actually useful applications were just around the corner. 7 years on, the only thing Bitcoin is actually useful for (as in better than the alternatives) is buying drugs.
- zeth___ 8y ago
  That's not true. The permanent ledger means that every transaction is stored forever. Unless you want government to know you bought drugs you're much better off using something actually anonymous.
- jokes_on_you 8y ago
  How it must feel to have had enough awareness of bitcoin in 2011 that you felt qualified to make offhand snide comments about it then 7 years later wake up and realize you could have been a centi-millionaire if only you'd been a little less cynical. The r/buttcoin subreddit was made in 2011 or 2012. I sometimes wonder if some of the original posters haven't thrown themselves out of a window by now. edit: And in come the down votes. Cognitive dissonance is a cruel mistress.
  - zimablue 8y ago
    I heard of bitcoin pretty early on in /b/ and have no regrets. I also don't regret that I wasn't alive to cash out at the right time on tulips or penny stocks or dot com companies, or even stuff which turned out to stick around like Apple. There are lots of places to gamble and lots of people winning and losing all the time, much more often through luck than genius. If some of those people end up fantastically wealthy and rather smug about it it's definitely not the biggest problem for me or my ego. People who become fantastically successful through skill, determination and creativity, they're a bit more bruising.
    - jokes_on_you 8y ago
      >I also don't regret that I wasn't alive to cash out at the right time on tulips or penny stocks or dot com companies, or even stuff which turned out to stick around like Apple. Begging the question of whether tulip mania is even relevant in this context, were you going around at the beginning of it or when Apple got listed making snide comments? Yeah. Thought not. But then again, this is """Hacker""" News so critical thinking isn't exactly what anyone would expect. For instance, a significant fraction of this thread is debating whether Goldman Sachs "believes" in Bitcoin. What? Who cares. The significance of them opening a trading desk is people who like to do their gambling with them can now buy Bitcoins. More buyers, more sellers, more volume. But carry on having no regrets. Oh and, nice cope.

by 21 8y ago

atomical 8y ago

What does being right about a prediction mean to you?

21 8y ago
I'm not sure what you are asking here. I do trade bitcoin, with an eye towards holding it for a bunch of years, possibly with leverage, so being right would make me money.
- atomical 8y ago
  You seem quite amused that you were right about a prediction. It must mean something to be right about the future, correct? Some personal achievement?

lern_too_spel 8y ago

Goldman isn't holding Bitcoin itself. They're not stupid.

Scott_Sanderson 8y ago
Why would they be stupid to hold the bitcoin themselves? If they don't hold the private keys, then whoever does could lose them.
- colatkinson 8y ago
  If they hold the Bitcoin themselves, they have to deal with securely holding the keys, compliance, and insurance. If someone else holds them, then this third party has all of these issues while GS will still get some kind of insurance payout if there is a catastrophic loss. Similarly, I doubt that GS commodity traders have warehouses full of gold/silver/oil.
  - tripletao 8y ago
    https://www.reuters.com/article/us-lme-warehousing-idUSTRE76R3YZ20110729 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-lme-warehousing-idUSTRE76... It's pretty common for commodity traders to buy commodity warehouse operators.
- lern_too_spel 8y ago
  By hold, I mean own. Holding as in holding the actual keys would be another level of crazy on top of that.

jcfrei 8y ago

The fact that central banks still hold gold reserves in developed economies is mostly due to historical reasons and not to back their currencies.

tlrobinson 8y ago

FYI, I think this is the first time it was mentioned on Hacker News: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=463793 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=463793 Sadly no comments. Here's the first post with comments: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=599852 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=599852 "Well this is an exceptionally cute idea, but there is absolutely no way that anyone is going to have any faith in this currency." Heh. Here are my BigQuery queries: https://bigquery.cloud.google.com/savedquery/1243883842:637bd741ee504603ac545baa7e522d1a https://bigquery.cloud.google.com/savedquery/1243883842:637b... https://bigquery.cloud.google.com/results/bq-test-1265:US.bquijob_6fd8382d_16323894ce9?pli=1 https://bigquery.cloud.google.com/results/bq-test-1265:US.bq...

volgo 8y ago

Imagine that the year is 1999, tech stocks are constantly discussed on HN, and someone says "in a few years most of these companies will be gone". Ha ha ha ha ha.... Today, someone (me) says: in the future, most cryptocurrencies will trade at ~$1 per coin (BTC, ETH, ...)

DINKDINK 8y ago
>someone (me) says: in the future, most cryptocurrencies will trade at ~$1 per coin Will you sell me a call option?
- zimablue 8y ago
  Out of curiosity, is there a place to do this with low transaction fees and low counterparty risk?
  - DINKDINK 8y ago
    LedgerX, Deribit, and Coinut all facilitate options contracts.
mythrwy 8y ago
Or even $0 per. Because there are no more $ at that point. Only cryptocurrencies. Or something else. No currency we know of lasts forever.
jokes_on_you 8y ago
I'd say show me your shorts. Otherwise it's just idle chatter.

lmm 8y ago

In 2011 I was saying "the only thing Bitcoin is actually useful for (as in better than the alternatives) is buying drugs", and people assured me that actually useful applications were just around the corner. 7 years on, the only thing Bitcoin is actually useful for (as in better than the alternatives) is buying drugs.

zeth___ 8y ago
That's not true. The permanent ledger means that every transaction is stored forever. Unless you want government to know you bought drugs you're much better off using something actually anonymous.
jokes_on_you 8y ago
How it must feel to have had enough awareness of bitcoin in 2011 that you felt qualified to make offhand snide comments about it then 7 years later wake up and realize you could have been a centi-millionaire if only you'd been a little less cynical. The r/buttcoin subreddit was made in 2011 or 2012. I sometimes wonder if some of the original posters haven't thrown themselves out of a window by now. edit: And in come the down votes. Cognitive dissonance is a cruel mistress.
- zimablue 8y ago
  I heard of bitcoin pretty early on in /b/ and have no regrets. I also don't regret that I wasn't alive to cash out at the right time on tulips or penny stocks or dot com companies, or even stuff which turned out to stick around like Apple. There are lots of places to gamble and lots of people winning and losing all the time, much more often through luck than genius. If some of those people end up fantastically wealthy and rather smug about it it's definitely not the biggest problem for me or my ego. People who become fantastically successful through skill, determination and creativity, they're a bit more bruising.
  - jokes_on_you 8y ago
    >I also don't regret that I wasn't alive to cash out at the right time on tulips or penny stocks or dot com companies, or even stuff which turned out to stick around like Apple. Begging the question of whether tulip mania is even relevant in this context, were you going around at the beginning of it or when Apple got listed making snide comments? Yeah. Thought not. But then again, this is """Hacker""" News so critical thinking isn't exactly what anyone would expect. For instance, a significant fraction of this thread is debating whether Goldman Sachs "believes" in Bitcoin. What? Who cares. The significance of them opening a trading desk is people who like to do their gambling with them can now buy Bitcoins. More buyers, more sellers, more volume. But carry on having no regrets. Oh and, nice cope.