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I don’t know why people are still surprised by this. There are a lot of people in powerful places that want Bitcoin to fail and die. Futures markets introduced

by craigc 8y ago

I don’t know why people are still surprised by this. There are a lot of people in powerful places that want Bitcoin to fail and die. Futures markets introduced a regulated way for them to make that happen. Buy up a ton of Bitcoin during the lead up to futures trading, then short Bitcoin on the futures market while market selling thousands of the cheaply acquired Bitcoin on spot exchanges. You succeed in lowering the price of Bitcoin, killing the public’s perception of crypto currencies, scaring away retail investors, and you make a killing in the process. JPMorgan has been using futures markets to manipulate Gold and Silver spot prices for years while also accumulating huge amounts. Look at an early article that was published prior to the launch: https://www.coindesk.com/cme-groups-leo-melamed-well-tame-bitcoin/ https://www.coindesk.com/cme-groups-leo-melamed-well-tame-bi... It was all planned ahead of time for Wall Street to get maximum profit at the expense of regular people. What else is new.

earthtolazlo 8y ago
It’s a good thing that Bitcoin’s inherent scalability and utility as a currency makes it resistant to such manipulation.
- arisAlexis 8y ago
  the manipulation resistance comes from decentralization. the USD price pair is irrelevant in such a scenario as commonly said 1 btc is 1 btc. If we want to look at the price pair though usd has totally crashed vs bitcoin during the years.
- EthanHeilman 8y ago
  Can't tell if sarcastic or not
  - nmca 8y ago
    Clue: it is sarcastic.
vkou 8y ago
And on the converse, there's a number of insiders in the crypto ecosystem, who cheat to prop their investments up. See: The USDT printing presses, wash trading. There's a lot of greedy people that want to make BTC cost a lot more then it really should. But pay no attention to them, blame some boogieman from Wall Street for curbing their enthusiasm. If it weren't for those meddling main stream traders, we'd be going to the moon.
- craigc 8y ago
  True. I’m aware it goes both ways. So the reality is probably somewhere in the middle. How do you define “a lot more than it really should”? I am aware there are a lot of Bitcoin haters here, but i believe it is the purest form of sound money (other than perhaps gold, but that is also debatable). It can’t be counterfeited, it is deflationary with a maximum supply of 21 million, it is very costly to produce, it is divisible to 8 decimal places, it can be stored very cheaply. The mainstream media narrative goes to extremes to try to manipulate the public’s perception and scare them away from it, but I think it’s very difficult to say what the fair market value for one Bitcoin should be. I personally think it should be much higher than what it is priced at today.
  - omegaworks 8y ago
    Some of the things you state are actually liabilities and some outright falsehoods. >It can’t be counterfeited, It can be double-spent, and the integrity of the transaction ledger is dependent on no one miner controlling over 51% of the compute on the network. https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Irreversible_Transactions https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Irreversible_Transactions > it is deflationary It can not, therefore, represent an economy that expands in real value as it grows to include more people engaging in more trade. > it is very costly to produce The network presently costs the Earth as much energy as the entire energy usage of the country of Denmark. https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/12/bitcoins-insane-energy-consumption-explained/ https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/12/bitcoins-insane-... And the network gets little real utility from this energy usage. A transaction can take "anywhere from 30 minutes to over 16 hours" to be recorded in the ledger. https://coincentral.com/how-long-do-bitcoin-transfers-take/ https://coincentral.com/how-long-do-bitcoin-transfers-take/ > it is divisible to 8 decimal places That there is a limit on the divisibility of a bitcoin makes its deflationary nature even more of a liability. >it can be stored very cheaply. Bitcoin has been stolen from marketplaces and web wallets with impunity. Even air-gapped storage is not invulnerable.
sp527 8y ago
> I don’t know why people are still surprised by this. There are a lot of people in powerful places that want Bitcoin to fail and die. Futures markets introduced a regulated way for them to make that happen. Do you have anything at all to back up this flailing conspiracy theory? Or are you just Roseanne'ing for an audience of true believers?
- craigc 8y ago
  Read this for a good primer https://medium.com/@super.crypto1/4th-dimension-bitcoin-manipulation-cartel-can-it-be-burnt-no-way-c53de65c166a https://medium.com/@super.crypto1/4th-dimension-bitcoin-mani... There are also documented case studies of banks paying to fund studies designed to harm crypto currencies or produce content. For example: https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/22/poland-central-bank-paid-youtube-star-for-video-about-cryptocurrency-crash.html https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/22/poland-central-bank-paid-you... A lot of the FUD attacks in the media have also been fake in order to create panic selling. For example: http://m.scmp.com/business/article/2132379/us-news-groups-targeted-bogus-email-claiming-widening-hong-kong-bitcoin http://m.scmp.com/business/article/2132379/us-news-groups-ta... There are also clear coordinated attacks from CNBC such as a couple weeks ago when Warren Buffet, Charlie Munger, and Bill Gates all got together to trash Bitcoin. These are carefully timed and executed attacks.
  - sp527 8y ago
    Okay. The medium post is written by 'SuperCrypto' and begins with this disclaimer: > As many people are reading this, I would like to remind all — Please take this as an opinion only I'm going to go ahead and not even bother dismissing that one. The CNBC article. You applied a Fox News worthy amount of spin to what really happened. The central bank of Poland decided to warn its citizens against the dangers of speculating in cryptocurrencies. The SEC has done the same. The former simply adopted a more creative approach targeted at a high risk population: millenials. Crypto is rampant with fraud. This isn't news. I'm not even sure why you linked the scmp article. From there: > The bogus invitation could be a ruse by traders seeking to profit from a further decline in cryptocurrencies including bitcoin on the futures market, analysts said. Enough said. > There are also clear coordinated attacks from CNBC such as a couple weeks ago when Warren Buffet, Charlie Munger, and Bill Gates all got together to trash Bitcoin. They're all close friends/business partners and have been for a very long time. It's neither surprising that they concur nor that their opinions were sought within roughly the same timeframe. Buffett and Gates are the two most publicly generous contributors to charitable and philanthropic causes around the world. You decided to call into question the motives of perhaps the two wealthy individuals on this planet who are least likely to have malicious intent, based on the evidence. As far as I can tell, you're the real shill. Weaponizing a combination of FUD and conspiracy theories to do whatever you can to resuscitate the value of your ill-advised crypto holdings. I can't fault you for being human I guess.
jansdignio 8y ago
We know for a fact that there is manipulation to prop up the price of Bitcoin. The wash trading and tape painting are well established. We know that exchanges have just invented $2 billion in the form of USDT. But clearly it's the Big Bad Evil Bankers who are manipulating the market to kill the poor little guys with their $120 billion Ponzi scheme. People are betting against Bitcoin because it's a stupid idea. It just plain doesn't work, so it's not a threat to anything except the atmosphere and Bitconnect victims. If anything, "the establishment" should be grateful for Bitcoin because it shows how much we depend on institutions like the SEC, the FDIC, and the Federal Reserve.
- jMyles 8y ago
  > It just plain doesn't work How do you then explain the sudden ability for a much wider array of people to subvert drug prohibition?
  - jansdignio 8y ago
    That's something I wonder about. Bitcoin and friends are only good for criminals, but organized crime is pretty big. If cryptocurrency comes to be the main currency in organized crime, won't they run into the same fatal scalability problems as anyone else? Is that niche so small that Bitcoin will work there?
- catuenda 8y ago
  By "well established" and "we know for a fact" you mean, those lies (and they are lies), have been repeated a lot of times? But that just means the lies have been repeated a lot of times. It doesn't turn them from false into true, from lies into something else.

by craigc 8y ago

earthtolazlo 8y ago

It’s a good thing that Bitcoin’s inherent scalability and utility as a currency makes it resistant to such manipulation.

arisAlexis 8y ago
the manipulation resistance comes from decentralization. the USD price pair is irrelevant in such a scenario as commonly said 1 btc is 1 btc. If we want to look at the price pair though usd has totally crashed vs bitcoin during the years.
EthanHeilman 8y ago
Can't tell if sarcastic or not
- nmca 8y ago
  Clue: it is sarcastic.

vkou 8y ago

And on the converse, there's a number of insiders in the crypto ecosystem, who cheat to prop their investments up. See: The USDT printing presses, wash trading. There's a lot of greedy people that want to make BTC cost a lot more then it really should. But pay no attention to them, blame some boogieman from Wall Street for curbing their enthusiasm. If it weren't for those meddling main stream traders, we'd be going to the moon.

craigc 8y ago
True. I’m aware it goes both ways. So the reality is probably somewhere in the middle. How do you define “a lot more than it really should”? I am aware there are a lot of Bitcoin haters here, but i believe it is the purest form of sound money (other than perhaps gold, but that is also debatable). It can’t be counterfeited, it is deflationary with a maximum supply of 21 million, it is very costly to produce, it is divisible to 8 decimal places, it can be stored very cheaply. The mainstream media narrative goes to extremes to try to manipulate the public’s perception and scare them away from it, but I think it’s very difficult to say what the fair market value for one Bitcoin should be. I personally think it should be much higher than what it is priced at today.
- omegaworks 8y ago
  Some of the things you state are actually liabilities and some outright falsehoods. >It can’t be counterfeited, It can be double-spent, and the integrity of the transaction ledger is dependent on no one miner controlling over 51% of the compute on the network. https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Irreversible_Transactions https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Irreversible_Transactions > it is deflationary It can not, therefore, represent an economy that expands in real value as it grows to include more people engaging in more trade. > it is very costly to produce The network presently costs the Earth as much energy as the entire energy usage of the country of Denmark. https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/12/bitcoins-insane-energy-consumption-explained/ https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/12/bitcoins-insane-... And the network gets little real utility from this energy usage. A transaction can take "anywhere from 30 minutes to over 16 hours" to be recorded in the ledger. https://coincentral.com/how-long-do-bitcoin-transfers-take/ https://coincentral.com/how-long-do-bitcoin-transfers-take/ > it is divisible to 8 decimal places That there is a limit on the divisibility of a bitcoin makes its deflationary nature even more of a liability. >it can be stored very cheaply. Bitcoin has been stolen from marketplaces and web wallets with impunity. Even air-gapped storage is not invulnerable.

sp527 8y ago

> I don’t know why people are still surprised by this. There are a lot of people in powerful places that want Bitcoin to fail and die. Futures markets introduced a regulated way for them to make that happen. Do you have anything at all to back up this flailing conspiracy theory? Or are you just Roseanne'ing for an audience of true believers?

craigc 8y ago
Read this for a good primer https://medium.com/@super.crypto1/4th-dimension-bitcoin-manipulation-cartel-can-it-be-burnt-no-way-c53de65c166a https://medium.com/@super.crypto1/4th-dimension-bitcoin-mani... There are also documented case studies of banks paying to fund studies designed to harm crypto currencies or produce content. For example: https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/22/poland-central-bank-paid-youtube-star-for-video-about-cryptocurrency-crash.html https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/22/poland-central-bank-paid-you... A lot of the FUD attacks in the media have also been fake in order to create panic selling. For example: http://m.scmp.com/business/article/2132379/us-news-groups-targeted-bogus-email-claiming-widening-hong-kong-bitcoin http://m.scmp.com/business/article/2132379/us-news-groups-ta... There are also clear coordinated attacks from CNBC such as a couple weeks ago when Warren Buffet, Charlie Munger, and Bill Gates all got together to trash Bitcoin. These are carefully timed and executed attacks.
- sp527 8y ago
  Okay. The medium post is written by 'SuperCrypto' and begins with this disclaimer: > As many people are reading this, I would like to remind all — Please take this as an opinion only I'm going to go ahead and not even bother dismissing that one. The CNBC article. You applied a Fox News worthy amount of spin to what really happened. The central bank of Poland decided to warn its citizens against the dangers of speculating in cryptocurrencies. The SEC has done the same. The former simply adopted a more creative approach targeted at a high risk population: millenials. Crypto is rampant with fraud. This isn't news. I'm not even sure why you linked the scmp article. From there: > The bogus invitation could be a ruse by traders seeking to profit from a further decline in cryptocurrencies including bitcoin on the futures market, analysts said. Enough said. > There are also clear coordinated attacks from CNBC such as a couple weeks ago when Warren Buffet, Charlie Munger, and Bill Gates all got together to trash Bitcoin. They're all close friends/business partners and have been for a very long time. It's neither surprising that they concur nor that their opinions were sought within roughly the same timeframe. Buffett and Gates are the two most publicly generous contributors to charitable and philanthropic causes around the world. You decided to call into question the motives of perhaps the two wealthy individuals on this planet who are least likely to have malicious intent, based on the evidence. As far as I can tell, you're the real shill. Weaponizing a combination of FUD and conspiracy theories to do whatever you can to resuscitate the value of your ill-advised crypto holdings. I can't fault you for being human I guess.

jansdignio 8y ago

We know for a fact that there is manipulation to prop up the price of Bitcoin. The wash trading and tape painting are well established. We know that exchanges have just invented $2 billion in the form of USDT. But clearly it's the Big Bad Evil Bankers who are manipulating the market to kill the poor little guys with their $120 billion Ponzi scheme. People are betting against Bitcoin because it's a stupid idea. It just plain doesn't work, so it's not a threat to anything except the atmosphere and Bitconnect victims. If anything, "the establishment" should be grateful for Bitcoin because it shows how much we depend on institutions like the SEC, the FDIC, and the Federal Reserve.

jMyles 8y ago
> It just plain doesn't work How do you then explain the sudden ability for a much wider array of people to subvert drug prohibition?
- jansdignio 8y ago
  That's something I wonder about. Bitcoin and friends are only good for criminals, but organized crime is pretty big. If cryptocurrency comes to be the main currency in organized crime, won't they run into the same fatal scalability problems as anyone else? Is that niche so small that Bitcoin will work there?
catuenda 8y ago
By "well established" and "we know for a fact" you mean, those lies (and they are lies), have been repeated a lot of times? But that just means the lies have been repeated a lot of times. It doesn't turn them from false into true, from lies into something else.