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My first reply was rather terse, so trying again, and I have a couple points: 1. Tether, even if fraudulent, has very little impact on bitcoin. How do I know t
by washedup 6y ago
My first reply was rather terse, so trying again, and I have a couple points:
1. Tether, even if fraudulent, has very little impact on bitcoin. How do I know this? There are currently 24 Billion dollars worth of tether in existence. The daily volume of bitcoin in dollars is almost three times that much. Even if tether wasn’t backed by dollars on a 1:1 basis, it would have a small impact on the current market cap of bitcoin. This is important because many people say tether is proof that bitcoin price is heavily manipulated and inflated. The reality is that selling $24 billion dollars worth of bitcoin won’t move that needle that much.
2. I have no reason to not trust tether. If it is one day revealed that there are no dollars backing the minting of tether, then so what? See point #1. People have been curious about Tether for years, and for good reason: it’s the first successful stablecoin (success in the sense that it actually gets used).
- floatingatoll 6y agoDo you have any conflicts of interest with respect to cryptocurrencies and/or stablecoins, such as personal investments in or employment in regards to them? Your comment history seems to indicate that since 2019 you’ve primarily commented at HN only to speak positively about cryptocoins, and so I’m curious if your financial welfare depends on them somehow.
- washedup 6y agoThanks for digging. Yes, of course I am invested. If I believed the things I say about them, it would be ridiculous not to be. Could you please instead address my response? What about my points do you disagree with? Edit: I have no exposure with Tether and honestly don’t care what happens with it. But it is not artificially propping up the value of bitcoin or other currencies.
- floatingatoll 6y agoI’m not well-versed enough in cryptocurrency to be able to reply otherwise to your comment, apologies.
- washedup 6y agoIt’s all good, and I appreciate your call out. Probably a good idea for me to add a little disclaimer going forward!
- floatingatoll 6y agoI would instead encourage you to participate on more topics than any single topic alone. It’s not that you need to include a disclaimer on every comment, it’s that your participation is so narrowly focused on boosting cryptocurrencies that I can determine you’re invested in them at a glance. Participating more broadly would be more welcome, and would give more weight to your views here. (I am not a site admin, this is only the thoughts of someone else on HN.)
- genericacct 6y agoYes but the volume of traded tether has been higher than the volume of traded BTC for months by a significant margin. Look this up on coinmarketcap if you don't believe it. Also let me remind you that market cap is really just a made up number. If only 1% of your company is floated and I buy all of it for a million dollars your market cap is 100 mil even though only 1 mil has moved.
- mekster 6y ago> Even if tether wasn’t backed by dollars on a 1:1 basis, it would have a small impact on the current market cap of bitcoin. Are you joking? You seem to think the world works only by mathematical formulas but in fact if the crypto market is run by a shady stable coin, I'm sure there will be a huge panic sell with hundreds of news sites stating crypto market was run by fraud and bunch of blogs mentioning "told you so" further upsetting all investors. I wish other legitimate stable coins gain more market cap to replace tether before it explodes in the face of traders.