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Bitcoin Price Tumbles After Wall Street Selloff
- Ozzie_osman 5y agoFriend: why is bitcoin down? Other friend: why was bitcoin up to begin with?
- technobabbler 5y agoThere's always a greater fool
- xwdv 5y agoFools eventually will no longer be created at a rate sufficient enough to sustain current prices.
- astoor 5y ago> "Fools eventually will no longer be created at a rate sufficient enough to sustain current prices." The world population has been increasing by between 1.05% and 2.2% per year over the past 50 years[0]. Remember also that faith in cryptocurrency operates in the same way as the spread of infectious diseases[1], so some previously infected hosts can lose immunity over time and become reinfected. [0] https://ourworldindata.org/world-population-growth https://ourworldindata.org/world-population-growth [1] https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/apr/10/bitcoin-soaring-value-buyers-infectious-disease-barclays-economists-say https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/apr/10/bitcoin-s...
- john37386 5y agoWhere did all this money go? It can't disappear just like that, can it? I can't withdraw more than a few K per week with crypto exchanges. How can $300B evaporate just like that?
- lotsofpulp 5y agoBecause $300B was never there. A quantity of a certain thing times its most recent sale price per unit was calculated to be a proxy of the trade-able value of what could have been there.
- john37386 5y agowell the blockchain won't agree with this. All transactions can be verified. Maybe I missed something.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- bildung 5y agoWell all this price action only happens in the databases of the exchanges, not on the blockchain. And on the exchanges only a miniscule share of all coins get traded. The "market cap" is then only extrapolated. E.g. Bitfinex, which seems to have the most volume, only saw 40k bitcoin traded, in sum, for today, which was less than $2B USD.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- stevehawk 5y agohe's talking about a philosophical idea and you're talking about a technical one
- lotsofpulp 5y agoNo, I am talking about the technical one. $300B technically did not evaporate because $300B technically were never there.
- NovemberWhiskey 5y agoThe blockchain tells you who owns the bitcoin, but it has nothing at all to do with the price at which people will exchange money for bitcoin.
- coolspot 5y agoEventually, it will crash all the way down and will be mostly forgotten. This “crash” however is unlikely to be the beginning of it.
- Ekaros 5y agoI would say next proper stock market crash. Now when will that happen is not easy question, but I'm certain something will happen at some point.
- gfodor 5y agoAt this point the end of human civilization and the end of the chain of technologies that began with Bitcoin probably will be the same event.
- astoor 5y agoAs long as the chain of technologies that began with Bitcoin doesn't hasten the end of human civilization (cryptocurrency mining is consuming ever more and more of the world's resources, pyramid scheme collapses have led to war in the past[0], etc.) [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albanian_Civil_War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albanian_Civil_War
- mgh2 5y agoThree scenarios might make it crash: 1. Big institutional investors (Tesla, Microstrategy) pull out or face crashing their stock as well - they bought Bitcoin directly or indirectly with borrowed money https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=st3KJN_DzCg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=st3KJN_DzCg 2. Crypto community panics and claim their money en masse 3. "Satoshi" and other insiders secretly cash out Since it is mainly a stakeholder manipulated market, regulation had not much impact so far... As long as the narrative keeps perpetuating belief & demand, it will live.
- reginold 5y agoWait are you making a case for or against Bitcoin? The crypto community selling out after all the years of "hodl"? I would pay to see that! Satoshi "secretly" cashing out....what? How could that even happen it's literally impossible for those coins to move. Maybe Satoshi simply sells his private key off-chain, is that what you mean?
- theknocker 5y agoITT we pretend we're smarter than some guy by refusing to understand how exchanges work.
- you-liquidated 5y ago> Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are notoriously volatile and often plunge for mysterious reasons. There is nothing mysterious about Alameda making money from it triggering margin cascades.
- frontman1988 5y agoWith the incoming Evergrande fiasco and eventual explosion of omicron cases it's gonna be a good winter for bears.
- ralusek 5y agoMore like half price for bulls.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- rfd4sgmk8u 5y agoThere are several things happening, which is reducing confidence. Of course, as a permabull, I believe that these things are transitory. Here are some more macro events that are worth considering. BTFD * India may try to make self-custody of crypto assets illegal, requiring all coins be given to exchanges. [A totally unenforceable law, trying to make math illegal, in this case storing 256-bit integers and performing the ECDSA/Schnorr signature algorithm.] Everyday Indian folk will lose their coins when the inevitable happens and the exchanges are compromised. * Europe considering how to put the genie back in the bottle. Also thinking about custody regulation and reporting. * US trying to develop (further) regulations around exchanges, trading, KYC/AML, derivatives and accounting. * Uncertainty over the CSW lawsuit. The jury is still deciding the verdict, possibly next week. * Custodial Bitcoin loaning service reported losing (wrapped) Bitcoin when defi platform was compromised. * Larger market uncertainty due to new variants. Its going to be bumpy. It always is. Maybe I have been watching too much Michael Saylor lately, but I think he is right about a great many things. It is too easy to look at systems from the inside and shout about bubbles. A more systematic appraisal of other large asset classes, the source/sink nature of money creation and capital flows is prudent.
- Grustaf 5y ago> trying to make math illegal This is a non-sensical but very common expression from crypto-bros. It's like saying that gun control is to "make steel illegal".
- orena 5y agoSometimes it goes down, sometimes it goes up - it's not the first time. History shows that it goes up more than it goes down.
- sharklazer 5y agoJust like a bunch of pump and dumps... before they went down for the last time. I’m not taking a stand on crypto here, just pointing out a logical fallacy, namely, the data is incomplete and we don’t know the future.
- travoc 5y agoWe’re on year 13 of a pump and dump?
- mmastrac 5y agoThe South Sea company bubble in the 1700s (arguably a similar circumstance) was ~9 years in, if I'm correct in my math. Tulip bubble was ~40 years in.
- reginold 5y agoTulip Mania: the classic story of a Dutch financial bubble is mostly wrong: https://theconversation.com/tulip-mania-the-classic-story-of-a-dutch-financial-bubble-is-mostly-wrong-91413 https://theconversation.com/tulip-mania-the-classic-story-of...
- ArtWomb 5y agoAnd Gwei almost hit $1k! Triggered by the rush of eth holders to the exit. None of the proposed eips do anything to de-incentivize "surge pricing" in mining rewards during "bank panics". It would be counter-productive to growing the network. But an interesting economic phenomenon to watch in real time just the same. Akin to price gouging gasoline during a hurricane ;)
- everfree 5y ago> And Gwei almost hit $1k! You mean Ethereum gas prices almost hit 1k Gwei? > None of the proposed eips do anything to de-incentivize "surge pricing" in mining rewards during "bank panics". I'm assuming that you're talking about gas price surges, as gas prices don't directly correlate with mining rewards (since EIP-1559 was implemented). What sort of mechanism would you propose to disincentivize surge pricing? Block space is a limited resource that's auctioned off, so a naive price cap would come with its own whole set of problems. I have never heard of a fair way to disincentivize surge pricing, but if you have an idea, I would love to hear it!
- ArtWomb 5y agoWell, even the NYSE uses "circuit breakers". But that's no solution ;) https://www.nyse.com/network/article/nyse-increases-resiliancy-during-extreme-volatility https://www.nyse.com/network/article/nyse-increases-resilian...
- everfree 5y agoIt's much different to shut down the trade of assets than to shut down a cloud computing service (Ethereum). That would be very counterproductive, like shutting down the freeway because of a traffic jam, or stopping a train service because the seats are sold out. It just means that the backbone has to work even harder to clear the backlog once it's back online.
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- flerchin 5y agoIt's going to zero folks. Sell now.
- ludamad 5y agoCrypto is a monetary game, and bitcoin is an original game piece. You have to at least give it some weird collectible value
- bgroat 5y agoThis is basically why I still hold a whole BTC. I'm something of a collector of bullshit hype tech
- the_watcher 5y agoI'm find myself agreeing with this more and more. Packy McCormick's framing as "The Great Online Game" seems like the best way to approach crypto and web3, to me. Go in for enough to play, if you're interested (it's honestly pretty fun), but you better have pretty extreme conviction if you're risking anything you can't afford to lose (I don't).
- WoahNoun 5y ago>The price of bitcoin seesawed later Saturday after El Salvador President Nayib Bukele, whose country adopted bitcoin as a national currency in September, said in a Twitter post that the country had bought 150 coins for an average of $48,670 each. “El Salvador just bought the dip!” he said. He later wrote that the country had “Missed the f**ing bottom by 7 minutes,” followed by a laughing emoji. El Salvadore needs to be cut off from the world financial markets; or at least USD markets. World Bank and IMF need to refuse to do transact with the country at all. This bitcoin experiment is going to end in disaster.
- detaro 5y ago> El Salvadore needs to be cut off from the world financial markets; or at least USD markets. World Bank and IMF need to refuse to do transact with the country at all I fail to see how that would improve their situation.
- betaby 5y agoProbably. And that may be beneficial to everyone. IMF aren't the good guys most of the time anyway.
- JCM9 5y agoThe primary value proposition of bitcoin is as a “currency” but the technical limitations on transaction throughput mean it will never be a viable currency at scale. Also the volatility of bitcoin value also makes it a terrible currency. Thus it boils down to just some random thing that people have arbitrarily decided has value, like we did with tulip bulbs centuries ago. This “story” has been told many times thought history and we know how this story ends. The technology is interesting, but the “value” of the coins seems built on a house of cards just waiting to collapse. Although like anything in that space, including tulip bulbs, those that can get in and out at the right time can make a killing while the suckers are left holding the bag at the end.
- mthomasmw 5y agoWould love if you can elaborate on your bitcoin tulip equivalency with the methods that were used to make tulips durable, scarce, programmable, fungible, verifiable, divisible, transferrable at global distances and portable within a human mind. Please be sure to include primary document citations in your explainer and thank you!
- brightstep 5y agoBeing a more technologically advanced vehicle for speculation doesn't make it less of a vehicle for speculation.
- everfree 5y agoUnless you think the price dipped because everyone was ignorant of that yesterday but all collectively realized it today, this comment isn't really timely or novel.
- JCM9 5y agoFair point, but judging from what I’ve seen out there many still don’t realize/understand this and are case studies of the old adage of “there’s a sucker born every minute.” They’re into it because it’s the thing to be into… not because they understand it and are making a rational investment decision. When the supply of suckers starts to dry up that’s when the value that nobody can explain in real terms starts to become very interesting to watch.
- suikadayo 5y agoOn another note, it’s nice to see ETHBTC ratio going up
- sph 5y agoNon-paywall link?
- 1_player 5y agohttps://archive.md/qznFW https://archive.md/qznFW
- bogota 5y agoAlways fun to see HN hot takes on bitcoin. Similar to browsing the buttcoin subreddit. But apparently this group of people is much more enlightened than everyone else.
- ceva 5y agoAm waiting a moment where Bitcoin will go to zero, the market and all that is bullshit.
- willmadden 5y agoIt wasn’t a simple sell off. Some not to be named hedge funds that were very long spot started selling aftermarket Friday to test the liquidity while taking out short positions. Then when they felt the market was illiquid enough after probing it for a few hours, they quickly dumped their long positions, liquidated the leveraged longs, cashed in their shorts, and bought back into the ensuing panic sell off.
- the_watcher 5y agoAre you able to share how someone could see that this is what happened? I'm not agreeing or disagreeing, I am genuinely interested.
- willmadden 5y agoLook at the leaderboards on FTX and Bitfinex while it’s happening. They’ll show you the most profitable recent traders. You won’t see it now but I’m sure there are screenshots on Twitter if you follow trading. Edit: this is also a great resource to see whales moving funds from their wallets, which telegraphs their trades: https://whale-alert.io/ https://whale-alert.io/ Also, watch short positions. If you see them ratcheting up when the market is calm and trading is thin, lookout below.
- reasonabl_human 5y agoWhere is the data on this move?
- willmadden 5y agoBoth FTX and Bitfinex have leaderboards that show the most profitable traders. The people doing it show up there but only for a short time (and only if they dump open market and not OTC- this was open market). Also this is a great resource to predict these sorts of manipulations before they happen: https://whale-alert.io/ https://whale-alert.io/ Also, watch those short positions!
- naveen99 5y ago
- billpg 5y agoBitcoin has gone sky-high or fallen off a cliff? That's normal.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- authed 5y ago> The global crypto market cap is $2.33T, a 4.85% decrease over the last day. not that bad...
- kristianp 5y agoThe coindesk article from 10 hours earlier: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29439049 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29439049