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Gold has very little practical value outside of the small % used for manufacturing. Most precious stones have lab-created near equivalents. There is still a mul

by andirk 4y ago

Gold has very little practical value outside of the small % used for manufacturing. Most precious stones have lab-created near equivalents. There is still a multi billion $ market for the real deal. BTC is just a bunch of code so it's not even pretty, but a lot of things have value despite not being very useful, and if people have "faith" that BTC has a certain value, then it has that value. Anecdotally, I considered BTC to be worth ~20-25k USD back when it was at < 3,000 USD, and including when it was well over 50000 USD. Turns out that seems to be the resting point currently.

angry_albatross 4y ago
When I say it has no value I guess I mean the "intrinsic value" as defined here: https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/capital-markets/overvalued/ https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/capital-mark... A stock is considered overvalued when its price is not justified by its earning outlook. Bitcoin does not have earnings, so if we tried to value it the same way we value stocks, the intrinsic value would be zero. People often use the word value to mean the market value though, in which case, yes I would agree that bitcoin has a nonzero market price. What sort of factors were you considering when you determined a valuation of 20-25k as the true worth of bitcoin?
- andirk 4y ago
  No factors that could be considered useful analysis. Something like: since most BTC has been mined + its general popularity + its usefulness, it seemed to me to be undervalued by some 10-20x (when it was 1-3k). Similarly, when it was 50k+, it felt over valued relative to popularity + usefulness. If it becomes more useful, such as if it becomes the main currency of countries with terrible currencies, then its value can skyrocket since it will be sought after like crazy.
  - angry_albatross 4y ago
    > if it becomes the main currency of countries with terrible currencies Yeah I guess we would just disagree about the probability of that happening. There are inherent technical limitations preventing bitcoin from ever reaching a high transaction volume, and I think the lightning network has its own problems, so I don't see that as a solution either. Also, since it is so extremely energy intensive, for the good of our planet's environment I hope that this misguided experiment in cryptocurrencies dies out sooner rather than later.

by andirk 4y ago

angry_albatross 4y ago

When I say it has no value I guess I mean the "intrinsic value" as defined here: https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/capital-markets/overvalued/ https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/capital-mark... A stock is considered overvalued when its price is not justified by its earning outlook. Bitcoin does not have earnings, so if we tried to value it the same way we value stocks, the intrinsic value would be zero. People often use the word value to mean the market value though, in which case, yes I would agree that bitcoin has a nonzero market price. What sort of factors were you considering when you determined a valuation of 20-25k as the true worth of bitcoin?

andirk 4y ago
No factors that could be considered useful analysis. Something like: since most BTC has been mined + its general popularity + its usefulness, it seemed to me to be undervalued by some 10-20x (when it was 1-3k). Similarly, when it was 50k+, it felt over valued relative to popularity + usefulness. If it becomes more useful, such as if it becomes the main currency of countries with terrible currencies, then its value can skyrocket since it will be sought after like crazy.
- angry_albatross 4y ago
  > if it becomes the main currency of countries with terrible currencies Yeah I guess we would just disagree about the probability of that happening. There are inherent technical limitations preventing bitcoin from ever reaching a high transaction volume, and I think the lightning network has its own problems, so I don't see that as a solution either. Also, since it is so extremely energy intensive, for the good of our planet's environment I hope that this misguided experiment in cryptocurrencies dies out sooner rather than later.