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Nothing to see here. This is a reputed and transparent financial institution. The government is just jealous of having competition.../s Binance has no known he

• roenxi 3y ago
  I work on the theory that any crypto firm is a gang of thieves run by charlatans. However, the regulated banks also appear to be gangs of thieves run by charlatans. Except everyone is forced to signal, financially, that they have confidence in firms when they turn out to be insolvent. And the people involved with crypto can't be forced to bail out Binance unless they trust them with their funds. I have a lot more faith in the value of my Monero than the USD - which I say for rhetorical effect since I don't trust the USD enough to own any. Silicon Valley Bank has detoothed a lot of criticism of the crypto industry, and it hasn't even been the biggest collapse this year. Then there is the inflation problem that that fiat currencies have which is on display right now.
  • smcl 3y ago
    > I have a lot more faith in the value of my Monero than the USD I've heard people say this about various cryptocurrencies over the last few years and I just cannot take the statement seriously. It just always comes across as a deliberately exaggeration of belief in a cryptocurrency in an attempt to persuade others to get in on it. Not only that, I cannot imagine a world where USD collapses and somehow things like Monero or Ethereum stick around and continue to work just fine.
    • rschneid 3y ago
      What about this statement is so hard to take seriously? There are a variety of concerns one could have about either fiat/fiscal policy or cryptocurrency development/deployment/stewardship. One is a highly centralized system, the other is relatively decentralized. They have different threat models, strengths, and weaknesses. I would hazard a guess that your demographic profile is similar to the members of the current cabal that try to control USD's supply and value but to those who don't have similar priorities, crypto offers a different set of values than the 'traditional' finance system. The two aren't mutually exclusive, and the person you're replying to didn't say either would be 'just fine' without the other... Not sure why you're proud of your inability to defeat a straw man!
      • smcl 3y ago
        I thought my comment was pretty self-explanatory but I'll restate it. I don't believe people when they make talk about how their particular favourite flavour of crypto is better/stabler/stronger than reserve currencies like USD, GBP, EUR, CHF etc. My feeling is that they're either just trying to convince you to get on board or perhaps even trying to convince themselves. > Not sure why you're proud of your inability to defeat a straw man! Pardon?
        • hef19898 3y ago
          >> or perhaps even trying to convince themselves. That leads me to a big, big tangent, completely unrelated to crypto. Recently I followed online discusions of a certain car model in comparison to well known alternatives and, no idea why actually, soccer clubs. And one thing I found funny, is to which length people go to, well, rationalize and defend their preferances. E.g. interior finish is just bad of model a compared to brand b, while obviously the fact that brand b can be had without leather interior is better because of animals suffering. Or model b is better because it can be had with a V6, while model a cannot, ignoring the fact that the majority of engines for model b are inline fours as well. That actually did sound a lot like convincing oneself that the preferance for model b is totally rational. You have similar vibes whem it comes to sport teams, it basically boils down to fanboyism. Which is fine, which car or club people prefer doesn't have to be rational. It gets risky so, if that attitude is extended to finance.
    • toolz 3y ago
      History is littered with global reserve currencies outright failing or losing its global reserve status. USD failing wouldn't surprise anyone looking at financial systems through a historical lens. Years after it happens (and I don't think anyone truly believes USD is the last global reserve currency humankind will see) it will be painfully obvious to everyone how unsustainable our inflation driven economy is.
      • hnaccount141 3y ago
        The question isn't whether or not the USD can fail. Of course it can. The question to ask is whether Monero or any other given cryptocurrency will fare better than the USD in the event that it does collapse. That seems much less clear at this point in time.
        • mattdesl 3y ago
          As a thought experiment: if USD were to fail, yet other world currencies stayed afloat, why would anybody holding non-custodial crypto flock to a dying currency? It’s not entirely unreasonable to predict that “crypto” might outlast a central currency, given the ease at which it can span geographic and state borders.
          • hef19898 3y ago
            Unless crypto is backed actual economies, as fiat currency is, that will propably not happen anytime soon.
          • smcl 3y ago
            The assumptions here are: 1. USD fails 2. All the other currencies are "dying" 3. (let's say) Monero exists and is not dying So yes in the scenario you've constructed where everything but a cryptocurrency dies or is dying, crypto is more successful.
            • mattdesl 3y ago
              You misread - the scenario is that USD is dying, but other state currencies like Euro or JPY stay afloat.
    • __MatrixMan__ 3y ago
      > things like Monero or Ethereum I guess it comes down to how far you're willing to stretch "like" there. Progress is glacial, but crypto is becoming more useful. Meanwhile, traditional finance appears to be getting worse. Eventually those lines will cross. Although I doubt the cryto's of that time will look very much like what we have today.
      • bigtunacan 3y ago
        How is it becoming more useful? Arguably it is more difficult to use for buying selling, plus if I spend it I'm taxed as if I sold an equity. It's value is pegged to the dollar so we can see massive shifts in its "value" constantly happening. There are almost an infinite number of cryptocurrencies and new ones still being created. Each is a different currency, so how should we determine which of these fake currencies actually have value and which don't?
        • __MatrixMan__ 3y ago
          I mean that the set of systems that you can build which require neither custodial trust nor have single points of failure is increasing. To name a few instances of this: This is old news, but I remember when zcash introduced halo and got rid of trusted setup--that's a legit increase in what's possible. NFT's as ownership of digital assets is maybe a silly application of the tech, but the sort of uniqueness constraint that they enforce is useful in centralized databases and I expect it'll find a similar niche in the distributed systems of the future. TCL's that use token price to encourage curation appear to be a non-starter, but coupled with a web of trust I think we can use the same concept to have consensus on a wide variety of useful things. Their use as money? Sure, wildly inconvenient. But like... duh. Emulated systems are slower than ones running on bare metal because you have to embrace the constraints of both systems--it's the same with the use of cryptocurrencies within the existing financial system. The point was never to make something that's just as good as traditional money--why bother? The point is to make traditional money obsolete in favor of something else. Something whose rules matter not because the guy who wrote them own has a gun, but because people consent to participate based on their merits. > how should we determine which of these fake currencies actually have value and which don't? By their side effects. If you value the endless consumption of electricity and zero sum games, you should value bitcoin. If you value politicians playing chicken over the debt ceiling, you should value USD. As it stands, the options are all pretty bad, but the ability to craft new ones is getting better and the cancer that our current one has is getting worse, so eventually there will be something worth switching to.
    • MacsHeadroom 3y ago
      The value of USD has collapsed 300x vs XMR over the past 6 years.
      • mrguyorama 3y ago
        Cool, when can I actually do anything with XMR other than trade it to other tokens and play dumb scams on various crypto systems?
        • MacsHeadroom 3y ago
          You can pay any bills with it, load a debit card with it, use it on eBay, Amazon, etc. through third party facilitators.
          • mrguyorama 3y ago
            By that you mean I can sell it for real money and use real money to do real money things.
          • smcl 3y ago
            Weird I just checked and every single bill I have I can only pay in CZK. Guess this revolution must have slipped by us here in the technological backwaters of Central Europe. Looking forward to reading about how people in the USA can pay their electricity, gas, groceries, internet, mortgage, insurance, tuition, taxes or anything else using XMR though. This sounds like a gamechanger!
  • zie 3y ago
    The difference is, the US govt has backstopped all the bank charlatans and put their money and their citizens money on the line when it comes to USD backstopping. The Binance CEO wouldn't backstop his firm any farther than he can throw his yacht.
  • BLKNSLVR 3y ago
    It's difficult to name a large financial institution that hasn't had a fairly recent "embarrassment of behaviour discovery", be it assisting drug cartels with money laundering, manipulating the price of gold / metals, or just plain immorally giving massive debt to obvious deadbeats and repackaging it with a AAA rating. Yhe whole finance industry is a festering wound. Cryptocurrency, by comparison, is a mosquito bite, but there's enough blood to have started attracting the real bad bacteria across from the traditional finance world.
  • PeterisP 3y ago
    It's a reasonable expectation that any and all institutions handling your money might be gangs of thieves run by charlatans. This is why any deviations from regulation should be viewed with extreme suspicion, since that's the only thing that mostly succeeds keeping these thieves and charlatans in check and protecting customers. Silicon Valley Bank is a great positive example, where the depositors were protected even despite the fact that the thieves and charlatans wanted to take on unacceptable risk by successfully managing in 2018 to lobby exemptions to the Dodd-Frank regulations that would have prevented the thieves and charlatans from doing so. So any financial institution that tries to circumvent even slight parts of regulations should be treated with extreme suspicion (as thieves and charlatans who want to take your money), and any financial process which tries to stay outside regulations as such (e.g. Monero) needs no suspicion at all, as this means that they're explicitly publicly acknowledging that yes, our gang of thieves and charlatans want to re-enable the ways of taking your money which were limited for the other gangs of thieves and charlatans.
  • ourmandave 3y ago
    However, the regulated banks also appear to be gangs of thieves run by charlatans. ... I have a lot more faith in the value of my Monero than the USD Ah yes, Monero. Trying to replace bitcoin as the preferred dark web currency when collecting ransoms from hospitals and pensioners. A few banks went south, so the entire system is just as bad as the ponzi crypto circus run by the Tether mafia?
  • deleted 3y ago
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  • pjc50 3y ago
    I'm reminded of this: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/balaji-srinivasan-lost-1-million-151000390.html https://finance.yahoo.com/news/balaji-srinivasan-lost-1-mill... Man bets on hyperinflation, obviously loses, and to the surprise of almost everyone it pays out. I'm fairly sure you yourself have been banging on about USD hyperinflation for years, too, without it happening.
    • ToValueFunfetti 3y ago
      That bet didn't make sense even if Balaji was right; he could have bought 40 BTC instead of putting $1M into escrow. Then he would have made 40x the returns if he was right, and would have 1.03x his investment now even though he was wrong. It can really only be interpreted as a publicity stunt, possibly to pump BTC. Incidentally, I don't know if Manifold is reflective of 'almost everyone', but they had it at >50% for almost the entire duration: https://manifold.markets/chrisjbillington/will-the-1m-vs-1btc-bet-between-jam https://manifold.markets/chrisjbillington/will-the-1m-vs-1bt...
  • JAlexoid 3y ago
    > Silicon Valley Bank has detoothed a lot of criticism of the crypto industry The problem with SVB was not the same as what we get with FTX and Binance. Let alone, the promise of crypto is to "be transparent", and this proves that they are not at all transparent. SVB made bad bets, that we knew were made. SVB collapse was not a result of them lying about how they operate, it was a result of the risk they took. FTX and Binance lied, which is not exactly what you want from someone who you should trust.
• nailer 3y ago
  A hundred percent. Most smart people that work in web3 avoid any kind of long term balance in USDT
  • nailer 3y ago
    If anyone is unaware: https://youtu.be/-whuXHSL1Pg https://youtu.be/-whuXHSL1Pg
• rchaud 3y ago
  Their offices are so transparent, one would think they're not even there! /s
• mrguyorama 3y ago
  Ain't it funny how a system supposedly designed to prevent a need to trust anyone only functions to it's current barely functional level if you trust a giant, centralized, opaque organization that has on the public record lied in the past about pretty serious things?
  • amadeuspagel 3y ago
    Bitcoin functions perfectly without Binance or any centralized exchange. Centralized exchanges are necessary as interface between the centralized world of traditional finance and the decentralized world of Bitcoin.