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Compare: The Strategic Beanie-Baby Reserve. What does it accomplish? Betraying American taxpayers in order to enrich the manufacturer and collectors. P.S.: For

by Terr_ 2y ago

Compare: The Strategic Beanie-Baby Reserve. What does it accomplish? Betraying American taxpayers in order to enrich the manufacturer and collectors. P.S.: For that matter, why not the Strategic Russian Ruble Reserve? Sure, it means asking US taxpayers to suffer in order to prop up a warmongering dictator whose local propaganda is that America might need to be nuked, but modern Republicans think it'd be awesome 'cuz reasons.

gs17 2y ago
The Beanie Babies could at least be burned for fuel if we were really desperate and no one wanted to buy them (and the government didn't want to play Santa). Crypto is almost the opposite, we burn fuel to get it and if no one wants to buy it, you couldn't even use it to make children happy.
- adeptusluminati 2y ago
  ..."and if no one wants to buy it" It's a 3 TRILLION dollar market...so far! Looks to me like people want to buy it. For context, the Beanie Baby craze in the 90's at peak, was $2.6 Billion dollars adjusted for inflation today. Crypto is world wide phenomena, and so far, is 1000x larger. It also has utility for those that don't like bank lineups and banker's hours. PS. FYI The Atlantic has become an extreme left leaning digital publication (source: https://www.allsides.com/news-source/atlantic https://www.allsides.com/news-source/atlantic). It stopped writing balanced articles years ago. Too bad, because it used to be great.
  - strgrd 2y ago
    Market cap does not equal value... Market cap does not equal value... Market cap does not equal value...
    - Terr_ 2y ago
      "Dude, tulips literally cannot go down."
      - kjksf 2y ago
        I can create (grow) as many tulips as I want. Can you create as many bitcoins as you want?
        Terr_ 2y ago
        It's a satirical reference to a historical event, where the speculative bubble kept going up... Until it didn't. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulip_mania https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulip_mania
        desumeku 2y ago
        It's important to note that this pretty much never actually happened and is only repeated all the time because of some movie. Source: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/there-never-was-real-tulip-fever-180964915/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/there-never-was-real-...
        kjksf 2y ago
        I know that, I've read about tulip mania before. To expand on my previous response: econ 101 teaches us that the price of any non-scarce product will converge to the cost of production plus some small profit margin. Tulip is not a scarce asset because you can make more tulips. If cost to produce a tulip is $1 dollar and the price spikes to $100 due to demand outstripping supply, people will be incentivized to grow more tulips. At some point they'll grow enough tulips for supply to meet the demand and they will have to sell tulips at merely small profit. In fact, some will likely have to sell tulips at a loss due to overproduction. Mona Lisa doesn't have this problem. There's only one Mona Lisa so as long as demand goes up, the price goes up. Bitcoin doesn't have this problem. There's a hard limit of 21 million bitcoins that will ever exist. As long as demand for bitcoin goes up, the price goes up.
        2y ago
    - adeptusluminati 2y ago
      "The stock market is not real!" Same logic & vibe. $3 Trillion dollars and 500+ Million people disagree with you.... so far.
      - brokencode 2y ago
        Nope, not at all. Stocks represent partial ownership of a company. If you buy all the stock for a company, you own the company. Companies are valuable because they (ideally) make a profit for the owners. Bonds are valuable because the company or government that issues them signs a contract to pay out a certain amount on them. They won’t always do that, but thats why we have rating agencies to help investors understand the risk. The closest equivalent to crypto in traditional assets is probably precious metals and gemstones, though even those typically have some industrial uses to drive demand. Diamonds are a great example of the downside of looking at the market value of something alone. The natural diamond market has been massively disrupted by the rise of artificial diamonds and diamond alternatives.
        desumeku 2y ago
        Great argument. "I don't believe it has value, so it doesn't." Well, keep telling yourself that. I'm sure you feel just as smart as you did when you dismissed bitcoin at $1,000, and you'll feel just as smart dismissing it at $1,000,000.
        deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
        brokencode 2y ago
        I’m not dismissing it. I’m saying that it’s different than traditional investments since most of the potential uses are still speculative, whereas it’s pretty obvious what value you can get from ownership of a company or a barrel of oil.
    - kjksf 2y ago
      It is, however, strongly correlated with value. Therefore, if you want to argue that any specific asset is overvalued (or has no value at all), the onus is on you to provide an actual argument and not a lazy slogan. What kind of usefulness threshold would Bitcoin have to reach for you to assign value to it? Is 25 million wallet not enough? Given that a wallet is basically a bank account except it cannot be seized by a government, a bank can't stop transfers, a bank employee won't demand to know why you're withdrawing the money and you can access your satoshis anywhere in the world. Is 420 million Bitcoin owners enough? Multiple Bitcoin ETFs? Legalized in multiple countries? Bitcoin ETF becoming the fastest growing ETF ever? Blackrock recommending 1-2% portfolio allocation to Bitcoin? El Salvador stacking on bitcoin? Strategy becoming the best performing stock in recent years with a simple strategy of stacking bitcoin? Other than that, what did Romans ever did for us?
      - snailmailstare 2y ago
        > Given that a wallet is basically a bank account except it cannot be seized by a government All wallets could become worthless in a weekend if a government makes the wrong stride in quantum research.. El Salvador is not recommending Bitcoin and found low interest in actual use. Madoff also had a fund that could return very well. Satoshi just has to show up and cash out to ruin his pyramid or push the pyramid entirely to the US tax payers right now. Seems improbable like the chairman of NASDAQ running a scam.. These bizarre scams have no place in a real economy and we have to get rid of 0% interest to kill this garbage.
        Terr_ 2y ago
        Cypto-currency has vanishingly few good and legitimate use cases, but: > All wallets could become worthless in a weekend if a government makes the wrong stride in quantum research.. TBF, you could say something similar about all stocks remotely related to transportation the moment someone invents a teleporter. I agree there's a difference there, but I don't think it has to do with the vulnerability of the asset.
        snailmailstare 2y ago
desumeku 2y ago
Strange, because a lot of the rhetoric I see online lately amounts to local propaganda saying "Russia might need to be nuked".
- Terr_ 2y ago
  Are you aware of the absurdity of your reply? On one hand, multiple years of Russian government-controlled television running professional segments, depicting potential targets, stock footage of missiles flying and exploding, with supporting quotes and appearances from Russian government figures. On the other hand, you recently saw *checks notes* internet randos venting, displeased how a portion of their government bends over backwards to appease Russia for no legitimate reason. You want us to believe those are even remotely comparable? Weak.
  - dudefeliciano 2y ago
    Don’t forget about the inert hypersonic missile that hit Ukraine a while back, that was purely a show of force
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
kjksf 2y ago
If you don't believe that long-term Bitcoin is going 10x - 100x and becomes, at the very least, a planetary store of value, then of course Strategic Bitcoin Reserve doesn't make any sense. If you do believe that then you understand why any person, company or country will benefit financially by stocking up on Bitcoin today. If you believe that Beanie babies or russian ruble will 10x - 100x then you would believe that any person, company or country will benefit financially by stocking on beanie babies today.
- pants2 2y ago
  Though much of the controversy is around the inclusion of ripple, solana, and cardano. There's no reason to have these in the reserve. Might as well hold GME in there too.
  - krustyburger 2y ago
    I love it when my government apes into things.
    - Terr_ 2y ago
      Even worse: 1. Using money taken from you, preventing you from ape-ing-in yourself. 2. Doing it with zero promise that any future profits will benefit you, as opposed to offsetting a giant tax cut for the wealthy again.
  - desumeku 2y ago
    You can't have stablecoins, smart contracts, and an entire crypto economy on Bitcoin alone. Trump said crypto capital. I'm personally expecting grocery stores to start showing you a QR code for stablecoin payment over your preferred chain next year.
- wmf 2y ago
  That wouldn't be a strategic reserve, just a speculative investment. You might ask why the US doesn't also invest in AAPL and NVDA. You might also consider the "soft power" effects of the US using the global middle class as exit liquidity.
BuyMyBitcoins 2y ago
>Strategic Russian Ruble Reserve Pardon my ignorance here, but don’t the central banks of most nations hold foreign currencies in a strategic reserve? I feel like we probably already have Ruble reserve.
- Terr_ 2y ago
  Some quick searching suggests the US government has some Japanese Yen and Euros, and if other stuff exists it's much more indirect via the IMF etc. https://home.treasury.gov/data/us-international-reserve-position/01312025 https://home.treasury.gov/data/us-international-reserve-posi...
JKCalhoun 2y ago
(Was thinking we need an Herbalife Reserve.)

by Terr_ 2y ago

gs17 2y ago

The Beanie Babies could at least be burned for fuel if we were really desperate and no one wanted to buy them (and the government didn't want to play Santa). Crypto is almost the opposite, we burn fuel to get it and if no one wants to buy it, you couldn't even use it to make children happy.

adeptusluminati 2y ago
..."and if no one wants to buy it" It's a 3 TRILLION dollar market...so far! Looks to me like people want to buy it. For context, the Beanie Baby craze in the 90's at peak, was $2.6 Billion dollars adjusted for inflation today. Crypto is world wide phenomena, and so far, is 1000x larger. It also has utility for those that don't like bank lineups and banker's hours. PS. FYI The Atlantic has become an extreme left leaning digital publication (source: https://www.allsides.com/news-source/atlantic https://www.allsides.com/news-source/atlantic). It stopped writing balanced articles years ago. Too bad, because it used to be great.
- strgrd 2y ago
  Market cap does not equal value... Market cap does not equal value... Market cap does not equal value...
  - Terr_ 2y ago
    "Dude, tulips literally cannot go down."
    - kjksf 2y ago
      I can create (grow) as many tulips as I want. Can you create as many bitcoins as you want?
      - Terr_ 2y ago
        It's a satirical reference to a historical event, where the speculative bubble kept going up... Until it didn't. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulip_mania https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulip_mania
        desumeku 2y ago
        It's important to note that this pretty much never actually happened and is only repeated all the time because of some movie. Source: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/there-never-was-real-tulip-fever-180964915/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/there-never-was-real-...
        kjksf 2y ago
        I know that, I've read about tulip mania before. To expand on my previous response: econ 101 teaches us that the price of any non-scarce product will converge to the cost of production plus some small profit margin. Tulip is not a scarce asset because you can make more tulips. If cost to produce a tulip is $1 dollar and the price spikes to $100 due to demand outstripping supply, people will be incentivized to grow more tulips. At some point they'll grow enough tulips for supply to meet the demand and they will have to sell tulips at merely small profit. In fact, some will likely have to sell tulips at a loss due to overproduction. Mona Lisa doesn't have this problem. There's only one Mona Lisa so as long as demand goes up, the price goes up. Bitcoin doesn't have this problem. There's a hard limit of 21 million bitcoins that will ever exist. As long as demand for bitcoin goes up, the price goes up.
        2y ago
  - adeptusluminati 2y ago
    "The stock market is not real!" Same logic & vibe. $3 Trillion dollars and 500+ Million people disagree with you.... so far.
    - brokencode 2y ago
      Nope, not at all. Stocks represent partial ownership of a company. If you buy all the stock for a company, you own the company. Companies are valuable because they (ideally) make a profit for the owners. Bonds are valuable because the company or government that issues them signs a contract to pay out a certain amount on them. They won’t always do that, but thats why we have rating agencies to help investors understand the risk. The closest equivalent to crypto in traditional assets is probably precious metals and gemstones, though even those typically have some industrial uses to drive demand. Diamonds are a great example of the downside of looking at the market value of something alone. The natural diamond market has been massively disrupted by the rise of artificial diamonds and diamond alternatives.
      - desumeku 2y ago
        Great argument. "I don't believe it has value, so it doesn't." Well, keep telling yourself that. I'm sure you feel just as smart as you did when you dismissed bitcoin at $1,000, and you'll feel just as smart dismissing it at $1,000,000.
        deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
        brokencode 2y ago
        I’m not dismissing it. I’m saying that it’s different than traditional investments since most of the potential uses are still speculative, whereas it’s pretty obvious what value you can get from ownership of a company or a barrel of oil.
  - kjksf 2y ago
    It is, however, strongly correlated with value. Therefore, if you want to argue that any specific asset is overvalued (or has no value at all), the onus is on you to provide an actual argument and not a lazy slogan. What kind of usefulness threshold would Bitcoin have to reach for you to assign value to it? Is 25 million wallet not enough? Given that a wallet is basically a bank account except it cannot be seized by a government, a bank can't stop transfers, a bank employee won't demand to know why you're withdrawing the money and you can access your satoshis anywhere in the world. Is 420 million Bitcoin owners enough? Multiple Bitcoin ETFs? Legalized in multiple countries? Bitcoin ETF becoming the fastest growing ETF ever? Blackrock recommending 1-2% portfolio allocation to Bitcoin? El Salvador stacking on bitcoin? Strategy becoming the best performing stock in recent years with a simple strategy of stacking bitcoin? Other than that, what did Romans ever did for us?
    - snailmailstare 2y ago
      > Given that a wallet is basically a bank account except it cannot be seized by a government All wallets could become worthless in a weekend if a government makes the wrong stride in quantum research.. El Salvador is not recommending Bitcoin and found low interest in actual use. Madoff also had a fund that could return very well. Satoshi just has to show up and cash out to ruin his pyramid or push the pyramid entirely to the US tax payers right now. Seems improbable like the chairman of NASDAQ running a scam.. These bizarre scams have no place in a real economy and we have to get rid of 0% interest to kill this garbage.
      - Terr_ 2y ago
        Cypto-currency has vanishingly few good and legitimate use cases, but: > All wallets could become worthless in a weekend if a government makes the wrong stride in quantum research.. TBF, you could say something similar about all stocks remotely related to transportation the moment someone invents a teleporter. I agree there's a difference there, but I don't think it has to do with the vulnerability of the asset.
        snailmailstare 2y ago

desumeku 2y ago

Strange, because a lot of the rhetoric I see online lately amounts to local propaganda saying "Russia might need to be nuked".

Terr_ 2y ago
Are you aware of the absurdity of your reply? On one hand, multiple years of Russian government-controlled television running professional segments, depicting potential targets, stock footage of missiles flying and exploding, with supporting quotes and appearances from Russian government figures. On the other hand, you recently saw *checks notes* internet randos venting, displeased how a portion of their government bends over backwards to appease Russia for no legitimate reason. You want us to believe those are even remotely comparable? Weak.
- dudefeliciano 2y ago
  Don’t forget about the inert hypersonic missile that hit Ukraine a while back, that was purely a show of force
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]

kjksf 2y ago

If you don't believe that long-term Bitcoin is going 10x - 100x and becomes, at the very least, a planetary store of value, then of course Strategic Bitcoin Reserve doesn't make any sense. If you do believe that then you understand why any person, company or country will benefit financially by stocking up on Bitcoin today. If you believe that Beanie babies or russian ruble will 10x - 100x then you would believe that any person, company or country will benefit financially by stocking on beanie babies today.

pants2 2y ago
Though much of the controversy is around the inclusion of ripple, solana, and cardano. There's no reason to have these in the reserve. Might as well hold GME in there too.
- krustyburger 2y ago
  I love it when my government apes into things.
  - Terr_ 2y ago
    Even worse: 1. Using money taken from you, preventing you from ape-ing-in yourself. 2. Doing it with zero promise that any future profits will benefit you, as opposed to offsetting a giant tax cut for the wealthy again.
- desumeku 2y ago
  You can't have stablecoins, smart contracts, and an entire crypto economy on Bitcoin alone. Trump said crypto capital. I'm personally expecting grocery stores to start showing you a QR code for stablecoin payment over your preferred chain next year.
wmf 2y ago
That wouldn't be a strategic reserve, just a speculative investment. You might ask why the US doesn't also invest in AAPL and NVDA. You might also consider the "soft power" effects of the US using the global middle class as exit liquidity.

BuyMyBitcoins 2y ago

>Strategic Russian Ruble Reserve Pardon my ignorance here, but don’t the central banks of most nations hold foreign currencies in a strategic reserve? I feel like we probably already have Ruble reserve.

Terr_ 2y ago
Some quick searching suggests the US government has some Japanese Yen and Euros, and if other stuff exists it's much more indirect via the IMF etc. https://home.treasury.gov/data/us-international-reserve-position/01312025 https://home.treasury.gov/data/us-international-reserve-posi...

JKCalhoun 2y ago

(Was thinking we need an Herbalife Reserve.)