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FUCK. Is all I have to say. When it was $200, I said "Fuck, I should probably wait". Same thing when it was $300. I'm so on the fence in investing in bitcoin. I

by rfnslyr 13y ago

FUCK. Is all I have to say. When it was $200, I said "Fuck, I should probably wait". Same thing when it was $300. I'm so on the fence in investing in bitcoin. I feel like it's going to reach $10k/btc and I'll be living in a lifelong depression of "what could have been". Tempted to drop like 5k into it... I truly don't know what to do at this point. I could wait and see a drop that may or may not come, and I'll constantly be in the state of indecision that I feel ultimately will cripple me in the future. I think I'll buy 1BTC/mo and see where it goes from there.

dubfan 13y ago
There are many people who bought real estate in 2006 with this same mindset.
- BlackDeath3 13y ago
  And this is why: * It's referred to as "speculation". * You don't "invest" more than you can afford to lose.
squidfood 13y ago
The more speculation changes, the more it stays the same...
pat2man 13y ago
As always don't invest more than you are willing to lose. There are a million ways that bitcoins could drop to nothing.
wintermuteblog 13y ago
Yeah... well I somehow managed to sell a couple days ago at 275.... right at the bottom of the quirky crash - and I feel ... depressed.
- BlackDeath3 13y ago
  Did you sell for personal reasons, or because the drop scared you off, or what?
  - wintermuteblog 13y ago
    I decided to sell at 350. I sat down on my computer, and put in my sell order at 352.Then it started to drop. Then suddenly, it crashed, 2 dollars a second. I watched it get down to 275, and then I just lost my nerve. Basically, it was incredible, incredible bad luck. As I havent really "watched" the price, for about 2 years. tl;dr; Bad luck can actually happen to you
    - pjc50 13y ago
      Hang on, that sounds like a serious limitation in the trading platform if you can issue a sell order at one price and have it fulfilled at a different one?
      - meowface 13y ago
        Every trade platform I've used provides two options: sell at current market price, or sell at a specific, unchanging price. So it sounds like he misunderstood the option he was selecting, or something.
      - broostoryco 13y ago
        no, he placed the order above market, didnt get hit, watched the price fall, lost his nerves and sold at market
      - kgermino 13y ago
        That reads like (s)he was sitting at the computer with the intention to sell at $350, and happened to be there to see it quickly drop to $275, got nervous and cashed out. The unlucky was that (s)he never would have thought to sell it except for seeing the price crash in real time.
      - TheCoelacanth 13y ago
- jebus989 13y ago
  I know it's a cliché to bring this up but even with BTC being (arguably) instruments for speculation, it helps to keep Ben Graham's "Mr. Market" in mind when you're worrying about what the current exchange rate is. If you went to a store and they discounted your favourite [grocery item], would you rush home and sell all that you had in your cupboard, or buy it up while you can?
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
atom-morgan 13y ago
If you were to wake up tomorrow and realize all the money you put into Bitcoin vanished into thin air, how much would that amount be that it wouldn't ruin your life? $100? $1,000? That's a good way to figure out how much you should invest. But with Bitcoin, think long-term.
jaibot 13y ago
Rule of thumb: Don't make speculative investments unless you know something that everyone else doesn't know. How many other people are thinking the _exact same thing_ right now?
- 3pt14159 13y ago
  I bought when only programmers knew ($4 / BTC) buying now would be buying when only techies and finance people know ($400 / BTC) if bitcoin continues to succeed and starts to get used for say, people sending money home to Pakistan it will be AT LEAST ($40,000 / BTC) and probably much much more depending on its usefulness. But the bet now is that it becomes very successful, not that it gains some momentum.
  - bmilleare 13y ago
    Out of curiosity, how much did you buy at $4/BTC?
    - fleitz 13y ago
      Out of even more curiosity, have you unloaded, if not, why is a 10000% return insufficient?
    - jaibot 13y ago
      Re: 10000% return...that's sort of a reverse-sunk-cost fallacy, isn't it? (Found gold fallacy?) Whether or not bitcoin is a good investment is an orthogonal matter.
    - 3pt14159 13y ago
      I don't share that online, but I have sold about 80% of what I bought at different levels. I'm holding on to the rest in case bitcoin gets north of $10k. I'm not a bitcoin millionaire, please don't kidnap me and force me to send you bitcoins :(
- nilkn 13y ago
  > Don't make speculative investments unless you know something that everyone else doesn't know. Bitcoin has not caught on in the general worldwide population. Simply knowing of its existence and understanding it at this point in time could be the hallowed knowledge you speak of here.
plainOldText 13y ago
Eventually bitcoin will crash again. The big question is when. Some people will win, some people will lose. That's just how it is. There are many advantages and disadvanteges to bitcoin - non-centralized, not controlled,but also volatile, prone to hoarding right now, etc. To have a more stable currency a few wrinkles will need to be addressed.
- vinchuco 13y ago
  "it may or it may not crash soon, it has many advantages and disadvanteges, there's stuff to be adressed"
  - plainOldText 13y ago
    Indeed, less verbose, but also less artistic :)
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
adamnemecek 13y ago
Yeah, I vividly remember in April 2012 (when it was ~$5) whether I should buy a couple K worth of bitcoins and then decided not to.
modeless 13y ago
Speaking as someone who owns more than a few bitcoins, there are still many threats that could drop the value to near 0 in a matter of hours. 1. An exploit or bug in bitcoind that either takes down the network or allows theft of coins. 2. Discovery of a weakness in the underlying cryptographic primitives, or their specific implementation in bitcoind. 3. A hack of several mining pools at once that allows a 51% attack. 4. A crippling hack of multiple of the main exchanges or wallets at once: Mt. Gox, BTCChina, Coinbase, and BitStamp. 5. Regulatory action threatening to outlaw or severely restrict bitcoin. 6. Real brute-force 51% attacks may still be possible by an attacker with access to cutting-edge semiconductor fabs and a very large budget. I think it's clear by now that the general concept of digital currency has a bright future, but betting on bitcoin specifically is still a risky investment.
fleitz 13y ago
Don't be sorry, you're looking at executing a buy high, sell low strategy. When you want to buy bitcoin is when it's just experienced a big drop, you're too late to the party, when it hits $50 again, buy. Pick a price point, make a buy order, as soon as your buy order executes pick another point, make your sell order. Don't time the market, price the market.
- jaibot 13y ago
  On a related note: Is the bitcoin infrastructure mature enough to support short selling in a sane way yet? I've yet to find a decent way to do this.
  - rfnslyr 13y ago
    I use BTC-E. Too bad I'm an idiot and traded over 50BTC for litecoins. I'm legitimately stressed.
    - fleitz 13y ago
      I refused an offer for my house in Aug 2007, don't sweat it. Go into trades with a clear head not thinking about the past. Whatever you did you did, stressing about it will not help you make better trades in the future. If you think BTC is going up, cut your litecoin losses and trade, if you don't stick with litecoin or something more stable til BTC reaches your price.
    - redschell 13y ago
      Hey, I remember first hearing about them on 4Chan /g/ back in late 2011, when they were maybe $6 a pop. We used to call them "Buttcoins" and laugh at all of the people mining them. Of course, we look pretty stupid at this particular moment, but who's to say it won't all go to shit next week? Easy, friend. There will be many more waves to ride.
  - chollida1 13y ago
    > On a related note: Is the bitcoin infrastructure mature enough to support short selling in a sane way yet? I work in finance so I'm very familiar with shorting but I don't know what you mean by "a sane way". What way's sane or otherwise are you referring to? Normally for shorting. you do the following: 1) borrow the stock from a broker 2) put in your short order 3) get your order filled 4) continue to pay a borrow each day for the stock you borrowed to short 5) buy back your stock 6) return the borrow and settle with your broker
berberous 13y ago
This is why I invested 1k at ~$100. If it goes to zero...well, it's not that much money that I'd really care. And it will have been fun to watch all the ups and downs. But if that $1k ends up being worth $50k and I didn't buy in...I would be so pissed. Definitely don't invest anything you're not okay losing.
javert 13y ago
You're thinking of Bitcoin like a stock. It is not a stock. Everyone agress that it is likely to either go up my orders of magnitude, or not do that. "Not do that" includes local price fluctuations that aren't predictable anyway, which is what you are trying to predit--like a stock. Either invest in it because you want to invest in something that will either be the next HTTP or will be the next Gopher, OR don't invest in it because you don't want to invest in high-risk obsenely-high-return vehicles.

by rfnslyr 13y ago

dubfan 13y ago

There are many people who bought real estate in 2006 with this same mindset.

BlackDeath3 13y ago
And this is why: * It's referred to as "speculation". * You don't "invest" more than you can afford to lose.

squidfood 13y ago

The more speculation changes, the more it stays the same...

pat2man 13y ago

As always don't invest more than you are willing to lose. There are a million ways that bitcoins could drop to nothing.

wintermuteblog 13y ago

Yeah... well I somehow managed to sell a couple days ago at 275.... right at the bottom of the quirky crash - and I feel ... depressed.

BlackDeath3 13y ago
Did you sell for personal reasons, or because the drop scared you off, or what?
- wintermuteblog 13y ago
  I decided to sell at 350. I sat down on my computer, and put in my sell order at 352.Then it started to drop. Then suddenly, it crashed, 2 dollars a second. I watched it get down to 275, and then I just lost my nerve. Basically, it was incredible, incredible bad luck. As I havent really "watched" the price, for about 2 years. tl;dr; Bad luck can actually happen to you
  - pjc50 13y ago
    Hang on, that sounds like a serious limitation in the trading platform if you can issue a sell order at one price and have it fulfilled at a different one?
    - meowface 13y ago
      Every trade platform I've used provides two options: sell at current market price, or sell at a specific, unchanging price. So it sounds like he misunderstood the option he was selecting, or something.
    - broostoryco 13y ago
      no, he placed the order above market, didnt get hit, watched the price fall, lost his nerves and sold at market
    - kgermino 13y ago
      That reads like (s)he was sitting at the computer with the intention to sell at $350, and happened to be there to see it quickly drop to $275, got nervous and cashed out. The unlucky was that (s)he never would have thought to sell it except for seeing the price crash in real time.
    - TheCoelacanth 13y ago
jebus989 13y ago
I know it's a cliché to bring this up but even with BTC being (arguably) instruments for speculation, it helps to keep Ben Graham's "Mr. Market" in mind when you're worrying about what the current exchange rate is. If you went to a store and they discounted your favourite [grocery item], would you rush home and sell all that you had in your cupboard, or buy it up while you can?

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

atom-morgan 13y ago

If you were to wake up tomorrow and realize all the money you put into Bitcoin vanished into thin air, how much would that amount be that it wouldn't ruin your life? $100? $1,000? That's a good way to figure out how much you should invest. But with Bitcoin, think long-term.

jaibot 13y ago

Rule of thumb: Don't make speculative investments unless you know something that everyone else doesn't know. How many other people are thinking the _exact same thing_ right now?

3pt14159 13y ago
I bought when only programmers knew ($4 / BTC) buying now would be buying when only techies and finance people know ($400 / BTC) if bitcoin continues to succeed and starts to get used for say, people sending money home to Pakistan it will be AT LEAST ($40,000 / BTC) and probably much much more depending on its usefulness. But the bet now is that it becomes very successful, not that it gains some momentum.
- bmilleare 13y ago
  Out of curiosity, how much did you buy at $4/BTC?
  - fleitz 13y ago
    Out of even more curiosity, have you unloaded, if not, why is a 10000% return insufficient?
  - jaibot 13y ago
    Re: 10000% return...that's sort of a reverse-sunk-cost fallacy, isn't it? (Found gold fallacy?) Whether or not bitcoin is a good investment is an orthogonal matter.
  - 3pt14159 13y ago
    I don't share that online, but I have sold about 80% of what I bought at different levels. I'm holding on to the rest in case bitcoin gets north of $10k. I'm not a bitcoin millionaire, please don't kidnap me and force me to send you bitcoins :(
nilkn 13y ago
> Don't make speculative investments unless you know something that everyone else doesn't know. Bitcoin has not caught on in the general worldwide population. Simply knowing of its existence and understanding it at this point in time could be the hallowed knowledge you speak of here.

plainOldText 13y ago

Eventually bitcoin will crash again. The big question is when. Some people will win, some people will lose. That's just how it is. There are many advantages and disadvanteges to bitcoin - non-centralized, not controlled,but also volatile, prone to hoarding right now, etc. To have a more stable currency a few wrinkles will need to be addressed.

vinchuco 13y ago
"it may or it may not crash soon, it has many advantages and disadvanteges, there's stuff to be adressed"
- plainOldText 13y ago
  Indeed, less verbose, but also less artistic :)

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

adamnemecek 13y ago

Yeah, I vividly remember in April 2012 (when it was ~$5) whether I should buy a couple K worth of bitcoins and then decided not to.

modeless 13y ago

Speaking as someone who owns more than a few bitcoins, there are still many threats that could drop the value to near 0 in a matter of hours. 1. An exploit or bug in bitcoind that either takes down the network or allows theft of coins. 2. Discovery of a weakness in the underlying cryptographic primitives, or their specific implementation in bitcoind. 3. A hack of several mining pools at once that allows a 51% attack. 4. A crippling hack of multiple of the main exchanges or wallets at once: Mt. Gox, BTCChina, Coinbase, and BitStamp. 5. Regulatory action threatening to outlaw or severely restrict bitcoin. 6. Real brute-force 51% attacks may still be possible by an attacker with access to cutting-edge semiconductor fabs and a very large budget. I think it's clear by now that the general concept of digital currency has a bright future, but betting on bitcoin specifically is still a risky investment.

fleitz 13y ago

Don't be sorry, you're looking at executing a buy high, sell low strategy. When you want to buy bitcoin is when it's just experienced a big drop, you're too late to the party, when it hits $50 again, buy. Pick a price point, make a buy order, as soon as your buy order executes pick another point, make your sell order. Don't time the market, price the market.

jaibot 13y ago
On a related note: Is the bitcoin infrastructure mature enough to support short selling in a sane way yet? I've yet to find a decent way to do this.
- rfnslyr 13y ago
  I use BTC-E. Too bad I'm an idiot and traded over 50BTC for litecoins. I'm legitimately stressed.
  - fleitz 13y ago
    I refused an offer for my house in Aug 2007, don't sweat it. Go into trades with a clear head not thinking about the past. Whatever you did you did, stressing about it will not help you make better trades in the future. If you think BTC is going up, cut your litecoin losses and trade, if you don't stick with litecoin or something more stable til BTC reaches your price.
  - redschell 13y ago
    Hey, I remember first hearing about them on 4Chan /g/ back in late 2011, when they were maybe $6 a pop. We used to call them "Buttcoins" and laugh at all of the people mining them. Of course, we look pretty stupid at this particular moment, but who's to say it won't all go to shit next week? Easy, friend. There will be many more waves to ride.
- chollida1 13y ago
  > On a related note: Is the bitcoin infrastructure mature enough to support short selling in a sane way yet? I work in finance so I'm very familiar with shorting but I don't know what you mean by "a sane way". What way's sane or otherwise are you referring to? Normally for shorting. you do the following: 1) borrow the stock from a broker 2) put in your short order 3) get your order filled 4) continue to pay a borrow each day for the stock you borrowed to short 5) buy back your stock 6) return the borrow and settle with your broker

berberous 13y ago

This is why I invested 1k at ~$100. If it goes to zero...well, it's not that much money that I'd really care. And it will have been fun to watch all the ups and downs. But if that $1k ends up being worth $50k and I didn't buy in...I would be so pissed. Definitely don't invest anything you're not okay losing.

javert 13y ago

You're thinking of Bitcoin like a stock. It is not a stock. Everyone agress that it is likely to either go up my orders of magnitude, or not do that. "Not do that" includes local price fluctuations that aren't predictable anyway, which is what you are trying to predit--like a stock. Either invest in it because you want to invest in something that will either be the next HTTP or will be the next Gopher, OR don't invest in it because you don't want to invest in high-risk obsenely-high-return vehicles.