Flies to the light
Comments
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I'm pretty sure digital currencies will in the long term be 'the future', but as an investment at the moment it's complete pot luck, and incredibly risky.
A friend spent 1k on bitcoin a few years ago and recent cashed out at over 100k. Pot luck, yes, but I couldn't be happier for him. The problem is that people hear about these cases and jump on the bandwagon, hoping they haven't missed the boat.
Some people are going to make/have made a lot of money, but a lot of people are going to lose even more. I have some digital currency investment, but it's a small part of my savings that I consider a punt.
Digital currency are only worth what people are willing to pay, which is basically the same as any physical asset.0 -
Well, you are buying the right to sell that digital currency to anyone as you see fit in the future, at a price at which you both agree is fair. Either privately or via a market exchange process.dealer_wins wrote: »I think of digital currencies as buying literally nothing lol
So, if you pay out some money for a fraction of a bitcoin or a fraction of one - you are not buying literally nothing. You are buying something which is unique and auditable. Though you may see it as figuratively nothing because 'its just made up of a bunch of 1s and 0s that are recorded in big registers all around the planet' and you don't think a digital 1 or 0 can have any inherent value for anything.0 -
When you consider that at one time you could buy a Stately Home and grounds for £10k, you begin to realise how much the Government has ripped us off through inflation.
So I would love Bitcoin to be a success and gve Central Banks some competition.
But I've never had any because I don't invest in things I don't understand. Which is usually for the best, but perhaps not in this case.“It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” --Upton Sinclair0 -
Shouldn't this be moths to the light?0
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My concern is that Bitcoin is being used as an investment first and utilised as a currency a poor, and distant, second. For me that rings alarm bells; it's classic bubble territory.
I heard about Bitcoin in its early days and yes, in hindsight I do have a pang of regret. But it's the same kind of regret you feel when you fold an opening hand of 7, 2 in poker and the flop comes as triple sevens. You may have snatched defeat from the jaws of victory on this occasion, but your strategy was correct. There's a reason you seldom hear about all the other cryptos that didn't make it!
I'm losing no sleep over Bitcoin; the rest of my investments are providing good enough returns for me. I've always approached investing as an extension of saving. Some of my peers are much more into the speculative/gambling side, or trading, but that goes against my motto of making the money work for you, not vice versa; i.e. the goal is passive income.: )0 -
Glen_Clark wrote: »When you consider that at one time you could buy a Stately Home and grounds for £10k, you begin to realise how much the Government has ripped us off through inflation.
So I would love Bitcoin to be a success and gve Central Banks some competition.
But I've never had any because I don't invest in things I don't understand. Which is usually for the best, but perhaps not in this case.
Inflation has some very useful aspects. It removes the effects of mistakes made by previous generations, or even by ourselves years ago, by eventually reducing all debts to insignificance. Looking at the wider picture without inflation perhaps we could still be paying significant interest to the money lenders for their help during the Napoleonic Wars, never mind the loans taken out to cover the 1st and 2nd World Wars.
Think about how a deflating currency system would work. No-one would want to take out a loan knowing that the capital value to be repaid was continuously increasing in real terms. Why invest if by simply holding cash you get richer every day, if you are lucky enough to be one of the perhaps very small number with excess cash rather than in debt. People would avoid buying something now on the grounds that they could buy it cheaper tomorrow. Perhaps good for the environment but not so good for employment.
Inflation hasnt ripped people off - they are in general far richer in real terms than they were decades ago. The period when they may have been getting poorer over the past 10 years or so has been one with the lowest level of inflation for very many years.0
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