BITCOIN

User232002

Frequentlyhere said:

"What evidence do you have that 'it has the reverse of any sort of traction'?"

To be honest, it seems a bit nuts to have to give any, is it not just common knowledge that crypto is a fad of the past alongside NFT's and meme stonks? 

The small slice of people who were interested have mostly been put off by the various bombs going off in the scene and the loss of their cash. This is hardly a controversial view, and even when fraud is not involved, it's also just the mathematics of a less than zero sum game.

But ok, here's some regular polling done by YouGov about investments in general. It shows that interest in crypto peaked in the UK in about April 2021, when a heady 7% of people thought it was becoming more appealing. That has now more than halved to 3%. The last date of the tracker was a few days ago, and no the price going up hasn't sparked interest.

Stateside, the story is similar and there's no "except bitcoin" caveat.

Haha.

Imagine something being 'so obvious,' and 'hardly controversial,' that the best evidence you can provide in support of it is a flipping YouGov poll (that actually shows an increase of 50% over the sample quoted anyway). You must be living in a clown world.

FYI, (1) YouGov also has another poll on its website showing that 10% of Brits bought cryptocurrency (and like all the other metrics I posted, its only been trending up over the sample), and (2) Bitcoin is an open network and its usage data is readily available, so why (aside from the fact it doesnt fit your narrative) would you not look at the actual data pertaining to the network itself?

Frequentlyhere said:

Other things - Well, Eth seems to have at least some traction in changing from PoW to PoS. Bitcoin meanwhile has been mocked by that progressive tech institution the US Government for not doing so, amongst many other attacks many of which we've described in these pages (e.g basically its use is limited to a speculative token). 

The Bitcoin POS fork already exists. Down 99%+. Rejected by the market.




Bitcoins energy usage is not a problem; https://www.lynalden.com/bitcoin-energy/ 

Frequentlyhere said:

there are still no particularly interesting use cases

Decentralised, bearer asset with an uncorruptible money supply and permissionless use. Seems pretty appropriate given that our governments can't control their debt burdens (see earlier graphs).

Frequentlyhere said:

it still can't handle being used as a currency for various reasons

My god.

Frequentlyhere said:

Re: price, I'm no longer sure what the point is. If we're just in it to make £, then it's just a day trading speculation game whatever the price. Fair enough if people do that, some can make good money. I'm sure it'll remain volatile. Dangerous waters though, and you're likely playing in a rigged casino

Price up 40% in a fortnight where banks are failing and being bailed out and you think these are unrelated events? Laughable.

When price goes up, you argue its just random. When price goes down, you think its meaningful. That's confirmation bias. You declared it dead and irrelevant at $16k; one would assume that the price doubling might make a reasonable person reconsider their opinion.

Frequentlyhere said:

Any other bright future where you just hold on to it would require it to have some sort of actual use eventually, which doesn't seem to be on the horizon. It could have perhaps just about landed as digital gold maybe, but I think SBF, Do Kwon & co have blown that one  (yes I know, that's crypto not specifically bitcoin etc - still) .

It has a use case right now. 

Frequentlyhere said:

As a result, the one area where it most definitely has gained traction as I'm sure you've noticed is in being progressively strangled with regulation out of any mainstream existence. How that can be good for bitcoin I'm not sure, but there's always an answer!

Great success! Banning Bitcoin has historically been excellent for the price of Bitcoin. 

silvercue

"a fad"  

Best performing asset class in last 10 years.  And this year... only up 60% already with another halving next year.   How are the non crypto markets doing?  Not as well.  Which is usually pretty standard.  

aaj123

For the 'no traction' folk - see below for the trend in number of BTC and ETH addresses that hold >1 unit of each (do note that 1 unit comprises different proportions of the supply of each coin - BTC supply is around 19 million while ETH is around 120 million so the lines are not comparable with each other):

https://charts.coinmetrics.io/crypto-data/?config=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

A chart that can be compared between BTC and ETH is one that plots number of addresses in each chain that have balance greater than a billionth of their respective total supplies:

https://charts.coinmetrics.io/crypto-data/?config=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

Malthusian

darren232002 said:

Malthusian said:

It would be pretty difficult for the vast majority of institutional investors to decrease allocation to cryptocurrency, given that for over 99.9% of the investment funds and pension schemes in the world, their allocation to cryptocurrency is zero, and any allocation to magic Internet money would be in violation of their fund's objective.

Which is why the image I posted, that you are referring to, contains this caption underneath; "data shown among current investors only."

So this survey purporting to show "institutional use increasing" consisted 100% of bros who have already bought in.
The real dead giveaway was actually that 71% of "institutional investors" believe number will go up, while 29% "neither agree nor disagree" that number go up. The percentage of "institutional investors" who believed number could go down was... zero. In opinion polling this is known as "doing a Mugabe".

darren232002 said:

Great success! Banning Bitcoin has historically been excellent for the price of Bitcoin. 

In much the same way as banning nitrous oxide is widely expected to be excellent for the price of NOS canisters. (Although not so great for anyone trying to use them to get high, who will now be at the mercy of the black market.) Time to go bullish on nitrox and ride that whipped cream to the moon. 1 NOS canister = 1 NOS canister. Few understand.

HHarry

darren232002 said:

Price up 40% in a fortnight where banks are failing and being bailed out and you think these are unrelated events? Laughable.

 Two banks, dealing in a niche area, have failed.  And one, with a history of problems, has been taken over.  That’s only 3 banks globally.

 If that’s enough to get people flocking to BTC then good luck to them.

aaj123

HHarry said:

darren232002 said:

Price up 40% in a fortnight where banks are failing and being bailed out and you think these are unrelated events? Laughable.

 Two banks, dealing in a niche area, have failed.  And one, with a history of problems, has been taken over.  That’s only 3 banks globally.

 If that’s enough to get people flocking to BTC then good luck to them.

Do you think we are talking of people going all-in on Bitcoin? Of course not. We are talking of allocations to Bitcoin being ramped up just like corporates have relationships with multiple banks. Such increased allocations cause enough inflows to be bullish on Bitcoin.

Looked at in this way, it appears downright unreasonable and bad fiduciary duty to not have even one alternative way of keeping hold of value outside the traditional banking system (now don't say you expect corporates to store gold / diamonds / cash under mattress because these are not items one can transact with outside of third party reliance or even transact in digital form). Can there even be a defense against such basic risk management?

Frequentlyhere

aaj123 said:

For the 'no traction' folk - see below for the trend in number of BTC and ETH addresses that hold >1 unit of each (do note that 1 unit comprises different proportions of the supply of each coin - BTC supply is around 19 million while ETH is around 120 million so the lines are not comparable with each other):

Wouldn't whether the address is actually active be a better metric of actual usage? (Genuine question) 

That looks to me like it's reached a peak of active use in April 2021 and since fallen back somewhat?

silvercue
Best performing asset class in last 10 years.  And this year... only up 60% already with another halving next year.   How are the non crypto markets doing?  Not as well.  Which is usually pretty standard. 

Well,  if you just want to boast that you're speculating successfully on bitcoin to the overall detriment of others trying to do so too, then whatever floats your boat. It's not really something that resonates with me because it can't generate winners overall, only winners at the expense of (more) losers.

I also find it rather odd in any case for an investor to be crowing about any asset that's still down 57% from its high and more like 70% in real terms. 

But even if it goes back to $69k or reaches $1m it doesn't really matter from an overall point of view, as it's still a negative sum game. But who cares if you're considering that from your lambo, right?

Frequentlyhere

HHarry said:

darren232002 said:

Price up 40% in a fortnight where banks are failing and being bailed out and you think these are unrelated events? Laughable.

 Two banks, dealing in a niche area, have failed.  And one, with a history of problems, has been taken over.  That’s only 3 banks globally.

 If that’s enough to get people flocking to BTC then good luck to them.

I think it's also worth again pointing people to Molly White's article on this.

No, Bitcoin isn't pumping because it's a "safe haven" from banks

We don't need custom charts to understand the basic points she makes, such as:

Bitcoin isn’t a store of value

“Bitcoin is a safe haven” first requires people to believe that Bitcoin is a good store of value, which is a thoroughly debunked idea for all except those who believe that if you can manage to find two points on a timeline where a Bitcoin is worth roughly the same, then it’s a store of value. Checkmate!

The thing with stores of value is that I should be able to, at some point in the future, liquidate that value for somewhere relatively close to what I put into it. With Bitcoin, you have to hope like hell that that future point doesn’t happen to be during one of the periods where Bitcoin has lost a third of its value over the past year, or half over the last eighteen months (as it is now, even after the recent pump)"

aaj123

Frequentlyhere said:

The thing with stores of value is that I should be able to, at some point in the future, liquidate that value for somewhere relatively close to what I put into it. 

I mean you are free to put in any restricted constraint and that's fine for yourself. For many though, that isn't the sole point - it's also about having a way of storing value that is independent of the traditional system and which can be transacted without third parties. If such is more volatile then okay that's a price many are willing to pay.

aaj123

Frequentlyhere said:

Frequentlyhere said:

Wouldn't whether the address is actually active be a better metric of actual usage? (Genuine question) 

That looks to me like it's reached a peak of active use in April 2021 and since fallen back somewhat?

It's not really something that resonates with me because it can't generate winners overall, only winners at the expense of (more) losers.

Not really. Active addresses usually go high during periods of heavy trading and obviously this is during heights of speculative frenzy. The true metric is therefore number of addresses that remain holding Bitcoin. I you were to really make a case of 'decreasing traction', you should see such keep trending down as more and more people dump their coins and they just get collected by a smaller number of fanatics. But that ain't what the data shows.

As for your last line, no idea where you get your conclusion from about 'negative sum game'. I feel it all comes from your idea that everyone in Bitcoin is there to ultimately come back to fiat. While people sure diversify back when rising values make Bitcoin a large part of their portfolio, most solidly intend to always keep hold of some that still forms a substantial part of their networth. Why would you argue that somehow this process is a zero sum game?

Every holder over time will benefit from Bitcoin regardless of their fiat gains as what they have is a piece of value outside of the traditional system that cannot be inflated away. The genesis of your 'zero sum game' theory is because you are not seeing this value and are just focusing on fiat gains and intention of 'total cash out'.