BITCOIN

BearWhite

thegentleway said:

BearWhite said:

So clearly we're not going to get any agreement on whether Crypto is a good investment or not, so maybe we can try and move on from that, on both sides, and make this thread useful?

I have about 5% of my wealth in it and am interested in what people think are good long terms investments in the space. I have BTC (55%)  and ETH (35%) plus some others platform tokens. Any views here on BTC v ETH as a long term investment? The rest of my money is in global trackers and a rental property so I'm well diversified.

My view is fairly bland I'm afraid: it's I don't know and I don't think anybody else does either. Seems reasonable to gamble a small proportion of your wealth you can afford to lose just in case it does become widely accepted.
I wanted to ask you something though: you mention the other 95% is in trackers and property so I was wondering if you have any gold or other speculative commodities/currencies? I find it interesting that people seem to be very happy to speculate on crypto but not other more conventional speculative assets.

No I don't and you raise a valid point. I've been aware of crypto since about 2014 but previously passed it off as a con until about 18 months ago, when some people I respected started buying bitcoin. That got me curious so I read up on bitcoin and when institutions started showing interest I figured it might go somewhere, hence buying some bitcoin and ether. I justify it to myself that it's just a small percentage of my assets but I do appreciate the contradiction. Personally I think it will grow in value significantly but if it doesn't it wont make much odds to me. I also wouldn't get involved with some of the smaller cap coins as they really do look like gambling.

User232002

Notepad_Phil said:

In the post I was replying to you said that banning bitcoin was impossible due to technical considerations. All I can see in your post are observations that you believe make it difficult to do but nothing which would make it definitively impossible. So are there technical considerations that would make it impossible or is it just a case of it being difficult to do?

Oh, did you miss you bit where I pointed out that you couldn't stop BTC trading unless you shut off the internet? I should probably add to that that I can store my entire wealth in my head with 24 words too. How are you going to ban an asset that can be traded over an all-pervasive network and effectively stored in my mind?

eskbanker

darren232002 said:
I should probably add to that that I can store my entire wealth in my head

Many of us have that sort of wealth, unfortunately....

User232002

lardellion said:

seansjt said:

It is definitely going more mainstream and mass adoption is starting to take off.  It will have a place in modern society it is just a case of how and where and when

This is true, however crypto is going mainstream because of speculative mania due to the price going up (and fears about inflation), not because the masses are actually using coins to trade goods and services, or for their intended purposes in general. So crypto isn't really being "adopted" for usage, but rather for cryptocurrency trading.

Bitcoins use case is a protection against inflation and a better store of value than anything currently in existence. In particular, the growth of Bitcoin is partly the story of the loss of trust in central banks. As Satoshi said, "The central bank must be trusted not to debase the currency, but the history of fiat currency is full of breaches of that trust."

I need to transact frequently in Bitcoin to enjoy this use case. Again, you are confusing money and currency.

wilding45

I wanted to try Bitcoin trading and deposited 350 euro with a broker. I could not even access the site to give instructions and noticed that the firm was not fsa regulated for UK trading. I requested a refund , to no effect. I was not worried as I had paid by credit card and asked for a chargeback.....their response was no chargeback and no section 75 because a cryptocurrency is involved. I will let you know how I get on at the ombudsman.

deejaybee

Coinbase what a palaver..... so far i have uploaded driving license and passport, plus done the webcam thing more than once, and still they are saying they cant verify my account !!!

Scott has kindly provided me info about Swissport, so i may have to go that way.

Notepad_Phil

darren232002 said:

Notepad_Phil said:

In the post I was replying to you said that banning bitcoin was impossible due to technical considerations. All I can see in your post are observations that you believe make it difficult to do but nothing which would make it definitively impossible. So are there technical considerations that would make it impossible or is it just a case of it being difficult to do?

Oh, did you miss you bit where I pointed out that you couldn't stop BTC trading unless you shut off the internet? I should probably add to that that I can store my entire wealth in my head with 24 words too. How are you going to ban an asset that can be traded over an all-pervasive network and effectively stored in my mind?

Except that if a government like the US (or maybe China in the future or even US+China in unison) ever did want to do this then they don't need to turn off the entire internet, they just need to turn off peoples access to get into or out of bitcoin. Yes you could still trade your 24 words amongst other similar minded people, but I suspect that BTC trading would soon die away in reality.

I had thought that there was some aspect of BTC that you were aware of that made it truly impossible, but if that's all you've got then I'd say that impossible is much too strong a word.

Anyway I doubt that any government would ever try to ban bitcoin or any of the legitimate cryptos, so I hope your dealings with crypto continue with success .

User232002

BearWhite said:

I have about 5% of my wealth in it and am interested in what people think are good long terms investments in the space. I have BTC (55%)  and ETH (35%) plus some others platform tokens. Any views here on BTC v ETH as a long term investment? The rest of my money is in global trackers and a rental property so I'm well diversified.

Past BTC and ETH, focus on good projects with working products (revenue streams or clear paths to generating such), a solid team of developers (security audited), with good marketing (network effects) and a non-scammy allocation of tokens (read the whitepaper).

Some avoids imo;
ADA (Cardano) is currently valued at $55B as an 'Ethereum killer,' but has no working smart contract functionality yet, has been in development for years and has limited developers working on it. It fails the first test above of being a 'working product.'

XRP has a current marketcap of $71B but the company that made XRP, Ripple Labs, hold nearly 50% of the supply. Even if you genuinely thought XRP was worth this, Ripple Labs has a much lower marketcap so it would be a far better investment given their holdings (not that I advise either btw, as I think XRP has a 'scammy allocation of tokens').

Ethereum Classic (ETC) has had numerous 51% attacks (essentially allowing someone to double spend tokens, or print free money) and has had no meaningful development on it since ETH abandoned it years ago. I shorted it at $7 earlier in the year for a brief period (I made money on that trade) because I thought even $7 was overpriced. Its currently trading for $120+ with a market capitalisation of $15B. Unfortunately the market is not very efficient yet and retail are buying this believing it has something to do with Ethereum, which it doesn't. It fails the 'solid team of developers' test.

underground99

wilding45 said:

I wanted to try Bitcoin trading and deposited 350 euro with a broker. I could not even access the site to give instructions and noticed that the firm was not fsa regulated for UK trading. I requested a refund , to no effect. I was not worried as I had paid by credit card and asked for a chargeback.....their response was no chargeback and no section 75 because a cryptocurrency is involved. I will let you know how I get on at the ombudsman.

To have a section 75 claim you would need the supplier to have broken their contract to supply you with the goods or services. It's not clear exactly what contracted 'transaction' for goods or services has been financed by your credit card company as you say your money disappeared and you couldn't access the site to give instructions. 

A number of major credit card issuers in the UK say that they are not to be used for cryptocurrency transactions (presumably because they don't want people putting in speculative claims when the currency falls in value) and so if that's part of their terms and conditions of use and you have tried to use them to buy crypto anyway, I guess they are probably not very interested in the supplier breaking their contract.  Sometimes you can can use the 'cash advance' feature of a credit card to do a cash transaction if it's for an activity (such as gambling or buying shares) that the card provider doesn't approve of. But in those cases you wouldn't get any S75 protection because you're not buying goods or services on credit, you're buying them with the cash advanced.   

These days, banks and some payment networks are also quite wary of gamblers and speculators doing 'chargebacks' when they are doing something speculative or risky such as buying crypto or placing bets that might not pay off. So they prefer to say their cards shouldn't be used for those types of transaction at all, and then if you try to give money to a crypto exchange or a betting group using your credit card they are not going to help you get it back because you only lost the money by breaking your terms. If you think you have some sort of a leg to stand on but the bank doesn't uphold your complaint and gives you a final written decision on your complaint that you don't like. tell the financial ombudsman about your complaint with the bank.  No point telling the financial ombudsman about your complaint with the crypto broker - as the crypto broker wasn't regulated for UK financial services, the ombudsman won't get directly involved with any disputes there.   

As an aside, the 'FSA' don't regulate financial services and investment business, it's the FCA (which stopped being called the FSA, 8 years ago); and the FCA don't regulate services provided by UK cryptoasset businesses, they only supervise money laundering compliance activities of such businesses. If it was a proper UK stockbroker, they would be regulated for buying and selling stocks. But it wasn't, so dead end.

User232002

Notepad_Phil said:

Except that if a government like the US (or maybe China in the future or even US+China in unison) ever did want to do this then they don't need to turn off the entire internet, they just need to turn off peoples access to get into or out of bitcoin. Yes you could still trade your 24 words amongst other similar minded people, but I suspect that BTC trading would soon die away in reality.

I had thought that there was some aspect of BTC that you were aware of that made it truly impossible, but if that's all you've got then I'd say that impossible is much too strong a word.

Anyway I doubt that any government would ever try to ban bitcoin or any of the legitimate cryptos, so I hope your dealings with crypto continue with success .

I've shown you that its impossible; Bitcoin trading can not be stopped as a technicality. Your argument is that BTC trading would die because there would be no value in it due to not being able to convert back to fiat. That doesn't mean its possible to ban it; it would still be tradable even if it went to zero. 

Beyond that, you're then arguing that governments increasing hurdles would make people want to give it up or destroy its value, but as I've already elaborated (i) history shows us this is incorrect (Bitcoin bans in other countries and the war on drugs), (ii) its against a governments own interests, and (iii) its unlikely the people with Bitcoin just write off that level of wealth.