BITCOIN

Scottex99

Saw an interesting post today where the Microstrategy guy who's into crypto was being interviewed and was advocating for crypto not as a digital currency (he said it was unfortunate it was regarded as that) but as digital property. ie. a store of wealth, but not something you typically buy something else with. Was talking about how the rich buy property.

I was was a bit disappointed the interviewer didn't question him on the return on those investments when compared to property, but it was an interesting thought. Aligns with those that compare it to investing in gold. The difference in volatility was not mentioned either.

I was just scrolling and it was a random feed the algorithm threw at me, so I didn't catch the channel but will see if I can find a link.

Yeah that's Michael Saylor, the biggest Bitcoin Maxi you can get.

Leveraging debt in his company to buy stacks and stacks of BTC. When price goes up, generally the price of his company stocks do too, so he then creates more debt and buys more coins.

It's a bold play, he says he's never selling and already billions in profit, I think his average entry is $35-40k at a guess. If we see $100-150k BTC one day (and sells) he becomes one of the richest guys in the world, if he isnt already

MeteredOut

gravel_2 said:

MeteredOut said:

gravel_2 said:

Another thing holding this kind of development back is the HODL philosophy... BTC hardcore don't actually want to use BTC as currency (right now), as that means holding less BTC. You don't want to be that guy who famously bought a pizza with 10k BTC or one of the thousands who spent millions in today's money on Silk Road.

This is also why platforms like Celsius and Nexo exist. People with large holdings would rather securitise their crypto, take tax-free cashflow in fiat and release their holdings later for the cost of interest payments (paid in fiat). Functionally BTC acts more like a fine art collection or property portfolio than currency in that market, and such market is geared only to those with significant holdings.

Saw an interesting post today where the Microstrategy guy who's into crypto was being interviewed and was advocating for crypto not as a digital currency (he said it was unfortunate it was regarded as that) but as digital property. ie. a store of wealth, but not something you typically buy something else with. Was talking about how the rich buy property.

I was was a bit disappointed the interviewer didn't question him on the return on those investments when compared to property, but it was an interesting thought. Aligns with those that compare it to investing in gold. The difference in volatility was not mentioned either.

I was just scrolling and it was a random feed the algorithm threw at me, so I didn't catch the channel but will see if I can find a link.

The only problem is the question of utility. Real property has obvious uses and therefore intrinsic value, although property valuation is not necessarily tied to intrinsic value. Art, while more subjective and esoteric, is desirable, has value and is tangible. Being a "store of value" or "digital property" is not a utility. And if not a currency, then what's it for? What sustainable need is actually driving the market?

Agreed. I do laugh at some of the fabricated utility some people try to convince themselves exists for some of the meme coins. Looking at you, DogWifHat.

From their website

“WIF isn’t just a cryptocurrency; it’s a symbol of progress, for futuristic transactions, a beacon for those who think ahead. It’s clear that the future belongs to those who embrace innovations like WIF, transcending boundaries & paving a new era in finance and technology.”

Read that again, then appreciate WIF has a market cap of over $3 billion for something that does nothing. The world is crazy, but people make money from crazy things.

Malthusian

$3 billion, pah. Dogecoin has a "market cap" of "$22 billion" despite being explicitly created as a joke.

But it also has a manifesto don'tchaknow:

We are developing a currency for the people, and we strive to do only good everyday. Through this work we have come to value:

Being useful, we value utility over technical brilliance.
Being personable, we value individuals and interactions over profit-driven economics.
Being welcoming, we value collaboration and trust over competition and exclusivity.
Being reliable, we value working solutions over speed of delivery.

As a reminder, this is a distributed spreadsheet entry that (like all crypto tokens) does absolutely nothing except record the ownership of the spreadsheet entry by a given key. Its ringleaders collaborate on absolutely nothing except maintaining the spreadsheet. It solves nothing, and delivers nothing, at a speed of infinity years per thing delivered. But so much real money and so many man-hours have been expended on buying and selling it that somebody felt they had to spend an afternoon cobbling together a "manifesto" to make the punters feel better about it. 

flaneurs_lobster

Malthusian said:

$3 billion, pah. Dogecoin has a "market cap" of "$22 billion" despite being explicitly created as a joke.

But it also has a manifesto don'tchaknow:

We are developing a currency for the people, and we strive to do only good everyday. Through this work we have come to value:

Being useful, we value utility over technical brilliance.
Being personable, we value individuals and interactions over profit-driven economics.
Being welcoming, we value collaboration and trust over competition and exclusivity.
Being reliable, we value working solutions over speed of delivery.

As a reminder, this is a distributed spreadsheet entry that (like all crypto tokens) does absolutely nothing except record the ownership of the spreadsheet entry by a given key. Its ringleaders collaborate on absolutely nothing except maintaining the spreadsheet. It solves nothing, and delivers nothing, at a speed of infinity years per thing delivered. But so much real money and so many man-hours have been expended on buying and selling it that somebody felt they had to spend an afternoon cobbling together a "manifesto" to make the punters feel better about it. 

It's a wonderful thing, and quite ridiculous.

The only crypto I have ever "owned", all [consults app] £32.13's worth of it. 

MeteredOut

Malthusian said:

$3 billion, pah. Dogecoin has a "market cap" of "$22 billion" despite being explicitly created as a joke.

But it also has a manifesto don'tchaknow:

We are developing a currency for the people, and we strive to do only good everyday. Through this work we have come to value:

Being useful, we value utility over technical brilliance.
Being personable, we value individuals and interactions over profit-driven economics.
Being welcoming, we value collaboration and trust over competition and exclusivity.
Being reliable, we value working solutions over speed of delivery.

As a reminder, this is a distributed spreadsheet entry that (like all crypto tokens) does absolutely nothing except record the ownership of the spreadsheet entry by a given key. Its ringleaders collaborate on absolutely nothing except maintaining the spreadsheet. It solves nothing, and delivers nothing, at a speed of infinity years per thing delivered. But so much real money and so many man-hours have been expended on buying and selling it that somebody felt they had to spend an afternoon cobbling together a "manifesto" to make the punters feel better about it. 

If its not clear why someone is doing something, follow the money, and you'll find the answer.

(their manifesto is pretty much a variation of the agile manifesto)

Scottex99

Malthusian said:

$3 billion, pah. Dogecoin has a "market cap" of "$22 billion" despite being explicitly created as a joke.

But it also has a manifesto don'tchaknow:

We are developing a currency for the people, and we strive to do only good everyday. Through this work we have come to value:

Being useful, we value utility over technical brilliance.
Being personable, we value individuals and interactions over profit-driven economics.
Being welcoming, we value collaboration and trust over competition and exclusivity.
Being reliable, we value working solutions over speed of delivery.

As a reminder, this is a distributed spreadsheet entry that (like all crypto tokens) does absolutely nothing except record the ownership of the spreadsheet entry by a given key. Its ringleaders collaborate on absolutely nothing except maintaining the spreadsheet. It solves nothing, and delivers nothing, at a speed of infinity years per thing delivered. But so much real money and so many man-hours have been expended on buying and selling it that somebody felt they had to spend an afternoon cobbling together a "manifesto" to make the punters feel better about it. 

Raoul Pal’s latest podcast episode covered this quite recently in a way I found interesting.

Why do people still play the lottery in their millions? Because it gives them a tiny chance of that perceived luxurious material goal.

For the older people here with 6 or 7 figures in property or bonds or index funds it’s unlikely to make sense, you/they understand the system and most people agree that if you start putting money into these things early enough, after 3 or 4 decades the compound interest will be enough for you to enjoy your retirement. It works and it’s safe.

But for many of the newer generation this is out of reach, everything is too expensive, they can’t get on the property ladder, wages are stagnant etc. The world of the man out doing his post office job and the woman at home yet they have a house, a car, and holidays is long gone.

So people look for another way. Is it lottery, is it gambling…. Is it crypto?

Plus no asset manager from traditional finance is going to have a model that includes “community”.

Some of this is more cult than community but these kids grew up on the internet, they see the power of memes. Everyone saw what happened with GameStop.

And likely this is the reason behind Bored Apes, behind DOGE and SHIB and WIF etc. People want to be part of something different, Probably they are not gonna make it but who knows. Maybe you don’t need to go to business school and work your way up to
board level of some financial institution, maybe you just get early into a memecoin and it does 1000000x.

But this is also the reason for the pricing/decimal bias, almost all memes have some price of 0.000007 USD because the youngsters have that dream of, if this just goes to $1 then I’ll have a boat or a super car. For WIF it actually happened.

I dabble in a few memes here and there, I don’t really have the capacity and right now there are 20,000 new ones a day on Solana, but that reasoning makes a lot of sense to me 

HHarry

After 334 pages are we finally seeing some consensus?!  For us dinosaurs, some recognition that crypto has similarities to the lottery / gambling / speculation is important.  It’s not an investment.

Good luck (and I genuinely mean it) to everyone who dreams of, or who has, made it rich based on the whimsical nature of whatever crypto you hold.

slinger2

HHarry said:

After 334 pages are we finally seeing some consensus?!  For us dinosaurs, some recognition that crypto has similarities to the lottery / gambling / speculation is important.  It’s not an investment.

Good luck (and I genuinely mean it) to everyone who dreams of, or who has, made it rich based on the whimsical nature of whatever crypto you hold.

and it's also not a currency. In fact, over the years it's got less and less like one.

MeteredOut

It's good to see some refreshing honesty from a crypto advocate that tells it like it is - completely different from what you see on most social media.

I still maintain that anyone believing "investing in crypto" in anything other than a version of the greater fool theory is not being honest with themselves.

The TikTik algorithms have started showing me a "$10K to $100K in Crypto" poster. I think he started soon after BTC took off at the end of Feb and he's put his $10K into that and a dozen or so alt coins. He's currently at $8K value (or was a day or two back, he may be back at $10K today given the volatility )

Most other posts I see on TT are still telling everyone that BTC is going to $100K (typically based on some VERY crude technical/chart analysis) and the meme coins will be dragged along, with a final "have a look at this new project, it's got utility". Very rarely do this latter lot declare any hodlings.

MeteredOut

HHarry said:

After 334 pages are we finally seeing some consensus?!  For us dinosaurs, some recognition that crypto has similarities to the lottery / gambling / speculation is important.  It’s not an investment.

Good luck (and I genuinely mean it) to everyone who dreams of, or who has, made it rich based on the whimsical nature of whatever crypto you hold.

I don't think this  "dinosaur - does't understand crypto, Gen Z - to the moon!" differentiation is helpful or accurate, other than as a gross generalisation.

It's financial acumen, wanting to understand, understanding risk versus wanting it today, following the crowd, lack of critical thinking, and those are not strictly generational traits (again, unless you want to align people to stereotypes).

One thing is clear - plenty of people are making money from crypto, but at the expense of those who are not willing/able to fully appreciate what they're getting involved with.