Peter Denis Posted June 8, 2020 Share Posted June 8, 2020 8 minutes ago, mr mr said: what about the actual real world use case of many of the other crypto projects out there ? i really hope you don't think the entire crypto market and blockchain is a ponzi scheme. Good point. I was only referring to Bitcoin, and agree that there is certainly future in digital coins when build on a value-creating use case. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Denis Posted June 8, 2020 Share Posted June 8, 2020 13 minutes ago, fdsa said: I appreciate your response, and indeed stocks like AMD or Tesla are not a 'classical' pyramid or Ponzi scheme. ... By simply substituting the word 'Bitcoin' by 'stocks' in my earlier post, you seem to imply that there is no difference between the two. Bying stocks allows companies that need money to make their product or service happen, to do so. The demand for those products or services (i.e. the value created) is a win-win. The company gets the money it needs to continue providing its products or services, and the share-holder is rewarded for investing his money. I don't see the win-win in the Bitcoin scheme where profits are not related to any real-world demand for products or services. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MJKT2014 Posted June 8, 2020 Share Posted June 8, 2020 On 6/5/2020 at 4:21 PM, Peter Denis said: Bitcoin is not an investment, it's a pyramid scheme 51 minutes ago, Peter Denis said: Bitcoin are not a 'classical' pyramid or Ponzi scheme You just add 'classical' and do a 180? 51 minutes ago, Peter Denis said: it's difficult to deny that the 'upward movement in market' which drives up the price, relies on a continually increasing demand for the coin. What about the way the coin is designed to have a finite number of coins that can ever be mined and the fact that the mining of them becomes more and more difficult as the process is halved, surely that has some influence on forward upward prices? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Denis Posted June 8, 2020 Share Posted June 8, 2020 12 minutes ago, MJKT2014 said: ... You just add 'classical' and do a 180? ... What about the way the coin is designed to have a finite number of coins that can ever be mined and the fact that the mining of them becomes more and more difficult as the process is halved, surely that has some influence on forward upward prices? No I did not do a 180 degree turn. Imo Bitcoin are indeed a pyramid or Ponzi scheme, as they rely on a continual influx of new users to maintain and drive up the price. But it is not a classical top-down centralized pyramid scheme, but a 'smart' decentralized version of it. What matters is that it is not sustainable, because the number of new users joining the scheme is by definition finite, hence the endless propaganda by those that 'invested' in Bitcoin to join this Easy Money scam. ... Bitcoin-mining is not a value-adding activity, on the contrary it is an enormous wastage of time, effort and electricity just to keep this crazy scheme in the air. The amount of electricity needed to do the trillions of computations to mine Bitcoins is staggering And the sight of those deserted Bitcoin mining-farms with hundreds of PCs being scrapped because the price of Bitcoin did not ensure enough profit anymore to keep on 'mining' them, is a sad relic of the Bitcoin craze. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
XGM Posted June 8, 2020 Share Posted June 8, 2020 3 hours ago, Peter Denis said: By simply substituting the word 'Bitcoin' by 'stocks' in my earlier post, you seem to imply that there is no difference between the two. Bying stocks allows companies that need money to make their product or service happen, to do so. The demand for those products or services (i.e. the value created) is a win-win. The company gets the money it needs to continue providing its products or services, and the share-holder is rewarded for investing his money. I don't see the win-win in the Bitcoin scheme where profits are not related to any real-world demand for products or services. That's in IPO or further offerings. The company does not benefit (not directly at least) from investors / traders buying and selling the shares to each other over weeks, months and years at increasing prices. Then, if the company pays no dividends, does no repurchase of shares, and has no plans to do any of those in the foreseeable future, this kind of trading and price movement is exactly built on the Greater Fool Theory. You are right however regarding no value being generated in Bitcoin - just like any other commodity, such as gold. It is important to remember though price bubbles can form, and explode in a very painful way, in either of those types of assets. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EdrigoSalvadore Posted June 8, 2020 Share Posted June 8, 2020 I can highly recommend hodlhodl peer to peer bitcoin exchanging. No ID needed, no thai bank account needed. See you there. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MJKT2014 Posted June 8, 2020 Share Posted June 8, 2020 10 hours ago, Peter Denis said: What matters is that it is not sustainable, because the number of new users joining the scheme is by definition finite, You lost me there. The number of bitcoin users is unlimited, but the amount of bitcoin will be finite at 21 million. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Denis Posted June 9, 2020 Share Posted June 9, 2020 9 hours ago, MJKT2014 said: You lost me there. The number of bitcoin users is unlimited, but the amount of bitcoin will be finite at 21 million. Yes, in theory the number of bitcoin users is almost unlimited (the complete world population each of them opening several user-accounts). But of course the reality is that the potential bitcoin-user pool is much much smaller. There was a surge in users mid-end 2017, when Bitcoin was the buzzword of the day, with many people then bying bitcoin for 'fear of losing out' and missing the stellar profits that were touted (remember the McAfee guy with his promise to eat his private parts live on TV when Bitcoin would not reach 1.000.000 US $ in 2020). The large majority of those new users did lose heavily, when those who bought earlier decided to sell the Bitcoins which they had bought cheap, that being one of the causes of the subsequent Bitcoin crash. The Ferrari's and Maserati's they bought from the phenomenal profit they had made were actually paid by the losses of those bying late (and even if they kept their Bitcoins, now 2.5 years later they still have not recovered their losses when they bought late 2017). Bitcoin is not a win-win investment, but a win-lose game. Your profit is the loss of someone else, and vice versa. So quite rightly, the large public concluded that playing the Bitcoin game is not for them, and despite the never-ending propaganda of Bitcoin-holders it is becoming increasingly difficult to find 'new suckers' to step into it. When reading Bitcoin websites it is a continual Good News show and you would be fool not to join the Easy Money club. But if you make the effort to look into earlier Breaking Announcements that Bitcoin will surge to the moon, you will quickly realize that these promises are hollow and are only meant to have new users dump money in the Bitcoin-pit, which is necessary to keep the whole scam in the air. As Lincoln said:: You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mr mr Posted June 9, 2020 Share Posted June 9, 2020 22 hours ago, Peter Denis said: Good point. I was only referring to Bitcoin, and agree that there is certainly future in digital coins when build on a value-creating use case. eth chanlink ada and xrp are what i like. just starting to understand a lot of it now but the whole staking with eth is a very very nice looking investment. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mr mr Posted June 9, 2020 Share Posted June 9, 2020 11 minutes ago, Peter Denis said: Bitcoin is not a win-win investment, but a win-lose game. Your profit is the loss of someone else, and vice versa. isn't that how buying and selling stocks works as well though ? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Logosone Posted June 9, 2020 Share Posted June 9, 2020 13 minutes ago, Peter Denis said: Bitcoin is not a win-win investment, but a win-lose game. Your profit is the loss of someone else, and vice versa. That is true of almost every investment, every time a forex trader makes a profit it means another person lost money. It's war. You get their money or they get yours. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Logosone Posted June 9, 2020 Share Posted June 9, 2020 Quote What is the easiest way to trade bitcoin in Thailand, using my Thai bank account. By far the easiest way, without any of the pitfalls of owning and having to resell Bitcoin, is to trade Bitcoin as a Forex pair. You can sign up with a reputable broker outside Thailand, fund your account with your Thai bank account and then trade Bitcoin vs USD. Very safe, but of course you'll need skill to trade. 92% of Forex traders fail. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Denis Posted June 9, 2020 Share Posted June 9, 2020 19 minutes ago, mr mr said: isn't that how buying and selling stocks works as well though ? Yes, that's correct. But there is a difference. When you buy stocks you are actually becoming the 'owner' of a tiny part of the stock-issuing company. And you are rewarded with dividends and your stock becoming worth more, when that company is doing well. And of course it also works the other way, if the company goes bust or does not perform well, you will lose all or part of your investment. But what do you actually get when buying Bitcoin? You will be the owner of a specific combination of numbers in cyberspace, the ownership of which is confirmed in the Bitcoin blockchain. Contrary to a company that creates value by providing products/services for which there is a demand, Bitcoin does not create any value (it being just numbers on a digital ledger). And so the value of Bitcoin is somewhat artificially determined by the broker firms where buyers/sellers of Bitcoin trade their 'numbers'. So Bitcoin can only rise in 'value' when there are more buyers than sellers, which will drive the price up. As I said before, hence the continual propaganda to get new users to step in the game and buy Bitcoins. Without any new 'investors', Bitcoin is doomed. Hence this game is not sustainable in the long run and it only survives on gullible people driven by greed and Easy Money to step into the scheme. It's a modern and clever 'pyramid' scheme. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mr mr Posted June 9, 2020 Share Posted June 9, 2020 5 minutes ago, Peter Denis said: Contrary to a company that creates value by providing products/services for which there is a demand, Bitcoin does not create any value (it being just numbers on a digital ledger). And so the value of Bitcoin is somewhat artificially determined by the broker firms where buyers/sellers of Bitcoin trade their 'numbers'. So Bitcoin can only rise in 'value' when there are more buyers than sellers, which will drive the price up. As I said before, hence the continual propaganda to get new users to step in the game and buy Bitcoins. Without any new 'investors', Bitcoin is doomed. Hence this game is not sustainable in the long run and it only survives on gullible people driven by greed and Easy Money to step into the scheme. It's a modern and clever 'pyramid' scheme. that could be argued though. all of the material things involved with mining bitcoin come at a cost right ? someone else is providing the cpu's and graphics cards and warehouses and wiring etc etc etc. there is a lot of real product and value being created there. with the insane money policies of current governments all over this earth printing trillions upon trillions and devaluing their currencies btc at a never changing 21 mil gives a great stability vs the printing and devaluing right ? bitcoin should be viewed as a modern form of value storage. like digital gold. soon enough everything on this planet is going to have a digital value. personal ledgers installed on every smart phone will allow billions of unbanked people world wide access to value and transactions that were never possible only a few years ago. micro payments and ledger to ledger instant transactions will be common very soon. bitcoin will be widely used in a lot of these new and upcoming systems. everyday people have lost faith in governments and the money system. many recognize that it is doomed to fail. correct me if i am wrong but bitcoin is pretty much corruption proof isn't it ? meaning because of the blockchain everything is available to see at any time by anyone sorta thing. i may be wrong with some of my wording so please excuse the mistakes if i have made some. since btc was first introduced has the number of wallets not been going up year after year ? the market is there and growing every year i think. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Denis Posted June 9, 2020 Share Posted June 9, 2020 5 minutes ago, mr mr said: that could be argued though. all of the material things involved with mining bitcoin come at a cost right ? someone else is providing the cpu's and graphics cards and warehouses and wiring etc etc etc. there is a lot of real product and value being created there. with the insane money policies of current governments all over this earth printing trillions upon trillions and devaluing their currencies btc at a never changing 21 mil gives a great stability vs the printing and devaluing right ? bitcoin should be viewed as a modern form of value storage. like digital gold. soon enough everything on this planet is going to have a digital value. personal ledgers installed on every smart phone will allow billions of unbanked people world wide access to value and transactions that were never possible only a few years ago. micro payments and ledger to ledger instant transactions will be common very soon. bitcoin will be widely used in a lot of these new and upcoming systems. everyday people have lost faith in governments and the money system. many recognize that it is doomed to fail. correct me if i am wrong but bitcoin is pretty much corruption proof isn't it ? meaning because of the blockchain everything is available to see at any time by anyone sorta thing. i may be wrong with some of my wording so please excuse the mistakes if i have made some. since btc was first introduced has the number of wallets not been going up year after year ? the market is there and growing every year i think. 1 - Mining bitcoin does not create value. Sure, you need specially chips and computers to do the bitcoin mining on an industrial scale. And the companies designing and producing these chips and computers are creating value. But the bitcoin-mining process itself is an enormous wastage of effort and energy. And for what? All that effort and staggering use of electricity, just to systematically search through all the possible combinations to find the winning 'lottery number' that represents a Bitcoin. An analogy > If I bury a bitcoin (actually the winning combination number written on a piece of paper) in my garden and tell people that they can come to 'mine' it, and those people are busy for weeks using sophisticated equipment to find that piece of paper, is that 'creating value'? 2 - I agree that the practice by most governments to print billions of fiat-money out of thin air to fund their projects, has negative consequences as that erodes the value of that fiat-money. But at least with fiat-money you have a legal tender (it's actually like bying stocks, and strange as it may seem with fiat-money you own a part of the government's treasury. And that's NOT the case with Bitcoin, which is based on ... nothing! An analogy > When young children play 'shop' they take a piece of paper and write a number on it, and use that to buy goods in their children's shop. They have seen that their parents trade pieces of paper (fiat-money) to buy goods. But children do not realize nor understand that the fiat-money their parents use actually represent an obligation to a debt. Bitcoin is like childs play money, as it is also created based on nothing - not even on thin air - and with no connection to an obligation in the real world. Fiat-money for sure has its problems. But trading fiat-money (with a debt-obligation that can be enforced) for childs play money (based on nothing but the faith of its supporters that their virtual lottery numbers are worth something) is not a good deal. 3 - You wrote > correct me if i am wrong but bitcoin is pretty much corruption proof isn't it ? Yes, you are wrong. Bitcoin 'value' is heavily manipulated by whales (owing such quantities of BTC that their buying/selling actions beoome self-fulfilling prophecies) as well as the traders that determine the Bitcoin 'value' by balancing the orders of the buyers/sellers. Fraud with bitcoin manipulation is rampant, as hundreds of reports confirm. And given the fuzzy way in how its value is determined, that leaves the door wide-open for manipulation. Note: And I am deliberately not even mentioning the use of crypto-currency in the criminal underworld. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andy from Kent Posted June 9, 2020 Share Posted June 9, 2020 On 6/6/2020 at 10:16 AM, mistral53 said: Just shows that you don't know how BTC transactions works. I don't recall I ever said I was knowledgeable about BTC, but your kind of post is not unexpected. I replied to this post and my post about it still stands. " They both require you to submit a photo of yourself holding your id card/passport to prove your identity. It's 50/50 if you get approved or not." Thanks for your interest. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mr mr Posted June 9, 2020 Share Posted June 9, 2020 5 hours ago, Peter Denis said: Yes, you are wrong. Bitcoin 'value' is heavily manipulated by whales (owing such quantities of BTC that their buying/selling actions beoome self-fulfilling prophecies) as well as the traders that determine the Bitcoin 'value' by balancing the orders of the buyers/sellers. i am more talking about bitcoin and blockchain itself. you're talking about its value. all assets that are traded and exchanged are manipulated. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mr mr Posted June 9, 2020 Share Posted June 9, 2020 5 hours ago, Peter Denis said: Note: And I am deliberately not even mentioning the use of crypto-currency in the criminal underworld. the amount of crypto used by the criminal underworld pales in comparison to what legal banks and institutions do. lets not pretend they didn't know exactly what they were doing here. hsbc i mean. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-hsbc-probe-idUSBRE8BA05M20121211 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phycokiller Posted June 9, 2020 Share Posted June 9, 2020 dont really want to get into the discussion because Im too busy with my retirement, thanks to bitcoin, but it is very easy to cash out, I do it all the time. just look around and do some research Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bander Posted June 12, 2020 Share Posted June 12, 2020 On 6/6/2020 at 9:31 AM, a3tsw said: I bought some bitcoin back in 2017. I still can’t figure out how to transfer back to my bank account. easy to buy , not so easy to get your money back , that has been my experience, would love to hear from anyone who has managed to get any money back to their account. my advice therefore would be to invest a minimal amount, say 1,000baht , then attempt to get it back to your account... good luck with that!! You click on the sell button and your bitcoin get converted to $US og what your platform uses. Next step is to transfer the amount back to the Bank AC your platform is linked to. Sounds like you have invested less than 1000 bath and don't bother getting it back. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bander Posted June 12, 2020 Share Posted June 12, 2020 On 6/6/2020 at 10:01 AM, Andy from Kent said: So much for the anonymity that bitcoin adherents tout. ???? This is LOS (land of scams) That's why they require passport/ID card pictures. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
a3tsw Posted June 13, 2020 Share Posted June 13, 2020 17 hours ago, bander said: You click on the sell button and your bitcoin get converted to $US og what your platform uses. Next step is to transfer the amount back to the Bank AC your platform is linked to. Sounds like you have invested less than 1000 bath and don't bother getting it back. Hi, I invested £1,000 (~$US1,250) , currently valued at US$832. Undecided whether to just bite the bullet and take the loss or hang in there for a while longer in the hope that it goes up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Denis Posted June 13, 2020 Share Posted June 13, 2020 11 minutes ago, a3tsw said: Hi, I invested £1,000 (~$US1,250) , currently valued at US$832. Undecided whether to just bite the bullet and take the loss or hang in there for a while longer in the hope that it goes up. Hi a3tsw, Luckily you only 'invested' a relatively small amount in Bitcoin and did not buy at the highest peak so your loss when selling now would be approx 1/3 of the price you bought them for. Unless you need the money, I would just leave as is and check once a month the Bitcoin price. And also decide a 'selling window' e.g. when the price goes under 50% of your initial investment or goes over the point that you would fully recover your initial investment. As mentioned you were smart only investing some 'game money' because there are others that invested their life savings hoping to become millionaires, trusting guys like John 'Cokehead' McAfee predicting a Bitcoin would be worth at least 1.000.000 US $ this year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phycokiller Posted June 13, 2020 Share Posted June 13, 2020 2 hours ago, Peter Denis said: Hi a3tsw, Luckily you only 'invested' a relatively small amount in Bitcoin and did not buy at the highest peak so your loss when selling now would be approx 1/3 of the price you bought them for. Unless you need the money, I would just leave as is and check once a month the Bitcoin price. And also decide a 'selling window' e.g. when the price goes under 50% of your initial investment or goes over the point that you would fully recover your initial investment. As mentioned you were smart only investing some 'game money' because there are others that invested their life savings hoping to become millionaires, trusting guys like John 'Cokehead' McAfee predicting a Bitcoin would be worth at least 1.000.000 US $ this year. plenty of people made millions from bitcoin. looking at the charts theres less then a year in its ten year history where you would have made a loss investing Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Denis Posted June 13, 2020 Share Posted June 13, 2020 24 minutes ago, phycokiller said: plenty of people made millions from bitcoin. looking at the charts there's less then a year in its ten year history where you would have made a loss investing Yes, I don't deny that. But the question is of course who will ultimately pay for those millions made out of thin air? If there is no influx of new users investing in Bitcoin, the scheme will come to a grinding halt, and when that triggers an exodus of Bitcoin holders cashing out, it will - as always - be those selling (too) late that will get only a fraction of the price they bought them for. The money they lost will have been wasted on keeping this crazy scheme in the air, as well as being used to pay for the Ferrari's and Lamborgini's of those who stepped in early and cashed out in time. A smart and decentralized pyramid scheme, but a pyramid scheme nonetheless... 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
a3tsw Posted June 13, 2020 Share Posted June 13, 2020 (edited) Hi Peter Denis, I am not in any desperate need to take whatever I have in the pot and cash out , as over the last couple of months I have been slowly recuperating my losses by frequently switching between bitcoin and tether , at one point I was almost $1,000 down on my initial investment. if I get to a point where I am back to my original investment amount, I will almost certainly take that. Just checked back and my initial jump into this was 15th December 2017 , bitcoin price on that Day £13,716 , talk about bad timing ☹️☹️ Edited June 13, 2020 by a3tsw 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Denis Posted June 13, 2020 Share Posted June 13, 2020 10 minutes ago, a3tsw said: Hi Peter Denis, I am not in any desperate need to take whatever I have in the pot and cash out , as over the last couple of months I have been slowly recuperating my losses by frequently switching between bitcoin and tether , at one point I was almost $1,000 down on my initial investment. if I get to a point where I am back to my original investment amount, I will almost certainly take that. Good to hear you have a working strategy to slowly recuperate your losses. Must have been an interesting ride for you over the last 2.5 years, and glad you used only a relatively small amount of Game Money (never invest what you cannot afford to lose). Hope for you that the bubble doesn't burst before you have recuperated your investment. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bander Posted June 13, 2020 Share Posted June 13, 2020 19 hours ago, a3tsw said: Hi, I invested £1,000 (~$US1,250) , currently valued at US$832. Undecided whether to just bite the bullet and take the loss or hang in there for a while longer in the hope that it goes up. Wait to cash in your investment until the big rally on bitcoin everybody is talking about. My guess is the bitcoin will end up at US$ 20.000 or higher in a few months. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Denis Posted June 14, 2020 Share Posted June 14, 2020 40 minutes ago, bander said: Wait to cash in your investment until the big rally on bitcoin everybody is talking about. My guess is the bitcoin will end up at US$ 20.000 or higher in a few months. We live in a crazy world in which anything is possible, so maybe you are right with your prediction. Time will tell. But the only way for the Bitcoin price to go up - besides manipulation by whales and which is always temporary - is the influx of new users willing to invest in the Bitcoin Easy Money scheme. That is becoming increasingly harder, as the prophecy of continuing stellar profits has turned out to be a false one, and the Bitcoin-crash at the end of 2017 has of course not been forgotten. I follow the Bitcoin-saga from some distance, as I am interested in mass-delusion spectacles. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pineapple01 Posted June 14, 2020 Share Posted June 14, 2020 When there not Toppling Statues there messing with Funny Money. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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