The Lemon Fool

Have been thinking about investing in cryptocurrencies, do you think it's too late to join the party?

Fill yer boots

https://www.ft.com/content/739f8954-b61 ... d59db9e399

I reckon you could be just in time

http://www.thedailysheeple.com/wp-conte ... bubble.png

Jamie Dimon (CEO of JP Morgan Bank) and Prince Alwaheed of Saudi Arabia (billionaire investor) recently said that crypto-currencies are a fad that will go to zero. This is like the tulip mania in Holland, where reason has gone out the window to be replaced by greed.

Dimon is like a head of postal service in the early 90's saying email will never catch on.

Found this.

Thought it would enhance thread...

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-10-2 ... n-offering

Take me to the moon...

At $7000 Dimon's eardrums said "pop!".

robbelg wrote:...


Are you aware that its currently worth over £2,600

Rob

Oldies but Goldies...£5600 and counting...

The bitcoin is incredible as it continues to grow, I think we can say that although for some in a ponzi system, for me it has made a lot of money throughout this year.

JMN2 wrote:At $7000 Dimon's eardrums said "pop!".

Almost a month later and $10500.

Well over $11,000 on some exchanges.

ccmm2012 wrote:The bitcoin is incredible as it continues to grow, I think we can say that although for some in a ponzi system, for me it has made a lot of money throughout this year.

If you've made money it follow that you still hold your coins. Just how are holders of $200bn of bitcoins going to liquidate them and realise their gains? Or are many of them satisfied to be ones who didn't realise them?

This is going to be an extremely painful lesson in the realities of investing.


GS

"If you've made money it follow that you still hold your coins. Just how are holders of $200bn of bitcoins going to liquidate them and realise their gains? Or are many of them satisfied to be ones who didn't realise them?

This is going to be an extremely painful lesson in the realities of investing."

I sold most of mine at around $4500 but I've got 2.5 coins left which I will hang on to, a million dollars a coin or bust...

Surerera wrote:"If you've made money it follow that you still hold your coins. Just how are holders of $200bn of bitcoins going to liquidate them and realise their gains? Or are many of them satisfied to be ones who didn't realise them?

This is going to be an extremely painful lesson in the realities of investing."

I sold most of mine at around $4500 but I've got 2.5 coins left which I will hang on to, a million dollars a coin or bust...

Surerera,

The maths around this thing is absolutely astounding, scam 101. I don't know average holding size, but based on average transaction size (c$5,000), In order to liquidate just 10% of bitcoin holdings at current prices it would take more than a week of continual trading. That's at the current maximum trading pace permitted by the technology.

The fact that each transaction costs something like £20 in UK prices to effect is an absolute scandal IMO. I am not even willing to short this POS because of the waste of planetary resources involved in the single trade!

Just guessing, but IMO, the endgame is establishment of futures market, a few months for pros to get positioned and then the whole edifice collapses.

GS
P.S. Presumably your trades have been valued in £1000s. Did you have any trouble extracting your cash?

Apparently, big institutional investors are increasingly beginning to experience FOMO. I only have one bitcoin, I call it a lottery ticket, not investing. Million dollars or bust! Better not take these things too seriously although some people feel somehow aggressively hostile about this.

FOMO I guess...

EDIT not directed at GoSeigen.

GoSeigen - No problem wthdrawing cash. I use cex.io and they have a daily limit of £50,000 and a monthly limit of £500,000.

I agree with everything you say but I've been long for over 5 years and can't let go of my last 2.5 coins. When I first bought them they were pretty unknown and I said to a friend "These could easily go to $10,000 or possibly even a $1,000,000 - the first target has been hit, whether they go any further I've no idea but I'm prepared to roll the dice as the trade has paid for itself many times over.

Surerera

JMN2 wrote: Better not take these things too seriously although some people feel somehow aggressively hostile about this.
[...]
EDIT not directed at GoSeigen.

Not directed at me, but accurate nonetheless! I feel hostile to bitcoin in particular (and possibly other cryptocoins) because:

1. I believe in their current form they are no more than a scam. It is a scam that has sucked in thousands (millions?) of small punters hoping to GRQ. When the scam collapses, yes, some lucky early sellers will have an amazing profit, but it will be at the expense of a mass of poor people who were ill-advised and can barely afford the loss. It's another method of moving money from poor uneducated masses to a wealthy unscrupulous few.

2. The waste of resources in this experiment seems scandallous, both in terms of energy wastage and the effort and time of people involved. Clearly there may be some benefit in terms of any techonologies which prove useful in future, but I think any such benefit will have arisen at great expense in terms of environmental damage and loss to the many individuals involved.

If this cryptocoin enterprise collapses, I hope Fools with a conscience will support some organisations helping the main strata of society that victims come from. OTOH if I am wrong, I hereby offer to donate £1,000 (one thousand) to a charity nominated by JMN2 and/or Surerera. I'm happy to set a date one year from today to judge this, criterion for me to avoid the payout being that Bitcoin has had a drawdown to at least 87.5% below its peak value by that date. [Not that meeting this criterion will necessarily mean I am right, but we need some sort of objective test...]


Personally I cannot bring myself to get directly involved in any way, either long or short. If/when the froth has gone I may reconsider the merits of the underlying tech.


GS

I don't think it is a 'scam' in the sense that one or more people are colluding in a conspiracy to defraud others.

I suspect the main reason behind the rise of bitcoin is its use as a medium of exchange by individuals who find it difficult to use the normal currency legal means of exchange. eg citizens of countries like Zimbabwe, criminals dealing in the proceeds of crime, black economy generally etc etc.

I'm not sure whether this is a 'good' thing or not. Obviously one does not want to make things easier for criminals and money launderers but I have great sympathy for people ruled by despotic thieving governments (Zimbabwe, Venezuela and loads of others).

Also currencies like bitcoin which are separate from any government may make it harder for countries to deliberately defraud their people with high inflation (which is a form of state theft). That is in my view a 'good' thing. There's an old saying that good money drives out bad.

The bitcoin saga may be a repeat of the 17th century tulip hysteria or it may be the start of a new era. Interesting.

Personally I haven't touched it yet and won't do until I think I understand it.

scrumpyjack wrote:Also currencies like bitcoin which are separate from any government may make it harder for countries to deliberately defraud their people with high inflation (which is a form of state theft). That is in my view a 'good' thing. There's an old saying that good money drives out bad.

The old saying (Gresham's Law) is that bad money drives out good.

Dod

Yes but I think what Gresham was saying was that if good money and bad money are both in circulation people will keep the good money and get rid of the bad - hence the good is no longer available.

Given a choice between Deutchmarks and Drachma, or Swiss Francs and Sterling, it's not hard to guess which people would prefer to hold! (not of course that DMs or Drachma are still available)

As Bitcoin is in limited supply and apparently cannot be debased by someone printing loads more, it may become increasingly attractive compared to Governments' confetti money!

GoSeigen - Funnily enough I have donated a fair bit of money to charity from my sale of Bitcoins. At least we agree on something!


Surerera