# Tether and Bitcoin



## Brendan Burgess (2 Feb 2018)

This is getting increasingly complex. 

There are suggestions in this great article referred to by azerogo that Tether has issued Tether coins, without their supposed one for one $ backing,  and used the proceeds to buy BTC. 

*Everything you need to know about Tether, the cryptocurrency that people worry could crash bitcoin and that regulators are investigating*

This helps explain the increase in the price of BTC and its recent fall.

_The report claims that the printing of Tethers tends to coincide with a dip in the price of bitcoin, suggesting it may be being used to buy up cheap bitcoin. "Tether printing moves the market appreciably; 48.8% of BTC’s price rise in the period studied occurred in the two-hour periods following the arrival of 91 different Tether grants to the Bitfinex wallet," the analysis said. 


$850 million worth of new Tethers have been printed in January alone and many market participants are worried about the pace at which new Tethers are being minted without proper documentation showing their backing. _


----------



## Brendan Burgess (2 Feb 2018)

odyssey06 said:


> the fate of BTC could be *ahem* tethered to Tether



That is actually the point of Tether. It is supposedly a cryptocurrency tethered to the dollar. 

Brendan


----------



## TheBigShort (2 Feb 2018)

In fairness, given the allegations of price manipulation and bitcoins current price trajectory, methinks it is time to sell up some more. Another 40% of my holding gone today. I'm down to 20% of what I held at most, which now stands at a whopping 0.132250 of 1 BTC.  
As a said before, if the circumstances change I will act in my own interest. I think it is fair to say circumstances have (are) changing. Albeit, always open to buying back in once the price settles.


----------



## Firefly (2 Feb 2018)

TheBigShort said:


> As a said before, if the circumstances change I will act in my own interest.



We'll knock that socialism out of you yet!

Well done on your gain by the way


----------



## Brendan Burgess (2 Feb 2018)

TheBigShort said:


> which now stands at a whopping 0.132250 of 1 BTC.



But that is still an awful lot of Satoshis.

And it's still worth €1,000

Do you mind telling us what price did you bought in at?

Brendan


----------



## Brendan Burgess (2 Feb 2018)

The guys on IG Index are still mainly long


----------



## Sunny (2 Feb 2018)

Brendan Burgess said:


> This is getting increasingly complex.
> 
> There are suggestions in this great article referred to by azerogo that Tether has issued Tether coins, without their supposed one for one $ backing,  and used the proceeds to buy BTC.
> 
> ...



Gets worse. Check out their relationship with Bitfinex in detail.


----------



## TheBigShort (2 Feb 2018)

Brendan Burgess said:


> But that is still an awful lot of Satoshis.
> 
> And it's still worth €1,000
> 
> ...



I started buying in when BTC price was @€2,350 back in June '17. I bought mostly in sums of €500 a go over a couple of months. I stopped buying when prices starting rocketing but did buy another small amount when prices were around €11,000.  My total outlay was €2,975. I've recouped that with a small profit on first 40% offload.

I'm not dismissing the last amount of my bitcoin or its value, but I consider that there is still scope to hold and perhaps buy-in at a future point.


----------



## Duke of Marmalade (2 Feb 2018)

Interesting stats from IG.  The much more balanced recent activity probably explains why the funding incentive for going short has been reduced from 25% p.a. to c.10% p.a.

Whilst we are in the mood for full disclosure the Duke followed the advice on this forum and shorted .15 bitcoin at 14,500.  He is now up over €1,000 which is an awful lot of dosh to a duke  And come next January I can look forward to my maximum bet with PaddyPower at 7/5 that bitcoin will be below 15,000, again thanks to AAM.


----------



## Brendan Burgess (2 Feb 2018)

Duke of Marmalade said:


> He is now up over €1,000 which is an awful lot of dosh to a duke



But have you cashed out? 

It's not real money until you close your position. 

Brendan


----------



## Firefly (2 Feb 2018)

One of ye has made money on the way up, the other on the way down. Niiice.


----------



## TheBigShort (2 Feb 2018)

Firefly said:


> We'll knock that socialism out of you yet!
> 
> Well done on your gain by the way




We are all socialists Firefly, just to lesser or greater degrees


----------



## Duke of Marmalade (2 Feb 2018)

Brendan Burgess said:


> But have you cashed out?
> 
> It's not real money until you close your position.
> 
> Brendan


I think that is a bit illusory.  It is not real *money *for sure.  But it is real *wealth*, just as an unrealised position in shares represents wealth.  I can always realise the position release the money and go back in.  That would be real money but my economic position would be unchanged.


----------



## Brendan Burgess (2 Feb 2018)

I view selling Bitcoin short  differently from buying shares.

My shares will rise and fall in value.

Bitcoin is far more volatile.

I have made unrealised profits from selling Bitcoin but if the price bubbles up again, I will have losses. 

I have unrealised profits on Ryanair shares.  They are unlikely to disappear completely overnight.

Brendan


----------



## Duke of Marmalade (2 Feb 2018)

But what if I realise and rebuy (resell?).  Then I have a real 1K in the bank but there is no change to my economic position.  If you say I can't really count that 1K until I escape bitcoin altogether then, to be consistent, someone just shorting .15 bitcoin today for the first time should see herself as immediately 1K down.  Maybe that is the prudent way for her to see it but why should she pluck 1K out of the air, why doesn't she immediatey regard herself as 3K down, say?

I'm playing word games with you I suppose but it does illustrate the psychological aspects of investing.  Two people in identical economic positions could have radically different views of the situation depending on how they got there (not really a bitcoin point, just a general observation).


----------



## fpalb (2 Feb 2018)

You can of course take it one step further and say that the 1k euro is not value realised until you spend it on something tangible that add value to your life, after all there is no _guarantee_ on its future worth in real terms.


----------



## Duke of Marmalade (2 Feb 2018)

fpalb said:


> You can of course take it one step further and say that the 1k euro is not value realised until you spend it on something tangible that add value to your life, after all there is no _guarantee_ on its future worth in real terms.


fair point


----------



## fpalb (2 Feb 2018)

And as for tether, I wouldn't like to hold any. It's the first significant example of a pegged crytpocurrency and might be the first good demonstration of why that's a bad idea. I wouldn't touch Bitfinex with a barge poll either. If tether is fraudulent it will probably be bad for Bitfinex, it will be another 'bad news event' for crypto and take some liquidity from some exchanges. Beyond that the real consequences are for those holding tethers more so than those holding any other crypto(s). In fact you might even get a rally on cryptos if people holding tethers flee for the exits of those exchanges and have no other avenue out.


----------



## jman0war (2 Feb 2018)

People have been talking about Tether printing for a long while now, in bitcoin terms.
Only just now coming into public awareness.
It started was around the time of Bitfinex'ed (twitter user) was whistle-blowing about Bitfinex the exchange.




TheBigShort said:


> I started buying in when BTC price was @€2,350 back in June '17. I bought mostly in sums of €500 a go over a couple of months. I stopped buying when prices starting rocketing but did buy another small amount when prices were around €11,000.  My total outlay was €2,975. I've recouped that with a small profit on first 40% offload.
> 
> I'm not dismissing the last amount of my bitcoin or its value, but I consider that there is still scope to hold and perhaps buy-in at a future point.



I got in a lot earlier at $500 and will HODL until the end of days.
Looking for the next buying opportunity now, but have not determined at what price.


----------



## TheBigShort (2 Feb 2018)

jman0war said:


> Looking for the next buying opportunity now, but have not determined at what price.



Same as that, hard to determine what that will be though. Certainly the bitcoin bears have a hold of things at the moment. Im in no position to take them on hence my (80%) evacuation. It will be interesting to see how much of all these regulatory/manipulation/pollution/ponzi/money laundering stories will effect the price long-term.

My sentiment is that most of the bitcoin negative stories are mostly noise, currently playing a decibel levels due to its rapid price rise. Reading between the lines its easy to spot where some reports contain elements of scare-mongering. When the dust settles a bit I would expect to buy back in again.


----------



## jman0war (2 Feb 2018)

Bitcoin devs are still at work, still contributing and adding features to the code.
While Ethereum was the first to market "smart contacts"; they are also possible in bitcoin, just harder to code.
Bitcoin has a built-in scripting language that has hardly been touched as yet.

Hopefully Bitcoin will recede from the mass media's attention for some time.


----------



## TheBigShort (2 Feb 2018)

I posted this 'Tulip mania' chart from Wiki a while back due to similarities in price rise to bitcoin from November.

 Just so everyone knows, tomorrow is Feb 3!


----------



## tecate (2 Feb 2018)

jman0war said:


> People have been talking about Tether printing for a long while now, in bitcoin terms.  Only just now coming into public awareness



I was aware of concerns about Tether for a long time.  However, what I was shocked to discover was the implications it would have for BTC.  I was in the process of cashing out my chips anyway but this (not being the only factor) really made me hurry the hell up!  There's an irony here if this turns out to be the case (that btc was being pushed up by tether produced out of vapour) - as freely printing money is the antithesis of bitcoin and anyone who buys into the concept.



			
				jman0war said:
			
		

> Bitcoin devs are still at work, still contributing and adding features to the code.


.
Good point.  This speculative circus since December has been just a distraction.  The technology is still being developed in the background (whether that's bitcoin or ethereum, etc.).


----------



## Pexus1976 (20 Feb 2018)

Tether is the elephant in the room, this is the only thing that could disrupt cryptocurrency growth in my opinion.


----------



## tecate (20 Feb 2018)

Pexus1976 said:


> Tether is the elephant in the room, this is the only thing that could disrupt cryptocurrency growth in my opinion.


How can the issue be forced though - so it can be dealt with once and for all?  I'd sooner have this put to bed - fully outed and dealt with to remove any uncertainty hanging over btc.


----------



## Negotiator (20 Feb 2018)

tecate said:


> How can the issue be forced though - so it can be dealt with once and for all?  I'd sooner have this put to bed - fully outed and dealt with to remove any uncertainty hanging over btc.



One would think that it would be fairly straight forward by just getting one of the Big 4 to do a full and transparent audit on a regular enough basis. 

Do we even know how much Tether is in circulation at any given time and how many exchanges have it?  

It sure is the elephant in the room but gtp a necessary evil until there's a better solution. I've had substantial sums of money tied up in Tether from time to time and it never gives me a warm and fuzzy feeling holding it!


----------



## tecate (20 Feb 2018)

Negotiator said:


> One would think that it would be fairly straight forward by just getting one of the Big 4 to do a full and transparent audit on a regular enough basis.


They won't cooperate and can't be compelled as far as I know.  They're based in the B.V.I. so probably totally regulation-less.


----------



## Negotiator (20 Feb 2018)

Yeah, if I remember correctly they were actually audited by some firm but they didn't release the report.....it's just all very dodgy and secretive!


----------

