Key Post Bitcoin is a clearly identifiable economic bubble

The under ~25 cohort are crypto-natives. It is not something new to them, it's something that has always existed during their adult life.
 
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Sarenco said:
Interesting article on the misery brought about by the ongoing crypto crash -
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And personal responsibility lies where in that story? I'm also waiting for the Guardian or NYT to do a similar story on the tragedy of the former cocaine addict and panic attack stricken former alcoholic that lost his life savings on tech stocks over the course of the past six months. Somehow, I think I'll be waiting...
 
This is a black swan moment - I agree with @tecate
Tales like this abound I'm sure, tragically, in the world of sports gambling especially given its online explosion.
It's like the Eco arguments against bitcoin.
Not relevant,
 
Well, I thought it was an interesting description of the fragile psychology of some retail crypto speculators and the importance of social media in creating a cult like following.

Crypto is regularly described as "digital gold". Whatever else it is, I think we can now say definitively that it’s not that.
 
Sarenco said:
Crypto is regularly described as "digital gold". Whatever else it is, I think we can now say definitively that it’s not that.
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Bitcoin is regularly described as "digital gold". The rest of crypto is very much not. Bitcoin is doing alright, relatively.
 
DazedInPontoon said:
Bitcoin is regularly described as "digital gold". The rest of crypto is very much not. Bitcoin is doing alright, relatively.
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Hasn’t Bitcoin lost over half its value so far this year?

Whereas gold has increased in value in euro terms.

IMO the performance of crypto is more akin to a, highly volatile, individual tech stock.
 
Gold Price



Bitcoin Price



Gold is up 50% since the end of 2018.
BTC jumped about 10 times in value before more than halving from its high.

I don't see why BTC can credibly be called a digital gold when it doesn't behave like real gold, and just when times are really uincertain with the pandemic and war in Ukraine, its value has more than halved. Real gold is as you would expect, up in the same period
 
No one is saying it behaves exactly the same right now though. Bitcoin is more volatile, as it has always been, perhaps only because it's way smaller in adoption/market-cap. It's a work in progress. As your first chart shows though, bitcoin volatility has been reducing as it has grown.
 
Sarenco said:
Well, I thought it was an interesting description of the fragile psychology of some retail crypto speculators and the importance of social media in creating a cult like following.
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Fair enough in that it definitely gives an example of 'fragile psychology'! Are there charlatans on YouTube and TikTok spouting nonsense? Of course there are. In 2018, I couldn't run a search on YouTube without this ad coming up with this clown walking on to a private jet and muttering 'crypto', 'millions' and some other buzzwords and notions (like not having to work a day in your life - which is what that guy in that Guardian article was dreaming about). There are also YouTubers shilling penny stocks and on a mainstream media level, there are the likes of CNBC. We had Jim Cramer saying Ethereum was a good buy at $3000 a few months ago - and now he's saying the whole thing is a bag of crap. He's no better than the youtubers.

I'm sorry - but I'm firmly in the personal responsibility camp on stuff like this. If there was any balance to these articles, they would talk about that aspect too. Furthermore, villainising crypto itself - as in the Bitcoin protocol - is ridiculous. And categorising everyone in crypto as being the same as the guy featured in that article is also entirely inaccurate.


Sarenco said:
Crypto is regularly described as "digital gold". Whatever else it is, I think we can now say definitively that it’s not that.
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I think you mean Bitcoin. And I disagree - we can't say that definitively. This is something that continues to play out over multiple years. Watch this interview with Ruchir Sharma of Rockefeller Capital Management - and see how he thinks about it. i.e. that these hype cycles will calm down over time - and the volatility with it.
Sarenco said:
Hasn’t Bitcoin lost over half its value so far this year?

Whereas gold has increased in value in euro terms.
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Have a look at the chart @Firefly linked to in post #510 above - and you'll see over the longer stretch, Bitcoin has been outperforming gold.

Sarenco said:
IMO the performance of crypto is more akin to a, highly volatile, individual tech stock.
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If you meant Bitcoin, then I agree. It's currently being treated as a risk-on asset. I believe that will change over the longer term - as it has all the characteristics of a risk off asset. But hype cycles are not helpful in that regard.
 
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It's also hard to see how you use BTC for digital jewelry and digital industrial uses.
 
time to plan said:
It's also hard to see how you use BTC for digital jewelry and digital industrial uses.
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It's also hard to see how you use gold for real time censorship-resistant global payments, for international settlement, etc.
The jewelry use case is just an extension of its store of value use case. Industrial uses account for a tiny fraction of its utility.
 
Sounds like you are saying that BTC is not digital gold then.
 
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