Trading cryptocurrency?

[Car Boot 10]

It seems like you completely misunderstand what cryptocurrency is in that case

 

Isn't the purpose of cryptocurrency to hide the identity of the owners? Its all about financial privacy for criminals.

[barleycorn 10]

Good luck opening an account with Coinbase without any ID.

[melthebell 862]

They divisible mel. Just like a pound has a hundred pennies, a bitcoin a one hundred million 'satoshis'. However, as with most cryptos, every transaction requires a fee (which goes to the miners), the fee to send any amount of bitcoin, will be about a fiver (which is very expensive as far as cryptos go).

ah cheers, its when they talk about "coins" i presumed A coin is just that, A coin, and costs this and thats that

[Waldo 96]

Isn't the purpose of cryptocurrency to hide the identity of the owners? Its all about financial privacy for criminals.

 

I think with certain crypto currencies, the idea is very much to hide your stash from the authorities.

 

In some countries (where there is serious corruption, mismanagement of resources and hyperinflation), governments, central banks etc, are busy financially raping everyone for their own profit, you can imagine how in such an environment, privacy based crypto currencies may be an attractive option. Sometimes, you have to ask yourself, who are the real criminals?

 

Of course, the above doesn't apply universally to every country.

 

---------- Post added 06-02-2018 at 18:00 ----------

 

ah cheers, its when they talk about "coins" i presumed A coin is just that, A coin, and costs this and thats that

 

You're welcome! Nope, they're practically infinity divisible.

 

The thing to watch out for is transaction fees; whenever you send bitcoins from one place to another, it will cost you maybe £2 to £5 worth of bitcoin (the price varies based on how fast you want the transfer to be confirmed). This transfer fee goes to the miners, it's a reward for processing the transaction, which takes a serious amount of computing power.

 

You may not want to buy a cup of coffee with bitcoin for example, if it's going to cost you a fiver extra, and in addition, you may have to wait around for 20 minutes, while the vendor confirms the transaction has gone through okay.

Edited February 6, 2018 by Waldo

[Marsman 10]

Isn't the purpose of cryptocurrency to hide the identity of the owners? Its all about financial privacy for criminals.

 

There's no need to use cryptocurrency for that. The Too Big To Fail banks can continue their criminal activity without taking any serious measures to maintain privacy. At most if their malfeasance is brought to the attention of the public the government will merely give the banks a fine of a few millions which to them is equivalent to a slap on the wrist. Remember LIBOR for instance?

[mossdog 10]

.........interesting article from Moneyweek

Bitcoin, they say, can’t lose its purchasing power as a result of inflation (thanks to its apparently limited supply). It doesn’t rely on governments for its value. It’s transferable, liquid and private – the perfect defence against the inflationary bias endlessly created by dim-witted central bankers (though their nerves will be jangling at the end of this week as cryptocurrency values plunge). It is, as one bitbug told me on Twitter last week, way better than gold as a hedge against governments and inflation: “Gold is old”.

 

If I can dig out the tweet, I will be referring my sneerer to Mr Carney. While he doesn’t like inflation measures that tell him what he doesn’t want to hear, he really, really doesn’t like the anonymous nature of bitcoin. “One doesn’t have anonymity for bank account transactions”, he says, “why would you for cryptocurrency transactions?”

 

Why indeed? I mention this to make the point that cryptocurrencies are only transferable, liquid and private for as long as regulators allow them to be. You could say the same of gold, of course. Owning all but a small amount of gold coin was temporarily made illegal in the US in 1933.

 

But gold has a few things going for it that cryptocurrencies don’t. The G20 doesn’t waste much time these days talking about how to regulate people’s gold holdings (Mr Carney says regulating cryptos is top of the list). It is universally accepted as a global and long-term store of value and one that doesn’t demand a password when you want to dig it out from under your bed. It’s pretty; it’s useful; it’s really hard to fake; it’s easy to change into a fractional currency; and, crucially, it has history. An ounce of gold has, give or take, hung on to its purchasing power for thousands of years.

 

I’d be surprised if anyone was saying that about bitcoin in 4018. I hold gold as a hedge against shocks and in particular against inflation, precisely because gold is old.

 

Got a comment on this article? Tell us what you think on the MoneyWeek website.

 

 

 

Merryn Somerset Webb,

[Jeffrey Shaw 90]

All such 'bubbles' burst. Remember tulip mania? See BBC item at http://www.bbc.com/culture/story/20160419-tulip-mania-the-flowers-that-cost-more-than-houses

[Waldo 96]

All such 'bubbles' burst. Remember tulip mania? See BBC item at http://www.bbc.com/culture/story/20160419-tulip-mania-the-flowers-that-cost-more-than-houses

 

A few differences between the tulip bubble and this current crypto bubble. The tulip bubble was a one off, whereas with the crypto (bitcoin) bubble, it's part of a recurring pattern. There have been several bitcoin bubbles in years past, after each, crypto has come back stronger. Also, bitcoin represents a new emerging technology (blockchain) which has multiple applications, and I'm sure will be a key component of this new information age we're heading towards. What new emerging technology did tulips represent!?

Edited February 8, 2018 by Waldo

[Baron99 779]

.........interesting article from Moneyweek

Bitcoin, they say, can’t lose its purchasing power as a result of inflation (thanks to its apparently limited supply). It doesn’t rely on governments for its value. It’s transferable, liquid and private – the perfect defence against the inflationary bias endlessly created by dim-witted central bankers (though their nerves will be jangling at the end of this week as cryptocurrency values plunge). It is, as one bitbug told me on Twitter last week, way better than gold as a hedge against governments and inflation: “Gold is old”.

 

If I can dig out the tweet, I will be referring my sneerer to Mr Carney. While he doesn’t like inflation measures that tell him what he doesn’t want to hear, he really, really doesn’t like the anonymous nature of bitcoin. “One doesn’t have anonymity for bank account transactions”, he says, “why would you for cryptocurrency transactions?”

 

Why indeed? I mention this to make the point that cryptocurrencies are only transferable, liquid and private for as long as regulators allow them to be. You could say the same of gold, of course. Owning all but a small amount of gold coin was temporarily made illegal in the US in 1933.

 

But gold has a few things going for it that cryptocurrencies don’t. The G20 doesn’t waste much time these days talking about how to regulate people’s gold holdings (Mr Carney says regulating cryptos is top of the list). It is universally accepted as a global and long-term store of value and one that doesn’t demand a password when you want to dig it out from under your bed. It’s pretty; it’s useful; it’s really hard to fake; it’s easy to change into a fractional currency; and, crucially, it has history. An ounce of gold has, give or take, hung on to its purchasing power for thousands of years.

 

I’d be surprised if anyone was saying that about bitcoin in 4018. I hold gold as a hedge against shocks and in particular against inflation, precisely because gold is old.

 

Got a comment on this article? Tell us what you think on the MoneyWeek website.

 

 

 

Merryn Somerset Webb,

 

Apparently there are only 21 million bitcoins 'created' by the individual or group, (nobody knows), Satoshi Nakamoto.

 

Presumably when one individual or group holds enough to hit a critical mass, they either hold sway over value of the 'currency' or it becomes worthless to everyone else & people intrested in this sort of thing move on to a new form of currency?

 

Think I'll stick to pounds, shillings & pence.

[Cyclone 10]

A few differences between the tulip bubble and this current crypto bubble. The tulip bubble was a one off, whereas with the crypto (bitcoin) bubble, it's part of a recurring pattern. There have been several bitcoin bubbles in years past, after each, crypto has come back stronger. Also, bitcoin represents a new emerging technology (blockchain) which has multiple applications, and I'm sure will be a key component of this new information age we're heading towards. What new emerging technology did tulips represent!?

 

Bitcoin doesn't represent blockchain, it simply uses it. Nor is it's value in anyway related to or tied to the success or failure of blockchain as a technology.

 

---------- Post added 12-02-2018 at 16:43 ----------

 

Isn't the purpose of cryptocurrency to hide the identity of the owners? Its all about financial privacy for criminals.

 

No, not at all. Of course criminals can misuse it, but they can misuse a kitchen knife, that doesn't mean kitchen knives are for murdering people.

[Mikes10 10]

See BBC 1 Panorama tonight or watch on BBC IPlayer:

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09s3wbt

[Waldo 96]

Bitcoin doesn't represent blockchain, it simply uses it. Nor is it's value in anyway related to or tied to the success or failure of blockchain as a technology.

 

Sure. I mean it (bitcoin) represents one implementation or application of blockchain technology; there are of course many more applications, other than digital currency / store of value.

 

Hard to say how the success of failure of blockchain will impact on the value of bitcoin. My feeling is that the more people entering the space (either as developers or investors), it's generally going to have a positive influence on price of bitcoin.

 

Bitcoin itself could well die off; right now it's the original big daddy of them all, but it does have its problems, mostly relating to speed and scaleability. Another, technologically superior crypto could well take it's place.