Merged Bitcoin - Part 3

[Dr.Sid]

Isnt that still way better than their old currency ? And it cam be 150k just as well ..

 

[Samson]

Isnt that still way better than their old currency ? And it cam be 150k just as well ..

But the people are protesting.
As I would if our pm started anchoring NZ's prospects to crypto.

 

[Checkmite]

Why are they "scammers"? Is there something bad about starting a venture with the hopes of making a profit?

The guy on the corner selling counterfeit Gucci would certainly argue that there isn't.

(Or are they psychic and KNOW that their particular brand of crypto will be profitable?)

Whether a venture is successful or not has no bearing on whether a venture is a scam. Scams can fail. Like Fyre Festival.

Cryptocurrencies, and the sub-scams that are derivative from them, are scams because from top to bottom they require dishonesty in their presentation. This starts with how crypto - regardless of "which one", is marketed. Crypto, prospective buyers are told, is a functional alternative to national cash-currencies. It's money that the government and corporate interests can't dip their fingers in, free from regulators limiting your profit potential, private and nearly anonymous. The distributed and decentralized nature of the blockchain makes it hacker-proof and robust against bad actors trying to steal money.

In truth, all of these are lies, either positively or by omission. It actually has no inherent value whatsoever; the value of a whatever-coin lies strictly in how much "real" money you can trade it for when the time comes to cash out, so it isn't actually a functional alternative to cash currency at all, it's just another security. Nothing is stopping corporate interests from buying crypto and even influencing its value just like any asset based on cash money (e.g., Elon Musk), and the unregulated nature of crypto only means that such actors can freely do things they would go to prison for the rest of their lives for if they were doing it to cash dollars directly. Even the myth that crypto is out of the taxman's reach is at best a wilfully-blind fantasy, since the taxman has no problem simply waiting until you cash out - which you have to do eventually, otherwise your "crypto wallet" is nothing but an idle-game. And as far as security - well, anyone who has your Etherium wallet address can drop anything they want into it, including an app that will clean you out completely if you so much as look at it to see what it is - and there's literally nothing you can do about it if it happens.

The suckers who believe the lies and buy in will find out about all the warts eventually of course; but they're pressured and/or shamed into ignoring them....because that's just "fud", and you don't want to spread fud, do you? That would be a loser mentality - lol, have fun staying poor!

But yes; I feel quite comfortable generalizing cryptocurrency as a scam because it unabashedly uses all the same structure, language, and marketing of a superjuice MLM, to include using shame and peer-pressure to suppress reasonable skepticism and criticism among members.

 

[psionl0]

The guy on the corner selling counterfeit Gucci would certainly argue that there isn't.

That is a very poor analogy.

Crypto currencies are not marketed as any thing else but crypto currencies. Most are open source software with a totally transparent blockchain. It is easy enough to tell how much of the currency is concentrated in the hands of whales and what sort of activity is going on. Price movements are tracked by the minute on crypto websites.

If it comes to peddling lies, there is nowhere to hide.

Cryptocurrencies, and the sub-scams that are derivative from them, are scams because . . . < snip >

I don't need to read further. You are obviously going to spin a simple case of making something and putting it to market as a massive conspiracy theory that has been debunked over and over ad nauseum.

Let me guess: did you throw in buzz words like "pyramid"? "ponzi"? "MLM"? "peer pressure"? "pump-n-dump"?

 

[BobTheCoward]

That is a very poor analogy.

Crypto currencies are not marketed as any thing else but crypto currencies.

I guess you haven't seen the crypto ads with Matt Damon.

 

[BobTheCoward]

The guy on the corner selling counterfeit Gucci would certainly argue that there isn't.



Whether a venture is successful or not has no bearing on whether a venture is a scam. Scams can fail. Like Fyre Festival.

Cryptocurrencies, and the sub-scams that are derivative from them, are scams because from top to bottom they require dishonesty in their presentation. This starts with how crypto - regardless of "which one", is marketed. Crypto, prospective buyers are told, is a functional alternative to national cash-currencies. It's money that the government and corporate interests can't dip their fingers in, free from regulators limiting your profit potential, private and nearly anonymous. The distributed and decentralized nature of the blockchain makes it hacker-proof and robust against bad actors trying to steal money.

In truth, all of these are lies, either positively or by omission. It actually has no inherent value whatsoever; the value of a whatever-coin lies strictly in how much "real" money you can trade it for when the time comes to cash out, so it isn't actually a functional alternative to cash currency at all, it's just another security. Nothing is stopping corporate interests from buying crypto and even influencing its value just like any asset based on cash money (e.g., Elon Musk), and the unregulated nature of crypto only means that such actors can freely do things they would go to prison for the rest of their lives for if they were doing it to cash dollars directly. Even the myth that crypto is out of the taxman's reach is at best a wilfully-blind fantasy, since the taxman has no problem simply waiting until you cash out - which you have to do eventually, otherwise your "crypto wallet" is nothing but an idle-game. And as far as security - well, anyone who has your Etherium wallet address can drop anything they want into it, including an app that will clean you out completely if you so much as look at it to see what it is - and there's literally nothing you can do about it if it happens.

The suckers who believe the lies and buy in will find out about all the warts eventually of course; but they're pressured and/or shamed into ignoring them....because that's just "fud", and you don't want to spread fud, do you? That would be a loser mentality - lol, have fun staying poor!

But yes; I feel quite comfortable generalizing cryptocurrency as a scam because it unabashedly uses all the same structure, language, and marketing of a superjuice MLM, to include using shame and peer-pressure to suppress reasonable skepticism and criticism among members.

You can choose to use crypto to buy goods and services directly, and that person can use it to buy goods and services. It doesn't need to be cashed out.

 

[psionl0]

I guess you haven't seen the crypto ads with Matt Damon.

No I haven't. Are these ads of the "invest in my highly profitable no risk crypto scheme" variety?

 

[Checkmite]

Why are they "scammers"?

Cryptocurrencies, and the sub-scams that are derivative from them, are scams because...

I don't need to read further. You are obviously going to spin a simple case of making something and putting it to market as a massive conspiracy theory that has been debunked over and over ad nauseum.

If you don't want to hear the answer, then don't ask the question. It's that simple.

 

[Checkmite]

You can choose to use crypto to buy goods and services directly, and that person can use it to buy goods and services. It doesn't need to be cashed out.

In theory, sure. In practice, it almost never works that way. When you buy a game from the Microsoft Store by redeeming Bitcoin, Microsoft isn't keeping that Bitcoin and using it later for corporate purchases; they're cashing it out.

 

[psionl0]

If you don't want to hear the answer, then don't ask the question. It's that simple.

It was always possible that you weren't going to repeat the same BS that has been recycled constantly for more than a decade. That turned out not to be true.

 

[gnome]

Encountered this one today--not new to find an article strongly opposing cryptocurrency, but the discussion of stablecoins and their questionable "reserves" is a new angle to me. Anything they're getting wrong here? Bolding in the quote is mine.

Jacobin: Cryptocurrency Is a Giant Ponzi Scheme

Without traditional banking relationships for issuing wire transfers, exchanges cannot easily facilitate trades between buyers and sellers on their platforms — someone has to pass cash between buyers and sellers. Stablecoins solve this problem by standing in for actual real dollars. They allow cryptocurrency markets to maintain ample liquidity — the ease with which assets can be converted into cash — without actually having to have cash on hand.

Tether has become integral to the functioning of global crypto markets. The majority of Bitcoin trades are now conducted in Tether, 70 percent by volume. By comparison, only 8 percent of trade volume is conducted in real dollars, with the remainder being other crypto-to-crypto pairs. Many industry skeptics, and even proponents, see this as a systemic risk and ticking time bomb. The whole system relies on traders actually being able to exchange tethers for real cash or — far more commonly in practice — other traditional cryptocurrencies that can be sold for cash on banked exchanges like Coinbase or Gemini, both headquartered in the United States.

Should faith in Tether falter, we could see its peg to the dollar collapse in a flash. This would be a doomsday scenario for crypto markets, with investors holding or trading crypto assets on unbanked exchanges unable to “cash” out, since there was never any cash there to begin with, only stablecoins. This would almost certainly cause a liquidity crisis on banked exchanges as well, as investors rush to cash out their crypto anywhere possible amid cratering prices, and banked exchanges processing far less volume would almost certainly not be able to pick up the slack.

There is no reason to have any faith in Tether. Tether’s peg to the dollar was initially predicated on the claim that the digital currency was fully backed by actual cash reserves — a dollar held in reserve for every tether issued — though this was later shown to be a lie. The company has since continuously revised down claims about how much cash they keep in reserve. Their latest public attestation on the matter, from March of last year, claimed to be holding only 3 percent of their reserves in cash. The rest was held in “cash equivalents,” mostly commercial paper — essentially IOUs from corporations that may or may not exist, given that reputable actors trading in commercial paper don’t appear to be doing any business with Tether.

While even these modest claims about their reserves may be a lie, as Tether has never undergone an external audit, none of this really matters, since Tether’s own terms of service make it clear that they do not guarantee the redemption of their digital tokens for cash. Should the market suddenly lose faith in Tether and exchanges become unable or unwilling to exchange them one for one with dollars or the respective amount of cryptocurrency, Tether accepts no obligation to use whatever reserves they may or may not have to buy back tethers.

 

[psionl0]

Encountered this one today--not new to find an article strongly opposing cryptocurrency, but the discussion of stablecoins and their questionable "reserves" is a new angle to me. Anything they're getting wrong here? Bolding in the quote is mine.

Jacobin: Cryptocurrency Is a Giant Ponzi Scheme

Criticism of Tether is valid. There is no way that Tether is fully backed by the USD so it could easily fail without notice.

Although a large number of bitcoin transactions are conducted in Tether, the effect on the bitcoin trade in the event of a Tether failure is not as clear cut as the article makes out. Any effect would almost certainly not be permanent.

The rest of the article is just the usual "bitcoin is a ponzi scheme and should be banned" BS that we see made by people all the time based purely on prejudice.

 

[gnome]

The effect of a Tether failure wouldn't have to be permanent to hit participants in the financial nards.

 

[psionl0]

The effect of a Tether failure wouldn't have to be permanent to hit participants in the financial nards.

I guess that hodlers would do what they always do when they hear "it's the end of bitcoin (this time for sure)" - wait.

 

[Samson]

I guess that hodlers would do what they always do when they hear "it's the end of bitcoin (this time for sure)" - wait.

Yep.
Michael Saylor is a classic. He declares he will sit through the bear market for Micro Strategy and never sell. Average price 26 plus k.
His personal holding looks better.
Once he has stated this how does he ever liquidate without eating humble pie?
It will be when Micro is down a few billion.

Eta more like 31k average
Here is the up to date story

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/01/21/mic...-rejection-of-companys-crypto-accounting.html