Why is that bad in your opinion?
That probably wasn’t me, and that includes the rest of what you just said. You probably mixed that up with stuff Aaron said.
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I mentioned earlier in the thread that approx 320,000 El Salvadorians use BTC for all aspects of their financial lives. So the current demand is a factor in it’s current value.
As more people use it for their everyday lives the demand for it will keep getting higher which will prompt currency exchanges to set a higher price for BTC.
Anyone who did not make money from BTC I’m afraid it’s on them. To support my point, ask any experienced trader to look at the price history for BTC from the very first day it became available to trade, then ask this trader to explain how people could have made money from it and lost money. You will get an interesting answer that’s for sure.
I wouldnt be so sure about it. There are real disadvantages.
Ah, those fools, A fool and his money are soon parted. Only question is, who is greater fool.
My point was, people who didn’t have trading experience should have invested less money due to their lack of experience and built up slowly.
Also, they lost value in the BTC but they DID NOT lose the actual BTC. So their choice is either to sell it at a lower price than they purchased it, or hold onto it until the price rises back above what they paid for it. That has always been the definition of trading anything and it does not change because it’s BTC.
So no they are not fools for investing in BTC they are just mistaken for not understanding the price can go down and take a long time to rise. I remember when BTC was £4,000 each. Whoever purchased 100 BTC around that time can sell them right this moment and get £2.8m this is an undisputable fact.
It is an undisputable fact, but it also highlights another problem with cryptocurrency, since its considered an asset not a currency in many countries trades are taxable, in the UK for example, current Coinbase price is £30,507 x100, 3,050,700 - 400,000 = 2,650,700 profit (-£517,840 capital gains tax bill assuming you’re unemployed).
Since it isn’t considered a currency it also means customers aren’t entitled to the same level of protection that is offered by traditional banking for example you can’t chargeback a bitcoin transaction if you’re not happy and your crypto assets aren’t government backed in the same way as normal banking.
The minute it is recognised as a currency it will become regulated by existing rules, eroding its value as openly accessible to all, and yet without any form of regulation it can’t offer the same degree of security/protection for users.
I’m pretty sure this is about to change since it is now officially a foreign currency since El Salvador adopted it as legal tender.
This isn’t the first time I heard this and I still find it rather strange. Isn’t it extremely obvious that charge backs and safety of assets you lend to a bank are services of a bank or credit card company, systems that are built on top of a monetary systems and not functions of the money itself.
It’s a bit like saying TCP/IP has to implement a forum post delete function… it makes no sense, that’s not what a settlement and transaction layer does. Those things are services on top. The base layer only makes sense if transactions are irreversible like data packets on the internet either reach their target or don’t, but you can’t pull them back.
Bitcoin itself is regulated by unchanging rules that are the same for everyone. It’s probably the strongest regulated currency in existence in that sense because those rules can’t be broken. It is in essence money by rules, not by rulers.
What gouvernments can, will and should do is regulate companies that build on this system. They can’t change the system and how it works, but they can make sure that service providers like banks or payment providers that offer Bitcoin custody or payment solutions with it follow the laws and behave like we would expect regular banks to behave. In fact they should probably regulate a lot more since they constantly get caught laundering money and other criminal activities, you know, all the stuff they say crypto is good for.
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The definition I give for NFT is “Non-Fundable Token” since I can’t afford to buy one right now. 
Yes it is extremely obvious, and I didn’t say that it was a function of the money, they are brought about because of regulation of financial institutions for traditional currencies, and my point is that cryptocurrencies aren’t currently recognised/regulated in this way.
I fully agree that it would be possible to change this, and that companies involved should be regulated, i’m sure in time they will, but at present those services, and the protection they provide simply isn’t available with cryptocurrency.
The bank I use just recently sent a questionnaire if customers would be interested in such services, like an account in Bitcoin or other crypto. And I say I really am, even though I’m already familiar with the technology and run my own node as well as have custody of coins in a hardware wallet, I would still use the service and park some of the coins on a bank. Just to not have all eggs in one basket. But they would have to be heavily regulated before I trust them and need the be insured in case they lose them.
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I believe the tax free allowance for capital gains is £12,300 in UK so the tax will only apply at values higher than this. Capital gains tax is only payable once BTC has been “Disposed” of. Disposed means selling or giving them away (not to a family member or spouse) or exchanging them for other crypto currencies.
Capital gains tax is also payable when making profit in trading foreign currencies.
I don’t believe it’s value would be eroded by becoming legal tender and a currency in UK. We still have to consider that it is finite and the demand for it will keep growing as more people use it, these are the biggest factors that will affect value.
Also, our normal UK banks such as HSBC, Natwest will want to get in on the action and may start providing Crypto accounts where we pay them a monthly fee to ensure the crypto assets security. Currently I do feel safe with my BTC staying on Nicehash or coinbase,
Have a search on google/youtube for “Nicehash theft” , They had 60 million worth of their customers BTC stolen. They were in a position to repay all their customers lost BTC using their own money, lots of customers remained with Nicehash and I believe they are currently close to retrieving the stolen BTC after about 5 years.
So as you can see there are many good companies within the crypto world who will strive to ensure their customers are well protected, I for one have so much respect for Nicehash and i am so happy to do business with them.
I could give a RL example but it would be reported as RL politics.
And yes, I probably mixed what you and Aaron said. Sorry.
Unironically, someone just asked me too about Bitcoin. I told him it has good and bad sides and we will have a meeting. So I better make a recap of this thread.
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Anonymous Crypto Wallet Moves $524M Worth Of Bitcoin (msn.com)
I have no stake in the matter, just trying to learn.
“Why it matters: Cryptocurrency whales that own millions of dollars in Bitcoin tend to move markets single-handedly. If the whale decides to exit this Bitcoin position, there could be enough market impact to push down the price of BTC. It takes about $15 to $30 million of sell pressure to move the price of Bitcoin down 2% on any given exchange.”
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This is due to BTC being a finite currency, when everyone is selling their BTC the value will decrease. If everyone suddenly decided to buy BTC then exchanges will set a higher value.
Perhaps this 500m crypto whale is a group of investors, they might be in it for profit so they may plan to wait for the value to go higher before selling. They might be planning to start some sort of crypto business like a new exchange.
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It better be, there is more satoshi’s than USD in the world. Scroll up, not going to recalculate it.
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That is not a good idea. You need more money if there is more people that have to buy stuff with it.
You would need money that can be regulated, to get more or less of them on the market. An elastic solution for elastic economy and changing world. Inflation and deflation have to be in check.
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This is the great thing about BTC and it being finite, 1 BTC can be split into a billion satoshi’s. So what we will find is that when there is higher demand for BTC the value will increase so less satoshis will be needed for everyday transactions
So right now £1 GBP = 3077 Satoshis (0.00003077 BTC)
I used 18,000,000(current amount of BTC) x 1,000,000,000(amount of satoshis in 1 BTC) = 1.8e+16
Which is 1,800,000,000,000,000 (1.8 Quadrillion Satoshis)
Now lets say the UK adopted BTC as legal currency and 50 million people suddenly started using it for their everyday bills, food, expenses. The value of 1 BTC would jump very high, all exchanges will sell out quickly and whoever brought BTC from the exchange early can then sell back to the exchange and make profit. The Exchange will still make profit selling it back to people in the UK at the higher value.
And what with those satoshis? Will you redistribute them and to who? This doesnt have sense. You would have to pay taxes with them first. And those taxes would have to be enormous initially, because what we have right now, is a massive inequality in bitcoin. All would have to hand over their bitcoin under the financial law to governments for it to be governed. Which I think would not be very gladly welcomed. By few.
But those few already have a lot of reasons for it to stay where it is now. Speculative asset.
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Listen, if people are hoarding BTC now and will only sell when the value gets sky high then fair play to them. It’s their BTC to do exactly as they please and yes, once the BTC is exchanged to any other currency tax is payable if total value is above £12,300 at around 20%
Again, if people want to pay £60,000 for the most recent ASIC BTC miner that’s their business if it results in them earning lots of BTC for it.
It’s the same with everything, the early adopters on a good financial product will do well.
Anyway, if bitcoin would ever have to become a currency, people would need to resolve the inequalities and taxation with it. Because taxes are an obvious thing, redistribution needs to take place.
Of course it would come after they resolve other problems with it.
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