To think a lot of folk are going to get their fingers burnt by Bitcoin

[Viviennemary]

I can't see this Bitcoin phenomena going on for much longer. I don't really understand it but isn't it a bit like the South Sea Bubble which has to burst eventually. Because it isn't actually based on anything tangible from what I can see.

[sagamartha]

With some assets, you can use 'information' such as weather, politics etc to see how the demand and supply affect the value.

Such as wheat and the harvest.

But with Bitcoin, how can you know whether the price is good relative to the demand and supply?

[Sanshin]

You can't, it's purely guess work. A couple of days ago it looked like it was rising rapidly so I guessed that it would continue like that and bought at £14k. The price then dropped back down to £11k. So I made a big mistake there and the bitcoins I bought then are still tied up waiting for the price to rise again so I can get rid of them. All £1450 worth. This is why I now only have £500 to trade with as its all that is left over from my cock up two days ago.

It can't be predicted, it's purely guess work and gambling.

[sagamartha]

It can't be predicted, it's purely guess work and gambling

People will always need coffee...

Or will they?

[Sanshin]

That looks like the current bitcoin graph 😂

[PersianCatLady]

Sanshin
The £20 profit in your example doesn't take into account the difference between buying and selling rates or any fees incurred though, does it or have I missed the point?

[Sanshin]

It does yeah, the profit would have been higher without the fees involved.

[PersianCatLady]

Thanks.

So all of your profits are calculated using the selling rates on your platform as opposed to the main current HTC exchange rate?

[Sanshin]

Yeah I use CEX so the fees are instantly taken off your buy/sell transactions. So for example earlier I started off with £530. Bought and sold which should have given me around £557 but I ended up with £550

[sagamartha]

Yeah I use CEX so the fees are instantly taken off your buy/sell transactions

Seems like being the person who takes the fees does rather well.

[PersianCatLady]

Excellent.

[Aussiemum78]

Why am I reminded of L Ron Hubbard saying "to get rich you can invent your own religion" whenever I see speculation about who founded bitcoin? I feel like someone somewhere is running a huge social experiment in the psychology of investment

[Sanshin]

Yeah the person taking the fees does do well but if the buyer is making a profit still, who cares?

[Noofly]

If you go down the hodling route rather than the trading route, you can use environmental factors just as you would any stock or share. Most of the long term people spend quite a bit of time tracking competing crypto currencies and their developments/goals as well as the current Bitcoin problems (e.g. the tensions between the miner and the developers, current high transaction fees and slow processing) and potential solutions over the coming months (promoting greater adoption of SegWit addresses over legacy, implementation of the Lightening Network and atomic swaps etc). Layer on purchasing drivers for the various parts of the globe and changing regulatory stances, and so on and so on and you can build a pretty good outlook of the current/future threats and opportunities.

E.g. I could be worried about Coinbase’s upcoming support for Bitcoin Cash. I could speculate that there will be a significant dip in the next couple of weeks on the back of it if I perceive it as a threat worth taking seriously. I could then decide to either ride out the dip if I think it will be temporary. Or, I could speculate that it is a very large risk and that the dip would continue into a slow but steady decline given the influence of Coinbase (as a believer in Bitcoin as opposed to Bitcoin Cash).

[Sanshin]

Noofly, where do you predict bitcoin is going? Some people are saying £20k by the end of Jan? Some are saying £50k by April? Others are saying it's on its way out and cash will take over?

[ArgyMargy]

"Well, all the currencies I can think of are not investments."

What a bizarre thing to say. People have always bet on exchange rates, switching from sterling to dollars etc.

[ArgyMargy]

Bitcoin started as a way for people to buy & sell dodgy stuff in secret. Once it becomes primarily a speculative investment it is vulnerable to crash. The fact that it's now discussed in the Daily Mail is probably a sign that its value has peaked.

[safariboot]

Yes, when the current bubble bursts a bunch of speculators are going to lose out.

Bitcoin in simple terms: The rate new bitcoins are created (or 'mined') at is governed by maths and physics. To process bitcoin transactions and mine new coins requires computing power which requires electricity. You can't forge a bitcoin or transaction and there's no central government with the power to suddenly print loads more.

So you can be assured that any bitcoins you have won't be rendered worthless by the market suddenly being flooded with loads more, unlike with fiat currencies which can undergo hyperinflation. Like another poster said, bitcoin is similar to gold in that way.

The demand for bitcoin on the other hand depends entirely on whether people want it. The bitcoin you have could certainly be rendered near-worthless if people stop wanting to buy it.

Bitcoin was and is an experiment, and I think one of the "results" is that if a currency doesn't have enough general use it's value will swing wildly due to speculators. This makes it a poor currency and is likely to mean even less use of it as a currency for buying and selling stuff, and it behaves as a volatile commodity with no inherent value or use other than its rarity.

[DoctorTwo]

Blockchain technology is the future of money.

I said this on here nearly 3 years ago and got laughed at. The Blockchain is the future in technology, and has been since Satoshi proved that it works.

[Firesuit]

You don't have to understand bitcoin to predict it's future.

That's possibly the most anti intellectual statement I've ever seen on mn.

I mean obviously I can make predictions about things I don't understand but they're not likely to be right...

Ok, let me elaborate. You can be the person who actually invented bitcoin, or (if not the same) wrote the actual code that implements it, and still not be able to predict its future.

It's future depends on its economic role, not the technicalities of how it works.

All you need to understand is that currencies vanish when better ones become available. You don't have to google much to realise that on a technical level, Bitcoin is not unique, and other crypocurrencies are better designed. So why is bitcoin still most successful? Because it was first, and has most credibility. Could another currency with more credibility be invented? Yes, the Bank of England or Federal Reserve or one or more major financial institutions could issue an asset-backed cryptocurrency which would be immediately be more attractive to all non-criminal users. (I would hope they would deliberately omit the features of bitcoin that make it attractive to criminals.)

All you need to know to know bitcoin will probably fail is that better alternatives can be created at will by any of a range of governments or financial institutions whose backing will give their currency greater credibility in the eyes of most potential users. And that if it can be done, and some useful purpose is served by doing it, it will be done.

[Noofly]

Bitcoin started as a way for people to buy & sell dodgy stuff in secret.

And what an utterly bizarre thing that is to say. I’d genuinely like to see your source for that and I can guarantee you won’t find it in the white paper. Bitcoin was quickly adopted by the dark net. It absolutely did not start as a way for people to use the dark net- conflating much?

Sanshin bearing in mind that I was telling people on Mumsnet that they would be crazy to buy Bitcoin back in 2014(?) that they’d be crazy to buy at £300ish, I’m probably full of shit with where I think it’s going now. I currently think Coinbase’s adding Cash is a big threat because loads of newcomers will get confused between the two and will see it just as a “cheap” Bitcoin. Bitcoin desperately needs the Lightening Network to be implemented and I think we’ll continue to be up and down but mostly sideways until it is in place. Then I think it will skyrocket again.

For the past few days it’s been slumping during the day (Western trading times) and then climbing overnight (Eastern trading times). Today is the first since Friday that we’ve seen a steady increase during the day building on the overnight climb which I’m taking as a good sign. I’m hoping some of the slump of the past few days has been large US holders selling some before the end of the tax year. If this is the case, they are hopefully pretty much done selling.

I’m really hoping for a good surge once we get past January so I can use some of my exit strategy.

[Rossigigi]

I've heard of bitcoins but never understood them. This has given me more of an insight but here's a really silly question:- if I wanted to buy a bit of a bitcoin, what's the least amount you pay? Are we talking £50 or £500? This is the part I don't get...

[Noofly]

On a light note, I need a new top for the gym so ordered this last night. It’s perfect for me.

[Firesuit]

"Well, all the currencies I can think of are not investments."

What a bizarre thing to say. People have always bet on exchange rates, switching from sterling to dollars etc.

People bet at roulette wheels, that doesn't make roulette bets investments. The fact that city types trade currencies does not make currency trades investments.

My definition of investment is something with a positive expected return. Shares give you profits, bonds (loans, debt) pay interest, property pays rent. Those thing are all investments.

Gold, over hundreds/thousands of years, has on average maintened its value in real terms, so it has been a useful store of value, a hedge against inflation, but it doesn't have a return. In fact it costs you money to own, as you have pay to store and protect it. It is sometimes held by investors for its diversification benefits, but that still doesn't make it an investment.

I suggest you look at the contents of a typical pension companies generic investment fund, the default fund that gets used by people who don't have specific ideas about how they want to invest. You will find that they own shares, bonds and maybe property. You probably won't find them owning gold, or hedge funds seeking profit from currency trading.

[SouthySa]

I bought a whole bitcoin in 2013 and it was stolen from Mtgox. I actively avoid looking to see how much it’s worth now.

[Sanshin]

Noofly, I've noticed that too - keep setting low bids to execute overnight but the price has climbed overnight and then dropped during the day. Today it's held onto its value which is encouraging. I need it to rise to £14000 to start my exit 😂

Rossigiggi, on the platform I use the minimum amount you can buy is 0.01% of a bitcoin which would set you back around £130