gary oldmans diary posted:

but comrades its a

Ham Sandwiches posted:

What I'm curious about is why funds, hedge funds, and financial institutions have started using Bitcoins if it is gambling? These companies are not in the business of gambling so presumably if that's what they are doing, they are violating their fiduciary duty to their shareholders. Like, I'm not aware of the Fidelity CEO taking a few billion down to Vegas to invest in roulette and then posting those returns. I've never heard of such a thing, maybe you have some recent examples.

quote:

So clearly real companies with real executives and real people are allowed to speculate in currency, but if any regular person should consider, then it is Gambling and imprudent.

Ham Sandwiches posted:

It's only gambling if individuals do it, these are real companies investing real money so they don't gamble.


No dude an investment is not a gamble, that guy wrote out so many words to explain the difference. I'm just asking why using his definitions none of the big financials do "gambling" the way people understand it, ie going to a casino and betting on games of chance. And yet they mine and invest in bitcoins. Clearly it's different but he doesn't recognize the difference, which is loving rhetorical garbage that he uses to browbeat individuals into investing his way.

Ham Sandwiches posted:

I see, I can't pay my taxes in Yen either, clearly not a real currency right???

EorayMel posted:

Send your bitcoins to this website to get rich.

Ham Sandwiches posted:

Things bitcoins are like:
Tulips
Ponzi Schemes
Gambling in las Vegas

Things bitcoins are NOT like:
sound financial instruments
stocks - those have INHERENT VALUE
currency

Repeat this at $700

And then at $1500

And then at $2500

and then at $4k

And then go "umm just because the numbers, hedge funds, countries, retailers, and people using this keep going up doesn't mean I'm wrong"

and you have the formula the SA forums have enjoyed the past few years. It's loving great.

Ham Sandwiches posted:

Yeah but as an American I can still buy and trade it even though I can't pay my taxes in it... now what

That also applies for Japanese people that own US dollars are you loving with me here dude!!!!

They can't pay their taxes with these things!!

Ham Sandwiches posted:

Ok. You are telling me that you can't pay taxes in bitcoin and that makes it fake.

If an American holds US Dollars that's great because they can pay their taxes in US Dollars to the US, where they live. That checks out.

Except an American can also buy Yen, and they can't pay their US taxes in Yen.

And Japanese people can buy Dollars, which they also can't pay Japanese taxes in.

How does the yen become more real to Japanese people since they can pay taxes in it and less real to Americans since they can't??

Ham Sandwiches posted:

How does the yen become more real to Japanese people since they can pay taxes in it and less real to Americans since they can't??

Ham Sandwiches posted:

This seems to be trying very hard to avoid the narrow definition of gambling that was just established at length. I am accusing you of having a double standard that it's gambling if an individual does it, investment if an institution does it. If someone has faith that bitcoin will continue to legitimize as an investment it does not make them a gambler. Clearly these institutions think it could pan off and are hedging their bets. It's loving ridiculous that you are painting individuals as reckless gamblers for trying to mirror the behavior of major institutions if they so choose.

Ham Sandwiches posted:

It is literally this that bothers me so much about all the bitcoin discussions. People are meant to be kept away from potential things at all costs, because this guy knows its gambling and knows better. loving BS.

You mean, what happens when you invest in wall street? Or is it not ok to imply that the hedge funds and wall street banks are largely concerned with their own well-being and not that of the overall market? HFT is great stuff, algorithms are great stuff, short selling is great stuff, stock manipulation is great stuff, and NONE OF THAT happens on Wall Street where major firms make billions systematically taking value from individual investors and weak hands

Ham Sandwiches posted:

If you believe that countries may consider it as an alternative to a specific fiat currency

Ham Sandwiches posted:

Here's one hypothetical out of many!
Sometimes countries get into really weird debt spirals or have bizarre inflation issues, like the hyperinflation in Zimbabwe. You never know if or when that stuff will happen, but Bitcoin could be surprisingly useful if it does

Ham Sandwiches posted:

The scenario you are making up is loving bizarre. What i'm talking about is:

Ham Sandwiches posted:

The citizens of Fuckistan have Fuckdollars which suddenly become useless when Fuckistan goes to war with the united states.

The citizens of Fuckistan may not be able to use Fuckdollars in any way but they can try using any Bitcoins they have for their transactions.

The citizens of the neighboring countries may say "We don't want your worthless fuckdollars because they'll be gone when Fuckistan is gone but we'll accept Bitcoins for bread since we can convert those back into our currency"

and that would generally cause the price to go up as more people started using it to do this

Ham Sandwiches posted:

Yes, and that may have uses! There is no nation state that owns Bitcoin so they won't be interfering in your use of it either. Like, the things you see as a negative I'm holding out as a positive! And just because we disagree doesn't make you right and bitcoins gambling. Hence my posts.

Ham Sandwiches posted:

Because every other currency belongs to a country that has a political agenda and an existing economy that uses it. For situations where that's a problem, you now have Bitcoins.

Think of it this way:
Before: 180 fiat currencies
Now: 180 fiat currencies and 1 currency that is a bit different

There's now more options and if Bitcoin is useful then its price / adoption should spread

quote:

It's so genuinely enjoyable going back through old bitcoin threads

exploded mummy posted:

Like when BTC-e, a MTGOX competitor tried to launder all the money stolen from GOX and a bunch of Russian ransomware funds, the feds traced it and arrested the dude who did that.


And also that's why BTC-e stopped operating.

Ham Sandwiches posted:

quote:

Why have banks, a malicious actor can physically breach the building and steal all the money! Hell, it's actually happened!

Ham Sandwiches posted:

It's fine if you feel that the risk associated with Bitcoin is too much and I think I've repeated this 50 times. That doesn't make it a scam or garbage or worthless. It just means it's too risky for you. The guy that played the fancy word game about "IF CRAMER = VALID; ELSE GAMBLING" I disagree with

Ham Sandwiches posted:

Dude if the 2008 liquidity crisis got worse and the US economy imploded and the US failed your dollars would be worth exactly $0, you know that right

Ham Sandwiches posted:

So the other guy that's giving me poo poo when I don't post enough when the meaningless price goes down how does that work??? It either matters or it doesn't matter, right? Or is it like some kind of dynamic inconsistency where it only matters when going down and doesn't matter anytime it goes up?

Ham Sandwiches posted:

Does the price matter, or does it not matter? I'm just trying to establish which one!!

quote:

From the outset, investors have been warned that it’s buyer beware in the world of initial coin offerings. On Wednesday, someone got a $70,000 lesson on the subject.

The person, only known at this point by their ethereum blockchain address 0xf51ec864d5fb2f184198e369fe063fc77045a3ad, was trying to buy about $508,000 worth of AirSwap tokens -- or 1,700 ether -- according to the transaction history on Etherscan. They ended up losing 236.9516 ether, worth a little more than $70,000.

As Etherscan explains, investors who experience a broken or canceled trade don’t lose the value of the transaction, but they do forfeit the amount of ether necessary to make the deal possible.

Ham Sandwiches posted:

Even that $70k loss thing is loving amazing. The half a mil that guy made on the coins int he first place? Paper gains, it's totally fake, nothing is real, he couldn't have gotten the money out.

evilweasel posted:

one assumes that he had $500k of electronic pogs that he was exchanging for the $500k of electronic tulips when he lost the $70k e-pogs

if he "made" that $500k in e-pogs or spent $500k of actual american dollars on e-pogs in order to trade them for e-tulips is not covered by the story though

Ham Sandwiches posted:

The scenario where a real life guy, having never messed with bitcoins, having made no money in coins in any way to that point, tries to do a transaction and loses $70k is clearly the moment where Bill in Utah lost $70k from his kids college fund, right??

That doesn't seem very plausible!

Ham Sandwiches posted:

The electronic pogs that some people were able to create using their existing GPU and for a few bucks in electricity might not represent an actual $70k loss, but the story is entirely presented as if that were his cost basis

Ham Sandwiches posted:

that's how you push the narrative of "everyone messing with this loses money" while the reality is the opposite

Ham Sandwiches posted:

I'm saying people that seem not very financially astute simultaneously pretend that every loss is real and sit there and wring their hands about how all the gains are fake because you can't get them out of the exchanges. It's a complete double standard.

Ham Sandwiches posted:

A lot of people on something awful have made fun of Bitcoins since they first came up. I thought those people were stupid. The most incredible thing is that those same folks were super smug and sure that bitcoins were a scam and that they'd never amount to anything and made fun of redditors for mining them. The only place you could have a useful discussion about the topic was on Reddit.

I find it truly fascinating to go back and talk to the posters that spent years spreading bullshit about things they didn't understand and were clearly wrong on, and to be here in the moment where it slowly dawns on them that they don't know what they're loving talking about, and see their reaction.

Like the guy that wasted years of his life writing a book about how wrong he is, that's genuinely loving amazing and I'm glad he did it.

Ham Sandwiches posted:

Why do you only post the stories when people lose money then?? Why not post some where they make money?

Ham Sandwiches posted:

Yeah I'm saying this is loving wrong and you have no basis for making this claim!

1gnoirents posted:

I havent been following the thread at all and I am a filthy buttminer afterall, but all logic and reason has failed on bitcoin and we were all wrong. If you cant figure out how to make money off something that has grown 7000% in 9 months, you dont deserve to "invest". If you had outright purchased any bitcoins at all this entire year you will at the very least broken even by today. The only possible way to fail was to buy at a previous peak close to $5000 and sold when it dived briefly to $2000.

If you bought any of the other coins though, thats on you.

Personally I am enjoying converting $12 in electricity into $200 a month risk free, but I am scraping the bottom of the barrel here.

Ham Sandwiches posted:

Ah wow so he made $20,000 and nobody scammed him and it wasn't for drugs? Like $20,000 free and clear? Seems pretty cool!

Ham Sandwiches posted:

The alarm bells should be ringing when you are advising real people with real bills that are really struggling to ignore $20,000 that your friend got for free because you "know better"

Ham Sandwiches posted:

WOW!! That seems hard to believe when Bitcoins are a scam and you can't transfer your money out in Dollars because all exchanges are bullshit and $70,000 in transaction fees and you need to wait hours for a bitcoin transaction!!

Ham Sandwiches posted:

Maybe those things don't loving matter when you can make $20,000 if you know what you're doing so warning people off is not helping them but in fact loving them over big time!!!

Ham Sandwiches posted:

Fair enough, I'm saying other people can do what your friend did and make $20k just like he did, so the well meaning generalized advice to avoid Bitcoins at all costs seems to completely ignore those scenarios where people do make money

1gnoirents posted:

The only possible way to fail was to buy at a previous peak

Ham Sandwiches posted:

Yeah but I didn't say this. I didn't say everyone will make money. The something awful consensus is that *literally everyone* will lose money, which I feel is absolutely false and I challenge regularly. I am not saying *literally everyone* will make money. I disagree with the claim that *literally everyone* will lose money, a claim that has been repeated for years and has been used to mock every single redditor that tried it and bit of turbluence relating to cryptocurrencies, while ignoring scenarios where people made money.

Ham Sandwiches posted:

No the predictions were that it was guaranteed to fail and it was a foregone conclusion that bitcoins are a scam and you'd never get your money out, those predictions were wrong! People posted bullshit graphs! Laughed about HDD crashes! A guy wrote a book about it! This really did happen.