
Bitcoin hits $10,000 - giacaglia
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-11-29/bitcoin-leaves-skeptics-behind-while-blasting-to-record-10-000
======
wintom
“Rosenstreich at online trading firm Swissquote said bitcoin’s surge harks to
the surprises of the U.K. referendum on European Union membership and
President Trump’s election.

“We have underestimated the populist movements,” he said. “There is growing
unease on how central banks and governments are managing fiat currencies.
Ordinary people globally understand why a decentralized asset is the ultimate
safe haven.””

That’s the reason for 10k and it will be the reason for 100k. 100k puts the
market at cap at a trillion, it’s not that crazy if you remember that Gold is
several times that and other than looking good as jewelry it has no other real
intrinsic value. No one likes to talk about that though, they like to demonize
bitcoin which actually does something gold could never do. Force trust in a
world where you can’t trust anything.

~~~
will_brown
>No one likes to talk about that though, they like to demonize bitcoin which
actually does something gold could never do.

Just playing devils advocate, but you can't replicate/duplicate gold. On the
other hand I could create 21M cryptocoins on a blockchain (calling them
Bitcoin2 or even just Bitcoin if it pleases). I can make them function
identically, similarly or more efficiently than Bitcoin. I can create a new
blockchain (network) or put these coins on an existing blockchain (say the
Ethereum blockchain). How much would you pay for all 21M Bitcoin? How much
would you pay me to create you 21M Bitcoin2 and transfer 100% of them to you?

You say Bitcoin is $10k because ordinary people understand why a decentralized
asset is the ultimate safe haven. If that is your premises it makes little
sense to compare Bitcoin to gold, compare Bitcoin to other currencies. Why
does Litecoin = $100 and Ether = $500? Bitcoin may do something gold could
never do, obviously, but can it do anything any other cryptocoin/token can't?

The real irony is cryptocoins and blockchains couldn't even exist without
gold, because it is a necessary component in the machines that created
bitcoin, that hosts blockchain nodes, mines, hosts wallets and facilitates
transactions.

~~~
drcross
>On the other hand I could create 21M cryptocoins on a blockchain (calling
them Bitcoin2 or even just Bitcoin if it pleases). I can make them function
identically, similarly or more efficiently than Bitcoin. I can create a new
blockchain (network) or put these coins on an existing blockchain (say the
Ethereum blockchain). How much would you pay for all 21M Bitcoin? How much
would you pay me to create you 21M Bitcoin2 and transfer 100% of them to you?

Econ 101: The price of a currency is based on people's trust in that currency.

>The real irony is cryptocoins and blockchains couldn't even exist without
gold, because it is a necessary component in the machines that created
bitcoin, that hosts blockchain nodes, mines, hosts wallets and facilitates
transactions.

That's not irony. Thats a happy coincidence.

~~~
lokedhs
"Econ 101: The price of a currency is based on people's trust in that
currency."

Right, but how many people really trust Bitcoin? And by trust, I mean trust
that it will retain its value for the foreseeable future.

I have trust that the Euro will retain its value, so I feel confident pricing
my product and services using it. On the other hand you'd be crazy to price
anything in Bitcoin.

No one has trust in Bitcoin as a currency. Some people have some degree of
trust in it as an investment vehicle, which is fine. That doesn't make Bitcoin
a currency any more than gold is.

~~~
ric2b
> I have trust that the Euro will retain its value

You must feel very betrayed every year when you look at the inflation rate and
the price increases...

~~~
vilmosi
The euro zone had around 1.5% inflation this year, what are you talking about?

~~~
ric2b
How is that retaining it's value? That's nearly 10% gone after 7 years.

And that's assuming 1.5%, some years are worse.

------
Cookingboy
Disclaimer: I do own BTC.

But I really can’t see how this is not just an instrument for some people to
get very rich in a very short amount of time on the back of others.

Can it reach 100k? Absolutely. 1M? Who knows. 10M/BTC? Someone on Reddit said
it will get close. But in the end I do think it will be remembered as a global
mania instead of the creation of a new asset class.

I do believe in block chain and the value of crypto currency in general, but I
just don’t see how BTC will be the winning asset in the end, if anything
Etherum has a lot more solid foundation and is a lot more scalable
technically.

~~~
nwah1
I heard a rumor that it will hit 1 trillion dollars. It sounded legit.

~~~
mancerayder
Was the rumor on Reddit, though? Because if so, I'm loading up on BTC. To the
moon, as they say over there.

------
deorder
Be careful. There is evidence that certain parties are issuing fake dollars
called USDT / Tether from which they buy cryptocoins (incl. BTC) to
artificially increase the price:

[https://mobile.twitter.com/bitfinexed](https://mobile.twitter.com/bitfinexed)
(One of the people monitoring the situation)

[https://np.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/7g5yml/my_investigation...](https://np.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/7g5yml/my_investigation_of_tether_scam_and_some/)
(Some more info)

Make sure you are able to get out on time if needed. Investigate and decide
for yourself. There is a lot of censoring and vote manipulation going on. I am
not going to point fingers, but just that you are aware.

~~~
dahdum
The Friedman memo showed they were 1-1 cash/usdt back in September, and
they've stated clearly it's institutional money coming in. In fact, that's
exactly what I would expect for large buyers trying to spread their purchases
across exchanges who don't use USD directly.

"I agree that if no one was able to get fiat in or out of Tether and USDT were
still being issued that would be a huge problem. As it stands, however,
institutional customers are able to deposit USD to Tether, and this is how
USDT is being issued."

[https://www.reddit.com/r/BitcoinMarkets/comments/7fsfwl/dail...](https://www.reddit.com/r/BitcoinMarkets/comments/7fsfwl/daily_discussion_monday_november_27_2017/dqfwq33/)

~~~
wils1245
If you believe them you must believe that they've received $250 million
dollars in the month of November alone.

[https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/tether/](https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/tether/)

This on a daily pattern that looks like a step function. Where could this
money possibly be coming from? Anonymous millionaires?

~~~
dahdum
Hedge funds, family offices, etc.. $250M isn't all that much. Arrington is
trying to raise a $100M crypto fund, Novogratz is raising a $500M one.

------
narrator
7 years ago: The first bitcoin article on HN with comments!

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1532670](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1532670)

One of the posters says the feds will shut it down. I also thought this too.
This remains one of the most enduring mysteries of Bitcoin to me. Why has the
government taken such a hands off approach?

~~~
seanmcdirmid
You mean the USA government? Because they have no legal basis to take action.
Rule of law is weird like that.

~~~
gregschlom
I'm not sure I understand your comment. There seems to be plenty of anti
money-laundering laws that would provide a legal basis.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
You can prosecute people for money laundering, that is very different from
banning bitcoin.

------
sillysaurus3
The most remarkable aspect of bitcoin is that if Satoshi is a single person,
it's the first time in history someone has become a billionaire by themselves.

It's not quite that clear cut, but it's not too far off.

~~~
Shank
The only problem is that Satoshi's coins are watched like a hawk. Satoshi
can't liquidate any of them, or even really move them without causing an
immediate reaction in the community. Exchanges might halt trading, whilst it
would immediately give away his or her identity. If the price of bitcoin
doesn't crash following a coin movement, Satoshi's life is most certainly at
risk. If it does, then the coins are worth nothing.

~~~
modeless
Satoshi is almost certainly dead. No living person could resist the temptation
to talk about their creation of a 100 billion dollar phenomenon. Two plausible
candidates who died at about the right time are Hal Finney and Dave Kleiman.

~~~
mikekchar
Edit: I misread the initial post, but still think what I wrote is reasonably
relevant. Had I been Satoshi (and I'm not), I would have no trouble not
talking about it.

I think this is unlikely. I think it is much more likely that he deleted his
keys -- on purpose. Despite the common "Bitcoin was created as a scam"
sentiment, I see very little evidence of this. Satoshi appears to have just
been a very idealistic person who thought that he was doing something useful.
From the beginning he said that he shouldn't hang on to those initial coins
because it would undermine the validity of the currency. Out of curiosity I've
read through a fair amount of the original dev forum archives (I forget where
they are, but I'm sure they are not hard to find -- last time I looked I found
them right away). As far as I can tell, it is what it appears to be. Which is
not, of course, to say that there aren't plenty of scammers in the Bitcoin
world. It just seems that Satoshi wasn't one of them.

~~~
sillysaurus3
[http://satoshi.nakamotoinstitute.org/](http://satoshi.nakamotoinstitute.org/)

------
mrb
Most comprehensive all-time Bitcoin price history chart you will find online,
to give some perspective:
[http://bitcoin.zorinaq.com/price/](http://bitcoin.zorinaq.com/price/) (Chart
is interactive, see instructions at the bottom. I made it.)

~~~
joelrunyon
You should fix the Y axis. Completely misleading.

~~~
mrb
A logarithmic scale is the proper way to show an exponentially increasing
value.

~~~
chii
But nowhere as impressive looking as a hockey stick graph.

~~~
mrb
True but the point isn't to be impressive, but to be scientifically precise.

------
ChuckMcM
If this keeps up buying $100 in Bitcoin would seem to be inexpensive
ransomware insurance.

------
jacquesm
Makes you wonder what triggers people have for themselves to sell their
'stash'. 10 fold increases in a year won't last for very long.

~~~
petercooper
There's a FOMO narrative of "$1,000,000 BTC if it goes mainstream" going
around which has fuelled speculative investments from some people I know
(myself included - obviously using money I am totally OK with losing given how
far-fetched an outcome it is).

~~~
kwelstr
Yes, that was written at the very beginning of bitcoin. The thought is that
bitcoin can be divided into 100,000,000 satoshis and a dollar can be divided
into 100 cents, so to make 1 satoshi = 1 cent means 1 bitcoin = 1,000,000
dollars.

------
gtrubetskoy
Back in September I've written down my thoughts on how Bitcoin price is
determined in a two part blog (the second part is about pricing), and back
then I concluded that Bitcoin will falter if it does not reach the cap closer
to that of gold, which has to do with the total "capacity" of Bitcoin as store
of value, which is its market cap. It still has more than 10x of growth to get
there.

[1] [https://grisha.org/blog/2017/09/22/bitcoin-
value/](https://grisha.org/blog/2017/09/22/bitcoin-value/)

[2] [https://grisha.org/blog/2017/09/25/bitcoin-
value-2/](https://grisha.org/blog/2017/09/25/bitcoin-value-2/)

------
wallace_f
Can someone explain to me why bitcoin should be priced so high relative to
other cryptocurrencies?

The conspiracy theorist in me wants to say that the best way to undermine
trust in cryptocurrencies is to create market turmoil. This would not just
undermine trust in cryptocurrency, but serve to embolden the Fed's 'Price
Stability' justification.

~~~
QML
I'd have to argue it's because Bitcoin went net-positive after the BCH fork --
that shows a bit of resilience and probably would inspire false confidence in
speculators.

------
goseeastarwar
I'd love to force disclaimers on bitcoin ownership prior to commenters trying
to convince us how decentralized currency will change the world and hit $1M
eventually.

It's called talking your book, which isn't illegal, but wildly disingenuous.
FOMO is why the number keeps going up, these other reasons are window dressing
for utter nonsense.

~~~
bluepirate
I bought a laptop with BTC a few months ago. Also MDMA.

------
cjensen
I wonder how many tulips you can buy with a bitcoin?

~~~
LeoPanthera
This is such a lazy comment and it comes up every time. It contributes
absolutely nothing.

~~~
cjensen
Pointing out the obvious in a minimum of words is not lazy.

Expecting people to stop pointing out the obvious is optimistic at best.

------
nikolay
Well, there are only that many people with speculators mentality who will keep
buying. At one point, all this will collapse. It's very easy to be profiting
when there's momentum upwards - just like it used to be with DotCom... until
everybody lost and the economy couldn't recover for years! I know a friend who
lost everything, including his house during the DotCom putting every single
penny into the stock market, including his 401(k), etc.

------
nly
I don't follow it but I read somewhere the other day that it now costs tens of
dollars worth to actually make a transaction on the blockchain.

If this is true then it seems to me that it's effectively become an inter-bank
settlement protocol (which may not be that surprising or bad of an outcome
given its inherent latency)

~~~
cocktailpeanuts
One thing I learned since learning about cryptocurrencies: NEVER trust
"something you read somewhere". A lot of them are propaganda or people who
have no idea how it actually works scratching the surface.

Do your own research if you're curious about it and don't want to feel left
out. It's never too late to make an actual informed decision afterwards. I've
seen so many otherwise intelligent people just keep dismissing Bitcoin and
cryptocurrencies without even knowing how they actually work. Don't be those
people.

Try to read some books about the actual technology that runs Bitcoin and other
cryptocurrencies and THEN make a decision whether you think it's a scam or
not. Even if you think you think it's a scam or a bubble or whatever, at least
then you'll be actually making an independent judgment on a new piece of
technology that nobody--including the inventor him/herself--fully understands.

~~~
nly
Oh, I'm well aware of how Bitcoin works. All the way down to the cryptographic
constructs.

I studied it for a while, and it lead me on to some more interesting topics,
but the currency itself doesn't interest me.

Understanding Bitcoin to assess "whether it's a scam" makes about as much
sense as learning about the mechanics of an electronic exchange to figure out
whether it's a good idea to invest in Facebook.

~~~
cocktailpeanuts
Not a great analogy.

------
antimora
From the outside, as nonuser, I cannot understand how this currency price
surge helps the currency as a medium of exchange. Wouldn't this signal
everyone to hold on their bitcoins? Doesn't this hurt the adoption in the long
run?

~~~
blueprint
It can also signal that you have enough money to buy what you wanted to buy in
the first place... while encouraging saving. Maybe not super bad. You're right
that if its function is as a currency then it should be used but it's hard to
make that case for Bitcoin. For Monero, it's very clear: Monero's anonymity is
strongest when it is actually used – when there are more transaction outputs
from which to choose, and so usage of it is to be encouraged – especially when
the alternative is the influx of hordes of speculators who merely hold or
trade and don't contribute to the technology nor community in any way. Well,
except perhaps in providing comedy material…

------
sosa2k
I vividly remember when it crashed down from around 900 a few years ago and
the /r/bitcoin subreddit literally had suicide hotlines pinned.

------
googletazer
Sometimes when I think if humanity met extremely advanced alien civilization -
what kind of "stuff" could they use to trade? At one point I thought - it must
be information, pieces of information are ultimately valuable. BTC might be
something close to that. Foggy thoughts, but its a foggy concept.

------
bluepirate
Maybe the price jumping high because organization like Amazon will announce
that they will start accepting BTC soon

------
HN15718653
Honest question: Is Bitcoin used in significant quantities for
"legitimate"/legal transactions? I don't know a single person who has bought
anything with a Bitcoin, or received payment. From my non-economic POV, it
sure seems like /pure speculation/.

~~~
ilaksh
I have received payment for programming work in Bitcoin. I also used it to buy
a movie ticket one night when my bank account had run out at the end of the
month.

------
m3kw9
I’m note sure if bitcoin can be a viable currency if the price movements are
so volatile. It’s all good the the volatility moving the price up, carrying it
in any big amount without insurance feels like gambling right now

~~~
_justinfunk
This is my hangup with it. The libertarian dreams of a decentralized currency
can never happen if people expect their money to rapidly increase in value.

Why would I buy a pizza today, or a house, or an island, with BTC if in 6
months, that same BTC would be worth 10x.

------
dcw303
I'd like to see Bitcoin gain more utility as a payment platform. I'm hoping
that CME's plan to offer futures contracts gives merchants the stability they
need to offer products priced in BTC online.

------
40acres
How do you transfer Bitcoin into fiat currency? There was a Bitcoin ATM in
Portland, OR a while back but I'm not sure how it worked and haven't really
heard of other ways to liquidate BTC.

~~~
ilaksh
There are a lot of ways. You could use Coinbase or an exchange. Or Bitpay. You
could also try localbitcoins.com. Or just find a person who is hyped about it
and help them set up a wallet then make a deal.

------
tehlike
I am surprised to see very little mention of monero, given that it's closer to
true anonymity than other cryptocurrencies.

------
atomicnumber1
People from the start have been predicting the death of Bitcoin and yet keeps
going strong. What going on here ?

------
mostly_harmless
It broke 9000 yesterday, didn't it? That's more than 10% in a day.

Is there any reason it is up, other than speculation?

~~~
empath75
Tether hyperinflation.

Edit: I should clarify. Bitfinex printed 95 million worth of tether in the
last _two days_ , and used it to buy btc. When your prices are denominated in
Monopoly money, the sky is the limit.

~~~
zenlikethat
This is the story that's missing here. When one of the major exchanges is
starting to look insolvent and USDT is getting scarier and scarier by the day,
a flight from USDT into Bitcoin is not surprising...

~~~
dahdum
Tether is being issued because institutional money is coming in through USDT.

[https://www.reddit.com/r/BitcoinMarkets/comments/7fsfwl/dail...](https://www.reddit.com/r/BitcoinMarkets/comments/7fsfwl/daily_discussion_monday_november_27_2017/dqfwq33/)

~~~
QML
That makes no sense; if institutional money were to come into cryptocurrency
(that is, fiat to crypto) -- which is a taxable event -- why would they be
going into USDT when the main goal of USDT is to be stable?

Essentially, that means people will be losing money.

------
karmapolic
I heard pretty much the same bs when it hit 5k. And now, oh boy, when is it
going to hit 100k now.

------
zeep
this time, it's for real... (the last time a 10k value was posted on HN, I
could not find 1 bitcoin for 10k on my exchange
([https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15796503)](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15796503\)))

~~~
pishpash
"This time is different," amirite?

~~~
johnhenry
"This time, it's Bitcoin." (tm)

~~~
ChuckMcM
Ok, that just crossed into the T-shirt threshold.

~~~
paulie_a
I am currently making a personal tshirt based on the this thread.

~~~
sp527
This whole place has lost its collective mind on the subject of crypto.

~~~
johnhenry
"This whole place has lost its collective mind on the subject of crypto!" (tm)

------
miguelrochefort
I bought my first Bitcoin at $10.

Of course, I had to sell it at $20...

~~~
jacquesm
At the present rate that is less than a year. Time to buy some more. /s

------
dustinmoris
Unlike gold a BTC has absolutely no use beyond whatever its current use is.
The only way for a BTC to be ever in demand is if enough people trust each
other that nobody will start selling it in large mass and therefore entirely
flooring the value of it. However trust is not exactly a great foundation for
a currency's value. Gold has at least has some useful applications outside of
banking. For a start it looks beautiful, it is highly in demand in fashion and
jewellery an it has also great application in electronics. This is a much
better foundation for being resilient against a complete loss of value and
promising longevity.

Besides BTC has serious flaws in order to attract a critical mass. It is
extremely unsustainable - for example buying a sandwich with BTC requires more
energy than a house for an entire week. This is alone is just horrible,
especially in times when we should be trying to save our planet and not waste
energy for shits like this. Secondly with it's current volatility the people
who own BTC are much much less likely to spend it somewhere, because of the
hope of gaining more value. However if nobody is willing to spend their BTC
then adoption will lack and eventually counter act on it's value.

Thirdly you can't really convert the value of BTC into hard cash and even if
you could, before you'd finish converting a large amount of BTC into cash
you'd have halved the price of the BTC as part of the exercise.

Overall the technology behind it is interesting, but BTC I honestly think will
massively flop and the current hype comes from pure greed. Investors trying to
convince the populus to buy into BTC so they can finally cash out, but the
reality is that for the normal person BTC is literally too cryptic to jump on
the train and tech savvy people know better that it's too late now. It's too
volatile and anything can happen. You don't buy expensive assets which are so
widely known that they are in the news every day. This is too late.. we just
watch and wait for the burst.

~~~
baddox
What percentage of the value of gold do you think is due to its “inherent”
value in jewelry or electronics? I’d wager it’s incredibly tiny, and I don’t
understand your argument that gold is a reasonable store of value only because
it has some tiny bit of “inherent” value.

~~~
dustinmoris
It has a lot with it to do, because a lot of today's asset value is based on
pure emotions of investors and their feelings and if something is actually
physical, which you can see, hold in your hands, which has a very shiny
appearance, is being worn by rich people around their necks and is used in the
most sophisticated electronics (which itself is required for the world to
function nowadays) influences one's feelings a lot - so yes, the fact that
gold has these attributes plays a huge role IMHO.

On the other hand a BTC is literally just a made up hashsum which is not only
extremely volatile on the markets, but could also very easily just physically
disappear through loss, theft or just malfunction.

~~~
baddox
But if you’re going to use emotions to explain a significant portion of gold’s
value, surely the emotions of Bitcoin traders should provide an equally
legitimate explanation of Bitcoin’s value.

I don’t really like appeals to “inherent value,” except for assets that can be
expected to be desirable to almost any individual in almost any conceivable
scenario (like food). Even then, there is some level of social or “network”
effect, because in order to trade food you need your trade partner to have
confidence that your assets are genuine (e.g. it’s not fake cans of beans) and
that there is some fundamental protection of property rights (e.g. you’re not
going to trade your canned beans for their eggs, only to immediately steal
back their eggs using the threat of force).

In that sense, all “inherent value” is just an abstraction based on your
confidence in your ability to predict the future behavior of other humans,
which isn’t so different than your decision today to trade fiat currency for
cryptocurrency (or even to trade your labor for fiat currency, like most of us
do in traditional jobs).

------
thisisit
Are we going get every other bitcoin price milestone on the frontpage now?

Earlier today:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15796503](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15796503)

Then two days ago for 9k:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15782222](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15782222)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15786821](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15786821)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15779933](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15779933)

at 7k:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15609264](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15609264)

~~~
ilaksh
Right and in a few months or years it will be on the front page when it hits
20k and then 40k.

