
Bitcoin passes 10,000 USD - ianopolous
https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/bitcoin/#charts
======
sunseb
In the beginning, there was this wonderful vision of making Bitcoin the
currency of the future. I loved that. Now it's just all greed. Bitcoin will go
the moon, that's all that matters now. Guess what, you can't create value out
of thin air. Bitcoin is useless, you can't do anything with it, except buying
and waiting that others buy after you so the price rises up: that's pretty
much the definition of speculation.

~~~
callahad
> _Bitcoin is useless, you can 't do anything with it_

There's a cafe down the street from me that accepts Bitcoin. I could literally
buy a meal with it right now.

It may not be rational, but it has actual utility.

~~~
sanmon3186
Given that BTC transactions take time (and high fee), how does it work for
cafes or any micro transactions of this kind?

~~~
timfrietas
How it (generally) works now: intermediaries pay the restaurant in fiat the
equivalent price in BTC on the time/day of the transaction. They facilitate
the trade without the restaurant needing to worry about price fluctuations or
digital currency exchanges.

How it may work in the future: Off-blockchain processing solutions like the
Lightning network (1) have been proposed to decentralize some degree of
transactions.

However, this inevitably takes some of the power away from the miners/those
who make money off every transaction fee. This has in essence been the
struggle/division behind many of the most recent forks or proposed forks; a
tradeoff between scale and economics for those that are generating coins or
facilitating transactions.

The Bitcoin drama is far from over, and for it to be anything other than
(primarily) a store of value in the longer term will require significant
technical changes. In fact, at this point, no existing cryptocurrency can
support the scale of, say, VISA. It's early days and the race to solve this
problem (or fail) is a fascinating drama to watch.

1\. [https://cointelegraph.com/explained/lightning-network-
explai...](https://cointelegraph.com/explained/lightning-network-explained)

------
eqmvii
A lot of "fear of missing out" discussion in this thread. Keep in mind that
calling market tops is a tricky business. If bitcoin crashes (as it often does
after meteoric rises), it will no longer look smart to have invested at many
times/price points.

There's a mania to the current market, but that's not enough information on
its own to predict the size or timing of a correction. The cryptocurrency
markets can stay irrational longer than you can remain solvent, just like
normal markets.

~~~
hardwaresofton
I've struggled with the FOMO myself, mostly because I've watched it so long
(or like to tell myself I knew about bitcoin earlier than the average person),
but I came to the same realization that I think is critical:

Bitcoin is just like other stores of value that fluctuate in price based on
some mix of speculation and "actual" value. If you're FOMOing about Bitcoin,
why not fear missing out about bluechip stocks? or owning real estate? or
futures? or bullion?

It is true that creation events for stores of value don't happen just happen
every year/decade/century but I wonder why the FOMO around Bitcoin is so acute
(for me at least)... it's like a penny stock that I feel like I should have
known was going to pop

[EDIT] - bouillon -> bullion

~~~
baby
what's FOMO

~~~
vidarh
"fear of missing out" in this case.

------
down
I think a lot of negativity here towards bitcoin comes from not getting in
earlier, I had the chance to get in 2016 but I didn't, I was an idiot, other
than this we should support it, because f... the banks, money printing,
corrupt governments... etc.

~~~
aw3c2
I once thought Bitcoin could be useful and be used as a currency. I loved that
idea and even used it as such in its infant phase for meaningless fun.

What it is now is a disgrace.

~~~
Double_a_92
Which coin can be used as a currency today? Ethereum, Stellar Lumen, Monero?

Bitcoin has become to slow and expensive (transactions) for that...

~~~
glass_of_water
Ethereum isn't inherently better as a currency. It still has the same scaling
limits as bitcoin, just lower utilization at this point.

~~~
zaarn
It has much higher limits though.

Bitcoin is limited to a fixed blocksize and ASIC mining while Ethereum has a
dynamically adjusting blocksize to fit the network usage and capabilities.

And IIRC Ethereum is atm handling more Transactions than Bitcoin and ETH TX
are arguably more complex, yet the network hasn't broken apart.

------
cs702
Here is a list of some of the money-like assets the world needs to function
everyday. People everywhere use these assets both for transacting with each
other and for storing wealth.

    
    
      Current market capitalization in US dollars:
      
      Global money supply (broad)              over $90.0 trillion [a]
      US dollar money supply (M2)                   $13.8 trillion [b]
      Euro money supply (M2)                        $13.2 trillion [c]
      All coins and banknotes in circulation         $7.6 trillion [d]
      All gold ever mined                            $7.1 trillion [e]
      Bitcoin                                  under $0.2 trillion [f]
    

We could debate forever whether any of these assets is "fairly valued" or not,
but surely everyone here agrees that if all of them suddenly disappeared, the
global economy would ground to a halt and modern society would collapse.
Together, these and other money-like assets provide immense value to
humankind.

Compared to the other money-like assets on the list, Bitcoin is very
different. Like gold, Bitcoin's continued existence doesn't depend on the good
management of any national economy; however, it depends on the continued
existence of the Internet. Unlike the other assets on the list, bitcoins are
digital so they can be encrypted, backed up, emailed, etc. Finally, bitcoins
will always be scarce -- no more than 21 million bitcoins will ever exist.
Bitcoin is truly a new kind of money-like asset.

The trillion-dollar question is, to what extent does the world need, to
function in the 21st century, a money-like asset with Bitcoin's unique
characteristics?

Sources: [a] [http://money.visualcapitalist.com/worlds-money-markets-
one-v...](http://money.visualcapitalist.com/worlds-money-markets-one-
visualization-2017/) [b]
[https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/M2](https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/M2)
[c]
[http://sdw.ecb.europa.eu/reports.do?node=1000003501](http://sdw.ecb.europa.eu/reports.do?node=1000003501)
[d] [http://money.visualcapitalist.com/worlds-money-markets-
one-v...](http://money.visualcapitalist.com/worlds-money-markets-one-
visualization-2017/) [e] [https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/08/17/how-does-
bitcoins-...](https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/08/17/how-does-bitcoins-
market-cap-stack-up-next-to-gold.aspx) [f]
[https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/bitcoin/](https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/bitcoin/)

~~~
Double_a_92
So in the absolute best case 1 Bitcoin will be worth the equivalent of $6.5
million of todays usd?

~~~
dragandj
I don't think so, since you can just create a bitcoin-based security and voila
- the supply is now unlimited.

~~~
nmj
Nah, there are still just 21 million bitcoin. Nice try though.

------
sillysaurus3
13 days ago I said it was a good idea to buy in at $5800:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15679776](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15679776)

72 days ago I said to buy in at $3k:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15259134](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15259134)

Both times people were skeptical. I'm not sure there's any moral to this, but
it's been an interesting few months.

~~~
agilebyte
When is a good time to sell?

~~~
Double_a_92
Shortterm, probably right now. It will fall down to at least $9700 in the next
few hours/days.

------
djhworld
My Dad was asking me about Bitcoin the other day, he's been receiving spam
emails to the point where it's surfacing on his radar as something to be
curious about.

Not sure if that means the ship has sailed now, or that BTC is hitting the
mainstream.

------
tudorconstantin
John McCafee on twitter: "It amazes me that human beings can deceive
themselves. Bitcoin has been doubling every month for the past three months,
yet an analyst suggests that it might grow, in the next 8 months, by 12%. They
opened the door to the new world, but brought the rules from the old world."

~~~
patrickaljord
He also said he would eat his own d*ck if it didn't get to $500k in 3 years,
the guy's a bit crazy.

[https://twitter.com/officialmcafee/status/887024683379544065...](https://twitter.com/officialmcafee/status/887024683379544065?lang=en)

------
zamazingo
How does everyone here buy/exchange bitcoin without giving every little bit of
detail about themselves (e.g. bank account, driver's license, etc) away? Every
time I look into it to buy online, I'm amazed by the sheer amount of PII
information I would have to expose.

------
danols
2017 is the first year
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Reporting_Standard](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Reporting_Standard)
is implemented. The rich need somewhere new to store their offshore cash.

------
CryptoPunk
Meanwhile Ethereum just broke 600K txs in one day. A much more useful metric
IMO. Bitcoin's price rise has decoupled from its transaction volume growth:

[https://i.redd.it/dreefk5ggkzz.png](https://i.redd.it/dreefk5ggkzz.png)

~~~
nmj
Guess what has to happen to maintain or increase value transfer when you have
reached a limit on blocksize.

Ding ding ding! You guessed it!

The price must rise. The utility has not degraded and just looking at 'number
of transactions' is not useful. Just because I can move some arbitrary number
of units in a given timeframe does not mean my unit is more valuable. Banks
can move way more than 600k USD transfers in a day.

~~~
CryptoPunk
>>Guess what has to happen to maintain or increase value transfer when you
have reached a limit on blocksize. Ding ding ding! You guessed it!

No, the price rise is not in any way conditioned on the block size being
limited. Whether $1 billion worth of coins is being moved via 1 million or 1
thousand txs has no bearing on what the per coin price has to be. All that
matters is the value moved and the number of coins doing the moving.

>>The utility has not degraded and just looking at 'number of transactions' is
not useful.

Being limited to larger value transactions with higher fees hugely degrades
utility.

------
joakleaf
Anyone have any idea why it exploded like this recently?

~~~
acjohnson55
From my perspective, nothing fundamental has changed about the Bitcoin
situation since it was priced at about $1000. I suspect that some inevitable
catastrophe is going to eventually cause a massive selloff. Per usual.

I have plenty of FOMO for not buying a couple years ago. But not trying to
jump on the bandwagon now.

~~~
corobo
If you had bought in a couple years ago would you have been the type to sell
out a year ago?

While I regret not grabbing a couple extra coins back in 2013 when I was
playing with BTC I know for a fact I'd have cashed out in the hundreds. If not
then definitely would have when it was worth $1000/1BTC

~~~
acjohnson55
> If you had bought in a couple years ago would you have been the type to sell
> out a year ago?

Probably so! Either that, or I'd be dollar cost averaging through the booms
and busts and it wouldn't matter anyway. That's why I don't really kick myself
over it.

I keep going back to my fundamental beliefs:

\- There's definitely _something_ to the underlying technology.

\- It has _not yet_ impacted the life of anyone I know, aside from its
fluctuating price. So basically, it's had about the same impact as sports
betting.

\- It's yet not clear to me whether trustlessness is worth it. (i.e. whither
Bitcoin, Ethereum, or permissioned blockchains)

------
Carhughes
I'm hardly an expert on Bitcoin but was is glaringly obvious over the past
month has been the highly speculative betting on Bitcoin. This run up seems
like a musical chairs and when the music stops there will be a lot more
standing counting their losses. #JustKeepinItReal

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Its actually built into blockchain currencies, that no regulation is even
possible. Until they come up with a feedback mechanism, I'm staying the hell
away from them.

------
grsblk
Yesterday already on South Korea-based bitcoin exchanges:
[https://www.coindesk.com/bitcoin-price-tops-10000-korean-
exc...](https://www.coindesk.com/bitcoin-price-tops-10000-korean-exchanges/)

------
maephisto
Even if it's not > 10k on all markets it's gonna get there in the next hours

~~~
sleepychu
I said that confidently yesterday when it surged to 9800 but here we are 12
hours later, still at 9800 (at least on my exchange!)

The sell wall at 10k is pretty huge.

------
simonsarris
What caused it to go to 10,000?

The news that it went to 9,000?

Hm.

~~~
Yizahi
This caused it -
[http://omnichest.info/lookupadd.aspx?address=3MbYQMMmSkC3AgW...](http://omnichest.info/lookupadd.aspx?address=3MbYQMMmSkC3AgWkj9FMo5LsPTW1zBTwXL)

------
chrischen
Seems like Bitcoin's main use cases are for 1) accepting payments online for
businesses that might not otherwise be authorized to do so (illegal stuff),
and 2) avoiding currency controls for moving money across borders.

~~~
nwah1
Agreed. There's no other valid use case. For anything lawful, there's cheaper,
more convenient, more stable alternatives and at the end of the day
governments demand people pay taxes in their official currencies. If you want
to have a house in the US, you need to pay USD to the government. The total
land value of the US is conservatively in the tens of trillions, and the total
amount of taxation in general, when adding up all the levels of government, is
about 40% of GDP. You can talk all day about network effects, but guess which
currency is going to get them... the one with trillions in compulsory demand,
or the one that does not?

------
coinbeats
The claim that bitcoin is useless is not valid. In fact, the anonymity of
bitcoin might be of huge value to the "dark side": drug dealers, tax evaders,
porn viewers, ... You name it.

These hidden markets, though usually under radar of the public, could
contribute significantly the bitcoin's market cap.

Btw, this weekend I hacked together to chatbot to send me bitcoin-related news
alert. Feel free to try it out:

[https://www.facebook.com/messages/t/1503071509774319](https://www.facebook.com/messages/t/1503071509774319)

~~~
wrinkl3
Nowadays Bitcoin is much less anonymous than it once used to be - the nature
of its blockchain is inherently transparent and I imagine every large law
enforcement agency in the world has resources allocated towards blockchain
analysis. All the cool kids are buying their drugs with Monero now, since its
blockchain allows for a much greater degree of anonymity.

------
baybal2
Ah, will my kids ever believe me if in the future I will tell them that I once
had a whole 50BTC block on my USB flash drive?

~~~
beejiu
Is there any kind of utility to search for a Bitcoin wallet on a hard drive? I
am fairly sure I gambled everything I had in Bitcoin from 2013/2014 and I have
not used it since. But I just want to double check!

~~~
0xfeba
find wallet.dat

------
baby
admins: imo this post should not be penalized because it includes bitcoin in
the title. This is a pretty huge milestone and deserves some time on the front
page.

------
margorczynski
And everytime I see a new height beaten I think to myself - "too late to buy
now, gonna pop any day now".

Still, I have high hopes for cryptos to overtake the current financial system
and end the bubble-crash cycle

~~~
mromanuk
I always regret the first time that intended to buy years ago, it was $2,
didn't like the broker site, looked too shady.

~~~
oscilloscope
It was probably MtGox and it was indeed shady.

------
posterboy
when there's noone left to offer currency, will goods be offered and inflate
the price further?

------
dimillian
Not yet. Whatever that crap site is.

~~~
cinooo
That "crap site" is in the top 500 for traffic now lol

~~~
CamelCaseName
Tangentally related but, I once saw a Medium post on r/entrepreneur or
r/smallbusiness and left a fairly derisive comment about the site in the
comments. Imagine my surprise when I discovered it was made by the co-founder
of Twitter!

~~~
cinooo
did not know that!

