Hacker News new | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submit login

> But, I think it is fair to say that the Madoff scheme is in the same ballpark of Bitcoin.

I was going to comment on this, but I was blocked by my time manager. :(

Current market cap of BTC, at $111M, puts Madoff's scheme at about half of BTC. Compared to BTC's peak in 2017, Madoff's $$ is about a quarter. (supply * rough BTC price of $20,000).

Additionally, Madoff's scheme affected 4800 clients. [0] The amount of users on Coinbase as of late 2017 is about 2400x that amount [1]. So while amount "paid in" is lower, market cap is much higher. The affected userbase is also many multiples higher than Madoff's clientele.

So, my point: the difference in $$ is higher, and the difference in userbase is far higher.

More practically, note: we are comparing BTC to the largest grift in history. That's a lot of money.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernard_Madoff

[1] https://www.cnbc.com/2017/11/27/bitcoin-exchange-coinbase-ha...




Join us for AI Startup School this June 16-17 in San Francisco!

Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: