Originally Posted by
Waterstpub87
People get religious about this, I get it. I hope you made money, and continue to make money. I hope everyone on the board continues to make money. I'm happy for you.
1. Bitcoins themselves have little to no intrinsic value, you can't make anything out of them, and besides limited applications in monetary transfers, there is no reason for bitcoin. Bitcoins functional appeal, especially when compare to other currencies, is limited.
A. Bitcoin is not total anonymous
B. Bitcoin is more difficult to use then other measures, such as ************, bank wires ect. It is not hard for you, because you are likely a technically competent person, but for someone else consider they have to start a wallet, fund a wallet, figure out the address to send to and figure out how to send it to someone.
C. Fees, at the current moment, are higher then other forms of payment, and paid by the consumer.
So the appeal of bitcoin is somewhat anonymous, and not controlled by the government.
What % of the population do you believe really cares/ understands the federal reserve control over monetary supply? I'll be generous, lets call it 5%. So functionally, maybe 5% of people would use bitcoins sometimes.
They can't really use it for much now. You can post a list of 50 companies or whatever like Newegg that take bitcoins, maybe some coffee shops in Seattle. You can't pay your mortgage in it, you can't pay your business taxes in it. You can't really buy much. So its appeal at the moment is illicit enterprises or person to person transfers, which is not a super huge application when you discuss money flows.
So therefore, to make use of bitcoin, you have to convert it into USD/Eur/GBP/JPY ect. If tomorrow, you could no longer do that in the US, how much is bitcoin going to fall? It is going to tank massively. Even making it slightly more difficult to buy bitcoins will push many of the less sophisticated people out of it .So you're technically right, the government can't stop it. But they can stop you from spending it, so what use does it have then except paying your drug dealer, who won't take it, because he can't pay his child support with it.
Also, bear in mind, that bitcoins rise has not occurred because it has gotten more useful. Bitcoin's price has been driven by larger investments into bitcoin. When bitcoin's return falls, as its risk remains the same, it won't look as good of an investment. Something with a 100% annualized return with a 70% vol looks ok. Something with a 10% annualized return with a 70% vol looks terrible. When the math no longer makes sense, people will pull out, causing a cascade of selling pushing the value downwards.
Additionally, the risk of substitution is high. I know nothing about monero, or etherum, or dash, or zcash, so I can't really say if those are better. Something will come along eventually, which will push bitcoin aside. With no practical value, there is no floor.
My own personal opinion. Lots of them in the world. It what makes a market. I certainly wouldn't short bitcoins, but I wouldn't mortgage my house to buy them either. Good luck with your trading.