ADVERTISEMENT

OT: Bitcoin, Altcoins, NFT's & All Things Crypto

So I guess that would be the concern right there.

But I would counter that concern by saying it is individual chinese companies and not the chinese gov't that is doing the mining. And as evidenced by China's crackdown the gov't and the miners are not exactly working hand and hand here.
Correct, they are there largely because that's where the cheap electricity is. If that changes, they'll go somewhere else.

ETH is moving to a proof of stake operation model. When implemented, it won't require mining (like the proof of work model).
True, but the points made in the article regarding most of the crypto mining being done in China still stand.
 
This is one of those situations where I personally don't know the answers but the fact that big time established investors as well as large financial institutions are in the space makes me strongly think that there is legitimacy here.

Which is something that is talked about in the ETH article above.

Are there people lacking credibility who push crypto? Sure, but that shouldn't taint the whole space, not when so many with credibility are also pushing it.
Remember how many “large financial institutions” were in on commercial mortgage backed securities and derivatives leading the great financial crash? Don’t give them too much credit here. And, they are not buying BTC as far as I know - they are primarily advising clients on crypto and setting up custodian services - I.e., adopting the “pick and shovel” model from the Gold Rush Era. Remember it was the gold miners that went bankrupt not the guys selling the supplies.
 
If there are no miners, who is processing the transaction?
The miners are validating every transaction.

If BTC miners are on the front lines and receive BTC as the reward for completing "blocks" of verified transactions, why are we comfortable with our biggest adversaries virtually owning this critical piece of the BTC ecosystem? With such a high percentage of miners concentrated in a few problem countries, how do we even know that their operations aren’t fraudulently verifying transactions? Yeah, I’m not interested in the whole “decentralized” argument because when you then take it a step further down the supply chain BTC ownership is also highly concentrated (although I wish I could find a legitimate source for the precise percentage). So, let’s recap - you have HIGH concentration in both BTC mining and ownership yet it’s “decentralized”? And, in the day and age when US politics and a presidential election can be influenced via bad actors nobody thinks BTC could be a scheme and manipulated? As if my 12 year old son couldn’t create a bunch of YouTube videos, bots, Twitter handles, websites, etc. to push a BTC agenda. Anyway, for those of you making a fortune from BTC and crypto all the power to you. If you can’t beat them, join them. Just wish there were enough answers to convince me starting with how nobody knows the origin or identity of Satoshi Nakamoto.

I dont think we're comfortable at all with it. To me, the Digital Yuan or a Chinese "stable" coin replacing the dollar as global reserve currency frightens me. To me it's one of the biggest threats to our democracy.

I think the US realizes this, now at least. Appointing Genseler as Chair of the SEC was a big move, and honesty prob the best thing I've seen Biden do as Pres, but that's a topic for the CE Board.

ETH is moving to a proof of stake operation model. When implemented, it won't require mining (like the proof of work model).

PoS as a stand alone entity is not the best model. While ETH has been having it's moment, I still think it's long term viability is most likely to be challenged by a competitor. You already saw the NBA pull away from the Ethereum blockahin and into their own chain. As I've said in the past, high costs & slow speed are leaving the door wide open for competitive chains to take market share, which they're doing.

For example, I moved 3k in coins on a DeFi platform that is run on the HECO chain for less than $.10. The transaction also occurs in less than 15 seconds. That same transaction on the Ethereum chain would cost me $30 and could take 15 mins. Less than 10 cents vs $30. Seconds vs minutes. They're going to have to implement changes quickly (which theyve shown an inability in the past to do so) to maintain their dominance.

Another similar chain - NEO is essentially the Chinese Ethereum. Except its built to be centralized and in theory regulated. Two things the Chinese govt love to do.

Eth aside, I've said for a while that anything from 30 - 75k for a BTC would surprise me in the near term. We topped out at 65k and appeared to bottom out just south of 30k. In a perfect world, BTC will hold 35k to 40k in the near term, before the next set of announcements roll out. Apple should be announcing in the coming months that they're accepting BTC as part of Apple Pay, and I think we'll see more corporations or institutions purchasing or adding to their positions in the near future.

I keep dripping into BTC, just as I do into the SPY, my 401k and my 529. I've also spent a ton of time trying to learn DeFi platforms. The more our govt threatens to regulate and tax crypto, the faster the push into DeFi will be.
 
Anyone interested in a deep dive into crypto topics, check out this podcast/interview with Vitalik Buterin (co-founder of ETH). It is very long, but timestamped by topic. Lots of great stuff!

 
The miners are validating every transaction.



I dont think we're comfortable at all with it. To me, the Digital Yuan or a Chinese "stable" coin replacing the dollar as global reserve currency frightens me. To me it's one of the biggest threats to our democracy.

I think the US realizes this, now at least. Appointing Genseler as Chair of the SEC was a big move, and honesty prob the best thing I've seen Biden do as Pres, but that's a topic for the CE Board.



PoS as a stand alone entity is not the best model. While ETH has been having it's moment, I still think it's long term viability is most likely to be challenged by a competitor. You already saw the NBA pull away from the Ethereum blockahin and into their own chain. As I've said in the past, high costs & slow speed are leaving the door wide open for competitive chains to take market share, which they're doing.

For example, I moved 3k in coins on a DeFi platform that is run on the HECO chain for less than $.10. The transaction also occurs in less than 15 seconds. That same transaction on the Ethereum chain would cost me $30 and could take 15 mins. Less than 10 cents vs $30. Seconds vs minutes. They're going to have to implement changes quickly (which theyve shown an inability in the past to do so) to maintain their dominance.

Another similar chain - NEO is essentially the Chinese Ethereum. Except its built to be centralized and in theory regulated. Two things the Chinese govt love to do.

Eth aside, I've said for a while that anything from 30 - 75k for a BTC would surprise me in the near term. We topped out at 65k and appeared to bottom out just south of 30k. In a perfect world, BTC will hold 35k to 40k in the near term, before the next set of announcements roll out. Apple should be announcing in the coming months that they're accepting BTC as part of Apple Pay, and I think we'll see more corporations or institutions purchasing or adding to their positions in the near future.

I keep dripping into BTC, just as I do into the SPY, my 401k and my 529. I've also spent a ton of time trying to learn DeFi platforms. The more our govt threatens to regulate and tax crypto, the faster the push into DeFi will be.
The great thing about ETH is that it is ever evolving and improving. It is not static. Will competitors come up with better ideas? Sure. However, ETH has the most developers in crypto and an expert group advising on its future. It is by far the most powerful and high-capacity smart contract blockchain. The reason why some smaller ones may seem to be quicker and cheaper is because they have minimal transactive volume. If you dumped ETH volume on one of these smaller blockchains, transaction times and costs would skyrocket (and many would likely crash).

BTC is definitely going through a consolidation phase. It may linger around $35-40k for another month or so, then we will see. Just gotta be patient and buy as we all see fit!
 
The great thing about ETH is that it is ever evolving and improving. It is not static. Will competitors come up with better ideas? Sure. However, ETH has the most developers in crypto and an expert group advising on its future. It is by far the most powerful and high-capacity smart contract blockchain. The reason why some smaller ones may seem to be quicker and cheaper is because they have minimal transactive volume. If you dumped ETH volume on one of these smaller blockchains, transaction times and costs would skyrocket (and many would likely crash).

BTC is definitely going through a consolidation phase. It may linger around $35-40k for another month or so, then we will see. Just gotta be patient and buy as we all see fit!

Ehh. Github activity disagrees with the notion of the most developers in crypto. Again, not to shit on it, as I own plenty, I just think it's now in a weird phase of trying to make everyone happy. Logistics and timelyness are going to hurt it.

Have you started buying actual coins/tokens yet or are you still trading funds? You've educated yourself a great amount the last 6 mos on crypto. I can guarantee you will regret not owning coins outright. Maybe not this year or the next, but in the next 3 - 5 years the importance of holding your own coins will be abundantly obvious to everyone.
 
Does anyone else find that the Coinbase app is pretty hitchy? Yesterday my portfolio wouldn't update and was giving me Friday prices. And then very often the graphs seem to be in reverse. Down ward graph with upward trending prices.
 
Also why do these ransomware attacks always seem to be in BTC? I thought the blockchain meant you can track it and thus no good for cybercrime.
 
Does anyone else find that the Coinbase app is pretty hitchy? Yesterday my portfolio wouldn't update and was giving me Friday prices. And then very often the graphs seem to be in reverse. Down ward graph with upward trending prices.
I haven't used the app yet. So far, the normal website functionality seems fine.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Zimm80
Anyone have any thoughts on which direction the Sec lawsuit may be going in regards to XRP - Ripple being a security, and where Ripples price may be heading towards the end of 2021 and beyond if the end result would be in Ripples favor or if they get a slap on the wrist so to say ?
 
Anyone have any thoughts on which direction the Sec lawsuit may be going in regards to XRP - Ripple being a security, and where Ripples price may be heading towards the end of 2021 and beyond if the end result would be in Ripples favor or if they get a slap on the wrist so to say ?
I haven't followed the case too closely, but recent news has been more positive for XRP than for the SEC. Not sure what will happen. High risk, high reward!

 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: Zimm80
I haven't followed the case too closely, but recent news has been more positive for XRP than for the SEC. Not sure what will happen. High risk, high reward!

That’s what I was thinking, I may dabble a little, like the old chicken magician commercial used to say , set it and forget it.
 
Last edited:
That’s what I was thinking, I may dabble a little, just like the what the old chicken magician commercial used to say , set it and forget it.
Not a bad bet with a modest investment. If you are wrong, you may lose 1x your money, if you are right (and they win the lawsuit), you may 5x your money.....or more!
 
  • Like
Reactions: Zimm80
Revolut is a great wallet for cryptocurrencies. I keep on a Revolut account all my Bitcoins. A lot of people don't like it, but I don't understand why. They argue it because Bitcoins on Revolut are easy to track, so anyone can see where these Bitcoins were in the past. But there are different software that deals with this problem, For example, the bitcoin tumbler. It breaks the chain by mixing cryptocurrency breaks all connections with your personal addresses. This means that all details regarding your transaction are deleted right after mixing.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: bob-loblaw
I invest a small amount of money that I won't be missing too much.
Interesting first post. Are you referring to investing in crypto? If so, you may be taking the right approach. The volatility is too great to risk money that you can’t afford to lose.
 
Interesting first post. Are you referring to investing in crypto? If so, you may be taking the right approach. The volatility is too great to risk money that you can’t afford to lose.
Watching your crypto money routinely go +/- 30% in a matter of a few days definitely puts into a different perspective those occasional 1% drops in the S&P that everyone freaks out about.

LOL!
 
  • Like
Reactions: Zimm80
Does the fact that the US government was able to recover more that 50% of the ransom put any sort of dent in the anonymity of cryptocurrency? I always thought that the decentralization was the key to this industry, but if the US government can figure out and trace the monies in a few short weeks, is cryptocurrency, blockchain and NFT's really that secure? I pose these questions to the crypto gurus on this board.
 
  • Like
Reactions: RUDead
Does the fact that the US government was able to recover more that 50% of the ransom put any sort of dent in the anonymity of cryptocurrency? I always thought that the decentralization was the key to this industry, but if the US government can figure out and trace the monies in a few short weeks, is cryptocurrency, blockchain and NFT's really that secure? I pose these questions to the crypto gurus on this board.

I think the story is BS and made up without the private keys for the wallet the DOJ could not get the coins. If these guys are good enough to hack the pipeline infrastructure there is no way they did not put the BTC in an offline cold wallet and sit on it. But lets say they put it on an exchange or a public wallet and the Feds subpoena the exchange and that's how they got it then the hackers are not that smart and we are in bigger trouble then we think if they were able to hack the pipeline
 
Does the fact that the US government was able to recover more that 50% of the ransom put any sort of dent in the anonymity of cryptocurrency? I always thought that the decentralization was the key to this industry, but if the US government can figure out and trace the monies in a few short weeks, is cryptocurrency, blockchain and NFT's really that secure? I pose these questions to the crypto gurus on this board.
Anonymity is only a thing if you keep your info anonymous. All transactions on the blockchain are public.
 
Anyone looking for a high potential cheaper coin take a look at AMP. It’s been flying under the radar since it’s only been listed on Gemini until today but it goes live on Coinbase Pro tomorrow and Coinbase soon after that. Gemini has a very small user volume so this is the first time AMP will get some serious exposure in the crypto world.

Huge potential. Its a token being used as collateral behind the Flexa payment network which allows people to make purchases using other crypto (like BTC, ETH, Dodge, and a handful of others for now). The Flexa network is already being used on a very small scale by certain merchants (Lowe’s, Dunkin’, coming to Sheetz gas stations end of summer).

IMO it’s going to be one of the leaders in the Crypto payment space. Long term hold though until crypto payments become more generally accepted.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Zimm80
Does the fact that the US government was able to recover more that 50% of the ransom put any sort of dent in the anonymity of cryptocurrency? I always thought that the decentralization was the key to this industry, but if the US government can figure out and trace the monies in a few short weeks, is cryptocurrency, blockchain and NFT's really that secure? I pose these questions to the crypto gurus on this board.

Anonymity is only a thing if you keep your info anonymous. All transactions on the blockchain are public.
I was actually going to go the other way with this. If the US(or any law enforcement) can recoup this money because you can track transactions does that not give credibility to crypto?
 
I was actually going to go the other way with this. If the US(or any law enforcement) can recoup this money because you can track transactions does that not give credibility to crypto?
If it can be tracked, monitored and hacked, then what sets it apart from regular currency?
 
I was actually going to go the other way with this. If the US(or any law enforcement) can recoup this money because you can track transactions does that not give credibility to crypto?

If it can be tracked, monitored and hacked, then what sets it apart from regular currency?

The "story" is that the money was not in an offline wallet and was in a custodial account or on an exchange and the DOJ subpoena the servers and made them hand over the private keys. Without the keys you cannot get the money. This is why you keep your stuff in a private wallet, as the saying goes "not your keys, not your coins". With that said, as stated in a prior post these hackers are not stupid and know that which is why I personally do not believe the DOJ story.
 
The "story" is that the money was not in an offline wallet and was in a custodial account or on an exchange and the DOJ subpoena the servers and made them hand over the private keys. Without the keys you cannot get the money. This is why you keep your stuff in a private wallet, as the saying goes "not your keys, not your coins". With that said, as stated in a prior post these hackers are not stupid and know that which is why I personally do not believe the DOJ story.
Aside from whether or not they actually recouped the ransom, can they not track the coin to the wallet? Whether or not they can get in, they would know where it is, and where it goes after that.
 
Aside from whether or not they actually recouped the ransom, can they not track the coin to the wallet? Whether or not they can get in, they would know where it is, and where it goes after that.

all they know is the wallet address but would never know where it is or who owns it. there are also bitcoin mixer (blender) services that will blend your transaction and then they would never know what wallet the coins went to.

 
The "story" is that the money was not in an offline wallet and was in a custodial account or on an exchange and the DOJ subpoena the servers and made them hand over the private keys. Without the keys you cannot get the money. This is why you keep your stuff in a private wallet, as the saying goes "not your keys, not your coins". With that said, as stated in a prior post these hackers are not stupid and know that which is why I personally do not believe the DOJ story.
Yeah, hard to believe they just left their coins on Coinbase
 
  • Like
Reactions: T2Kplus20
all they know is the wallet address but would never know where it is or who owns it. there are also bitcoin mixer (blender) services that will blend your transaction and then they would never know what wallet the coins went to.

But I often hear the narrative that crypto is detrimental to crime because it can be tracked on the block chain.

In general I thought one of the benefits of blockchain is that it provides a permanent record that can not be altered.
 
The "story" is that the money was not in an offline wallet and was in a custodial account or on an exchange and the DOJ subpoena the servers and made them hand over the private keys. Without the keys you cannot get the money. This is why you keep your stuff in a private wallet, as the saying goes "not your keys, not your coins". With that said, as stated in a prior post these hackers are not stupid and know that which is why I personally do not believe the DOJ story.

I doubt our government is going to make public the exact mechanisms of their actions.
 
I doubt our government is going to make public the exact mechanisms of their actions.
trust me if you know anything about crypto the story is suspect......the story is coming from the same people that are trying to get you to get a suspect vaccine. They never wanted to treat the virus just make the vaccine to get people registered in a database and control the public. I will leave it at that do not want to turn this into a political debate.

 
  • Like
Reactions: ashokan
The "story" is that the money was not in an offline wallet and was in a custodial account or on an exchange and the DOJ subpoena the servers and made them hand over the private keys. Without the keys you cannot get the money. This is why you keep your stuff in a private wallet, as the saying goes "not your keys, not your coins". With that said, as stated in a prior post these hackers are not stupid and know that which is why I personally do not believe the DOJ story.

Somebody is definitely lying. Hard to believe these guys were smart enough to hack into a pipeline but not smart enough to secure their bitcoin.
 
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT