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Brisketexan

Brisketexan 105,187

Posted
Posted
15 minutes ago, Anastasis said:

All the best and most reliable currencies are backed up by aircraft carriers. 

Historically (and using the analogs of the time), that's more right than wrong.  You don't have to like it to make it true.  "Power" is a pretty good backing.

And I've always loved the "crypto is better than the dollar, that's just backed by the full faith and credit of the United States!"  Hey, crypto bro.....if shit goes down that's significant enough to gut "the full faith and credit" of the United States....shit's gotten unspeakably bad.  Do you think that anyone's going to give a shit when you wave your digital wallet at them and say "but I have 50 bitcoins!" as they run you through with a sharpened stick and take whatever food you have?

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Neonmoon

Neonmoon 38,130

Posted
Posted
1 hour ago, bernorange said:

The joke is on you fools.  WEF says it's time for the big boys to drive the crypto trains.

https://www.kitco.com/news/2023-01-03/WEF-says-cryptos-will-revolutionize-the-global-financial-system-as-U-S-regulators-highlight-the-risks.html

The big boys have enough trouble not crashing the economy with traditional financial instruments 

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Dahobbs

Dahobbs 17,627

Posted
Posted
4 hours ago, Brisketexan said:

Do you think that anyone's going to give a shit when you wave your digital wallet at them and say "but I have 50 bitcoins!" as they run you through with a sharpened stick and take whatever food you have?

Wait until I tell them of the folly of central bank monetary policies!

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B00M

B00M 6,435

Posted
Posted
15 hours ago, Brisketexan said:

Historically (and using the analogs of the time), that's more right than wrong.  You don't have to like it to make it true.  "Power" is a pretty good backing.

And I've always loved the "crypto is better than the dollar, that's just backed by the full faith and credit of the United States!"  Hey, crypto bro.....if shit goes down that's significant enough to gut "the full faith and credit" of the United States....shit's gotten unspeakably bad.  Do you think that anyone's going to give a shit when you wave your digital wallet at them and say "but I have 50 bitcoins!" as they run you through with a sharpened stick and take whatever food you have?


The dollar losing its WRC status due to inflation probably won’t result in lord of the flies shit but it will make everyone holding dollars poorer. On the bright side, it will reduce our wealth inequality

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Neonmoon

Neonmoon 38,130

Posted
Posted
3 hours ago, B00M said:


The dollar losing its WRC status due to inflation probably won’t result in lord of the flies shit but it will make everyone holding dollars poorer. On the bright side, it will reduce our wealth inequality

The dollar is not losing WRC status due to inflation. 

 

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52-80

52-80 19,211

Posted
Posted
19 hours ago, Brisketexan said:

Man.  Y'all STILL haven't figured out that the solution to all the world's problems, the key to universal happiness, wealth, and security?  Come on guys, you can say it with me.....

Crypto was my happy key today. 

Im not gonna claim the timing wasnt 95% luck, but a short position I initiated this week on Silvergate Capital - the traditional intermediary banking for the major crypto operators - paid off when the stock splooged 40% today.  

FTX contagion got to them and news confirmed their selling off assets to preserve liquidity. 

It funded my IRA contribution for this year. 

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Trey3216

Trey3216 15,350

Posted
Posted
20 hours ago, Brisketexan said:

Historically (and using the analogs of the time), that's more right than wrong.  You don't have to like it to make it true.  "Power" is a pretty good backing.

And I've always loved the "crypto is better than the dollar, that's just backed by the full faith and credit of the United States!"  Hey, crypto bro.....if shit goes down that's significant enough to gut "the full faith and credit" of the United States....shit's gotten unspeakably bad.  Do you think that anyone's going to give a shit when you wave your digital wallet at them and say "but I have 50 bitcoins!" as they run you through with a sharpened stick and take whatever food you have?

Food, water, and the tools to acquire food and water....  

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bernorange

bernorange 8,362

Posted
Posted
Quote

...
Last week, at a crypto conference in St. Moritz, Switzerland, CNBC spoke to industry insiders who painted a picture of 2023 as year of caution. Bitcoin

is expected to trade within a range, be sensitive to the macroeconomic situation such as interest rate rises and continue to be volatile. A new bull run is unlikely in 2023.

However, experts are looking to next year and beyond with optimism.
...
Meltem Demirors, chief strategy officer at CoinShares, said bitcoin is likely to be rangebound trading at the lower end between $15,000 and $20,000 and on the upper end between $25,000 to $30,000.

She said a lot of the "forced selling" that happened in 2022 as a result of collapses in the market is now over, but there isn't much new money coming into bitcoin.

"I don't think there's a lot of forced selling remaining, which is optimistic," Demirors told CNBC Friday. "But again, I think the upside is quite limited, because we also don't see a lot of new inflows coming in."
...
In CNBC's interviews, several industry participants spoke about historical bitcoin cycles, which happen roughly every four years. Typically, bitcoin will hit an all time high, then have a massive correction. There will be a bad year and then a year of mild recovery.

Then "halving" will happen. This is when miners, who run specialized machines to effectively validate transactions on the bitcoin networks, see their rewards for mining cut in half. Miners get bitcoin as a reward for validating transactions. The halving, which happens every four years, effectively slows down the supply of bitcoin onto the market. There will ever only be 21 million bitcoin in circulation.

Halving usually precedes a bull run. The next halving event takes place in 2024.

Scaramucci called 2023 a "recovery year" for bitcoin and predicted it could trade at $50,000 to $100,000 in two to three years.
...

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/01/16/bitcoin-price-prediction-2023-investors-see-12000-to-30000.html

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Anastasis

Anastasis 23,481

Posted
Posted (edited)
On 1/5/2023 at 10:07 AM, B00M said:


The dollar losing its WRC status due to inflation probably won’t result in lord of the flies shit but it will make everyone holding dollars poorer. On the bright side, it will reduce our wealth inequality

We’re not losing our currency status. We will simply stoke whatever geopolitical instability is necessary to keep the house of cards standing. 

Edited by Anastasis
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bernorange

bernorange 8,362

Posted
Posted

If Genesis' bankruptcy destabilizes the USDC coin, it would likely trigger another implosion in the greater crypto market.  The tweet raises the possibility of it, but doesn't say that there is a known risk in that regards.

Gemini and Genesis have been embroiled in a spat for a while now:

https://www.kitco.com/news/2023-01-03/Gemini-Genesis-spat-goes-public-prompts-new-criminal-allegations-against-DCG-from-3AC-s-Zhu.html

The ripple effect of Genesis' bankruptcy *could* (I don't know that it will for sure) impact Gemini's Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) which, again, could have ramifications for Bitcoin specifically and the crypto market as a whole.

https://www.kitco.com/news/2023-01-17/If-this-crypto-firm-collapses-then-a-massive-selling-event-in-Bitcoin-would-occur-Scott-Melker.html

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RDCanecutter

RDCanecutter 26,458

Posted
Posted
2 hours ago, Hefeweizen said:

I can’t understand a word of that salad.  I am starting to see how olds felt about the internet when it came around.

I have learned that when a tech dude stands in front of a blue or purple background, thinking deep thoughts while holding his hands like he's lying about a fish he caught, that it all translates into "give me money for some bullshit I am promoting."

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bernorange

bernorange 8,362

Posted
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Quote

... the Ethereum Shanghai update scheduled to be implemented sometime in March, ...
...
The main goal of the Shanghai update is to enable staking withdrawals, which have been disabled since the launch of the beacon chain in Dec. 2020.
...
During the 99th Consensus Layer (CL) call on Dec. 1, Ethereum developers decided that they intended to roll out Ethereum staking withdrawals with the upcoming Shanghai hard fork due to the fact that some stakers have had their tokens locked for two years. At that time, the upgrade also included the implementation of "EVM Object Format" (EOF), which is a collection of Ethereum Improvement Proposals (EIP) designed to upgrade the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) and make future upgrades easier.

On Jan. 6, developers held another call where they agreed to exclude the planned implementation of EOF from the Shanghai upgrade over concerns that its complexity would delay the implementation of withdrawals.

At the time of writing, data from Beaconcha.in shows that there are 16,149,561 Ether worth approximately $26.19 billion deposited into the Ethereum staking contract and currently unable to be withdrawn. According to Wennerge.com, the Shanghai upgrade will take place on March 31.

https://www.kitco.com/news/2023-01-24/Ethereum-devs-prepare-for-the-Shanghai-upgrade-with-the-launch-of-a-shadow-fork-for-testing.html

So if the Shanghai update is successful, there will likely be some short term pressure on ETH as folks liquidate ETH assets that have been locked for the last two years.  However, I'm pretty sure that the price of ETH was way higher when folks locked their coins on ETH2, so I don't think there will be a lot of "profit taking".  Longer term, I expect more investment into ETH staking as rewards can be realized, so it should be help drive more investment into ETH.

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HamsterHookah

HamsterHookah 112

Posted
Posted (edited)

Pop Quiz: Which of the following is the best-performing asset so far this year?

  • Bitcoin
  • The Nasdaq composite
  • The S&P 500 financials sector
  • Tesla
Spoiler

The answer is Bitcoin, which was up 37.7 percent in 2023 as of 3 a.m. Eastern. No. 2 is Tesla, up 34.1 percent.

 

Edited by HamsterHookah
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Blotto

Blotto 23,560

Posted
Posted (edited)
33 minutes ago, HamsterHookah said:

Pop Quiz: Which of the following is the best-performing asset so far this year?

  • Bitcoin
  • The Nasdaq composite
  • The S&P 500 financials sector
  • Tesla
  Hide contents

The answer is Bitcoin, which was up 37.7 percent in 2023 as of 3 a.m. Eastern. No. 2 is Tesla, up 34.1 percent.

 

You failed your own pop quiz. TSLA is up ~60% YTD

image.png.d7748379634cb9d22000a3015cbe1e9a.png

 

 

Edited by Blotto
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Blotto

Blotto 23,560

Posted
Posted
3 minutes ago, HamsterHookah said:

Hmm....weird. I got that from NYT btw: https://www.nytimes.com/section/business/dealbook

Probably depends if the calculation is made using the closing price on 12/30, or the closing price after the first day of trading in Jan (1/3). It looks like TSLA took a big shit on 1/3. The sites that I use that provide a YTD return all seem to base YTD return on the 1/3 closing price. 

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Firemans4Horn

Firemans4Horn 18,118

Posted
Posted
2 hours ago, Blotto said:

Probably depends if the calculation is made using the closing price on 12/30, or the closing price after the first day of trading in Jan (1/3). It looks like TSLA took a big shit on 1/3. The sites that I use that provide a YTD return all seem to base YTD return on the 1/3 closing price. 


YTD should always be based on 12/31 closing price. 

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Firemans4Horn

Firemans4Horn 18,118

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Posted

Cryptocurrency lender Celsius was “insolvent since inception,” investigation finds

Turns out the Celsius Network, a cryptocurrency lender that promised customers 17% annual yields on their deposits, was indeed too good to be true.

The company halted withdrawals and transfers in June 2022 amid a liquidity crisis, citing “extreme market conditions.” The price of bitcoin had halved in two month’s time. In June, Celsius filed for bankruptcy and its founder and CEO, Alex Mashinsky, resigned in September.

 

But according to a court-ordered investigation into the company, the falling price of Bitcoin was only part of the problem. Celsius’s failure was, in fact, intrinsic to its business model, the investigators found.

“Celsius Network on a stand-alone basis has been insolvent since inception,” wrote Shoba Pillay, the former federal prosecutor tasked with investigating the company, in a report (pdf) released on Jan. 31.

Mashinsky, who founded Celsius in 2017, spent years slamming critics of his business for spreading “FUD” — crypto-speak meaning “fear, uncertainty, and doubt.” But the examiner’s report appears to vindicate those doubters.

“Behind the scenes, Celsius conducted its business in a starkly different manner than how it marketed itself to its customers in every key respect,” Pillay wrote.

The report says that while Mashinsky promised customers their deposits were safe with Celsius, he and other executives were actually using those deposits to buy and prop up CEL, the company’s native cryptocurrency, while they sold their individual stakes in the coin for profit. The maneuver benefited Celsius’s executives while further depleting their company’s liquidity.

Was Celsius a Ponzi scheme? 

Martin Glenn, the bankruptcy judge for the Southern District of New York, appointed Pillay in part to investigate claims that Celsius was operating as a Ponzi scheme, a specific kind of financial scam in which there is no real product and early investors are paid out with deposits from later investors.

While Pillay did not explicitly say if Celsius met the criteria for such a scheme, her findings implied it.

“In some instances, however, between June 9 and June 12, Celsius did directly use new customer deposits to fund customer withdrawal requests,” Pillay wrote.

Employee testimony included in the report also indicated there were  concerns internally that the company  operated a Ponzi scheme.

In one case, an unnamed employee wrote in April 2022 that the company’s use of customer coins to buy CEL was “very Ponzi like.” Back in January 2021, another employee named  wrote that his title should be “Ponzi consultant,” though he told the examiner this was just a “poor joke” and he wasn’t concerned at the time that the company was, in fact, running a Ponzi scheme.

The report will likely place additional pressure on Mashinsky, who agreed to the examiner’s report in a deal with federal and state investigators  probing him for fraud. In a separate case, the New York attorney general in January filed suit against Mashinsky for defrauding investors.

 

https://stocks.apple.com/AxgqP31-IThuY5-R5FTIc-w

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Dahobbs

Dahobbs 17,627

Posted
Posted
On 1/31/2023 at 10:24 AM, HamsterHookah said:

Pop Quiz: Which of the following is the best-performing asset so far this year?

  • Bitcoin
  • The Nasdaq composite
  • The S&P 500 financials sector
  • Tesla
  Hide contents

The answer is Bitcoin, which was up 37.7 percent in 2023 as of 3 a.m. Eastern. No. 2 is Tesla, up 34.1 percent.

 

Speculative asset going to speculative asset. 

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Dahobbs

Dahobbs 17,627

Posted
Posted
1 minute ago, HamsterHookah said:

We are talking about Tesla stock, right? 😛

The car company that is increasing volume by ~40-50% yearly, reported $12.6 billion in profit for 2022, has billions of dollars in capital assets worldwide, and is currently trading at ~a 53 P/E ratio (cf. Amazon at >100, Netflix at 40)? While its P/E ratio is high compared to established manufacturers, none of them have the growth trajectory that Tesla has. It may not be the best investment in the world, but it isn't a pure speculative investment like Bitcoin.  

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HamsterHookah

HamsterHookah 112

Posted
Posted (edited)
13 minutes ago, Dahobbs said:

The car company that is increasing volume by ~40-50% yearly, reported $12.6 billion in profit for 2022, has billions of dollars in capital assets worldwide, and is currently trading at ~a 53 P/E ratio (cf. Amazon at >100, Netflix at 40)? While its P/E ratio is high compared to established manufacturers, none of them have the growth trajectory that Tesla has. It may not be the best investment in the world, but it isn't a pure speculative investment like Bitcoin.  

The joke was Tesla got up to $408 a share at one point, which was driven by (among other things) speculation, and the stock is rocketing again and...who knows?

Edited by HamsterHookah
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Dahobbs

Dahobbs 17,627

Posted
Posted
Just now, HamsterHookah said:

The joke was Tesla got up to $408 a share at one point, which was driven by (among other things) speculation, and the stock is rocketing again and...who knows?

I got the joke. It is just a flawed comparison. Speculation may have helped fuel Tesla's stock price. But it isn't a purely speculative asset. It has real, demonstrable value. Bitcoin doesn't. 

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HamsterHookah

HamsterHookah 112

Posted
Posted
5 minutes ago, Dahobbs said:

Ha. Just do it better next time.

But for real, I assumed your post, in addition to being funny, was also an attempt at making a serious point.

No worries, it wasn't. I think Tesla stock and Bitcoin are both ridiculous (and entertaining and fun to watch) and am ambivalent to both, which is unique because these usually invite strong opinions on both sides.

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bernorange

bernorange 8,362

Posted
Posted

Making progress on the Shanghai update for the Etherium network:

https://www.kitco.com/news/2023-02-01/Ethereum-developers-launch-seven-testnets-in-preparation-for-the-Shanghai-hard-fork.html

~~~

Charlie Munger doing his best Mortimer Duke impression:

"Fuck America! Now, you listen to me! I want crypto trading banned right now. Get those legislators back in here! Turn those internet machines off! "

https://cointelegraph.com/news/community-mocks-charlie-munger-for-his-obsession-with-china-s-bitcoin-ban

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Nice Guy Eddie

Nice Guy Eddie 13,515

Posted
Posted
13 hours ago, bernorange said:

SEC dropped the hammer.  Americans can't stake coins on exchanges any more:

https://www.kitco.com/news/2023-02-09/SEC-charges-Kraken-with-selling-unregistered-securities-effectively-criminalizes-staking-as-a-service.html

many (all?) of these coins allow you to stake without giving up control. I’m sure some services were legit, but we now know some services had bad practices that led to the coins disappearing.

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bernorange

bernorange 8,362

Posted
Posted

I have had coins staked on Kraken for well over a year now.  There was nothing shady about their service/system. 

So, how do you folks stake coins without an exchange?  Do you use a soft wallet like Metamask?  How do you calculate the tax burden for your staked coins?  There are a bunch of tax services that can interface with the major exchanges to calculate tax reports.  Does the same exist for reporting activity in wallets like Metamask?

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bernorange

bernorange 8,362

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Posted
Quote

...
“Companies like Kraken can offer investment contracts and investment schemes but they have to have full, fair, and truthful disclosure. This puts investors in a better position,” said Gensler. “They were not complying with that.”
...
... Kraken knew how to register, other firms know how to register. It’s just a form on our website,” said Gensler. “If they want to offer staking, we’re neutral. Come in, register. Because investors need that disclosure. What are you doing with the tokens? Are you trading against the tokens? Are you borrowing against the tokens? Are you using them for your own purposes?
...

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/were-technology-neutral-at-the-sec-but-were-clearly-very-focused-on-american-protection-gary-gensler-comments-on-crypto-staking-79c71790

Sounds like it might not be quite the death knell for exchange staking service that it was being made out to be.  Exchanges just need to get their ducks in a row.

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Mullet Free

Mullet Free 40

Posted
Posted
3 hours ago, bernorange said:

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/were-technology-neutral-at-the-sec-but-were-clearly-very-focused-on-american-protection-gary-gensler-comments-on-crypto-staking-79c71790

Sounds like it might not be quite the death knell for exchange staking service that it was being made out to be.  Exchanges just need to get their ducks in a row.

 

6 hours ago, bernorange said:

I have had coins staked on Kraken for well over a year now.  There was nothing shady about their service/system. 

So, how do you folks stake coins without an exchange?  Do you use a soft wallet like Metamask?  How do you calculate the tax burden for your staked coins?  There are a bunch of tax services that can interface with the major exchanges to calculate tax reports.  Does the same exist for reporting activity in wallets like Metamask?

Any idea how Coinbase's service differed from Kraken's?

If staking services are effectively outlawed, and Eth can't be unstaked, how is that resolved?

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bernorange

bernorange 8,362

Posted
Posted
21 minutes ago, Mullet Free said:

Any idea how Coinbase's service differed from Kraken's?

Kraken actually gave you complete control over if, which, how many and when you wanted to stake coins with a detailed log of reward transactions.  You could stake and unstake as many or as few of your coins as you wanted to, when you wanted to.

Coinbase pays you staking rewards as interest for a few specific coins just for keeping the coins in your account.  You don't actually have to do anything extra (or commit your coins).  I'm not entirely sure how it actually works in their system as actually staking a coin involves locking it in the staking pool and CB isn't locking your coins.  

I get where the SEC is coming from.  Voyager went bankrupt gambling client coin in ponzi investments and paid out interest like CB does (except they never claimed coins were being staked).  What I find puzzling is that they targeted Kraken which has the most transparent staking service of the exchanges that I've seen.

21 minutes ago, Mullet Free said:

If staking services are effectively outlawed, and Eth can't be unstaked, how is that resolved?

They didn't technically outlaw it.  They claim that staking is kosher as long as exchanges jump through certain hoops.  It's not clear to me exactly how much of a burden jumping through the requisite hoops actually is.

I didn't stake ETH2 on Kraken so I didn't really pay attention, but I think they said ETH2 rewards would be released ASAP (when Shanghai update goes live).

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Neonmoon

Neonmoon 38,130

Posted
Posted (edited)
16 hours ago, B00M said:

God damn, using the banking sector and executive order to punish or crush your political opponents should deeply concern every American… But my team good! the ends justify the means! hurr durr

There is a CR thread for political hot takes like this 

Edited by Neonmoon
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