Cryptocurrency

[Mandi90TT]

I'm using Minergate right now, which is by far not optimal, but is literally as easy as downloading the software and clicking start. Minergate has issues, though (they take roughly ~20% of your hashrate for themselves). It's a stopgap until I have time this weekend to correctly configure my rigs for either Winminer (which also has issues), or point them at a pool to mine directly. That will take time, though, and I don't have any time right now.

Side note: I sold all my bitcoin at $16,773/BTC because I've got a strong feeling we have hit the top of the bubble, and it is going to crash in a couple of days. I'll keep on mining, and will likely rebuy some BTC when/if it does crash.

[Kolyan2k]

How long does it take for SELL transaction to go through, is that instant?

Another thing is that lots of people and even pros compare it to stock, which I think it's not. But I am still having trouble understanding if you can sell into panic? Like with pump and dump stocks, people make millions too, it's just if you miss the opportunity to sell while suckers are buying, you'll be screwed.

[geogerf]

Originally Posted by Rob340i

Personally i feel its a little late in the game to get into it and it all seems a little risky to me i will stick with the conservative methods such as the stock market precious metals and property.

It is super risky, but I don’t think it’s late to invest. You aren’t going to get the 5000% return like you hear about, but if this continues to become mainstream, his is still the beta stage of the market.

BTC was $7k at the start of November and now is having a crazy run up this past week. I think it will hit $20k by the year end (if not next week. Haha)

[Hawkeye]

only invest what you are ok losing I am treating my investments like Vegas personally.

[Mandi90TT]

Originally Posted by Hawkeye

only invest what you are ok losing I am treating my investments like Vegas personally.

Completely agree. All the money I have invested in cryptocoins, and crypto mining, is money I can afford to lose. I won't be happy if I lose it, of course, but I won't fail to make any mortgage payments, either.

[bimmer456]

Originally Posted by Hawkeye

only invest what you are ok losing I am treating my investments like Vegas personally.

The odds of winning are better than vegas, where the house always wins. With a little bit of common sense you can win big.

[bimmer456]

Originally Posted by Dave 90TT

Completely agree. All the money I have invested in cryptocoins, and crypto mining, is money I can afford to lose. I won't be happy if I lose it, of course, but I won't fail to make any mortgage payments, either.

Same here, I could lose it all and still be okay but I won't.

[bimmer456]

Originally Posted by geogerf

It is super risky, but I don’t think it’s late to invest. You aren’t going to get the 5000% return like you hear about, but if this continues to become mainstream, his is still the beta stage of the market.

BTC was $7k at the start of November and now is having a crazy run up this past week. I think it will hit $20k by the year end (if not next week. Haha)

There's still plenty of room for it to grow, we are not at the ceiling, and even if we are it will rally some more in the future.

[geogerf]

Originally Posted by bimmer456

There's still plenty of room for it to grow, we are not at the ceiling, and even if we are it will rally some more in the future.

Totally agree. I was watching on the sidelines all year, but did get into a good position of late.

I wish I did ETC at the beginning of the year!

[Hawkeye]

Originally Posted by bimmer456

The odds of winning are better than vegas, where the house always wins. With a little bit of common sense you can win big.

I disagree - These currencies are not backed by anything and the volatility is ridiculous. If you don't see a bubble in the future you're blind. It is a complete gamble because nobody knows when this bubble is going to pop.

[3 Stripes]

Originally Posted by Hawkeye

I disagree - These currencies are not backed by anything and the volatility is ridiculous. If you don't see a bubble in the future you're blind. It is a complete gamble because nobody knows when this bubble is going to pop.

"These currencies are not backed by anything"
You should definitely do some reading on some of the cryptocurrencies

[Mandi90TT]

Originally Posted by Dave 90TT

I'm using Minergate right now, which is by far not optimal, but is literally as easy as downloading the software and clicking start. Minergate has issues, though (they take roughly ~20% of your hashrate for themselves). It's a stopgap until I have time this weekend to correctly configure my rigs for either Winminer (which also has issues), or point them at a pool to mine directly. That will take time, though, and I don't have any time right now.

Side note: I sold all my bitcoin at $16,773/BTC because I've got a strong feeling we have hit the top of the bubble, and it is going to crash in a couple of days. I'll keep on mining, and will likely rebuy some BTC when/if it does crash.

So, I changed to BetterHash, seems to be working better, and was easily able to make withdrawals that quickly got posted to the various exchanges in which I keep coins online.

And yeah, no one is arguing that cryptocurrency is a safe investment. We all get that it's risky. Don't invest money you can't afford to lose.

[xQx]

Originally Posted by Hawkeye

I disagree - These currencies are not backed by anything and the volatility is ridiculous. If you don't see a bubble in the future you're blind. It is a complete gamble because nobody knows when this bubble is going to pop.

Tesla, Facebook, Mining stocks?

It's a complete gamble, it's impossible to calculate it's intrinsic value and it's rising like 17th century tulips. But it's not backed by nothing.

I invested because I withdraw all but a rounding error from my account five years ago. Now I seem to have real money wrapped up in this bubble.

Can't bring myself to buy more, certainly can't bring myself to sell.

[Hawkeye]

Originally Posted by 3 Stripes

"These currencies are not backed by anything"
You should definitely do some reading on some of the cryptocurrencies

In a sense, if Bitcoin is backed by anything, it’s backed by the strength of clever mathematics.Bitcoin might represent the first currency which is not backed by a physical good and still prevents arbitrary inflation.

One of the many many sources, and I am not posting more than this because your viewpoint is just troll like.

What, exactly, do you think it is backed by?

[Hawkeye]

Originally Posted by xQx

Tesla, Facebook, Mining stocks?

It's a complete gamble, it's impossible to calculate it's intrinsic value and it's rising like 17th century tulips. But it's not backed by nothing.

I invested because I withdraw all but a rounding error from my account five years ago. Now I seem to have real money wrapped up in this bubble.

Can't bring myself to buy more, certainly can't bring myself to sell.

Having almost no investment and having value in it now is different than dropping large amounts of money in now, very different. I put in a bit a while ago, waited for it to double and took out my original investment. Now I am treating it as it is, a gamble. It will either go to a very significant amount and I will cash out or I will lose it all first.

What do you think Bitcoin is backed by?

[Kolyan2k]

People on social media going nuts with this cryptocurrency.....I see many promote and buy in ICOs....There are "Bounties" on bitcoin forums for these new ICOs. Its crazy. This is exactly how it was back in Russia in 1990s....Investment firms out of nowhere with referral programs where you had to bring your friends etc. People dumped ton of cash in those ponzies back then. Many made money, many lost everything.

[xQx]

Originally Posted by Hawkeye

Now I am treating it as it is, a gamble. It will either go to a very significant amount and I will cash out or I will lose it all first.

[QUOTE=Hawkeye;22528821]
I totally agree with you, and have said to people since it was trading at $5k that it's a "black or red" proposition (ie. like roulette). I left my money in because (back then, a whole month ago), I thought it was equally likely to hit $25k as it was to hit $300.

I didn't put more in because I don't have money to gamble. If I did, I'd be rocking a seibon hood and quad exhaust in my mods list below.

Originally Posted by Hawkeye

What do you think Bitcoin is backed by?

Utility value.

I used bitcoin before it became a bubble as a merchant. Transaction fees were same/better than visa/mastercard, there was no chargeback (so when you got your money it couldn't be clawed back because of fraudulent activity - like cash, it's yours) , it's liquid and easy to turn into AUD, CAD or USD, and has third-parties who've made it easy and accessible to use instead of credit card payments on websites, and it was very easy to transfer directly between people via email or QR Codes.

While not actually anonymous, many people thought it was - so it is a perfect way of carrying out transactions over the Internet that used to be done in person via cash.

It's also very easy to travel in and out of the country with millions of dollars of bitcoin, and turn it back into local currency without too much drama. There aren't many alternative ways of doing this.

To give you a practical & legal example: Say I'm selling a rare 'M car' in the USA to a Canadian buyer. I wouldn't want cheque because it might bounce, They wouldn't want to rock up with $200k USD in cash because of fear of violence; and doing a bank transfer from CAD to my bank in USD is both slow and expensive, using PayPal has the risk of 'clawback'.

But if they turned up today and transferred me ~20BTC, I could confirm the cash was received after a short time, give them the car, then cash it out into USD that day and all is sweet.

Finally - if the price of BTC settles down and becomes predictable, as an Aussie, I'd be just as happy holding BTC for foreign transactions as I am today using USD. Thus making it as useful as Gold or USD for storing wealth, not just transferring it.

That is what BTC is "backed by".

Now, other coins have features which might trump BTC eventually. BTC is not anonymous, clearing (apparently) takes more than 10 minutes or more, and apparently transaction fees are becoming significant. BTC might fix some or all of these as it grows, or they might lead to its demise and the rise of another coin.

Now, what's the value over ethereum, dash or 'CoinZ by Dr Dre' - popularity.

People are buying and selling stuff with BTC today, and have been for five years. If you have a woo-commerce/big-commerce or shopify website, accepting BTC is as easy as accepting Visa. And people have BTC to spend.
I expect some of these merchant providers will become multi-coin, so you can just as easily transact in ethereum, dash, litecoin etc - and the rise of one may mean the fall of the other. ... or the market might be rising in general such that BTC and [some other coin] are equal market leaders worth $100,000 or $1m per coin. I don't know.

But I wouldn't be going near ICO's, they're scammers in the extreme. There doesn't seem to be anything to me that's not possible with the current top 5 coins, and given the dominance of BTC I think it's crazy to believe any new ICO is going to pip it from first place.

But here's the thing, the big concession - I don't know if 1 BTC is intrinsically worth $1, $300, or $1m. And unless you're speculating in the market, I don't think it matters. For it to be useful for all the things above it needs to be stable or rising in value, trusted and secure. At the moment it's all of those things.

What could cause your BTC to go from $15,000 to $0 overnight? If someone finds a flaw in the encryption that lets them 'corrupt' the block-chain or steal or counterfeit BTC.

That's the risk you're taking having real money wrapped up in this bubble.

Otherwise, I'd say it's a bit like US Property in 2007. It might be worth half or a quarter of what it's trading for, but it does have some inherent value.

[CO_Steve]

Read an article today that said at the current growth rate by 2020 the bitcoin miners will be using as much energy as the world uses today. Doesn't seem sustainable??

[Hawkeye]

Originally Posted by xQx

What could cause your BTC to go from $15,000 to $0 overnight? If someone finds a flaw in the encryption that lets them 'corrupt' the block-chain or steal or counterfeit BTC.

That's the risk you're taking having real money wrapped up in this bubble.

Otherwise, I'd say it's a bit like US Property in 2007. It might be worth half or a quarter of what it's trading for, but it does have some inherent value.

That is what is always going to be a risk with any digital currency. It will be harder since it has to be verified by multiple ledgers and whatnot, but only a matter of time until someone finds something that create a hit to value. Even if Bitcoin or another coin doesn't go to 0 from that you have a legitimate chance to lose your investment with no recourse.

With US property, even if the market crashed completely there is value in the structure itself. With this currency there is not. If someone finds a major flaw and it loses the one benefits you mention (utility value, trust, cross currency exchange) it becomes worthless.

[Mandi90TT]

Anyone who invests in cryptocurrency with money they can't afford to lose is a complete idiot. Stories of people taking out second mortgages to invest in cryptocurrency....blows my mind.

That said, there is money to be made, and IF you have money to spare, it's not a bad idea to invest in cryptocurrency directly, or if you enjoy technical things, to build a mining rig or two.

[Kid Eh]

IOTA is the way to go. All the others use the blockchain which is doomed to fail.

[TurboSid]

ordered all parts for a mining rig and ethOS

6x RX580 gpus. Should have it up and running next week depending on when the rig frame gets in.