ramssuperbowl99 Posted September 30, 2017 Share Posted September 30, 2017 4 minutes ago, incognito_man said: And then they are stuck never spending it, and any other coin ever associated with that address is also marked. Bitcoin is fantastic for law enforcement. Far easier to track than cash. I would be interested in more background on how that works. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ET80 Posted September 30, 2017 Share Posted September 30, 2017 11 minutes ago, ramssuperbowl99 said: I don't buy that $70B figure. People who got in at the beginning hold the overwhelming amount of Bitcoin (like 95% or something), and aren't selling it. You are taking the 5% and extrapolating that the demand and price wouldn't drop drastically. Cryptocurrencies in general is probably a more apt way to phrase it. There's a finite amount of hard dollars invested into any crypto. Once everyone stops getting gains and the market reaches a plateau, you'll see people trying to drive specific coins by kiting from one coin to another coin, never really increasing the value unless they cash out. It's fiscal cannibalization, in essence. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ET80 Posted September 30, 2017 Share Posted September 30, 2017 6 minutes ago, incognito_man said: Bitcoin is fantastic for law enforcement. Far easier to track than cash. This seems completely and totally opposite of what cryptocurrencies are valued for... 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ramssuperbowl99 Posted September 30, 2017 Share Posted September 30, 2017 (edited) 5 minutes ago, EliteTexan80 said: Cryptocurrencies in general is probably a more apt way to phrase it. There's a finite amount of hard dollars invested into any crypto. Once everyone stops getting gains and the market reaches a plateau, you'll see people trying to drive specific coins by kiting from one coin to another coin, never really increasing the value unless they cash out. It's fiscal cannibalization, in essence. I don't even buy it for crypto in general. The overwhelming majority of those coins aren't up for sale and held by very few people. If you had to cash out every crypto coin in the next month, do we really think it's going to pull anywhere near $70B? I realize Amazon's stock price would take a hit if everyone holding shares had to do the same thing, but the magnitude of the change with crypto is going to be so much bigger given how much less volatile Amazon stock is compared to crypto, which might go up or down 10% on a whim. Edited September 30, 2017 by ramssuperbowl99 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
incognito_man Posted September 30, 2017 Share Posted September 30, 2017 (edited) 23 minutes ago, ramssuperbowl99 said: I would be interested in more background on how that works. Whenever a payment is sent somewhere that coin is forever recorded and associated with that address. The bitcoin (in theory) can't ever be disassociated with it. So the entire world knows where the bitcoin is, as far as what anonymous address it is at and can choose never to accept that money. It's useless to a criminal unless they can somehow launder it. There are some non-trivial ways to launder bitcoin (on exchanges, via tumblers, etc). But those entities also will have an inherent desire not to launder say kidnappers money else they will get a TON of law enforcement attention. The world will know whenever the owner of a crime linked bitcoin tries to spend it, where they are trying to spend it and the address(es) on the other side of the exchange. It is anonymous in that the actual person behind the address isn't necessarily easy to figure out (although law enforcement agencies can track an entire lifetime of transactions once they have a suspicious address identified), but the coin itself will forever be tainted. Every bitcoin (unlike a dollar) is traceable by its history. edited for link: http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2016/03/why-criminals-cant-hide-behind-bitcoin Edited September 30, 2017 by incognito_man Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
incognito_man Posted September 30, 2017 Share Posted September 30, 2017 22 minutes ago, EliteTexan80 said: This seems completely and totally opposite of what cryptocurrencies are valued for... bitcoin is like having an account that no one can trace back to you personally, that is veritably your's according to everyone who owns any bitcoin, and unless your public address is associated with some heinous crime, anyone will be willing to accept bitcoin that you've ever owned. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
incognito_man Posted September 30, 2017 Share Posted September 30, 2017 42 minutes ago, ramssuperbowl99 said: I don't buy that $70B figure. People who got in at the beginning hold the overwhelming amount of Bitcoin (like 95% or something), and aren't selling it. You are taking the 5% and extrapolating that the demand and price wouldn't drop drastically. well, no that's not really how bitcoin works. Only 15% of the total current supply was mined in each of the first 4 years (from 2009 to 2012). So 40% of the total supply has been mined since 2012, and 85% is owned by folks who mined it a year after it opened. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ramssuperbowl99 Posted September 30, 2017 Share Posted September 30, 2017 (edited) 7 minutes ago, incognito_man said: well, no that's not really how bitcoin works. Only 15% of the total current supply was mined in each of the first 4 years (from 2009 to 2012). So 40% of the total supply has been mined since 2012, and 85% is owned by folks who mined it a year after it opened. I'm gonna read your link on the tracking. Seems interesting. But for the bitcoin amounts: https://bitinfocharts.com/top-100-richest-bitcoin-addresses.html The top 0.75% of addresses own 89% of the total coins. So, you're right that they might not all be people who got in at the beginning, but when you have an asset that has it's value vary wildly, extrapolating the total value on the very small percentage that is actually up for sale isn't a good estimation of the total value. Edited September 30, 2017 by ramssuperbowl99 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ET80 Posted September 30, 2017 Share Posted September 30, 2017 36 minutes ago, ramssuperbowl99 said: 42 minutes ago, EliteTexan80 said: Cryptocurrencies in general is probably a more apt way to phrase it. There's a finite amount of hard dollars invested into any crypto. Once everyone stops getting gains and the market reaches a plateau, you'll see people trying to drive specific coins by kiting from one coin to another coin, never really increasing the value unless they cash out. It's fiscal cannibalization, in essence. I don't even buy it for crypto in general. The overwhelming majority of those coins aren't up for sale and held by very few people. If you had to cash out every crypto coin in the next month, do we really think it's going to pull anywhere near $70B? I realize Amazon's stock price would take a hit if everyone holding shares had to do the same thing, but the magnitude of the change with crypto is going to be so much bigger given how much less volatile Amazon stock is compared to crypto, which might go up or down 10% on a whim. I guess context is in order - incog and I were discussing market conditions in which we'd see "cannibalization" of coins among one another within this market, something witnessed in deregulated industries such as landline phones in the 70s, electric companies, etc. I argue that if "new money" in the economy were to stop, you'd find yourself in stagnation and people would flip from coin to coin to try to grow portfolios. I fully agree that $70b is not a reliable figure, given this markets' volatility. I'd wager if you saw about 20% of Bitcoin being sold at the same time from different sources, you'd have a Black Friday-esque crash. Stability is the biggest weakness, and there's no way to stabilize it - except for regulations across multiple governments. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
incognito_man Posted September 30, 2017 Share Posted September 30, 2017 2 minutes ago, ramssuperbowl99 said: I'm gonna read your link on the tracking. Seems interesting. But for the bitcoin amounts: https://bitinfocharts.com/top-100-richest-bitcoin-addresses.html The top 0.75% of addresses own 89% of the total coins. This is not what you stated, and I'm not real sure what this represents either. 60% of addresses own less than $5 worth of bitcoin. 90% of address hold less than $450 worth of bitcoin. The trading volume (i.e. market) is not set by those 90% of addresses who own 0.6% of the supply. Every day ~250k bitcoins are 'traded'. 60% of the addresses own 2k coins. I'm not real sure what your point here is, however - so I'm not sure what else to point out Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ramssuperbowl99 Posted September 30, 2017 Share Posted September 30, 2017 1 minute ago, incognito_man said: This is not what you stated, and I'm not real sure what this represents either. 60% of addresses own less than $5 worth of bitcoin. 90% of address hold less than $450 worth of bitcoin. The trading volume (i.e. market) is not set by those 90% of addresses who own 0.6% of the supply. Every day ~250k bitcoins are 'traded'. 60% of the addresses own 2k coins. I'm not real sure what your point here is, however - so I'm not sure what else to point out Yes I phrased that poorly. Sorry about that. See the edit for more context. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
incognito_man Posted September 30, 2017 Share Posted September 30, 2017 32 minutes ago, ramssuperbowl99 said: when you have an asset that has it's value vary wildly, extrapolating the total value on the very small percentage that is actually up for sale isn't a good estimation of the total value. can you quantify "very small percentage" that leads you to this conclusion? For reference, the daily trading volume of bitcoin represents ~1.5% of total outstanding shares. Compared to, say, the S&P 500 which is at ~0.7% of total outstanding shares. It appears to me the trading volume represents a sufficient percent of total supply to make the value meaningful. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ET80 Posted September 30, 2017 Share Posted September 30, 2017 48 minutes ago, incognito_man said: The world will know whenever the owner of a crime linked bitcoin tries to spend it, where they are trying to spend it and the address(es) on the other side of the exchange. Wouldn't this be assuming that said coin ever finds itself in a legitimate business transaction? I mean, a kidnapper isn't going to spend his ill gotten gains on some Ray Bans from Overstock, an Xbox 1 from Microsoft and a foot long Sweet Onion Chicken Terayaki from that one Subway that accepts coin. They're probably going to use the funds to buy some stolen AK-47s from an illegal gun runner, who will then use the coin to buy meth from a cartel, etc... I think of how stolen art is used to fund large drug buys - not like the cartel is going to a museum to cash out on their stolen Monet, but they'll hand over a ton of meth to someone who wants to give em said Monet... https://www.google.com/amp/www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/news/stolen-ls-lowry-paintings-traded-as-currency-and-collateral-by-criminal-gangs-10229331.html%3Famp Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
incognito_man Posted September 30, 2017 Share Posted September 30, 2017 (edited) 12 minutes ago, EliteTexan80 said: Wouldn't this be assuming that said coin ever finds itself in a legitimate business transaction? I mean, a kidnapper isn't going to spend his ill gotten gains on some Ray Bans from Overstock, an Xbox 1 from Microsoft and a foot long Sweet Onion Chicken Terayaki from that one Subway that accepts coin. They're probably going to use the funds to buy some stolen AK-47s from an illegal gun runner, who will then use the coin to buy meth from a cartel, etc... I think of how stolen art is used to fund large drug buys - not like the cartel is going to a museum to cash out on their stolen Monet, but they'll hand over a ton of meth to someone who wants to give em said Monet... https://www.google.com/amp/www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/news/stolen-ls-lowry-paintings-traded-as-currency-and-collateral-by-criminal-gangs-10229331.html%3Famp Well that bitcoin can NEVER be spent in society. That makes it effectively worthless. It makes it far less desirable than cash or gold or anything for criminals who could eventually spend that on ANYthing. A placeholder for bartering illegal substances seems kind of useless to me, why would anyone ever do that? Well, better stated, why would anyone intelligent ever do that? And why would authorities prefer criminals use untraceable cash to traceable bitcoin? *edit: think of it like a $100 bill with a "VOID" stamp on it (and that void stamp carries a negative meaning). Sure, other criminals won't care if they know they can give it to another criminal for drugs. But would they prefer a $100 bill without that marking on it? There is no way (kinda...) to scrub the void stamp off a bitcoin. Edited September 30, 2017 by incognito_man Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
incognito_man Posted September 30, 2017 Share Posted September 30, 2017 (for the record, I do not and have never even owned bitcoin. I do recognize it's utility, however.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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