Inspired by this bit of news about tanTrump wholeheartedly endorsing crytocurrencies, and being myself extremely skeptical of the whole idea, I wondered how many of the readers in this board have ever bought any cryptocurreny, and if so, why. As IMHO is the place to poll, I have two questions:
Have you ever bought cryptocurrecy?
Yes
No
0voters
If your answer was yes, I would like to know the reason (multiple answers possible):
Investing
Speculating
To pay a ransom or similar
Something related to the Dark Net
For the Lulz
Other
0voters
Don’t hesitate to elaborate, point to options I have missed or explain whatever you like to add.
I will start answering No to the first question and leaving the second question aside.
I had an interesting taxi ride recently in which the driver enthusiastically recommended cryptocurrencies.
He started off claiming that they out-performed stocks + shares and were even better than buying a property.
Gradually he admitted that many cryptocurrencies have gone bust (or were Ponzi schemes) and that even the existing ones (e.g. Bitcoin) vary dramatically in value.
Reminds me of the perhaps apocryphal story of a Wall Street mogul who decided to sell his shares just before the crash in 1929 because he heard a lift-boy or a shoe cleaner (sorry, don’t remember) recommend buying shares.
I agree with you, but I wanted to post the question in as neutral as possible way, because being interested in those who buy crypto and their reasons I thought asking “what fool has fallen for this scam?” was not going to get me interesting answers. But after 16 replies, 15 of which are “No, I never bought crypto”, it seems that this is not the right forum to find an answer for WTF is crypto good for.
Now I see I should have added a third poll about why you did never buy crypto. As I feel too lazy to propose answers I just ask: why not?
In my case: I believe they are a scam, I never bothered to find out how to buy them, I don’t understand them anyway. And now, on top of that: if tanTrump backs them, I am off.
Any item that is used as a common medium of exchange, including for barter, can be considered a currency. The example given there is when furs were once used as a form of currency.
Bitcoin in particular, probably more than any other cryptocurrency, can be found as a medium of exchange in numerous places. As Investopedia puts it:
As Bitcoin has also become accepted as a medium of exchange, stores value, and is recognized as a unit of account, it is considered money.
Though it’s clearly not “real” money, as it goes on to say:
But its exchange rate, the value most often associated with the coin, isn’t so much a factor of the people who use bitcoins in transactions; it’s investors buying the cryptocurrency hoping for profits and traders buying and selling it to make money on price movements.
So it doesn’t really work as an effective form of currency. That’s why I considered it more of a barter item than a legitimate currency.
People can and have made money off of cryptocurrency. But that takes a great deal of luck. I am a follower and supporter of Coffeezilla, who does investigations of scammers on his YouTube channel, and focuses a great deal on crypto (it’s a majority of what he covers, though not all of it). If I wasn’t wary of investing before, I certainly am after watching his show. Although he himself does say that he doesn’t dissuade people from investing, he just warns people to be very cautious if they do so.
Except it isn’t even that. Actually commodities have material value; durable commodities such as gold, copper, and helium can be traded and used to make real products (and with care, recycled). Perishable commodities and consumables such as rice, crude oil, and porkbellies provide nutritional or energy benefits. But crypto actually has negative material value insofar as it consumes enormous amounts of electrical energy to ‘farm’ without contributing to the production and distribution of goods or facilitates useful services.
The one thing for which cryptocurrencies should be good for—the secure electronic transfer of funds to facilitate commerce—they actually suck at because their valuation is driven by market speculation (and often manipulation), which means nobody who isn’t under the illusion that they have a crystal ball wants to hang on to their crypto for any longer than they can convert it into ‘fiat’ cash or real property. And that is the biggest drag on crypto; there is no cryptocurrency economy! You can’t buy useful things (other than electric vehicles from douchy proto-fascsist brohs or sexbots from shady startups) without converting it into real currency that legitimate businesses will accept as legal tender. It is all speculation, all the way down.
It is like DeBeers diamonds, except even dumber because at least with the diamond you are buying into a shared cultural touchstone, even if it is an advertising gimmick that would make Don Draper jealous that he didn’t think of it first. With crypto, you are literally just getting a ‘wallet’ with some codes that may or may not be worth anything to anyone holding actual legal tender cash or real goods depending on the time of day and whether some nerd in cargo shorts has been caught scamming the ever-loving fuck out of investment banks who have lost all institutional memory of Enron or Bear Sterns.
I some money to move out of China when I repatriated, mine and my wife’s. It’s, let’s say “difficult” to move money from China, so BTC made a lot of sense. We bought something like a 100 BTC, and sold most of them when we got here.
We held onto a few on them just for lulz. At about $650 each, I kind of regret not holding onto all of them. I’d be retired now.
I remember a thread back in 2016 or 2017 when people called me an idiot for hanging on the the few that I did.
It’s a relatively recent development in US regulated financial markets.
You have pretty much direct exposure to the full volatility of the underlying real assets = cryptocurrency(ies), with zero of the custodial hassle or counterparty risks.
ETA: there’s relatively little diversification; many ETFs are licensed to own only and exactly Bitcoin. More are coming as the SEC gets more comfortable w the idea.
AFAIK the first regulated [whole basket of significant non-fraudent crypto currencies] ETF is still in the future.
