Bitcoins in 2014?

[Edwin]

Of course it's a Ponzi/pyramid scheme!

The official Bitcoin FAQ wriggles away from that by pretending that a Ponzi scheme is only meant to enrich the original founders of the scheme. But that's playing semantic games. A pyramid scheme relies on the investors that come after you to bring your profit.

In reality, every single Bitcoin owner is playing their part in this scheme. If you bought Bitcoin today, you naturally want to do your utmost to find a "greater fool" to buy Bitcoin tomorrow - more demand means that the value of the Bitcoin you're holding (which, remember, you're holding as an INVESTMENT, not to use, like 99.9%+ of Bitcoin in circulation) will go up, and if you time it right you can sell at a profit and pin the losses on the Johnny and Jenny come latelies.

 

[retired_member36]

Not sure if this has already been posted

Mt Gox Finds 200,000 'Stolen' Bitcoins

http://news.sky.com/story/1229605/mt-gox-finds-200000-stolen-bitcoins

 

[Retired_Member38]

you naturally want to do your utmost to find a "greater fool" to buy Bitcoin tomorrow

You could say the exact same with the nonsense domains people on here often try to sell for £xxxx a go.... they're truly worthless and need to be passed onto a greater fool :lol:

 

[Edwin]

You could say the exact same with the nonsense domains people on here often try to sell for £xxxx a go.... they're truly worthless and need to be passed onto a greater fool :lol:

No, they're completely different.

Every domain is unique.

Every Bitcoin is the same.

Therefore every Bitcoin owner is in the same "collective conspiracy" to raise the value of Bitcoin - but if I regardless of whether someone fails/succeeds to sell a particular "nonsense" domain for £xxxx it will have zero impact on the value of your domains.

 

[Retired_Member38]

I know that. I'm just pointing out its a bit funny people using 'greater fool' when domainers in general are effectively trying to rip off buyers by selling absolute shit that can't ever be developed or see a return on...

 

[websaway]

I know that. I'm just pointing out its a bit funny people using 'greater fool' when domainers in general are effectively trying to rip off buyers by selling absolute shit that can't ever be developed or see a return on...

What do you mean by can't get a return on.
How are you evaluating a return ?

 

[Retired_Member38]

What do you mean by can't get a return on.
How are you evaluating a return ?

Mostly low quality emd domains that have missed the emd boat - no possible way to build/rank them and make any money.

Many domainers know they're holding a bag of turds, but are still actively looking to pass them on to 'greater fools'

 

[websaway]

Mostly low quality emd domains that have missed the emd boat - no possible way to build/rank them and make any money.

Many domainers know they're holding a bag of turds, but are still actively looking to pass them on to 'greater fools'

But I don't see the type of names you refer to attracting many if any buyers .

 

[Retired_Member38]

But I don't see the type of names you refer to attracting many if any buyers .

I wouldn't have thought so either. But they must sell some or they wouldn't keep trying...

 

[Edwin]

But I don't see the type of names you refer to attracting many if any buyers .

Neither do I. You can't "trick" a buyer into parting with thousands of pounds for a domain name. Or if you can, you know something everyone else doesn't!

 

[Retired_Member38]

You can't "trick" a buyer into parting with thousands of pounds for a domain name.

No, but you can offer domains at a price that nobody could ever actually generate a profit from, whilst knowing this is the case. And just hoping some mug comes along and falls for it. Advertising cost of making a thread on acorn = zero and stays live forever so no real cost in trying it is there.

 

[websaway]

No, but you can offer domains at a price that nobody could ever actually generate a profit from, whilst knowing this is the case. And just hoping some mug comes along and falls for it. Advertising cost of making a thread on acorn = zero and stays live forever so no real cost in trying it is there.

Where I don't agree is that apart from newbies who really don't know domain values, most people, if the domain is low quality will pitch the price accordingly.
You must see though that it's not all about online sales, catchy memorable short descriptive visually attractive names are fantastic for company prestige and image. A couple of thousand pounds for a good memorable descriptive image/prestige or generic brand domain is money well spent.

 

[Retired_Member38]

Where I don't agree is that apart from newbies who really don't know domain values, most people, if the domain is low quality will pitch the price accordingly.
You must see though that it's not all about online sales, catchy memorable short descriptive visually attractive names are fantastic for company prestige and image. A couple of thousand pounds for a good memorable descriptive image/prestige or generic brand domain is money well spent.

Sure, but I'm talking about emd's that can't rank for their emd phrase, and also can't really be built into a legitimate standalone business. These type of domains used to do really well and some were worth significant money.... right now they have a negative value (outside of passing on to a greater fool) as the only thing you can do with them is waste time and money failing at building a site on it....

Yet people are still trying to offload them knowing this. Which is exactly what is going on with bitcoin, if you believe its all a big ponzi type effort.

The thing is if you sell someone a crap domain like above there is nothing at all they can do with it. If you sell someone a bitcoin they might manage to get back out of it at a profit if they're lucky (again assuming you agree with the ponzi stuff). Or they can exit at any point on the down curve and get some of their money back. With the domains you're stuck with them.

Even if you think bitcoins are a bad idea you'd still realistically be better off buying them then a crap emd.

 

[Retired_Member42]

At least with BTC you're only ever buying at the market rate and the market rate is consistent across the board. Domains is a different story entirely, people can ask what they like for their domains, which is fair enough, but by doing that you're effectively able to sell domains for much more than they're really worth if you find the right buyer.

I used to think domain pricing was pretty consistent but my recent wanted thread most definitely shows it isn't. Far from it. I'm being offered EMD's for £XX and EMD's for £XXXX with the lower priced ones actually being better keywords. To me, that makes me feel like somebody is trying to rip me off and label me one of the "greater fools" than buying a coin for $500 when the guy before me has only paid $400.

 

[seanc]

Intersango.com were UK based I believe but the banks kept shutting their UK bank accounts down.

If you can open an exchange that is easy to get money into from the UK you'd be onto a winner, no one likes paying £20+ more per coin on localbitcoins but there aren't a lot of other options without jumping through a load of hoops and ID checks.

Grant

i had funds in intersango but the company seem to have disappeared into thin air..

 

[retired_member36]

Bitcoin Exchange Vircurex Battles Insolvency

http://www.forexminute.com/bitcoin/vircurex-freezes-digital-currency-withdrawals-as-reserves-drain-out-25783

 

[Edwin]

This news follows the catastrophic shutdown of Mt. Gox, once the largest Bitcoin exchange in existence, on Feburary 25th. Other prominent exchanges have ended in sudden shutdowns, including Flexcoin on March 5th, and Crypto-Trade on Febuary 27th.

http://venturebeat.com/2014/03/23/y...lodes-vircurex-will-freeze-accounts-tomorrow/

It's like dominoes, falling one after the other... and the common thread in all such cases is that the Bitcoin "disappeared" (due to hackers, incompetence, lack of reserves etc. etc.)

 

[Edwin]

“Unfortunately we had large fund withdrawals in the last weeks which have led to a complete depletion of our cold wallet balance and we are now facing the option of either closing the site with significant unrecoverable losses for all or to work out a solution that allows the exchange to continue to operate and gradually pay back the losses.”

Sounds exactly like a rogue trader trying to "double down" to cover escalating losses - and there are many fine examples of just how well that works out

 

[Edwin]

If HMRC decide to take a leaf out of the IRS's book and also treat Bitcoin as property, accounting for Bitcoin investments could be about to get a lot more complicated and expensive...
http://www.thedomains.com/2014/03/2...ncy-will-be-treated-as-property-not-currency/

More detail (note how the decision applies retrospectively as well!)
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-...erty-not-currency-in-tax-system-irs-says.html

I found this particularly interesting...

Bitcoin miners will have to report their earnings as taxable income with a value equal to the worth on the day it was mined. If they mine as part of a business, they would have to pay payroll taxes as well.

 

[Retired_Member38]

I don't see anything groundbreaking or even interesting in that, I don't understand why anyone even cares (multiple posts on Reddit about it too).

It seemed pretty obvious that capital gains tax was going to apply to it, so I'm not sure how investing in it suddenly got more complicated.