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Posted

I'm just going to say, I haven't been a crypto head forever. I have watched it since 2012 and felt satisfaction every time it busted because "I told you it was a bubble." This includes the recent bust in 2017.

 

It wasn't until late 2018 that I realized I WAS WRONG. Despite being "right" everytime it was a bubble, I missed the opportunity of buying an asset that went from $100 to $3000 (at the bottom of the 2018 bust) over the same time I was telling everyone "see...I was right. It WAS a bubble."

 

When focused less on the investment merits and more on the technological merits, my mind was changed and I realized that it had the potential to eat the entire payment/processing/settlement industry at the very least.

 

Once accepting there was a valuable use case, you can then begin defining that use case and begin putting a value on it. I decided back when it as ~$8k/coin that it was worth ~50-60k/coin minimum if it met my base case scenario and replaced a large portion of Visa/MasterCard/AmEx/Square/PayPal etc and began accumulating.

 

Is it overvalued now? Probably since it hasn't actually replaced them yet - but it also has a history of trading at extreme overvaluation relative to it's current potential and growing into that. And I have a habit of underestimating its potential. So am willing to give it a little room to run and imagine that in 5-years it won't matter that it was "overvalued" today - just like it didn't matter it was "overvalued" in 2017 and 2013.

 

Contrary to what my writings may be perceived as, I'm a firm believer in cryptocurrencies.  But not this first batch that are essentially unsupported by anything but demand.  The next generation created by nation states, corporations as large as nation states, financial exchanges, credit card companies will set up the next wave of crypto, and there will be clear winners and losers from that.  And the general population will start to adopt some of those currencies.  Cash will no longer exist in 20-40 years other than as a collectible.  Cheers!

Posted

 

Thanks for the responses.

 

"If the US is serious about releasing a digital dollar..."

 

Doesn't that already exist in substance?  I get paid electronically in US dollars.  I pay my bills electronically using US dollars.  I pay merchants the same way.  I'd guess that 99 percent of my inflows and outflows are electronic and in US dollars.  So why do I need a different electronic currency?

 

[/Quote]

 

Is it really though? Because for some reason it takes 3-5 business days for ACH transactions to go through, a month for credit card companies to deliver receivables to merchants, and 4-6 weeks for my bank to reliably schedule an auto-pay. Seems weird that these transactions would take days if they were truly electronic in nature and in plumbing. Shouldn't it be instantaneous?

 

And this isn't a hypothetical. The US is looking at a digital dollar just the China is rolling out a digital yuan. Seems like even the authorities disagree with you in terms of already having the benefits of digital currencies.

 

What opportunity?  Buying bitcoin doesn't give you partial ownership of the system any more than having US dollars in a bank gives you partial ownership of the bank or paying for things using a Visa gives you ownership of Visa.

 

Maybe you should ask yourself what it is that Square, Visa, PayPal, and other payment processors who are expanding the use of digital currencies must see since they're the experts. It's not just a couple of guys on a forum telling you this stuff. The industry is rapidly moving that direction.

 

We can talk til we're blue in the face to get you to understand what it is and that it has value - or you can just look what the experts are doing. Acquiring crypto and developing crypto solutions...

 

The reason the transactions aren’t instant is because of regulation. The government is trying to prevent criminal activity. That alone should sound serious alarm bells.

 

They must have skipped the criminal activity part

 

https://perspectives.dtcc.com/articles/leading-the-industry-to-accelerated-settlement

 

Q: Why stop at T+1 or T+½? Why not go to real-time settlement?

 

A: Real-time settlement is a simple technical solution but a very complicated market structure change. While the industry should continue to aspire to real-time, it is more pragmatic to reduce the settlement cycle in stages to capture the benefits faster. With real-time settlement in today’s market structure, the entire industry – clients, brokers, investors – loses the liquidity and risk-mitigating benefit of netting, and that is particularly critical during times of heightened volatility and volume. For example, on a typical trading day, NSCC processes an average of about $1.7 trillion in equities transactions. The multilateral netting process reduces that number by about 98%, and the total value settled is around $38 billion. Netting allows brokerages to transfer that $38 billion between parties only once at the end of the day. In a real-time settlement scenario, netting is not possible and trillions of dollars in cash and securities must move through the financial system on a continual basis throughout the trading day. This creates massive market and capital inefficiencies, increases credit and operational risks, and increases costs between trading parties, possibly undermining the stability of the markets.

 

Accelerating settlement requires careful consideration, industry coordination, and a balanced approach so settlement can be achieved as close to the trade as possible (for example, T+1 or T+½), without creating capital inefficiencies and introducing new, unintended market risks, such as eliminating the enormous benefits and cost savings of multilateral netting.

 

I'm very confused. Why are you guys referencing settlement times for equity securities? I can quite easily transfer small dollar amounts of my money to another individual today, instantly. Anything large has limitations and takes more time, due to regulations. What am I missing?

 

You're missing that no settlement happens INSTANTLY in today's financial system. Not for securities. Not for cash.

 

ACH takes 3-5 business days. Stocks take 2 business days to settle. Wires can still take a few hours and cost $. Even solutions like Venmo that seem instantaneous take a few days for cash to reach your account.

 

The only solutions where cash moves "instantly" are solutions where a liquidity provider is giving you their cash while they wait for the cash you transferred to arrive (like trading Schwab allowing me to trade my cash deposit immediately or paying a fee to use an ATM).

 

Cash does NOT move instantly in today's system - this is a result of the plumbing and structure and not of government regulation.

 

 

Also, securities will exist as tokens and be traded on a blockchain in the future as well.  Maybe on a chain such as Ethereum.  Companies will issue shares directly to the blockchain and be able to buy-back and remove them.  You will be able to see in real time how many shares exist.  You will also be able to trade them almost instantly without 3rd party involvement.

 

This I can understand, and I see the value. Why does this mean Bitcoin is worth $50,000 though? Even if real-time settlements don’t happen, it sure seems like they do to me as the consumer. Why does better plumbing, that I don’t even see, make Bitcoin worth $50,000?

 

That was just an aside.  But you won't be buying 25 shares of Amazon with $USD, value will be stored in BTC not cash.

 

I don't see that happening unless the world loses faith in the U.S. economy.  I just see USD being executed electronically though blockchain technology, so that you have secure, instant transactions.  BTC will go the way of trading stamps.  Cheers!

Posted

https://www.wsj.com/articles/you-can-earn-6-8-even-12-percent-on-a-bitcoin-savings-account-yeah-right-11614959768?mod=djintinvestor_t

 

"You Can Earn 6%, 8%, Even 12% on a Bitcoin ‘Savings Account’—Yeah, Right

New trading platforms want to borrow your cryptocurrency, and are willing to pay a pretty crypto-penny for the privilege. Just don’t let anyone convince you it’s like putting your money in a bank."

 

Yes, but your BTC holdings can fluctuate anywhere from 2%-25% on any given day as well!  No stability...how do you reconcile its utility as a fiat currency?  Cheers!

Posted

The decentralized account ledger, which is essentially a function of blockchain technology, is what is valuable.  You can track anything in such a ledger...real estate, stock certificates, bonds, pretty much any asset or anything.  BTC itself is worthless and has zero utility...you could do the same thing with tulips if there was demand.  Cheers!

 

Counterpoint:

 

Coinbase internal ledger shows lack of faith in BTC—and they’re right:

https://coingeek.com/coinbase-internal-ledger-shows-lack-of-faith-btc-and-theyre-right/

 

Just a tourist here. But it seems like the one distinguishing feature of BTC makes it a pain-in-the-a**  for most real world applications. And what you really need to make this useful is a central clearinghouse...

 

---

Edit to add: Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't "pure" crypto kinda like the old days when stocks and bonds were certificates. And you had to clip your dividends and mail them in? Then everything was put in "street name" and we got good things like discount brokers and electronic trading?

 

Posted

The distinguishing feature is that its a store of value that is accessible from anywhere. Not so different from a Swiss bank account but much lower fees and higher volatility.

 

I don't see the harm in high net worth having small percentage in it. Memorize your keys and you can get the money anywhere.  What else is there that offers that?

 

It's also a good hedge again fed printing. At some point that has to catch up to us.  I choose to hedge via equities and RE but crypto could play a role too.

Posted

Coinbase is netting, but charging every buyer/seller a commission to do the trade. It’s called fraud, and underlines why the intermediary (Coinbase) needs to be removed entirely. Spinning that it’s a technical impossibility is BS, and the tail attempting to wag the dog. The basic issue - Coinbase infrastructure not fit for the task.

 

Coinbase, as an external broker, needs to do fewer and higher value transactions – which isn’t their business. Nothing wrong with netting, but you do it within a fund, the fund nets internally, and does a single external Coinbase trade for the token balance. Multiple trades through the day, depending upon how often you net. The ‘internal netting’ is essentially the operation of an unregistered, unregulated mutual fund, and illegal. Yes, while it may well be unintentional, and ‘just the way it is’, it is still a material ‘off side'...

 

If the fund gets hacked, collecting on your beneficial ownership is at risk, same as it would be with any other security. If that is a concern for you, simply do bigger external transactions through someone else – who IS NOT netting. Your trade now visible as a block on the blockchain itself. You are already paying the commission.

 

Not to knock Coinbase, as they aren’t alone; but the ‘actual’ is quite a bit different.

Transparency sucks, but ultimately it leads to a better result – for everyone.

 

SD

 

Posted

The distinguishing feature is that its a store of value that is accessible from anywhere. Not so different from a Swiss bank account but much lower fees and higher volatility.

 

I don't see the harm in high net worth having small percentage in it. Memorize your keys and you can get the money anywhere.  What else is there that offers that?

 

It's also a good hedge again fed printing. At some point that has to catch up to us.  I choose to hedge via equities and RE but crypto could play a role too.

 

Right.

 

Bitcoin is the first asset in mankind with

a) no counterparty risk when transferring at scale and

b) where one can get on a boat naked and travel from the US to China carrying $10bn memorized in their head with no physical trace (before you get excited and try to challenge how risky this is - this is an extreme example to help explain what is unique and valuable about btc.  a more moderate way of doing this would be to write down 10 of the 16 private digits and memorize the remaining six).  gold is valued as a hedge of extreme outcomes (hyperinflation / financial system collapse) that are very low probability events.  btc is a better version of gold.

 

If you're still slamming your first on the table and yelling tulips: what could cause you to change your mind?  Is it possible you're suffering commitment/consistency bias?  A lollapalooza effect combined with real fundamental value (fundamental for value investors is discounted free cash flows which is fine - nobody is saying you have to invest here.  but the tulip argument ignores that censorship-resistant/seizure-resistant/inflation-resistant store of value HAS fundamental value in a different way).  Just because there are plenty of idiots in this trade (embarrassingly so) does not mean the thesis doesn't have some merit. 

 

There are real attack vectors for bitcoin, just rarely discussed due to the cheap common counterarguments that are usually made. 

Posted

 

Thanks for the responses.

 

"If the US is serious about releasing a digital dollar..."

 

Doesn't that already exist in substance?  I get paid electronically in US dollars.  I pay my bills electronically using US dollars.  I pay merchants the same way.  I'd guess that 99 percent of my inflows and outflows are electronic and in US dollars.  So why do I need a different electronic currency?

 

[/Quote]

 

Is it really though? Because for some reason it takes 3-5 business days for ACH transactions to go through, a month for credit card companies to deliver receivables to merchants, and 4-6 weeks for my bank to reliably schedule an auto-pay. Seems weird that these transactions would take days if they were truly electronic in nature and in plumbing. Shouldn't it be instantaneous?

 

And this isn't a hypothetical. The US is looking at a digital dollar just the China is rolling out a digital yuan. Seems like even the authorities disagree with you in terms of already having the benefits of digital currencies.

 

What opportunity?  Buying bitcoin doesn't give you partial ownership of the system any more than having US dollars in a bank gives you partial ownership of the bank or paying for things using a Visa gives you ownership of Visa.

 

Maybe you should ask yourself what it is that Square, Visa, PayPal, and other payment processors who are expanding the use of digital currencies must see since they're the experts. It's not just a couple of guys on a forum telling you this stuff. The industry is rapidly moving that direction.

 

We can talk til we're blue in the face to get you to understand what it is and that it has value - or you can just look what the experts are doing. Acquiring crypto and developing crypto solutions...

 

The reason the transactions aren’t instant is because of regulation. The government is trying to prevent criminal activity. That alone should sound serious alarm bells.

 

They must have skipped the criminal activity part

 

https://perspectives.dtcc.com/articles/leading-the-industry-to-accelerated-settlement

 

Q: Why stop at T+1 or T+½? Why not go to real-time settlement?

 

A: Real-time settlement is a simple technical solution but a very complicated market structure change. While the industry should continue to aspire to real-time, it is more pragmatic to reduce the settlement cycle in stages to capture the benefits faster. With real-time settlement in today’s market structure, the entire industry – clients, brokers, investors – loses the liquidity and risk-mitigating benefit of netting, and that is particularly critical during times of heightened volatility and volume. For example, on a typical trading day, NSCC processes an average of about $1.7 trillion in equities transactions. The multilateral netting process reduces that number by about 98%, and the total value settled is around $38 billion. Netting allows brokerages to transfer that $38 billion between parties only once at the end of the day. In a real-time settlement scenario, netting is not possible and trillions of dollars in cash and securities must move through the financial system on a continual basis throughout the trading day. This creates massive market and capital inefficiencies, increases credit and operational risks, and increases costs between trading parties, possibly undermining the stability of the markets.

 

Accelerating settlement requires careful consideration, industry coordination, and a balanced approach so settlement can be achieved as close to the trade as possible (for example, T+1 or T+½), without creating capital inefficiencies and introducing new, unintended market risks, such as eliminating the enormous benefits and cost savings of multilateral netting.

 

I'm very confused. Why are you guys referencing settlement times for equity securities? I can quite easily transfer small dollar amounts of my money to another individual today, instantly. Anything large has limitations and takes more time, due to regulations. What am I missing?

 

You're missing that no settlement happens INSTANTLY in today's financial system. Not for securities. Not for cash.

 

ACH takes 3-5 business days. Stocks take 2 business days to settle. Wires can still take a few hours and cost $. Even solutions like Venmo that seem instantaneous take a few days for cash to reach your account.

 

The only solutions where cash moves "instantly" are solutions where a liquidity provider is giving you their cash while they wait for the cash you transferred to arrive (like trading Schwab allowing me to trade my cash deposit immediately or paying a fee to use an ATM).

 

Cash does NOT move instantly in today's system - this is a result of the plumbing and structure and not of government regulation.

 

 

Also, securities will exist as tokens and be traded on a blockchain in the future as well.  Maybe on a chain such as Ethereum.  Companies will issue shares directly to the blockchain and be able to buy-back and remove them.  You will be able to see in real time how many shares exist.  You will also be able to trade them almost instantly without 3rd party involvement.

 

This I can understand, and I see the value. Why does this mean Bitcoin is worth $50,000 though? Even if real-time settlements don’t happen, it sure seems like they do to me as the consumer. Why does better plumbing, that I don’t even see, make Bitcoin worth $50,000?

 

That was just an aside.  But you won't be buying 25 shares of Amazon with $USD, value will be stored in BTC not cash.

 

I don't see that happening unless the world loses faith in the U.S. economy.  I just see USD being executed electronically though blockchain technology, so that you have secure, instant transactions.  BTC will go the way of trading stamps.  Cheers!

When the world is in turmoil; it goes through invention. Necessity is mother of invention. Different characteristic for Internet is its focus on the world versus prior US centric world. BTC is "Internet of Money"; so It may follow Internet characteristics on which it is based on.
Posted

In a sign of the crypto-times, a piece of digital art just sold at auction for $60,000,000.  It is a collage of a bunch of graphic images.

 

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/03/11/most-expensive-nft-ever-sold-auctions-for-over-60-million.html

 

If you'd like to view it without shelling out the $60,000,000, you can see it here for free:

 

https://onlineonly.christies.com/s/beeple-first-5000-days/beeple-b-1981-1/112924

 

I still struggle to grasp the value of "digital" art that isn't hanging on my wall - but ultimately I do think the concept of NFTs, or the use of a blockchain to track authenticity and uniqueness, makes a TON of sense for the luxury goods world.

 

While we're on it, can somebody build the blockchain to track home ownership so we don't have do a damn title search/title insurance everytime a piece of property is bought and sold?

Posted

In a sign of the crypto-times, a piece of digital art just sold at auction for $60,000,000.  It is a collage of a bunch of graphic images.

 

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/03/11/most-expensive-nft-ever-sold-auctions-for-over-60-million.html

 

If you'd like to view it without shelling out the $60,000,000, you can see it here for free:

 

https://onlineonly.christies.com/s/beeple-first-5000-days/beeple-b-1981-1/112924

 

I still struggle to grasp the value of "digital" art that isn't hanging on my wall - but ultimately I do think the concept of NFTs, or the use of a blockchain to track authenticity and uniqueness, makes a TON of sense for the luxury goods world.

 

While we're on it, can somebody build the blockchain to track home ownership so we don't have do a damn title search/title insurance everytime a piece of property is bought and sold?

 

As long as you go with a 'name', it is actually very smart - and you get that 'name', by bidding it up  .....

It's not just an NFT, it's marketing in-your-face, the proof of concept. Crypto Kitty vs 60M for a Picasso, or this - but I can prove there is only 1 of this, whereas the Picasso .... Elimination of 'art critics' pronouncing the image real, or fake, is bonus.

 

Marketing is usually a cost. Most would expect this to sell for quite a bit more as blockchain becomes progressively more main stream; this is marketing at a profit. It's also hard to borrow cash against a token; whereas it's a lot easier to borrow against a 'thing' - paid for via token ;). Money laundering flowing through this channel, vs others, pushing prices up further.

 

Ultimately, this is just a digital application of the gentrification process, that is well established in the RE world. Disruption.

We keep hearing about it, but it was always 'someplace else' - now it is in-your-face. If you are a young person, a great time to be alive!

 

Different strokes.

 

SD

 

 

 

 

Posted

Digital art sells for $69 million and digital socks sell for over 100k per pair.  What the hell is wrong with people?

 

https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/unisocks/

 

I'm thinking about taking screen caps of posts on this board and selling them as NFTs with very reasonable prices starting in the low thousands.  I'll even give Sanjeev 50% of the profits since it's his board.  Anyone want to buy a NFT of one of their own posts from me?

Posted

Excellent idea!

 

Long vilified, there are a great many fake copies of famous paintings done by extremely good artists, often as good as the masters themselves. Today that faker can become a 'name', proving their fake of a famous painting on a blockchain, and demonstrate their skill for posterity (in a good way!). Digital proof as a NFT, sold alongside the physical painting.

 

The 60M Picasso, or the 2M fake/NFT done by the best faker in the world? The Yin/Yang of currency, reflected in art as well.

Very appealing to the anarchist, and the more it disrupts a rigged art market - the more appealing!

Hail the network business model.

 

Great time to be a young person.

 

SD

 

 

 

Posted

On another board people were discussing NFTs and someone said something like "Art has always been nothing but money laundering it is no surprise that it would go digital."  That is probably too broad a statement and a gross generalization, but still, there is probably a kernel of truth in that.

 

Posted

Digital art sells for $69 million and digital socks sell for over 100k per pair.  What the hell is wrong with people?

 

https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/unisocks/

 

I'm thinking about taking screen caps of posts on this board and selling them as NFTs with very reasonable prices starting in the low thousands.  I'll even give Sanjeev 50% of the profits since it's his board.  Anyone want to buy a NFT of one of their own posts from me?

 

I'm in!  God knows I would never profit from this sh*t otherwise.  ;D  Cheers!

Posted

Doesnt SSTK own a whole library of digital crap? Perhaps some value investor could write it up as the new SOTP story...$100,000 price target/ thesis is basically GAAP accounting forcing them to obscure their treasure trove of assets.

 

Im all for BTC because its the literal definition of legal front running. But this other shit is really kind of insane.

Posted

NFTs are definitely quite bubbly (wrong side of Gartner hype cycle).  With that said, plenty of extremely interesting opportunities across crypto right now - we've discussed BTC's thesis at length but the DeFi space is fascinating and worth checking out -- if for nothing more than intellectual curiosity. 

 

People on this board mocking how dumb crypto is (essentially implying superior IQ and analytical abilities) without spending any meaningful time understanding the space strongly resembles the value-above-all crowd mocking anyone paying >15x FCF regardless of quality just a few years ago.  Most of the space is extremely nascent and 95% of projects will fail (similar to what happened in '90s) but if you're not absolutely fascinated by a meritocracy based pseudonymous developer ecosystem attempting to rebuild the financial system using first principles, you're just being stubborn. 

Posted

It's not just innovation in the de-fi space, it is in the database space as well .... We 'used to' store data as bytes, that the database referenced as/when required. The data had to be stored somewhere, backed up every night, and a distinction made between 'current' and 'historic' re access speeds.

 

In the new versions ...

The byte is now a blockchain, a 'record' on the blockchain accessed via the Merkle Tree, and the database is now a 'library' of code accessing block headers anywhere on the internet. The cost/upkeep of a mainframe shrunk materially, greatly expanding the potential market. So what? If you want you to beat a Facebook at its own marketing game, you need cost effective access to a high speed mainframe, with open access to the worlds data - not just a company's private data ;)

 

Current prototypes suck, but with each iteration they get better, and the cycle time declines.

The first Samsung cellphone sucked as well; but for many, it is now their everyday device, and around the world.

 

This string is evidence as to how the resistance to blockchain is developing, .... and there will be resistance.

We can mock all we want, but the sands are rapidly shifting under our feet, and we're the dinosaurs ....

 

SD

 

 

 

 

 

Posted

NFTs are definitely quite bubbly (wrong side of Gartner hype cycle).  With that said, plenty of extremely interesting opportunities across crypto right now - we've discussed BTC's thesis at length but the DeFi space is fascinating and worth checking out -- if for nothing more than intellectual curiosity. 

 

People on this board mocking how dumb crypto is (essentially implying superior IQ and analytical abilities) without spending any meaningful time understanding the space strongly resembles the value-above-all crowd mocking anyone paying >15x FCF regardless of quality just a few years ago.  Most of the space is extremely nascent and 95% of projects will fail (similar to what happened in '90s) but if you're not absolutely fascinated by a meritocracy based pseudonymous developer ecosystem attempting to rebuild the financial system using first principles, you're just being stubborn.

 

What FCF ratio are investors paying for crypto now?

Posted

It's not just innovation in the de-fi space, it is in the database space as well .... We 'used to' store data as bytes, that the database referenced as/when required. The data had to be stored somewhere, backed up every night, and a distinction made between 'current' and 'historic' re access speeds.

 

In the new versions ...

The byte is now a blockchain, a 'record' on the blockchain accessed via the Merkle Tree, and the database is now a 'library' of code accessing block headers anywhere on the internet. The cost/upkeep of a mainframe shrunk materially, greatly expanding the potential market. So what? If you want you to beat a Facebook at its own marketing game, you need cost effective access to a high speed mainframe, with open access to the worlds data - not just a company's private data ;)

 

Current prototypes suck, but with each iteration they get better, and the cycle time declines.

The first Samsung cellphone sucked as well; but for many, it is now their everyday device, and around the world.

 

This string is evidence as to how the resistance to blockchain is developing, .... and there will be resistance.

We can mock all we want, but the sands are rapidly shifting under our feet, and we're the dinosaurs ....

 

SD

 

I have over 30 years in software development from desktop to mobile to back end servers and I can't understand what you are sayin about data here. Adding a massive amount of processing requirements to data storage requirements doesn't seem useful in very many applications, excepting digital currency.

 

And to quote Benedict Evans, "The blockchain can’t lie, but you can lie to the blockchain"

 

 

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