Where will Bitcoin be on 9/4/2018?

Quote: Wizard

I know I'm just dreaming. I am trying to say it would be a good thing to have a single world currency but don't see how it happening in my lifetime.

I can see a phone app that allows you to easily make payments among the northern European currencies (British pound, Icelandic - Norwegian - Swedish - Danish crowns). The values would still fluctuate against one another for the time being. But you could instantly pay for anything electronically in the five countries without large fees, and express the payment amount in any or all currencies.

Quote: Wizard

With paper money, I admit it only holds value because people think it does, but at least the name of the country is on the currency. If we can't have faith in the strength of the government to control its currency, then we may as well become anarchists and hunker down in a log cabin full of weapons of food.

This is only good as long as the country keeps it sound. Country currency failure is the norm, not stability.

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So I totally believe in a one-currency world. I don't dispute that a crypto currency is the way to do it. However, I think you can agree most of the money in Bitcoin or any crypto currency is held by people gambling on it. I think its natural value, if you take out the gambling component, is around $1,000 for a Bitcoin. If it gets close to that number, I'll start buying it.

One-currency I doubt would ever be feasible. Greece cannot even handle the Euro now. I agree it is people gambling on it now. But that does not mean this will always be the case. Bitcoin may be the digital gold that other cryptos get based on.

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Let me add that Bitcoin is flawed and we need something better. Huge transaction fees, long processing times, and it wastes the energy consumption of a small country to mine the things. I think there are better cypro currencies but that is about as far as I can take that point.

This will all improve. Energy wasted to me is no worse than the energy wasted on pennies.

Quote: AZDuffman

Energy wasted to me is no worse than the energy wasted on pennies.

One Bitcoin Transaction Now Uses as Much Energy as Your House in a Week. It costs 1.5 cents (WSJ link) to make a penny.

Quote: Wizard

One Bitcoin Transaction Now Uses as Much Energy as Your House in a Week. It costs 1.5 cents (WSJ link) to make a penny.

When this article was written on Nov 2 the rate was 8.5 Tera hashes per second.The peak rate has reached 17 Tera hashes per second by 17 December.
https://blockchain.info/charts/hash-rate

Quote: AZDuffman

This will all improve. Energy wasted to me is no worse than the energy wasted on pennies.

It will not improve. It is an energy Ponzi scheme.

Quote: Pacomartin

It will not improve. It is an energy Ponzi scheme.

It will improve when they increase the block size.

What makes you say it’s value is around $1000 Wizard? As far as I can tell no one truly knows how to value these things. Which in turns makes it impossible to say whether it is a bubble or not.

Quote: Aussie

As far as I can tell no one truly knows how to value these things. Which in turns makes it impossible to say whether it is a bubble or not.

It is difficult to define what money actually is. Put simply, one can say that it is an agreement or convention between individuals in a country or region that “something” will function as money.

Quote: Aussie

What makes you say it’s value is around $1000 Wizard? As far as I can tell no one truly knows how to value these things. Which in turns makes it impossible to say whether it is a bubble or not.

I admit the figure is arbitrary but $100 seems too low and $10,000 too high and I was trying to stick to rounds numbers and looking at the natural rate of growth when not in a gambling hysteria period like now.

Quote: Wizard

looking at the natural rate of growth

We know there is 1BTC for every 450 people in the world, but some estimates are that only 1 person in 2500 is invested in Bitcoin. Without having any idea of the popularity of the coin, there is nothing to base an answer to the question; "What is natural growth?".

Quote: Wizard

I admit the figure is arbitrary but $100 seems too low and $10,000 too high and I was trying to stick to rounds numbers and looking at the natural rate of growth when not in a gambling hysteria period like now.

You have to analyze Bitcoin differently than other items.

There will be at most 21 or so million of them, a certain amount already lost forever. Need to ask what percent of the population will invest in them and how much. That will drive the price. It is not like a stock where you can figure earnings then a P/E.

1 percent of the world wanting one means demand for 75 million of them, over 3 times subscribed. What would they pay?