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Why Bitcoin Boomed During the Government Shutdown
Daniel_Stuckey writes "Just two weeks after the Feds shuttered the Silk Road, the notorious online drug bazaar, Bitcoin prices have touched a five-month high — with a single Bitcoin fetching nearly $156 on Tokyo-based exchange Mt. Gox. Bitcoin's resiliency can no longer be denied, especially as the digital currency continued its ascendancy even against the backdrop of a U.S. government in utter disarray. At the 11th hour of the crisis, President Obama signed a bill that ended the partial government shutdown and, more importantly, raised the debt ceiling, an arbitrary limit on the amount of money the country can borrow that would have been surpassed today. If Congress had failed to reach a deal and the U.S. was unable to pay its bills, the results might have been catastrophic, eclipsing the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers five years ago, the domino that could trigger the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression."
The recent price of Bitcoin has far more to do with explosive adoption in China than anything happening in the United States.
If Congress had failed to reach a deal and the U.S. was unable to pay its bills, the results might have been catastrophic, eclipsing the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers five years ago, the domino that could trigger the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression."
Someone's been watching too much "news". The results wouldn't be catastrophic. They'd be annoying. Like everything else the government has done over the past decade. Catastrophic is the entire government collapses, food shortages and water become scarce, and people start killing one another in open anarchy.
Words. They mean shit, Slashdot. Choose them carefully.
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
Are you freaking kidding? Why is it that every half wit thinks that bitcoin is all about drug transactions and prostitution?
They aren't even anonymous transactions... if you convert bitcoins to cash, that's a major weakness.
And they have a great use: eliminating payment processing costs. Those costs are distributed among the people who run the mining software.
Banks made transferring out of MTGOX impossible, MTGOX refunded my $. They are about 8 weeks behind processing withdraws.
Bad news, banks and government attacking at same time interfered with each other.
Also, they had this guy, he sold drugs... lots of drugs... but did they bust him? Nope, they did an elaborate sting to bag him for something REALLY REALLY evil... (I hate drugs btw) Why? So he wouldn't be a martyr for free wealth exchange.
Also the whole BTC aren't totally anonymous thing is a good to know.
Gold dropped because the market's built-in assumption that the Fed would keep printing money to finance the government's deficits forever was temporarily shaken by the possibility of maybe some sane fiscal policy showing its head for once. Then gold went back up when the deal was signed, signifying full steam ahead on printing and deficits. It made absolute sense.
But yeah, this article in particular is just a bad case of hindsight bias.
If Congress had failed to reach a deal and the U.S. was unable to pay its bills, the results might have been catastrophic ...
While I realize that most /. synopses are just cut and pasted from the referenced article, it would nice if we could avoid clipping one-sided political hype at the same time. While a default might have been bad, there are many who believe that letting a man destroy the value of the dollar and the country by unchecked borrowing is even worse. This latest surrender by the Republicans tells him that there is really no limit to what he can spend. He can even borrow money from China and give it to China as "foreign aid".
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
Much in the same way as bitcoin isn't backed by anything real or stable, just demand.
What is backed by "real and stable"? US currency? Nop, it gets devalued pretty fast. Gold? Real Estate? (How much Real Estate do you put in your wallet when going grocery shopping?)
Humans used to use all sort of currency, from sea shells to alcohol to pretty pieces of paper we have today. None of them backed by anything, just convenience. Maybe bitcoin is the next "it"
sounds like your problem is with all forms of cash
The difficulty parameter autoadjusts depending on the number of miners. Less miners = easier difficulty.
There should always be a new block every 10 mins (on average).
Also while the benefits of mining diminish, the 'fees' should increase with the use of bitcoin.
At some point the fees overtake the benefit of finding a new block.
Remember the fees get paid to the block finder.
Or maybe because what I buy is my business and my business alone? Without anonymity, it makes it trivial for people to track my purchases. If people can track my purchases, they can target me for their sales campaigns in order to try and manipulate me into giving them more money, Since I'm not terribly fond of being manipulated, nor am I terribly fond of junk mail or spam, I prefer my transactions to be as anonymous as possible.
But yeah, I guess you're right, it's all about the hookers and blow, Couldn't possibly be any other reason I don't want folks up in my business.
Gold is an excellent safe haven in the sense that if you have 1kg of gold about $40,000K and civilization collapsed tomorrow you would still have 1kg of gold. If you had that in hard currency all you would have is 40,000 pieces of paper. Though 40,000 pieces of paper would be very valueable as toilet paper. Hmmmmm maybe gold isn't as good of a safe haven as I thought. I need to stock up on US currency.
This is why I don't get folks that want to hoard gold as a hedge against economic fallout. If civilization collapses, gold becomes worthless. In a collapsed economy, gold has no practical value. If civilization collapses, I want things that will actually be useful. Food. Water. Shelter. Guns. Clothing. These are the currency of a collapsed economy, not pretty baubles or shiny bricks.