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Microsoft Halts Bitcoin Transactions Because It's An 'Unstable Currency' (bleepingcomputer.com)
Catalin Cimpanu, reporting for BleepingComputers: Microsoft has stopped supporting Bitcoin as a payment method for Microsoft products, Bleeping Computer has learned. A Microsoft support staffer has told us the move is temporary and cited the unstable state of the Bitcoin currency. Microsoft added support for Bitcoin in 2014, and has previously temporarily stopped supporting Bitcoin in the past.
I canâ(TM)t wait for the spin on this one!
When a currency can quickly gain or lose half it's value with no apparent reason and no apparent cause, many people won't want to take them for fear they will lose money on the deal.
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
And lost all their bitcoins.
So they learned the hard way that bitcoin has no cybersecurity protections.
Funny how they only care about its stability when its going down.
Crypto-Currencies are a new form of unregulated gambling.
I'll think I'll start my own cruptocurrency and call it "Tulip Bulbs".
The stock market is over valued. Home Building in my area has gone nuts again. Same were my parents live in the North East - even though there are more folks leaving than moving there.
It's 1999 again! Thanks to the same culprit - the Fed. All those years of cheap money....
I hate cryptocurrency and everyone that likes it. I love the US Dollar and the banks holding on to my money for me. Generic response about a bubble and how I don't want responsibility in my life. I'd rather someone else do it for me, blah blah. :)))))
Of course, we know the cause of that: The Federal Reserve.
This is good news for Bitcoin.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
No one saw this coming.
It's just not stable enough do to the inability to scale it. The number of bit coin in existence is capped and we're feeling those repercussions as transactions are mere fractions of btc now.
I don't read AC
When a currency can quickly gain or lose half it's value with no apparent reason and no apparent cause, many people won't want to take them for fear they will lose money on the deal.
The cause of the volatility is obvious. Fear Of Missing Out combined with greed which is what drives most asset bubbles.
Microsoft ultimately has to convert all transactions to dollars for financial reporting. They hold many currencies (global company) but it's a bad idea to hold particularly volatile ones since they will have to convert those to dollars at least on their financial reporting statements. They can take the risk since in reality bitcoin is basically a rounding error to them but they aren't going to take a loss on it either.
You betcha!!
There's nothing more secure than a currency that's created by some mathematical algorithm that very few people on this planet can hope to fully understand. A currency that loses over half its value overnight - and maybe drop to one cent the next night.
Say what you want about the US dollar but I have complete confidence that its going to be worth what it was the previous day when I wake up in the morning. Or have pretty much the same value a year or two from now.
Butcoin is nothing but unregulated gambling now and is inappropriate to use as a currency.
To be able to purchase goods and services online, you would need:
a) (Close to) Instant payments
b) (Close to) Instant conversion to USD
c) (Close to) Zero fees
It is my understanding that a) and c) are coming soon (eg Lightning Network).
Atomic swap with USDT or equivalent would take care of b).
Then it would not really matter if BTC increases or drops by 10% in a few hours.
That would reflect poorly on Microsoft's security, not Bitcoin's.
If you want to get in on the cryptocurrency mining scene, you need a good motherboard that allows for multiple GPUs: ASRock H110 Pro BTC+, ASUS B250, Biostar TB350-BTC, and GIGABYTE GA-H110-D3A.
It's the speculation related to the market dynamics of blockchain currencies being treated as commodities in a market that is currently causing any instability, either perceived or otherwise. That is a completely different issue than any cryptocurrency's intrinsic *technical* stability.
Water is wet
MS Is not going to allow the use of a Crypto that could end up costing them money.
There will soon be a Fedcoin, Worldcoin, Phoenix coin or something like that of which MS will support. Everybody needs to avoid all Crypto's if you value your freedom, because the new crypto WILL be under a centralized control and they will be able to track and even control every single place you can use it, if at all, and they can tax whatever amount they want.
It's because MS supports IoTA which is not based on the blockchain, and hence
It's fee less
Pre-mined
No theoretical transaction limits
The Dollar has always been a currency many count on because of its stability. Bitcoin is just the opposite of that.
Notice they only made this decision now that bitcoin is down.
It's not really down though. It's oscillating between 14k-15k for a while now. It's down 4% since last month, hardly dramatic.
Ethereum for some reason never really went down and has been on mostly a steady climb for some time.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Bitcoin Halts Microsoft Gentrification Because It's An 'Unstable Platform'
bitcoins fees and transaction time are to high for most day to day things.
Accepting bitcoin payment is similar to accepting payment in terms of commodities, frozen concentrated orange juice ("Sell 30 April at 142!") or pork bellies. Or, at best, a foreign currency with a very volatile exchange rate. So there is no surprise, nor real news in this announcement.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
When a currency can quickly gain or lose half it's value with no apparent reason and no apparent cause, many people won't want to take them for fear they will lose money on the deal.
There is a cause, wall street speculation. Bitcoin's price rose 65x as wall street speculators were joining the pre-existing home based speculators.
Reminds me of one of the first bank runs and massive failure by companies issuing their own unique scrip.
The Panic of 1819: Reactions and Policies by Murray N. Rothbard
If you want to get in on the cryptocurrency mining scene ...
Stop yourself, don't do it. Take either of these two paths:
(1) You were going to buy a GPU anyway for some non-mining reason. Go ahead, buy the GPU. Maybe, **maybe**, buy a model up one level of performance/price from what you would have otherwise bought, if its a low to midrange model. Say if you were otherwise planning on a GTX 1050 Ti 4GB ***maybe*** get a GTX 1060 6GB, ****maybe****. If you were otherwise getting a high performer, say a 1070 Ti for that 4K monitor, do *****not***** go up a level to a 1080 Ti. Then let the GPU mine when you are not using the machine. Use a watt meter to determine the total power consumption of your machine to determine power usage, do *not* trust online references that say your GPU uses so many watts. When your GPU is mining other parts of the computer are also drawing power, especially the CPU which may also be mining. You want to know the total system power and make sure your mining proceeds exceed that amount. Be sure to use above baseline residential power rates in your calculations, do *not* just look at your current bill and expect the current rate. If it is not profitable to mine do *not* fall into the trap that "the coin price will eventually rise and make it profitable", that is a losing game. Instead, take whatever money you would spend on power and just buy the coins directly, you will have more coins that way if the price rises. But above all else, do not get into the mindset of joining the mining scene, that is a path to losing money. Stay in the scene "the GPU I have anyway can make some coin when I'm not using it".
(2) Take whatever money you were willing to spend on a GPU for mining and just buy coins with that money. You will likely do better that way if the price rises. Many miners fall into the trap that they are profitable and pat themselves on the back. They do not consider the opportunity cost of the alternative of just buying coins directly. The following are very rough estimates but the point will nonetheless be clear. Lets say you spent $500 on a GPU last summer and another $500 on a GPU last fall. At above baseline residential power rates maybe you have about an extra $1,000 after factoring in power. Congrats your GPUs are now paid. However your friend bought $500 worth of bitcoin in the summer and another $500 in the fall and now has $3,000 worth of bitcoin. You are at net $0, he is at net $2,0000. If you are willing to gamble on increasing coin prices you may be better off just buying coins directly. Things are not as simple as a mining rig being profitable, the opportunity cost of the just buy directly must be considered. Many other things must also be considered before joining the mining scene.
That's the only way to stop BitCoin, which has a god-awful carbon footprint due to all the pointless farming going on. I'd be happy to see it just go away.
You drank my drink, you drunk!
Paying a with bitcoin is a bit like asking a vendor to give you a product based on winnings from a yet unplayed poker game. Companies these days (especially big ones like MS) are looking for any way they can to decrease their risk. Risk these days are only for employees and customers. Even insurance companies have done all the calculations and eliminate risk. They will reject anything less.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
Its a perfectly stable genius.
Lke all USAmericans!
Transactions of its operating systems because it's an unstable operating system. I thought the original heading looked strange