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Cryptocurrency Markets Lost $18 Billion Overnight (yahoo.com)

An anonymous reader quotes CryptoCoinsNews: Over the past 24 hours, the crypto market has recorded a loss of $18 billion, as major cryptocurrencies including Bitcoin, Ether, EOS, and Bitcoin Cash dropped by 4 to 13 percent. While Bitcoin ended the day with a 4 percent decline in its value, Ether, the native cryptocurrency of Ethereum, plummeted by 13 percent against the US dollar, becoming one of the worst performing major cryptocurrencies alongside NEO. Tokens recorded the steepest drop in their value on August 11, as most Ethereum-based tokens such as Theta Token, Aion, Pundi X, Aelf, DigixDAO, WanChain, and VeChain recorded a drop of around 14 to 18 percent

For the first time in 2018, Bitcoin, the most dominant cryptocurrency in the global market, has obtained 50 percent of the market share, securing its year-to-date (YTD) high on the dominance index. The sudden increase in the dominance index of Bitcoin which coincided with the spike in the volume of Tether have demonstrated that investors have become reluctant towards taking high-risk and high-return trades, mostly due to the lack of confidence in the short-term trend of the market. Over the past few weeks, tokens have lost over 50 percent of their value against Bitcoin, which has also fallen by more than 20 percent since late July.

"During this 13-day stretch, the total market cap for all cryptocurrencies has fallen $70 billion," reports MarketPlace, in an article headlined "Bitcoin looks 'very sick' and the pain is not over, says analyst."

7 of 99 comments (clear)

  1. Excellent by fluffernutter · · Score: 4, Funny

    Excellent, I'm in the market for a good video card.

    --
    Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
  2. Re:So? by PopeRatzo · · Score: 4, Funny

    How much have fiat money market losts? WAY MORE. This is a good thing for the Cryptocurreny

    What the fuck are you talking about?

    I know I'll be buying more and more every day because I make A LOT of tax free money already. Guaranteed.

    reader poll: Is he joking? Serious? Are there really such people?

    --
    You are welcome on my lawn.
  3. Re:So? by Registered+Coward+v2 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    reader poll: Is he joking? Serious? Are there really such people?

    Yes. The technical term for them is fools; they are very important part of a well functioning market as they provide a steady stream of money for the taking.

    --
    I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
  4. Manipulation by JBMcB · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Bitcoin prices increase = it's a bubble
    Bitcoin prices decrease = it's collapsing
    Bitcoin prices are stable = it's a dead market

    --
    My Other Computer Is A Data General Nova III.
  5. I don't trust the blockchain hype. by Qbertino · · Score: 4, Informative

    I see problems with long-term feasiblity. Power consumption is through the roof, as is ineffciency in validation/resolution.

    Digital currency is a very, very good idea, but a massive simple one-dimensional set of tokens managed by a single trusted service is way more likely to offer real-world advantage over bitcoin and Co. I believe digital currency will take off when we get one that doesn't require obscene amounts of processing power to handle and transfer via transactions. When you can have an app on your cheap-ass asian semi-feature-phone and transfer 50 cents with a push of a button and the guy selling you his fruit can see if on his phone in 3 seconds. This isn't going to happen at a global scale with any of the current cryptocurrencies. Hence their real-world usefulness is notably limited and thus they won't succeed as currency IMHO.

    --
    We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
  6. Blockchain has three use cases by jdoeii · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Blockchain exists for ~10 years and still there are no mainstream use cases where it replaced the incumbent tech, other than illegal activity. There is a fundamental reason for that.

    BCh offers a single unique feature: distributed trusted transaction (DTT). DTT competes with a centralized transaction == transaction with a trusted third party (T3P). DTT is by definition distributed and as such is *always* more expensive than a T3P all other things being equal: reaching consensus with multiple parties is harder than with a single party. In order for DTT to be competitive with the old tech T3P, the distributed nature of DTT must offer some advantage for people to be willing to pay the required premium. So far the only use case where people or willing to pay this premium is circumvention of regulation, when the trusted third party does not exist. This brings us to this list of use cases:

    1. Circumvention of regulation.
    This is the only meaningful use of DTT.
    China has capital flow controls which effectively bar companies and individuals from moving money out of China. To get around these regulations people buy video cards and electricity in China for CNY, mine cryptocoins, sell them in the States for USD. That's the largest market right now, much bigger than buying drugs on the likes of Silk Road. This use case also includes ICOs and other pump and dump schemes.

    2. Selling picks and shovels.
    Derivative of (1). If 1 goes away, 2 will go away too.
    https://finance.yahoo.com/quot...

    3. Marketing & FMO
    Add blockchain to the company name and see your valuation pop.
    "We must work on blockchain because it's the future".
    All kinds of blockchain projects in banks, etc which are going mainstream "any time now". All of them can be done easier/cheaper/more reliably with a T3P, no exceptions.

  7. Re:Slow painful death by NicknameUnavailable · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Except Bitcoin has unmitigated issues in the near-term. We're looking at 6 years at most until quantum computers can run Shor's Algorithm. At that point the signature schemes used in Bitcoin are dead. Before that happens (by a few years, at a minimum, to ensure the blockchain is irrevocably altered) everyone needs to convert to post-quantum protocols on a wallet-by-wallet basis (as in, initiated by every single Bitcoin holder individually.) The issue there is that smallest secure post-quantum protocols have signatures on the order of 30KB per transaction. That means a blockchain on the order high-TB to low-PB growth annually. That means mass centralization (at best) because there's no way every user (or even most non-exchanges) can afford that within the next decade given anticipated hardware developments.

    TL;DR: Bitcoin is already dead due to hardware constraints, it exists purely as a pump and dump campagin: the same applies to all cryptocurrencies.