You're right, it's not absolutely fool proof. But if you send some of your BTC to another address, how can anyone know you sent it to yourself or to someone else? You still have plausible deniability, provided you live in a police state where they don't torture their own citizens.
"Bitcoin derivatives market has arrived" http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-12-08/bitcoin-derivatives-market-has-arrived I think companies like bidu or others who accept(ed) and gathered large amounts of btc could use more ways to hedge their exposure. The other day I was looking for CFD places that trade bitcoin who accept Americans. I want to trade it like silver SI futures on steriods because this is the most volatile thing I've seen in my life. I'm sure derivatives and more participants would tame the volatility a bit with more market makers and such in there. I would think a method that exploits vola would do well trading btc.
I owned a business in Lugano, Switzerland in the 70's and Lugano was a town of 28,000 people with 32 full service banks -- UBS, Credit Swiss et all. Lugano and Chiasso existed to service those who were circumventing Italian exchange controls. My partner and I specialized in transfering money out of Italy without it ever leaving the banking system. The sophisticates are interested in either keeping their money in the banking system in ways that attract no attention (I'm sure they prefer not to recieve a wire from Mt. Gox) or getting money that is not in the system into it. They want bank deposits and they have zero interest in having the fruits of their labor pass through a commodity that can fluctuate 10, 20 or 50% in a 24 hour period. Today, who knows what tomorrow brings, BC is poorly suited for drug dealers, those evade capital controls or money launderers. The "money to move" industry serves that market quite well with much less risk and at reasonable cost. In the early 90's you could move it with a $200,000 minimum transaction, bank to bank, Jo'burg to NYC for 6%. The price went down over $500,00 and again over a million. And I am sure guys were quoted better preices than I was. BC is for nerds not guys in action. BTW, a major NYC law firm wrote an opinion letter telling us we were not in contravention of any America law and Switzerland obviously welcomed our business. I passed on visiting Italy for 10 years after we wraped up our operation. I missed everything about Italy -- heaven on earth -- but prudence is key.
At these levels, yeah. But at the beginning of this thread, people were able to mine some coins per day and were called stupid - back when it was $20-50 each. Probably some bitcoin millionaires in here if they held them until now.
Any currency ($USD, Yen, Euro, Dinar, gold) is a "store of value" on some level. Bitcoins are none of that.. just speculation between financial illiterates. If you're "playing the Bitcoin game" and lose your ass... YOU DESERVED IT FOR BEING SO FUCKING GREEDY AND STUPID! (Yeah, I know... "up 10,000%"... get back to me later on that.)
Bitcoins should be banned, abolished and destroyed by the US Government, Other governments and boycotted by general populations. Reason: Bitcoins are used only for bad criminal activities: Drugs, Weapons, Porn and other gory kinds of acts like vids of animal torture and children kidnapping and captivity, women and people abuse, frauds etc. THAT IS NOT ACCEPTABLE !! Government doubles the fines on drug dealers who sell near children schools so why not abolish Bitcoins used for bad activities. Bye!