BTC goes up b/c it's supporters are so fanatical. Like $TSLA. Tesla couldn't be valued properly without profits, which drove it to these insane levels. But Tesla is at least a conventional asset (stock) and now with profit (if you believe it), which will eventually lead to a significant decline b/c the valuation makes no rational sense. BTC is a new asset class with no method to properly value it (except maybe stock-2-flow, which imo is nothing more than a self fulfilling prophecy). Bitcoin is going to blow everyone's minds with how high it goes. I hope you learned something.
Memes aren't arguments even if they are funny. Here is an essay for you as an argument, just so you know next time what type of thing we are expecting: Cthulhooo; "The dirty secret is price isn't tied to some magical metric or real world usage or objective. Its future could be simply a cumbersome, useless, speculative game and the price could still go up. Or down. Or oscillate around some price point. That's the sad truth. It's a giant game of chicken powered by bad faith arguments, conspiracy economics, quirky beliefs and sexy memes. The price goes up because people think there will be enough buyers in the future who will think the price will go up further and there will be enough buyers down the road who will buy from them at a higher price again. What is the ceiling? What is the bottom? It's all speculation, take your pick. The funniest thing is even if there is/are or will be any coin(s) that are technologically superior, provide more utility, more efficiency, more features and power to the user...it doesn't matter that much because cryptocurrency communities over time devolve from experimental internet currency enthusiasts to sunken cost fallacy cargo cult. In a normal world, any sensible person will eventually abandon the tool they use if new, strictly superior tool is available to them that improves their life. They'll do so with little remorse, not cryptocurrency fans, they will go down with their ship because they're invested in them emotionally and financially, they're not really users, they're bagholders and they will bash and smear any competition to win by any means necessary. In principle those bagholders of various brands will refuse to participate and use more superior tools because they're already invested in something else. And because of that perhaps decent products won't be financially viable investments and bad products can always pump all day long if there is enough sentiment behind it. It's completely conceivable to bet on something that seems technologically sensible and lose massively because market notoriously rewards memes and liquidity over utility. How many programs you used in your life that over time you abandoned and you won't even remember them by now? Probably many. But crypto fanatics are the kind of dudes who would use windows 95 forever because it was first and they already poured some resources into getting familiar with it, it's like a Highlander, there can be only one!
Practically, what are the risks of Bitcoin or other Cryptocurrencies? 1. Government ban --> Difficult to happen (Especially after legally having future contracts traded and other linked securities, both live and in the making). It's also very difficult or even impossible to have a consensus & agreement from all world governments to ban Bitcoin. Yes, one or two or more governments can do that, but you can't count on a global ban. Few governments banning is not a problem at all since it's de-centralized and spread across the world, so no fear of any major hits if this happens. 2. Internet/Electricity outage --> Seriously this is not a real risk to Bitcoin for 2 reasons. The whole blockchain is available, an internet/electricity outage would just bring a temporary halt to the Bitcoin network operations, but people won't lose their Bitcoins anyway. Once the outage is over, everything will come back to normal (Though it will take time) 3. Total Internet/Electricity Shutdown --> If this happens, the least everyone in the world to worry about would be their Bitcoins, trading & transferring Bitcoins/Money. This will be a catastrophe and the world would literally go to the stone age. I can tell you if this ever happens on a global scale, it will be a disaster, because the world is not prepared for such an event. And no, those companies or datacenters who have backup independent power generators won't help, because majority of the world don't. What's the use if Google servers are up but 90% of the population doesn't have electricity? 4. Another coin or token taking over --> You have to know the difference between a coin and a token. A token is for a specific use case using the blockchain technology. Coins are mainly money/currency equivalent, tokens are not. The closest metaphor is that Coins are commodities while Tokens are shares in companies. Both has the blockchain technology as their underlying foundation, but they are very different in reality. Another coin can takeover Bitcoin, but first it needs to outgrow it's current network or at least show enough potential network growth to threaten Bitcoins' position. This process can happen also if a new coin grows it's network rapidly while Bitcoin loses it's network, it can happen much faster than anyone can think. What's really keeping Facebook, Twitter & Instagram valuable? It's their network. Can another platform take them down & get their spot, sure, but they have to have a larger network or take the network from them. How or why this happens? It happens only when a new coin is introduced to solve major problems of Bitcoin and starts gaining momentum or traction among users & miners, only then this risk materializes. This in my opinion is the largest risk against Bitcoin as an individual coin. But remember, it's not always easy for this to happen. The barriers to entry are so high.
Crypto fans use Linux for easy protection of private keys. Hey Pekelo, you're invested in cryptos, too , right? I thought you bought some bitcoin cash or xmr. It's a bull market now, all coins should go up in value. Rising tide lifts all boats.
You are wrong on several point. A government ban is rather easy, they can just make it illegal for retailers to accept it as legal tender. That is it. Now if Joe wants to pay Bill with a crypto between them, who really cares? But cryptos are supposed to be currency and retailers can't accept them because it is against the law, the whole currency idea is out of the window. And they only need to do this in 3-4 big countries, who cares if Venezuela or Albania accepts bitcoin? The barriers to enter is INCREDIBLY low. Litecoin was created by altering Bitcoin's code, took about a few hours I think the most. The last and most important miss in your post was Tether. That is the biggest danger to bitcoin right now. Check the Tethers issued vs. Bitcoin price chart. They are parallel. Oh yes, and a general market downturn. Check out how much Bitcoin dropped compared to the general market back in March. Store of value my ass. It is a high beta stock after all.
Yes, a bullmarket helps everyone. Also the Feds printing money and investors need to put it somehwere. Anyhow to answer your question with a reddit quote: "I’m a no-coiner. I’ve just followed this whole bitcoin out of interest. One of the things that fascinates me is how otherwise intelligent people believe things that are not true. In my observations there are a number of factors that lead to this. The biggest one, common to all instances of mass self-deception, is the investment into a belief system. Couple this with financial self interest and this is a formidable force." Personally I don't mind others trading or holding cryptos, as long as they know the risk. What I do mind when they back it up with BS "fundamentalist" nonsense.
as a instrument to "speculate" perhaps it is great ,,,exchanges like CME thinks the same way. They created futures on it just so they can be part of the action.. If there are enough punters ready to punt on Mongolian horse racing or cost of salt in the Zanzibar central market sure an exchange like CME will create a derivative product on it ... ( if one can stomach the volatility.. I mean i will bet on two cockroaches if legally permitted and if I think I have the edge ) however lets not compares this to "store of value" Until the entire world supply chain starts using it it is of no value...so all the "Believers: sure in this huge speculative bubble glorify yourself.....but stop the BS on store of value and anonymity.. at the end of the day how is it "anonyms" when to start with one has to transact in FIAT which means it gets recorded somewhere.. I too agree with this statement from Pekelo "What I do mind when they back it up with BS "fundamentalist" nonsense."
True enough. But with institutional inflows, that narrative now has legs and likely increasing stability. Still, only gold really has a comparable store of value function - that's why people like it. USD? don't make me shoot milk out of my nose. I do like digital gold, though! Not that I like BTC (I vastly prefer ETH and look to ADA to eventually overtake as form of payment).