Crypto thread

Dow Jones price in 1999 (11,500) = 42 ounces of gold ($273 oz) 

Dow Jones price now (21,237) = 15 ounces of gold ($1,503 oz) 

Oil is down 6% to 25 

Looks like another rough day for the markets  

Panic is about to set in on Americans 

Amazing how the corona is being used as cover for the collapse and people are buying it 

Big Government: 

Today - spend money collecting tax money

Tomorrow - spend money giving people back their tax money 

Americans: 

Massive mortgages 

Auto loans 

Student loans 

Unemployed 

What happens when a massive amount of people start defaulting on their loans? 

Boston (probably other cities as well) just cancelled every construction job in the city until further notice. That is tens of thousands of well paid construction workers. Plus all of the hotel/bar/restaurant etc workers. 

The economic impact is MASSIVE. And everyone is paying attention to this stupid corona thing. Unbelievable really. 

THERE ARE ONLY 12 SERIOUS OR CRITICAL CORONA CASES IN THE ENTIRE U.S. AT THIS MOMENT. 

TWELVE. 

Total cases: 6,534 

Total deaths: 116 

Compare that to 2009/2010 swine flu: 

Total cases: over 60 million

Total deaths: over 12,000 

Detox,

I dont see how any crypto could be mainstream even if the tech were better...it has to be as easy or easier than cash or cash eqiv and that cant happen with these..even Tether. The transaction costs and complexities are too high. I dont want to spend 2 percent to trade anything and yet that is what I spent to buy the bitcoin...it is outrageous and flies in the face of the intention this is supposed to serve. I also do not agree with the sticking it to the man approach or hiding from the government. If that is the purpose then it will never be more than a side show only. To get mass appeal it has to be fast, reliable, cheap and easy to do and it is not that in the slightest. I also NEVER worry that someone is going to hack my bank account and steal my money because it is insured and I get fraud notifications and I can access my accounts very simply.

Everything you’re saying was also said about the internet and credit cards. 

Bernie Sanders: “I am calling for emergency cash payments of $2,000 to every household in America every month for the duration of the crisis” 

The internet was not expensive at the start and credit cards are not expensive unless you carry a balance. To utilize both they are much more cost efficient and the benefit greatly exceeds any initial barrier. Getting credit at first as a kid is a challenge but that does not stop you from conducting your business. 

Crypto to be mainstream has to BE mainstream and that means massive infrastructure and a huge learning curve to the public...most people are not motivated or smart enough to do what is needed. This is a niche side thing at best. I dont mind side things but the prices you throw out are based on some massive assumptions that would never ever come to pass with the majority. I got one but even for me it was pain in the rump and then to worry about theft and transaction cost...most people arent going to do all of this as a sub to currency.

Yeah and that is why Sanders cant win...he is either too stubborn or stupid to know you cannot be an extremist and win the popular vote. 

There is a huge problem though as our economy has evolved into being service based...with this social adjusting it severely crimps a service based workforce and people are going to be struggling to make ends meet in another month or so.

Your argument is the same as an old person talking about the news paper vs reading the news online 25 years ago. Even 10 years ago not a lot of people would have thought that Barstool would be more powerful than The Boston Globe. 

Some of the smartest visionary’s in the world are working/investing in the crypto space.

What you see today is not the final product.

Somebody, maybe coinbase/maybe not, will eventually master the on/off ramp. It’s just a matter of time until that happens. Agree or disagree? 

Spending wallets/apps are being fine tuned all over the world as we speak. And what’s currently out there is pretty good. 

Mass inflation and the loss of trust in centralized institutions will (possibly) be the catalyst for change. I’m not sure if crypto is 100% ready, but it’s getting close. 

The issue is too many layers of execution and cost needed to make this completely efficient and cost effective...that and too much price movement. A currency cannot be relied upon if it is fluctuating so extremely like this and the barriers of use for commerce and the high cost. I think this cannot work because the beta is too high across the board. The theory works but that same theory is being used now with online banking...so electronic payments are possible now and not through crypto. I can send money electronically and convert and exchange and transact because the infrastructure is in place and the common person understands how to conduct business. My father in law who is 85 and a knucklehead can do online banking and online transactions there is ZERO way he could do crypto. And the massive issue of fraud and theft is almost second nature to crypto and that will scare off most. It scared me off for a VERY long time.

No I think crypto is boutique and has a niche in the fringes but to get to any scale I dont see it happening.

Credit Suisse just released a memo shredding the institutions. At the end of it they said: 

“Therefore, attention starts to turn to alternative currency regimes, whether gold, or digital, or all of the above.” 

You’re missing the point of centralized vs decentralized and that’s the entire point. Do you believe there is currently any fraud or theft happening within the centralized institutions?  

In theory, USD is currently backed by oil. Oil is down 50% in the past month. 

It was backed to gold and even gold has had major fluctuations. 

I agree that it may be difficult now for the layperson to buy crypto's. I agree with detox as well though that advancements are being made daily to make things easier. In Canada, we have shakepay and after comfirming my ID, I can just e-transfer from my bank account to the app, which happens either instantly or within 5 minutes, and either exchange it or set limit orders. Companies are trying to make it easier. Opera now allows US and Scandinavia to purchase cryptos using a debit card or Apply pay through their browser.

http://crweworld.com/article/news-provided-by-globenewswire/1458387/opera-now-lets-us-users-buy-bitcoin-and-ethereum-with-apple-pay-or-debit-card

PENN down to $4.80. It was $35 is February. 

Yeah, PENN is essentially being priced for zero I'm afraid, even if it isn't there yet.. There will be many more. 

Detox.. You're still not getting the bigger picture.  This virus is much more contagious than other flus.  This has the potential to completely overwhelm the medical system and has the potential to make a figure like 12,000 look like Child's play.  That is the concern.   

There have been 8,800 deaths in the entire world. 

According to the CDC the flu kills 646,000 people around the world each year. 

The flu has overwhelmed hospitals in the US in the past. 

Seems pretty close to business as usual. Maybe a few extra precautions here and there but shutting down the entire country seems ludicrous. 

Now people will be healthy, have no job, car, or house and will jump off the bridge while walking to work next year. 

I am not investing in crypto because i believe it is the future. It probably is, but ill cross that bridge when i get to it. For now there are incredible opps to get a return on crypto. The next run will be driven by emotion, FOMO. Some crypto just have to hit 50% of ATH for a 10x. return. My plan is take 30 now turn to 250ish in three yrs. Honstly at these prices i dont think that is too lofty a goal. Make cash before everyone tries cashing out next run.

Late for practice first one off the ice. Thats my strategy.

This is crazy 

Hey wallstreet, I’ve been thinking since my post about USD being backed by oil.  

Would there be a correlation there (oil $22 barrel) as to why the Fed will start printing so much money? 

I think global economies and banking systems are about to collapse because there aren’t enough dollars being generated to keep up. 

I read that there is only $3.5 trillion dollars in existence but there is $90 trillion in debt owed back in USD. 

This creates a mad scramble for USD? And I think the people scrambling have taken close to everything the can out of Bitcoin.

I was going to reply to that because I think you are not understanding what the currency is valued against. Oil is priced in USD, the USD is not backed by oil, it is backed by nothing.

The USD trades and is valued RELATIVE to other currencies and nothing else...even when gold backed it, the currency still was valued relative to another, it is one vs the other as a currency.

So the USD is vs the Euro or the Yen or the CDN Dollar or whatever else...and that valuation is based on many aspects from relative economic strength, the industries that the country is reliant upon, the government, the inflation situation...so many things.

The ammt you mentioned about "owed" is not really owed to USD, if you read that ZH article I mentioned the other day it explains it well. Foreign debt is denominated in USD, that means the covenants of the debt means that the loan is valued in USD, not that it is owed. Banks and lenders will not covenant a big loan unless it is based on the USD, so in THEORY the ammt short the USD is 12 T I think I read...globally. That does not mean we have to print that ammt to satisfy foreign covenants but what it means is if the banks HOLDING these instruments globally want to call in the loan or require margin to bring the loan back into proper ratios then they CAN require dollars...not local currency because the dollar is less crazy plus the debt is marketable and able to be packed into CLO bundles and sold if tied to the USD.

That is why I am flipping my lid about what the FED is going to do and what the Treasury is going to do...they are going to float credit lines for all this global garbage because it is causing such a mess and the UST is going to hold the bag for a certain percentage of losses in order to lure the FED into the game...so we as a country are going to front losses for loans that the FED allow into their debt burger program.