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Bitcoin Businesses The Almighty Buck

Bitcoin Watchers Running Out of Explanations Blame Slump on Moon (bloomberg.com) 157

Posted by msmash from the not-the-onion dept.
If regulatory concerns aren't enough to explain Bitcoin's 50 percent slump from its record high reached last month, how about blaming it on the moon? An anonymous reader writes: The Lunar New Year, which marks the first day of the year in the Chinese calendar, is being cited by some as contributing to Bitcoin's slump as Asian traders cash out their cryptocurrencies to travel and buy gifts for the holiday that starts Feb. 16 this year. The festivity is celebrated not just in China, but in other Asian countries including Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, Korea and Thailand. "The January drop is a recurring theme in cryptocurrencies as people celebrating the Chinese New Year, aka Lunar New Year, exchange their crypto for fiat currency," said Alexander Wallin, chief executive officer of trading social network SprinkleBit in New York. "The timing is about four to six weeks before the lunar year, when most people make their travel arrangements and start buying presents."
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Bitcoin Watchers Running Out of Explanations Blame Slump on Moon More

Bitcoin Watchers Running Out of Explanations Blame Slump on Moon

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  • People are jumping to other Crypto (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Bitcoin is not the 'cool' one anymore.... there are too many other options.

    • Re: People are jumping to other Crypto (Score:5, Insightful)

      by reanjr ( 588767 ) on Wednesday January 17, 2018 @12:01PM (#55946583) Homepage

      Perhaps, but the other major altcoins (ETH, BCH, and LTC) are dropping faster.

    • LOL at buttcoin (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      lol

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Holi ( 250190 )
      No they are not. all coins were depressed during this slump.

    • Re:People are jumping to other Crypto (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Mr D from 63 ( 3395377 ) on Wednesday January 17, 2018 @12:11PM (#55946673)
      Its not a slump. Its more a correction.

      • Re:People are jumping to other Crypto (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Graydyn Young ( 2835695 ) on Wednesday January 17, 2018 @12:15PM (#55946705)
        A correction would have them all go down to zero.

        • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

          by Anonymous Coward

          For a technology site, the fear of the unknown masquerading as haughty dismissal is akin to my father asking why anyone would want to pay $14/mo for dialup to send email, when you could write a letter and use a stamp for only $0.14.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by jbengt ( 874751 )
            You remind me of my old boss, who said, "Why would I pay $600 for a fax machine, when FedEx is reimbursable?" (which he said about a month before he bought a fax machine, because so many of his clients were trying to fax him and complaining they couldn't.)
            But it has nothing to do with Bitcoin, which at this point is no longer a currency, but just pure speculation and gambling.

            • But it has nothing to do with Bitcoin, which at this point is no longer a currency, but just pure speculation and gambling.

              It never really worked as a currency, nobody priced things in bitcoin because it was far too volatile, instead anybody accepting bitcoin either priced things in fiat currencies and specified "equivalent in bitcoin" or used an intermediary to convert bitcoin to fiat currencies so they didn't have to hold bitcoin.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by F34nor ( 321515 )

              Thermal paper didn't double in cost in a week.

          • ...haughty dismissal is akin to my father asking why anyone would want to pay $14/mo for dialup to send email, when you could write a letter and use a stamp for only $0.14.

            The problem is that a digital system designed to be used as currency is for several reasons not fit for that purpose, and is now being traded purely as a speculation.

            To follow your analogy, that would be like using your $14/month modem to drive nails.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by murdocj ( 543661 )

            Or perhaps it's more like wondering why anyone would pay $10 for a pet rock.

        • Only if you assume that your two cents is worth more than the billions of dollars involved in bitcoin.

          In the long run, the market is the mechanism we use to determine the "correct" price of something. You may be right now and then in the short term, but over longer terms, if your opinion and the market are in disagreement, it is you who is wrong, not the market.

          • Re: (Score:3)

            by spun ( 1352 )

            Wait, are you saying that if it turns out later that he was wrong, then he's not right?

            • A correction would have them all go down to zero.

              In his opinion, the "correct" price of bitcoins etc is zero.

              An investor may believe from time to time that the market is mispricing something, and occasionally he can be right. But if he believes, for example, that stocks (in general) or bitcoins are worthless, then no amount of analysis or strong opinion will help him - he is wrong. No matter how sure he thinks he is, his opinion does not outweigh the opinions of thousands (or millions) of people and billi

            • Hard to argue with that, though.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by jbengt ( 874751 )
            At least you used the term "price", and not "value".
      • Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • More like a point that it isn't affordable anymore. The Rate of mining new bit-coins gets exponentially more complex, while demand more or less had a linear increase. This creates bitcoins which are too valuable to trade, because they are growing too fast. (Like the guy who once bought a pizza for 20 bitcoins). So people are not trading them, so its value goes further up.

      If bit coins price is too low, people don't want them because they are too worthless for the effort, if they are too valuable, people

  • Compare the charts (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anon-Admin ( 443764 ) on Wednesday January 17, 2018 @11:58AM (#55946553) Journal

    Just compare the charts for the last 5 years. It drops off like this every year about this time. This is not that unusual.

    • It's a good time to buy cheap altcoins.
      Take 1000 bucks; buy 10 top-falling altcoins from top 200, spend 100 dollars worth on each. Wait until market recovers, sell them for a profit.
      In the meantime I'll keep mining Vertcoin and Unitus, 1.5 VTC and 22-25 UIS per day.

      • Why?

        • Why, what?

          • Why are you mining Vertcoin and Unitus, if I may ask?

            • It's no secret: Vertcoin is a relatively old and stable coin with active development and good infrastructure, so I hope it'll survive the big 2018 coin culling, and Unitus because it was added in merged mining here (https://vertcoin.easymine.online/) and I just thought "I'd like 1000 of those please" and my CPU was idling a lot :)

      • or as it's been called, "catching a falling knife"
      • They often look really good when you look at the charts but remember the coins in positions 150 - 200 likely were not there 3 months ago. You are looking at the top performers from positions 150 - 400 from 3 months ago, so of coarse they look great. (Well except for the coins that were in the top 150 that fell.)

        • Yes, that too. I usually don't touch anything less than 2 years old, and which doesn't have a proper mining infrastructure.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Quirkz ( 1206400 )

        Take 1000 bucks; buy 10 top-falling altcoins from top 200, spend 100 dollars worth on each. Wait until market recovers, sell them for a profit.

        If I had money to play with, that's probably what I'd be doing. Though instead of just looking at which are falling most, I'd probably cross-correlate with currencies that already have a presence in a few major stores, to sort of boost their prospects at legitimacy and longevity. For instance, I think I've heard the Apple store took a few of them. If other places that I shopped also did, that would probably make them a more likely buy.

        In the meantime I'll keep mining Vertcoin and Unitus, 1.5 VTC and 22-25 UIS per day.

        That's useful info. I've been meaning to look into some that are also sti

    • Just compare the charts against that of a standard economic bubble. It drops off like this every time about this time, ... and it will drop a shitload more.

    • Re:Compare the charts (Score:5, Insightful)

      by msauve ( 701917 ) on Wednesday January 17, 2018 @12:17PM (#55946721)
      Correlation is not causality. And, if you think past performance is an indication of future outcomes, did you buy in Oct, sell in Dec, and will you be doing the same again next year?

      Oh, and BTW, no it doesn't "drop off like this every year about this time." Let's look at the last 5 years, as you suggest:

      There was a 46% drop in Jan 2018 from a December peak.

      ...about a 30% drop in Jan 2017 from an early January peak.

      ...about a 20% drop in Jan 2016 from an early January peak.

      There was a drop of about 46% ending in Jan 2015, but that occured over the span of two months, not two weeks, so isn't comparable.

      Jan '14 basically held steady.

      Jan '13 was a steady rise.

      • > did you buy in Oct, sell in Dec, and will you be doing the same again next year?

        I bought in January of 2011 and still have them.

        • So you knew of what you believe is the norm yet failed to sell at the peak and rebuy at the drop? basically you just blew half your money if you actually believe your trend.
      • Gets even less correlated if you account for the actual date of the lunar new year, which varies by a couple weeks over the five years in question.

        I heard a joke once. An economist was walking down the street and saw a $100 bill lying on the sidewalk. He glanced at it and kept walking. A bystander saw this and asked "why didn't you pick up the $100?" The economist replied "Don't be silly, if that was worth anything someone would have picked it up already."

        The point is, as you say, if there were a reliab

    • Just compare the charts for the last 5 years. It drops off like this every year about this time. This is not that unusual.

      I suspect that's more to do with "It's a new year so I'll change X" and in years where Bitcoin did well X was taking the opportunity to cash-out, this could be what's motivating the Asian traders as well.

      I don't think the gift+travel idea makes sense. Bitcoin ownership is massively concentrated, anyone who has enough Bitcoin to tank the market should already have more than enough fiat currency to fund whatever holiday plans they have.

      In this case however, there's more than enough bad news to suggest that th

    • Just compare the charts for the last 5 years. It drops off like this every year about this time. This is not that unusual.

      Sort of, but not the time of year, its the reaction to an extremely fast exponential rise. If I remember an Ars Technica article correctly ... there have been four huge exponential spikes and they are typically followed by a 75% drop. Recall 2014, exponential rise to $1,100 followed by a drop to $250, followed by hovering in the $250-300 range for years. If the current exponential risk to $19,000 keeps this pattern then something in the area of $5,000 can be expected.

      Of course there is something differen

  • Think of the poor Moon! (Score:4, Funny)

    by DickBreath ( 207180 ) on Wednesday January 17, 2018 @12:08PM (#55946649) Homepage
    The moon gets blamed for everything. People blame the moon for causing the ocean tides. Warewolf attacks. Increased crime. Now people blame the moon for bitcoin slumps.

    I've got news for you: It is the ocean tides that are to blame for causing the moon! Proof is their direct correlation.

    I couldn't do my homework because . . . . the moon! (Because Windows 8 my homework no longer works.)

    • Look, DickBreath, if you keep up this mindless prattle, I'm gonna send you...To The Moon! [youtube.com]

    • You didn't read the article, only the headline, didn't you?
    • With their "to the Moon!", Buttcoin proponents had revealed themselves as certifiable lunatics long before this newest claim.


    • Three things are certain:
      Death, taxes, and lost data.
      Guess which has occurred.
       ...

      Windows NT^H^H 8 crashed.
      I am the Blue Screen of Death.
      No one hears your screams.

    • The Moon: A Ridiculous Liberal Myth (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward

      The Moon: A Ridiculous Liberal Myth

      It amazes me that so many allegedly "educated" people have fallen so quickly and so hard for a fraudulent fabrication of such laughable proportions. The very idea that a gigantic ball of rock happens to orbit our planet, showing itself in neat, four-week cycles -- with the same side facing us all the time -- is ludicrous. Furthermore, it is an insult to common sense and a damnable affront to intellectual honesty and integrity. That people actually believe it is evidence th

  • They're wrong, of course; it's obviously the boogie...
  • It certainly isn't rich people racing to cash out and stop from losing more money then they already have. Because that wasn't foreseeable.

  • Bitcoin was barely usable all year. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by i286NiNJA ( 2558547 ) on Wednesday January 17, 2018 @12:32PM (#55946891) Journal

    Bitcoin's transaction fees were higher than paypal unless you wanted to wait days for a transaction to go directly to the ledger. Of course it's a stupid time to be investing.

    Who are these people?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by mysidia ( 191772 )

      Bitcoin's transaction fees were higher than paypal unless you wanted to wait days

      Yes, both Bitcoin AND Ethereum had major congestion issues many times during the year there were long waits or high fees to clear a transaction. Not what you want for something which is supposed to be a better way technologically to send instant payments --- the end user experience SHOULD be better in every way to truly provide the full benefits the tech claims.

      So far the only Alt that was getting significant volume that h

      • No, because of it's unfortunate name. It will forever be associated with the fundamentally broken bitcoin.

      • Bitcoin Cash is more like Bitcoin than Bitcoin is. It is way too early to tell, but we could be looking at the first stages of a switch from Bitcoin (which isn't really Bitcoin any more) to Bitcoin Cash (which still IS Bitcoin).

        Or (in my opinion far more likely) the market price was way too high compared to the long term trend, and is now correcting. We could fall all the way back to ~5 times the previous peak high (or lower if it overcorrects) and not make it back to 10-20k for 2 or three years.

      • Could it be that another crypto will overtake BTC now?

        Surely it's going to be Dogecoin. Just give it a few decades or so.

    • The dumbest people on the internet; redditors

  • Brocoin Astrology (Score:5, Funny)

    by PopeRatzo ( 965947 ) on Wednesday January 17, 2018 @12:42PM (#55947001) Journal

    Everybody knows you shouldn't buy Bitcoins when Mercury is retrograde. Wait until the moon is in the seventh house, and Jupiter aligns with Mars. Then blockchain will guide the planets and cryptocurrency will steer the stars.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by glitch! ( 57276 )

      Combine astrology and blockchain?! That's brilliant! Find a way to include biorhythms and Pokemon and you're ready for ICO!

    • I hate this bitcoin fanaticism as much as the next /.er, but the headline is stupid. The reasoning behind the slump is based on the Lunar New Year, which yes, is based on the moon. But that's as moronic as blaming a mid-March alcoholism rise on the death of a 5th Century Irish dude.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by hawk ( 1151 )

      Why, buying at this stage of the moon would be simple lunacy. Lunacy, I say! :)

      hawk

  • Loaded (Score:5, Insightful)

    by chispito ( 1870390 ) on Wednesday January 17, 2018 @12:50PM (#55947117)
    I'm pretty skeptical of cryptocurrencies in general and of the viability of BitCoin in particular, but--my goodness--what a needlessly loaded headline.

  • Volatile commodity is volatile (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    News at 11.

  • Go look at CoinMarketCap's historical charts. Pretty much every cryptocurrency moves in almost exact lockstep in rises and dips. That wouldn't happen in a diverse crypto economy, the fluctuations would be much more varied instead of nearly perfectly identical. This is a dead giveaway of inside manipulation and cashing out while the cashing out is good.

    • I thought the drop across all coins today is from bitconnect's demise? It's a Ponzi scheme using crypto and its creators cashed out. Maybe that spooked people about the soundness of other coins?

  • Bitcoin bulls are always yelling about the moon, so why shouldn't it get the blame when it turns the other way.

  • 100 thousand in electricity and 900 thousand in new hardware, USD per hour. That is the current investment in all crypto mining. That required 1 million more in people to invest every hour. The total market cap for crypto currencies wasn't very high, about half a trillion which in financial terms is nothing. Assume crypto is mostly invested in by only wealthy, male geeks between 25 and 55 who have maybe 20K to play with then the total investment pool would be maybe 10 million people, world wide. That's

  • Just imagine ... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by surfcow ( 169572 ) on Wednesday January 17, 2018 @02:11PM (#55947931) Homepage

    Imagine that someone invented a method
    of converting Terawatts electricity and human intellect
    into a symbolic currency with no intrinsic value,
    with no link to any material asset,
    not backed by any government (except North Korea),
    and which you can not actually spend at the local store.

    Oh, wait ...

    Generates pollution without generating value.

    Exxon should love it.

  • It's dropping like a rock because the smart ones got everyone else excited about it to inflate the price. ( OMG look how fast its jumping in price ! I gotta get in on that. )

    Once they hit their target price, they sold.

    Leaving all the chumps holding an empty bag at the end of the day.

    This is true of any crypto currency and / or stock.

  • For those who want to get out, they face another problem: a transaction takes days!

  • It's cold outside.
      Credit card bills coming due from Christmas.

  • He says "exchange their crypto for fiat currency" as if there is something different about the two, but there's no more 'intrinsic' value to cryptocurrency than there is to paper greenbacks (or whatever plastic funny money it is that other countries use). In fact, the bills in my pocket are backed by the 'full faith and credit' of the U.S. government -- yeah, yeah, I've heard the jokes before, but Bitcoin doesn't even have that!

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