Bitcoin Bubble - Crash

[Lesley Resnick]

I know this will bring out the haters and the, "you don't understand bitcoin".  With that said here goes:

Bitcoin hit $23,000 this week.  What does that even mean?  You and I agree that today one Bitcoin is the value a used Honda Accord?  In December of 2019 it was under $4,000.  That is an amazing growth.  Imagine buying a house for 40 and selling it for 230 next year!  Sign me up.  

The premise is that the value of bitcoin is a currency, exchange it to get something in return.  As a currency it is inflationary, you get less for your currency over time.  This sounds great, but prices will rise at the same pace.  If you get paid once a month by the end of the month you will effectively make less than than the month before.  Given the option you will get paid in a stable currency.

For an examples Google: Weimar Republic, Venezuela.  While the causes of the Hyper inflation are different the effect is the same.

 No government or corporation is benefiting from bitcoin.  Regardless of your political bend it is an undeniable fact that governments want to tax and regulate and companies want to monetize.  In fact the early signs of the governments crack down are showing up in the tax code.  I can easily report currency swap trades, but if I trade bitcoin, then I must file a separate schedule for them.  

Facebook tried to start its own digital currency and was shut down.  Why would it allow Bitcoin to continue?

The Digi-dollar or the Digi-Yuan will render the Bitcoin useless as a currency. There is widespread agreement that a completely digital currency is necessary. The first government to issue one will have a significant competitive advantage in remaining or becoming the reserve currency. The pay off would be 2 people in third world with phones could transact in dollars with out any knowledge of the US or speaking English. While there are a lot of critics of the dollar and fiat currency, the US still owns assets. What is the Grand Canyon worth in a liquidation? Bitcoin on the other hand owns nothing and is accountable to no one. My bank gets hacked and I get my money back from them or the FDIC. What about Bitcoin, While block chain is a great idea, it is not fool proof. It will someday be hacked. To geek out a bit, I believe the block chain data is secure by its distributed nature, however access to it from the Client, (purse) will be compromised. If I have your pasword, (cats name, younges child, etc), I can access your account.

The press has been covering the fact that Wall Street is getting into Bitcoin.  These are the same people who brought us the Credit Default Swap and we all know how that turned out.

Bitcoin is speculation.  There will be people who make big money speculating and there will be a lot of losers in the game.  It is not investing and as long as people do not think they are going to retire holding bitcoin they should be fine and potentially could make a few bucks.  I, on the other hand am not a speculator.   

[Matt Whitney]

You know what's also speculation? Fiat currencies. The US dollar loses purchasing power each year because the Federal Reserve prints money out of thin air. Not to mention, with quantitative easing & the fed lowering interest rates, they're trillions of negative-yielding bonds worldwide as a result. Why would institutions keep their clients money in negative yield assets, when they could dip their toes in bitcoin? Only a 1% allocation from Wall Street would cause a mania unlike you've ever seen before. 

The market cap of bitcoin is roughly $400 billion, the market cap of gold is $10 trillion, more or less. Bitcoin is gold 2.0 and could easily do 5x in the next decade, conservatively. You can't manipulate bitcoin either because it's decentralized and they're difficulty adjustments built-in (hard to explain here but there's crazy game theory built into the algorithm. I would recommend reading into that if you're curious. 

You cant bring a million dollars worth of gold with you on an airline to another country, yet you can do bring a million dollars in bitcoin on a USB drive. Bitcoin is a store of value and safe-haven asset that cannot be manipulated. Real estate, gold bitcoin are all great investments in my opinion. My personal strategy is to dollar cost average into it every week with small amounts, which helps reduce the volatility risk. I'm up 173% this year 

I'd be more than happy to address any concerns you have about bitcoin or share any resources!

Matt