I enjoy following the bitcoinchannel.com buy. I can read candlesticks fairly well but was never much into looking at the market strength (buys and sells) as a whole - I know, bad, partial picture but the candlesticks and a few indicators always did me well.

Anyway, looking at the market on clarkmoody's site:

Looking for that 100k volume on the buy and sell side - It just moved off $70 on the buy to $65 (a bit bearish). The sell side is on $220 at 100k - keep an eye on that. Total sales have been creeping up since post crash (I don't have the exact dates as have been following it only a couple of times a week.)

Some key figures on the buy and sell side ($70 buy and $300 sell) show that more sellers are coming in at those levels and the buyers are dropping. It is not a huge number so I tend to agree with the bitcoinchannel.com guy that short term things look bearish. Nothing that would make me sell my long term stash.

Can anyone add anything here as it's the part I'm still learning...  

IAS

Can someone tell me where to get this chart? Also, is it essentially the same as the MtGox Live?

Thx,
IAS

What are you using to get this please?

It is interesting to see larger orders going through as we approach 120. I guess quite a few people want to pick them up cheaper down low.

Things are looking better. Viewing Clarkmoody's Market Depth the overall sells are decreasing and the value of the $300 sales rising. The overall volume numbers on the buy and sell side are promising again. (Bids are rising at $70 and sells are dropping at $300. I am following the bicoinchannel.com's "method" of looking into market depth and thus far has been an EXCELLENT indicator, at least short term.

The volume numbers for today (It is Saturday, isn't it?!) are looking VERY VERY good.

The buy numbers for $70 are up solid and the sell numbers for $300 are dropping hard (currently at 155k).

The sell price on 100k volume is rising very well to $195. This is GREAT imo.

Things are looking great. I'm short term Bull now but will keep an eye on things.

Thanks bitcoinchannel.com guy for your education!

Its About Sharing

You guys that are into focusing on "the Wall" - can someone give some input about this area please?
The way I see it is that you are looking for a "wall" of buyers or sellers at a certain price. Both to see price direction but also to look for manipulation of the market? Is that right?

Are you observing this wall as individual (and not grouped by $5) prices or is it the grouped version? Details please,

Thanks,
IAS

True, there is resistance at 120-124 (that big volume hammer on the downside) but we broke through it on the rally or bounce out.
I think that makes that resistance weaker, no?

That is a bit scary. It had to be that 30 minute CCTV spot.

Now, a few of those people are probably going to be buying BTC's in the near future. In a way, it could be like the Cypress event, in that sudden buying pressure may come...

Great news,
IAS

I didn't notice that part you quoted but it stood out to me in the argument. WOW!!! This is so huge it makes Cypress seem, like well, Cypress.  

I wonder why the Government would be behind it and my first reaction/feeling is that they are probably sick and tired of the USD and the bond issue that comes with it.
In a way, other governments embracing BTC (and other crypto-currencies) is a way of combating American Hegemony. Think about that...

China is sort of like another MtGox volume influence, maybe at the least. Have to ponder this one, oh my...

I am pretty leery now of selling based on just TA in light of this news. You never know what will happen...

Thanks for posting that reddit link, I will have to read the thread there.

IAS

Yep. Clearly those walls are not all buys and sells but just manipulations.

But, there are many people not showing their cards and just waiting to jump in one way of the other...

But when it is so "obvious" it can go either way, no?

Buying a Ferrari because the price of BTC is rising is a panic buy.

Take part in history, I mean anti-fragile innovation. 

Its about sharing

True, but this is truly something that cannot be compared to a traditions currency, stock, protocol, technology, etc.
However, I'm not saying you are wrong. Government intervention might take it down. It depends on the government. Imagine the US is against it but the rest of the world is for it...
On the other hand, the China thing has just started. It can shoot to $1000 and then come back down to $70. We shouldn't get attached here. We are really taking part in one of the
worlds biggest experiments. Since BTC is anti-fragile, I'd say the Universe is on our side.

Realistically, BTC is not about getting rich, it is about a new form of money. And, if it is successful, you will only need 1. Think about that...

IAS

LOL, you are right. Just make sure you put a decent catalytic converter on that bad boy.  

I am worried about that big buy bid that went up (again)? Same guys?

It is a tough thing to predict. I can imagine some big VC firms want in at much much lower levels.

But, the question is, considering there are 11 million BTC out there (much of which is not getting sold), who gets to it first, the big money or the masses just buying a few here and there?
If it does go down (again) to 50, it is pretty clear people will load up on it.

Look at what is happening with gold. The banks are selling naked puts to drive the price down, hoping to take interest away from it. What has happened? Demand went up. Figure that one out, it is easy to see. People have had it with governments lying and cheating. Really, a statement is being made. I'm not saying BTC will succeed. But it does look like most are behind it, or what it and other alt coins stand for.

Well, this is a first for me.
Anyone just see like 60 - 100 sell orders come through for around .2* BTC? Clearly a program, but why do that? The price didn't change. Is it just to lag the system as BTC approaches $120?

We probably can't imagine some of who are involved in BTC. I think that is a fair statement.

For all we know a big buyer (VC) steps up, if that sell isn't removed first, and just purchases the $2M in bitcoins without making the price move up. Think about that. Great opportunity to buy lots at one time.

If they pull it, we might just run on through it, actually that is my feeling anyway. I really don't think the large sell order will stay, just as the earlier large bid at 100 (?) got pulled.

For some reason, trading today and yesterday is like a movie...

Good description, thx for that. What about on the sell side at $120 though?

That is what I am thinking. Traders who watch the market depth will see that. Those that just put in buy orders near the bid, don't have a clue about the manipulation going on.

I think China is going to be more of a large Vacuum than a wall. But no matter, they are going to suck up a lot of coins.

Still got that big wall at $110 and smaller sell wall at $120. Both are huge though...

You may be right regarding the last crash and the time it may take to "recover" from the latest. But, as you said what about the Chinese? And a very big factor to consider is our outstanding supply of 11 million (probably a bit less than that). We are moving forward at a pace that is not linear, maybe not exponential, but quadratic or somewhere like that.

Due to the low float and the world situation, to use the past as a predictor of the future, especially when talking about anti-fragile technology, is dangerous. It can bite us quick like.

He might have one, but something I've learned (and read/recognized from J. Krishnamurti) is that we need to "See the truth in the false". In other words, everyone has something to say and there are true words coming from everyone - and quite often wise due to different lives, circumstances, experiences, etc. I'm not saying he is all truth or all false, but clearly he adds a lot to the talk. I listen to what everyone has to say. Sometimes we look for just a "professional" perspective with big words and all that, and then we miss the teacher on the street that goes under the radar. I'm not coming down on you either, just being slightly contrarian.  

So, basically we are going to finish forming that triangle (going up and down a bit) but then breakout to the upside again, as the original trend was, before the drop (started the triangles formation)?

That I can believe though I'm not sure BTC is going to follow TA all that well due to it's anti-fragile & Black Swan nature 

I don't see any option at bitcoincharts.com for that type of chart. Do you mean he just used their data and then his own charting software or ?

That is a really interesting chart, probably because it just keeps going up steadily 

If you could find the link that would be great - much appreciated.

IAS

Where are you seeing that? I still see the total sales at 172k. The only wall is 2k at $130. (I'm looking at ClarkMoody)

I am really careful of that order book (market depth is the same I think?) as that is where the psychological manipulation occurs.
If someone wants to bring things down, they will just put out a sale at market and then add to it, no? Maybe a bit of both?

I wonder the same thing. The one idea that needs out attention is that the crash of 2011 was when BTC was basically unknown (relative to now). It is much easier to have happen what happened. Factor into the new crash the low amount of BTC's in existence and increasing awareness of BTC, most notably China and even the US over the last few months. I too don't outright disagree with what others are saying but we have some pretty knowledgeable guys mixed on opinions and someone will be judged to be correct. Pretty hard to call correctly what we see happening as BTC is also Geo-Political and on the radar in more ways than most of us imagine imo.

IAS

Speaking of Great Walls, How do we factor this in?
 
The past 24 hrs, btcchina.com is the #2 exchange in volume traded after Mt.Gox!
http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1dryau/the_past_24_hrs_btcchinacom_is_the_2_exchange_in/

We may be dropping now, but trying to trade this "stock"/"currency"/"protocol"/"technology"/"commodity"/"etc" is going to get more and more dangerous than just holding.

edit - Think BTCChina might be #4 actually.

Imagine Facebook allows shops or the like and adds BTC as a payment! Heck, how about Paypal adds an exchange  

When you look at the chart going back a few months, it is pretty clear that that symmetrical like triangle is a part of the uptrend and NOT recent downtrend. Also, since it is symmetrical, that would be a good omen coming out of a big upmove. But I agree with you, I don't know. 

In light of all the big news lately, I really don't feel like trying to trade out and pick up more cheaper. Maybe with 30% of your holdings if you like to gamble. But I see BTC at this stage as just too open to a violent up-move.

IAS

Not sure: taken from http://www.trending123.com/patterns/bearish_pennant.html

Apart from its shape, the Pennant is similar in all respects to the Flag. The Pennant is also similar to the Symmetrical Triangle or Wedge continuation patterns however; the Pennant is typically shorter in duration and flies horizontally.

Volume


As the Pennant develops, the volume tends to decrease. Martin Pring notes in his book, Technical Analysis Explained, "a pennant is in effect a very small triangle. If anything, volume tends to contract even more during the formation of a pennant than during that of a flag." However, as with Flags, when the Pennant completes you will often observe a sharp spike in volume.

Duration of the Pattern


In his book, Technical Analysis of the Financial Markets, John J. Murphy identifies that Pennants and Flags are relatively short-term and should be completed within one to three weeks". He also notes that by comparison, the bullish patterns take longer to develop than the related bearish patterns.

Trading Considerations


Possibility of Price Reversal


In some rare cases, the price will break against the original price movement, and create a reversal trend. The pattern reversal may be signaled during the Pennant formation by an increase in volume, as opposed to the more typical decrease.


Duration of the Pattern


The duration of the pattern depends on the extent of the price fluctuations (consolidation). The greater the fluctuations, the longer a pattern will take to develop.

Thank you! And can you tell us, as others including myself have asked, where did you get that Logarithmic chart? Was it built custom from Gox data?


IAS

That was interesting. There was that sell order for 450-500 or so sitting on 110. As we blew to it it went up to 600 something...
This 110 level just keeps seeing more and more sells.

It's gone!!!

Wow, all those orders to 111 and then 112 and in between some orders of 13 or so BTC dropped the price by $2???

The market depth on Gox is really starting to look strong. It is like the opposite of before we took that dip on May 1st (looking at April 30th's numbers).

The bids at $70 are the 2nd highest I have recorded. They are at 125k, up from 109k yesterday (when I last checked). Nice sign.
The sells at $300 are slightly down by 2k from when I last checked yesterday. Not good nor bad.
And we are seeing those sell values in $ creeping up. All doing my best imitation of the Bitcoinchannel.com guy.   

Yeah, the manipulation can get the better of things and twist the numbers but things are looking overall good. Anyone else?

IAS

This is the pic I keep coming back to. What a beautiful triangle (with or without the logarithmic scale - though it looks better on the latter.)

Breakout on the New Moon?    (May 10th)

I caught up with the last 10 hours or so of this thread. Reading this thread and not looking at a chart of the price would make a person think that BTC lost a ton of value. I look at the chart and it basically hasn't moved.

What gives Bears? LOL
Talk about manipulation, seems like a ton of people trying to get people psychologically to break. The manipulation in the market isn't having much of an effect and neither is it here.

Remember Bears, we are a Black Swan and AntiFragile. See Sig and lots of Love,
Its about Sharing

But aren't we just trying to find a price and go from there? I mean looking at outstanding shares, shouldn't be be able to find an agreeable price. It is hard for me to look at this just as a TA thing.

Yes, the bull run up was unsustainable but it happened at an interesting time and to find a price. Now we have started a correction and none of us really know where it is going. Also, the market has just opened up more to China it seems.

I think sentiment is what is going to drive this, at least in large part. The other part might just be services and such - things that enable BTC.

Wow, it is amazing to not see all those small orders going by. Looks more orderly. Stupid Question - The volume is not trades, but rather total BTC traded, right?

You know, to be honest, I think we are better off without the large bot trades. BTC is about a new form of money and if turns into machine traders then that is against what we are in a sense.

Don't be all in or all out. If we tank than use your cash to pick up more shares. If we go up then at least you don't have to buy in later 2X as much.

I know this is a speculation thread but we shouldn't really lose sight of the point here. It isn't about making money per say. It is about helping a new money to get a foothold. It is about being an early adopter to a revolutionary and risky idea. I'm cool with all that.

So, instead of what others find to be a good entry point, make that decision for yourself. All I have to look at is the current "float" - 11 million is nothing. That is worth taking a chance over.

IF we do succeed then these prices will seem like nothing (do the math regarding the float). If we don't succeed then I'm sure we still took part in one of the greatest experiments in recent history. Think about that - governments and wealthy individuals have always controlled money. This is the first step away from that (that I can think of). Still nice to say, years from now, that you tried to do your part to change things.  And if things really take off, we shouldn't lose sight of the fact that it is truly all about sharing. I'm game when that time comes, we are all in this together.

Sounds like you are too close to the tree and can't quite make out the forest. I don't disagree with you, Yes, in the near term you are right. I don't think BTC is THE answer, but I do think it is taking money in a new direction. In the end, money won't matter, but till we get there we are taking steps. In the meantime till money is not about power, there are choices - time based currencies are a great idea and will probably compliment BTC. But getting away Fiat currencies that back wars/killing should be at the top of our humane list of money's problems.

You know how they say BTC will only have 21 million coins in 2140 (or whenever that is) - you know, I don't think it will get that far. Money as we know it, money as BTC, etc only has a few more decades if that (yes, imo). As long as money allows power over others, as does our political system, we will always be searching for more. And we will probably get there. If we are every going to truly live together, a much more star trek type system on money will be in order. When we get there and look back all these forms of money will seem barbaric, but each new one is hopefully a step in the right direction.

That is all I'm saying. BTC is a step in the right direction. These viritual currencies will show us that money is in large part about trust. And since no one trusts governments, the next few logical steps seem clear. The masses will never move en mass unless they have to. At least with BTC there is an intermediary to start moving out of state controlled money's and I think the Chinese see BTC as a bit of a savior from them and the USD. It is probably going to get "exciting" there soon. Seems like Syria is on the agenda and talks between the west and Russia/China are centering around it. I really hope we can avoid disaster there, that is a tipping point imo.

Yes, the ledger is sweet, is it not?  
But they don't have to hide anything as they often say don't worry to us about "them" watching us, unless we are hiding things from them. An open and honest society in both directions. We are the government is what people and "governments" alike are starting to realize....

I envision having many crypto currencies in the near future, just as there are many state run currencies. Governments will be scrambling, as will militaries. There is just too much to keep an eye on. We are now in the Universe's hands...

Anyone looking for a Virus... look no further than BTC... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijPE7fe4XTg

Pretty bad logic there. You move money into things of value, not the other way around. Don't try to catch a falling Knife...
The markets are up due to the Quantitative Easing funneling money into markets. They will print more but this can't keep up. Hence why BTC is up, a reflection of inflation (unlike manipulated gold/silver, which is only partially a reflection).

Money starts to move again in to BTC now.

I just went through it as well and clearly there is money starting to flow back into BTC. It is not huge, but the first decent jump I've recorded in a week or so and the bids (130k) at $70 are higher now than any (I've) recorded.
Sell side $ value at 100k and 50k are up as well. Things starting to creep.

But, as you said, manipulation can occur here, but still a good sign. I don't see any big walls anyway, it is the many small ones we can't see.
Edit - I now see the walls coming up.

No, media attention alone and a quick rich scheme is a bit simplified. Are you open to discussion or is your "nothing more, nothing less" final? It is a hedge for people in dollars, Euros, etc. Get rich? How about don't let the banks take your money Cypress style (latest word is 80-90% of accounts with 100k or more). Some might get rich, but those are the few early adopters. This is a bit bigger than that.

If BTC came along in the past it wouldn't have done much because money systems were more secure (at least more hidden). People have been waking up to the printing of more money. Buy you jumped all over that and made it into a money thing. It is a people thing. It is about equality and self management. It is about controlling our rights and not using money for wars and minipulations.

This is a complex situation that is just starting in reality and for you to tell us the two things it depends on, which is more your projection, is pretty telling.

We are just starting, others currencies will follow. Other modifications, other solutions, etc.

Ahh, I see you point a bit more. I'm not really a diehard bitcoiner, but I do see it as an incredible step forward. Very high risk, agreed.  I wonder if those in Cypress thought the same?   
Yes, gold and silver are "safe" but manipulated down so people don't see as much value. Funnily enough, even with the huge slam down from the 500 ton paper sale a month ago, more people are guying it now. And, the banks are once again long. I think it was a hedge fund that might have done that sell. Anyway, I wonder when the hedges (in addition to VC's) go more heavily into BTC.)

It should be an interesting year and just think what may develop??? More China? Syria (I hope not). I do think some of the EU countries will have big problems...

The MtGox Market depth is looking better and better, albeit on low volume. Considering that, I am surprised how good it is looking. Yes, it can be manipulated.
That said - The bids at $70 are up solid just as the asks at $300 being down good. Total sales are dropping but the $ value of sale level is rising (e.g. - 100k level sells rose from $165 - $175).

Again, worried about the volume but at least the price is going up and not down along with the good market data.

Wow, the buying is just relentless. The interest is much higher than I would have thought. There is true demand at these levels.

Can you at least speak in facts? We are witnessing bad news just get eaten up by buys. Amazing, and that is all you can say?

How about we just try to be realists and not Bulls or Bears? This is interesting lab work right now.  

But something doesn't make sense. FinCen isn't going after BTC, nor is any other government agency. Why now the DHS? The take down sports web sites! Just what Hitler envisioned they would do. LOL

So far the "news" is from Dwolla and that is it. It doesn't sound sinister.
What news about any other payment providers outside of Dwolla? What are you talking about?
The MtGox queue is also over now, the said they are caught up.

Thx - Isn't Dwolla on the small side regarding funding? And do most Americans fund through an American payment provider or are they transferring funds to Japan?
I'm wondering why we haven't heard anything from other funders.

And you are clearly a Bear?  

A centralized way of funding? Isn't that the very problem we are talking about though?

Where does it say anything about other businesses outside of Dwolla?

It took over 4 years. I'd say longer than expected.

Come on China, EU, - DHS can't take you down.  

You should probably just stay away then. You knew what BTC meant when you got in.
This is not an investment, it's a movement.
Use that conference money on setting up a nice IRA...

If anyone is interested, frozenlock and coinseeker have now used their BTC profits in a joint venture.
Others have obviously invested some funds as well:

So, there was just a small fire because DHS is trying to crack down on online gambling. First, I feel safer and second, look at all those who showed their true colors with this blip of news.

We are still in this sideways price channel on essentially, no news and some people online trying to create a sell off.

$115 and the same wall at $120.

I get a real mixed message from you but the manipulative part is clear. It is the honest part that isn't so clear. You try to keep things professional with your words, sort of like a banker in a suite, but your message isn't exactly in line with your professionalism, sort of like a banker in a suite.  
For example, none of us had a full story regarding the DHS thing with Dwolla. Well, how can you come out and say things are heading down, this sounds real bad, etc? The most we can say is what the statement said, but you took that and created a whole story and gave every body an easy way out - sell.
You are showing your true agenda - you want the price of BTC down, whether or not it is for you to buy in lower we don't know. My guess is no, because being ingenuine in order to buy lower (by helping a panic sell to occur) is being ingenuine in the end. That is clearly not what BTC is about.

And yet you try to convey this image of being a good person. You bring up your wife and how you talk about those crazies on the forum. Hello... you are sort of one of them in many of our eyes. And again, it is because of this in-genuine odor you give off. Many won't bring it up to you for you on probably on ignore. Anyway, I don't dislike you, I just don't have respect for you method of manipulation and manipulation in general. If you question what many of us see in you, just re-read the posts, I did, and it is clear what you are. A smile is only skin deep. Give it a rest and be what you are... that is genuine.

Remember, It's about sharing...

Yeah, I guess greed is a big part of it. We reap what we sow though. It is just amazing to see someone smiling all the while stabbing others in the back. I am sure they know this, if not that is a psychopath. And I'm not name calling, I'm name finding and placing.

I think he and others reading his posts just need to be reminded, that is where we come in. 

Please, don't come on here and try to justify your manipulation. Too many of us see through you and your kind. Be a wolf if that is what you are, but don't get all dressed up like a sheep.

I don't deny this may end bad, we all know we are in a big experiment, but don't jump over the crap you spew non stop and then try to justify civilized, all the while skipping over the FUD.

What is just the beginning? The price is going sideways and you keep talking this is just the beginning in so many threads. Do you not see your lies? We are in a volatile thing/market.

Free market. ehehehh, You are a great big liar and most of us see it. Hide behind your sheeps clothing my friend. It doesn't fool many of us. This is a thread about walls in the price and to a larger extent about the price and some TA. You are coming on and not taking a breather, just spewing more and more attacks. And then you pad them with "But I never hid the fact that I want the price to come down."  And as another poster said you speak opinions like they were facts. Manipulator.

I don't want to intimidate you. I want you to see that we see your lies. I wear my heart, I wish you could say the same. The scary thing is, if what you say is true, you believe your own lies.

Coinseeker - Looks like you are awfully popular lately.

LOL, that is a quote to remember. Sometimes things just blow up in your face.

The chart in itself is a sentiment indicator. The news driven "mini sell off" is also a sentiment indicator. I'd say yes to your question as we are still dealing with the same basic premise. Further, if the news stays about at the level it has been received, it is essentially no news. Interesting how it was attacked and run with as being like the end of the world. Really, BTC is an anti-fragile technology and the event is a Black Swan. See my sig. It does not mean we succeed, but I think we have a very very good chance. Time will tell.

ManBearPig - Nice chart and I agree with the reply to it. It is nice to see a confirmation of a bottom, thanks for the chart!

I really wonder how much support we are getting from Europe and China. Here in Germany when the news hit, the prices were unaffected in large part.
As we go more global, it is going to be interesting to see how we adapt and adjust to news. I am looking forward to more good news from China.
Remember, we have next to no float (11 million minus BTC's). Once the majority of those stop changing hands so often for the purposes of pure speculation, we will see another run to a market price.
Where that is we can only guess, but doing some simple math puts us in the 100's of dollars per BTC, and that is short term. Let's hope we continue to follow regulations fairly well and that VC money
keeps coming in. Even if we become a Western Union, pay pal replacement IN PART, we are talking a valuation over $500 per BTC. 11 million float for a global currency is like a bad joke, at least we
have those 8 decimal places.  

Just wow, after what a few bears told us was bad news, we are basically back to yesterday's level. 116 Dollars now!

This is just going to get more and more interesting. Regulators and laws going against huge amounts of VC money and an economy screaming for alternatives in currency, hello Cypress.

Man, those were some huge buys that just went through. Was it at market?

I think we are complicating things here, by "we" I mean you and a few others judging the severity of the DHS news.
First, regarding "not many options left" - that is just no longer true. MtGox is no longer the center of the BTC universe, though it is still too large. This news will actually help level things and probably open other doors.

Second, stability is a ways off. We are just starting the "government/banking" journey. This news was NOTHING. Really, they aren't even going after BTC. The reason being, there are no laws which allow them to do so. Governments at this stage are afraid to, and actually don't have a clue, as what to even define BTC as. I'm afraid, for them, it is just like Internet PII. They will just be too slow to react. The only thing they can hope for is to somewhat regulate it. The banks will push for that to a point. But, we are just too small to do much about. Stopping it, being that the world will likely support it (all the while having a float of less than 11 million BTC's) is not really an option at this point. It will continue to be attractive to too many people unhappy with the state of things.

Just look at the slowness of things. And, again, they are not even attacking BTC (maybe with words) but they are just making sure regulations are being followed. And the Dwolla Gox thing is really really gray. I mean MtGox spent, what? 25 million getting things in order in the last year for this? This screams of either being overblown or too little too late.

Anything is still possible, but unless the internet gets shut down or the like, we probably continue for months if not years before we see what can amount to anything huge. And by that time we will probably be too well established imo.

Most are not content. How could you ever make a statement like that? We are in the top 5% or so of the world, right? I mean just being here and on a computer. And many of us, if not most, see the disparity of wealth. I'm afraid you are missing the point of BTC. You often speak of it in terms of "investing". It is a movement. It is a symbol. It is a statement. It may flop, but the seed has been planted and that is in part, why I "donate" to the cause. There is no failing in setting precident. This isn't about making money. It is about making change.

Remember in the days of AOL CD's all over the place? I was an IT guy back then and thought "Who the heck needs help setting up an account? What a joke? It is easy!" But see, we are the techy's (here). We are the leaders/early followers. We are just laying the foundation. We are analagously in the stage of going from a command line internet search (our clunky wallets) and going to Netscape Navigator (nice and easy to use wallets). Don't lose sight of the forest by staring at the tree too closely.


Wars with words has been "their" norm. The "War on Drugs", "War on Terror", etc. But, we are collectively waking up. Associate all you like. We are waking up. It comes down to prosectution and laws and as you can see, they are trying to pull an Al Capone on us. They can't catch us, not legally anyway, so they are going for the regulations. But, most exchanges will follow regulations. VC's will start new ones that will. It will be a huge snowball effect. They are just helping us to be legit.

Bitcoin is like torrent. Money is like Napster. Do I have to hold your hand with these basic observations. Again, this is why I see you as being manipulative. Your ability to communicate and what you say are at two different levels. It is easy to dissect your purpose here. I'm just making it easier for others to see what you are.

Overall, you are one of the most negative and fearful posters on this board. I see nothing in the way of an open mind. So, I imagine all of this is a challenge to your reality set. It sounds like being correct is more important to you than helping life to continue here on Earth. Being right is more important than taking a chance and making a statement. Sitting there watching everyone dance while you remain in shackles must be tough. But it's never too late to get up. Maybe we can't dance well, but we are trying. We are going forward, with or without you.

Dream, take a chance, do what is right, get away from the darkness and fear.

IAS

Think about something. What does ignoring coinseeker do? It makes those few hundred who post regularly here not challenge him and makes those reading those posts to not see any challenge. So, the other 10's of thousands who just read, start to actually be influenced by him. It is much better to "challenge" and debate posts we disagree with, at least those that have some assemblance of intelligence - which unfortunately his do. That is why I find his kind dangerous. They can look at you with a straight face and say they mean no harm and they are trying to help, all the while clenching the hidden knife harder in their hands. What some won't do for money.

Coinseeker - What I find amazing is that you have so much time just to say bad things. I mean, think about it. What is your purpose here? Are you trying to save others? IF you are then stop posting false stuff like BTC is illegal and other nonsensical things. Again, it is why you are so clearly to me here to manipulate the price. Wouldn't it be better to spend all the time you spend here posting negative things, be better spent posting somewhere where you are trying to do some good and not just be a downer?

Anyway, give this time. The AOL CD's (BTC wallets and services) are just getting started. Regardless of how well BTC does, we are more than likely going to see some very interesting innovations in the next 6 - 12 months. I mean, I am no longer an IT expert, many years removed but I was able to figure out how use most of the BTC tools and such.

Remember in the early days of the internet how those damn AOL cd's were all over the place? Many of us IT "geeks" hated them and thought it was a waste. Who needed that to connect? Just put your information in manually and then connect to the internet. I remember laughing that AOL stock was $5, man that wasn't worth it. Anyway, I called Amazon, Ebay and a host of other internet companies correctly, but I missed the one right in front of my nose due to my tech conditioning.

Well now, the wallets and much of the BTC technology is a bit non user friendly - quite rough around the edges for non computer people. The analogy here is that we are just getting started and perhaps some of the die hard BTC people don't see how we need "AOL CD" like things to make this journey easier for us.

That said, we are quite close to that. IT is not rocket science to make better wallets (e.g. - easily scan and import your private key and BTC's, not have to download the whole 7Gb of data with the standard client, etc.)

Money is mass adopted already. There is a HUGE need for quicker and cheaper transactions. There is a huge need for a cheaper paypal and a way of sending money Western Union style but easier and cheaper. There are so many opportunities.

You see, we don't even need mass adoption to be successful. We need less than 1% adoption. We are at a fraction of a percentage as is and the price is already over $100 a share. That is not a coincidence. It is not a coincidence that some big VC's are saying BTC is HUGE. We can see, you can only fear...

Further, this isn't about America. There is the rest of the world. It would be easier to go at it with America, but certainly we don't have to.

Where do you get off on the bull statements time and time again you manipulator you? Most money laundering and drug trades occur in dollars, not bitcoins. The money laundering occurs via big big banks as it is in the billions of dollars. Bitcoin is not in that arena.

People can see you as a phony because you are so one sided and non stop at that. But that is ok, everyone needs help at times.
There is a reason we are already quite successful, you might want to spend some of your time there as well and not make your one sided attacks so obvious.

I agree, it is getting out of hand. I'm all for free speech when it is driven by intelligence. But how can one keep up the nothing but negative attacks without getting even a warning?
The board would be a better place with him and those like him off it. At least keep it on topic, which it is getting away from.

VC's are often the creme of the crop when it comes to Capitalism. Now, I'm not pro capitalism, at least not in its current rendition, but I don't look a gift horse in the mouth.
They are however careful with their money. I was there in the early days of the internet and I saw the power early on. I see THE SAME SORT OF DISTURBANCE regarding power with bitcoin (and cryptocurrencies). It isn't about the money, it is about the change.

Look, I don't see BTC being out of America any time soon. It serves a function, clearly. All I said was it probably goes forward with or without America, especially since many countries (e.g. China) are a bit too heavily vested in dollars. Read into that one.

No, we do need BTC. That much is clear. Visa, Mastercard, American Express, Pay Pal, Western Union - they are all threatened (in part) by BTC. They are not threatened in the loaning aspect of their businesses (nor are banks imo, at least not yet). But to be able to transmit money for essentially free, is HUGE.

Again, the way you overlook these things is really disturbing. You see nothing good. Just bad. Just look at your posts here. You are one depressing individual - which I'm sure is your intent. But love will save ya....
Ripple. LOL - eheeheh, good one.

rpietila - Hey brother, you keep on keeping on. Take care of yourself, get some rest and don't forget this is about change. Don't let the $$$ part stress you out. Our sites are bigger that that.

Heal up brotherman and enjoy this dream we call life,
It's about Sharing

I just looked at the market depth over at GOX. My guess is that something is up. The sell side is really starting to dip (146k), lowest I've recorded since end of April.
Bids at $70 are the 2nd highest I've seen and the asks at $300 are the lowest since the start of the month. The sell side volume at higher prices is creeping up.

Hmmmm   

Who is just talking about America? 

Interesting thing I just heard. The actual inflation rate is more like 9.5% (taken from this economist - http://www.theaureport.com/pub/htdocs/expert.html?id=2000
So, just like the unemployment rate (which if we used 1980 stats would be closer to 23.5%) the inflation rate is really distorted.

I know this is all over the place, but try to digest this regarding the BTC price: http://libertyblitzkrieg.com/2013/05/16/peter-thiel-gets-the-bitcoin-bug/#more-5747


The scary part to consider is that first big company that takes on BTC. And then, after that, many other larger company will probably feel forced to go along, especially if there is a flow of new funds to supporters of these companies.

The Market Depth is jumping up nice again on MtGox. Yesterday was a great day in that respect and the jump to today is likewise good.
Yes, big if regarding manipulation, but just to put the numbers out there.

Bids at $70 are up another 15k to 145k. Highest this month. Also, buy side at $5 and $15 are climbing up.
Asks at $120 are down another 12k to 120k. Lowest this month.

100k sells are at $220. Highest level since end of April.
50k and 100k buy levels are highest in a month as well.

Manipulation to explode up or a real sign?

+1

No one misses that FUD

WHAT?

There was a 7k buy that went through? And then they pulled the rest? Man, this can just explode up through $200 quicker than we can understand.

Coinseeker, Coinseeker?

Are you the reincarnation of coinseeker?  

FUDer

BTC is just an intermediate step to something much greater. In the short term we have to get the criminals out of politics and government (which means a total revamp of our system).

Regarding the walls - just don't look at them. Buy and sell when you need to. Big players might see those walls but really, what do they do outside of psychologically? Thus far we don't have any shorting of BTC, and that is a good thing.

We need to protect ourselves from the bankers. They all have the same thing on their minds, war and...

I wasn't aware of that. But, due to the design of the network, you can't do naked shorting I would think. So, shorting would mean, borrowing actual shares from someones account and then selling them and promising to buy them back at a later date. I would also think that you would have to cover the sell in cash and would be subject to margin calls as well. I don't know if shorting BTC nor derivatives, could really ever "work" at quite the same was as they do in the stock market. For one, most people don't keep their coins in the exchanges - right there you can't borrow them for sale.

I guess some investors would do that, but die hard BTC'ers would NEVER EVER allow their coins to be used for such purposes. In the grand scheme of things it is probably quite small at that site and I can only hope it stays that way. Again, due to the nature of the network, you are not going to see naked shorts. And, due to most keeping larger amounts of coins offline, you just won't get the short volume needed to manipulate.

Interesting - First wall I see is around 2k at $130...

Well, a 2000 BTC sale can for sure kill a rally (smaller one). I would think for shorting to really really matter, we would have to be talking in the 10's of thousands? Thoughts.

Thanks for the information by the way. We have to look at everything, even those things we don't like to see. 

Well, I don't like shorting. It is another instrument of manipulation. I know derivatives can help miners, just as how they help farmers in agriculture, but moreso they can be instruments of manipulation. Luckily we are somewhat protected by the "infrastructure"/blockchain of BTC.

Did I miss that point, really? I said a few posts ago that BTC is just an intermediary away from money as we know it. I love what BTC stands for but in the end, not that far from now, I don't see money in it's current form (with or without a central controlling entity) being an answer. When you look at it, clearly money has problems. There is still too much power involved. Something more along the lines of a time based currency, to me, seems like a better solution. But that is alongside, and after, BTC.

When we trade EVERYTHING is in the blockchain. The shorts (which are just sells in this model) are in the blockchain. That is why I said naked shorts can't work. Something to consider with the stock market, A LOT of shares of stock are fake. The stock exchange itself should implement a blockchain model to control counterfeit shares.

You are making a mole hill into a mountain. What happened with Dwolla/MtGox was NOTHING. Look deeply into it. It is nothing. It is a blessing in disguise if you think even a bit about it.

I'm not saying we come out on top, for as you said, perhaps the internet get shut down. But, I trust in Universe...

Can you put up a higher resolution version? I can't make anything out.

Would love to comment...

Well, this early in BTC's progress, it pretty much is all speculation, no? And at the same time fairly good size amounts investments and $$$ are coming in. Pretty big and well respected VC's are saying BTC is HUGE. There are hundreds of millions of $$$ to be saved by using BTC over paypal, visa, mc, ae, western union, etc. The list goes on and on, and I guess you can say speculation, but that is like saying AOL at $5 a share was speculation. It was and so what? The writing was/is on the wall, can read it?

$120 isn't cheap? 11 million shares and a global economy that we are only hoping to get a small fraction of a percentage of ? $120 is VERY cheap when you factor in the market, incoming VC money, low float, affect on currency/monetary policy, etc. We are talking about a revolutionary game changing technology. Can you come up with something better? 

A currency not used is essentially a useless currency - at least when one considers what BTC is about.

Anyway, with the (current) 100,000,000 bits per BTC, it doesn't require many to be in circulation for it to be effective. We have near infinite divisibility (can increase) of each of the 11 million BTC units (not infinitely printable like current central banks and Quantitative easing - yuck! Think about that... Use it or lose it I would say though. It should not be about hoarding. We are early on in the movement though so things will change here as we go forward. Further the mentality of the average BTC user is not about power and fame. This is a morally found movement about change. Don't cheapen the argument here.

We are taking part in the largest social experiment in our history. And you know the answer? eheeh, come on...    We are all sitting in the front row and watching with our eyes wide open...  

Early one people seem to be doing two things:
1 - Have a BTC savings account (e.g. paper wallet, etc.)
2 - Have a spending account (e.g. - client, e-wallet, android apps, etc.)

At this point in time it seems the users are also trying to spend their BTC's with #2 but they are also holding (hoarding?) for the future. But I don't see that as a long term problem. As the price goes up people will start selling. That has already begin. It is a sort of distribution system. We don't want "wall street" buying things up at these low levels.

I guess it is safe to say that none of us know. But in danger of missing a Black Swan go by I would rather sacrifice some future "profit" or holdings of BTC by trying to buy in later at lower prices, with just holding at what I see to be a great price - now. But I can say, it is wise to have capital available to buy more in later should that occur. But it sounds like you are trying to rationalize the greatest social experiment in the history of our civilization. Think about that.

Now, if it jumps up $100 or $200 in a day, your going to be there sitting in cash. Moral...

Don't try to time a Black Swan.

MtGox USD Price - $ 122.65, Euro Price - 94
Bitcoin.de (Germany, Europe) Euro Price - 89

The difference has been like this for weeks. I've seen it even higher.

Exactly. If you get super lucky and call it right you might get another 20% or so, but if you call it wrong you are holding ZERO and buying in at much higher levels.

Look at the world - Banks are printing money (Japan, US, Euro) at record levels, Gold/Silver is being naked short sold in the paper markets suppressing the price and all the while Central banks are buying gold up, Unemployment is up, Financial numbers are being fudged, new wars are being talked about or close (Syria, Iran, etc.), etc. and etc.

When the weasel goes pop you won't have time to get back in and you won't believe where the price is...

IAS

Yeah, but it is a bank holiday here in Germany and I think in other places as well.

When the general volume on MtGox falls below that of other exchanges then you will know something took place. That probably doesn't happen as the recent DHS news isn't really much, but who knows how it affects people.

That is not true about only a Black Swan in hindsight, it is merely hard to predict. So, for the masses it is near impossible to predict. A few (including me) called the internet as a Black Swan. Now I'm saying cryptocurrencies (maybe BTC) are the next big Black Swan. And they are Anti-fragile to boot. Very very powerful (see Sig).   

If it drops $100 in a day then you should buy some more, no? It depends on the reason. But complications aside...

My point, and I think it was made clear, but I'll type slower for you:
If you are going to wait on the sidelines for it to drop and it doesn't but instead goes up $100 in a day, you will be holding cash. Your choice.

That is my simple point. But, my bigger point is that this isn't an investment. It is a statement. I am making my statement now. I am not an investor, this is about trying to create a better place, getting us away from central banking. If you want to see it purely as money making, well, you create your own reality. We all need to be careful in that regards to be honest.

IAS

Your complicating something quite simple by talking in analogies, which in this case is really missing the point.

Do you believe in BTC? If not then don't partake. Is it an investment? Then find your entry point. Really quite simple.

As I said above, I believe in what it means and what it stands for. Nothing complicated, no TA needed, just looking at the world and what bankers are doing to it is enough for me to make my "donation" to a better cause. We will be in this together anyway.

It's about sharing

I'm not even thinking so large. I just see it in the short term as a competitor to pay pal, western union and credit cards. But that alone is a huge industry. If you are a store and can increase your monthly profits by 3% or so, you do and don't think twice (barring security and other valid concerns).

Pay Bal is huge and it's not in the supermarket. That is years and years away for BTC imo, but who knows.

I think it is so early in BTC's history that we really don't know what we are dealing with here.

Fair enough with the idealogies, but the point remains - If you wait for it to drop and it doesn't and instead shoots up $100 or $200 in a day, you will be there with cash and no BTC. I think that is a much much bigger gamble than buying some BTC now, especially since we retraced and are getting stable (and the whole China, Rushia pay pal, VC money, etc. news)

Question for you wall watchers:

I noticed this Friday that the amount of Asks (sells) at 100k volume jumped from the range of $170-$180 in May to $330 3 days ago and $245 the last two days?

Any ideas here?

+1 & Well Said.

We've discussed this quite a bit since the first CCTV news.  Word is that the latest news was neutral to somewhat positive. I think we are going to see adoption in China, both as a speculative investment but also because of the world economic situation. Something we have to consider also, is that people may start to get behind it as a big FU to the USD. That is probably why the government has been pretty open to it.

I imagine that over the next 6 months to a year that China will be the biggest holders of BTC. Just on population alone, it only takes a few thousand wealthy people to make that happen. Just a feeling of a guess.

As the price of BTC goes up, we either need to go to another term e.g. mBTC or do a split (if that is possible). With the latter no one loses holding power as with creating new shares. I just don't see people being as game to buy when the price is high. But, if it truly starts to grow and is seen as valuable, then mBTC will be the new term.

IAS

That is about as extreme as saying it will cause the price to explode to $10,000. I just don't see how advertising to millions or potentially billions of people will have no effect???

That is a very arguable point. Do you not remember the downloads of the QT client exploding? Do you not remember the price climbing coincidentally after that? What about the nodes showing up all over China?
Anyway, in an emerging and explosive market like BTC, I would not really pay much attention to one past event as being a predictor of future actions. That said, something clearly happened.

Yeah, that psychological barrier is the biggest. But once we cross it, it is behind us. So, at first you are right, people are going to be like "I don't want no .1 BTC for $111!" But when the price keeps going up and then people are talking in mBTC, it won't be a problem. Also, even a noob can understand that a float of 11 million is NOTHING. We have to move those decimal places over.

Started moving but continued right? I mean we are talking about a volatile thing here. And you ignored the QT Client downloads exploding, as well as the presence of quite a few nodes over there.

Anyway, the bigger point is, How can something being shown to Billions of people in a positive light not have any effect, especially considering the times? That just seems impossible...

Good point, hopefully they find Multibit (is it)?

This is truly big news (again). They just keep coming and coming - that might describe the Bid rise in the charts.
The thing is, we only need this "liberal" kind of policy for a year or so - just enough time for BTC to get its foot in the door. Once it catches on... Game over!

Really, it seems at this point we are waiting for an Amazon/Paypal or the like to jump on. The China news and Russian Pay pal will probably affect the volume some.

A sure fire thing, which is inevitable imo, is another Cypress like event happening. When that happens we probably don't look back...

Have you checked productivity rates? Real inflations rates? Unemployment rates? Economic difficulties in Spain, Greece, Italy, Cypress, Ireland, and on an on?

Your analogy has a way of missing what it is that is happening in the world around us, an oversimplification of sorts. If you don't see it then I suggest you look a bit harder. We are getting closer and closer to a tipping point, essentially that is what I see happening.

The epidemic is here, but the world health organization refuses to acknowledge it, after all the stock markets are going up! 

People in Cypress with over 100k in their banks are having their money stolen at a rate of around 80% - 90% (not clear yet). Further they took 400 million of their gold (an artificially reduced rate due to the naked short selling). In addition the people of Cypress are STILL not allowed to withdraw more than 300 Euros a day. Hey mom, can I have some more money? LOL

Cypress was merely the canary in the cage falling over. Now, are the miners listening or watching CNN and seeing that the economy is all well?

You can't think of anything more insightful but my spelling?

So, which logical fallacy does this fall under? Am I guilty by association, na, probably Ad Hominem - Attacking the individual instead of the argument.

Thanks for your well thought out rebuttal.

I wouldn't confuse happiness with a well researched expectation, due to an understanding of economics. The current system cannot continue in its current state. Few would disagree with that. I am not looking forward at all to people suffering due to an economic collapse (or the like). But sometimes you have to take a few steps backward before once again going forward. Can you really not see the world state as to not be able to put a picture together? Yeah yeah, quantitative easing (inflation bordering on hyperinflation - by definition) is going to lead us out of the bad the bankers led us to to begin with. When is enough enough?

Yeah, I know it is Cyprus, must have been many years ago when I listened to Cypress Hill - got to my spelling.

Really, when individuals care more about spelling than arguments, that is quite telling to agendas.

I am not saying the Cyprus thing is not speculative but more importantly, beyond the speculation it is a sign of economic times. This "speculation" is a bit more than mere speculation. It is based on banks failing and many more banks being on a precipice of failure. We are talking about monetary systems that have been responsible for much suffering in the world. They appear to be being challenged with BTC. I'm not saying BTC will come out on top, but it does appear to be bringing some change with it being let out of the bag.

I understand the citizens of Cypress are not buying (nor able to buy) BTC, for the most part. I would only say that BTC is a part of something much bigger and is not an answer to a problem. Rather I see it as an intermediary step to get away from centrally controlled money. We still have the problem of power via money. Baby steps...

It will take time for BTC to be ready for the masses, but we are moving quickly. Just think of AOL in the early days of the internet. It didn't take much at all. And here we are talking about money, capitalism, oddly enough, will help spread BTC...

Man, three people have corrected my Cyprus spelling, I'm really sorry guys. eheheh

The price is not stable as a reflection of the current economic situation. If things were fine with the dollar and Euro, BTC would be at less than $1 still. Stability has ZERO to do with 3600 coins added daily. We are talking about a market in the billions and perhaps trillions with a float of 11 million shares currently. Many would argue we need more liquidity (not decimal places) to make BTC more attractive at current prices.

Doesn't that mean that the asks (left side) would require light volume to go up and the sells would require heavier volume to move the price due to the steepness of the slope???

Thanks for clarifying things Rampion. I've been following the market depth at GOX daily for a month or so now. It has been looking a lot better lately. Though the depth is really an easily manipulated thing and even when it's not I wonder how valuable it is, consistently speaking (as orders are always pulled).

I'm wondering how much business is actually leaving Gox. Any ideas how much the Dwolla thing is really affecting them? I know Dwolla itself was probably not a huge funding source for them (more for small cats), but I think it scared people off Gox anyway, and rightfully so.

Anyone have any ideas on Gox here? I also wonder how much money is moving to Bitstamp. Any ways of seeing this via an order book / market depth comparison between the two?

Interesting...

Volume on MtGox (via ClarkMoody) is 6,000
Volume on Bitstampt (via frontpage) is 5,000!!!

Is it possible that Bitstamp is moving in so quickly on MtGox???

Who are you and what happened to Coinseeker? Seriously, did you go to FUD rehabilitation or what?
Welcome, whoever you are  

It is certainly interesting. I think since BTC isn't only a stock/currency/protocol/technology/commodity/etc. we might be witnessing something oddly new - just a balancing, so to speak of current demand coupled with a bit of uncertainty. I'm sure there is lots of money on the side waiting for BTC to jump up (and then they will ride that wave) or waiting for BTC to crash (and then they will try to pick-up "cheap" BTC's).

Looking at all the incredible topics at the conference (via the articles on the bitcoinchannel.com) I'm really struck by something:

This isn't just about BTC. We are entering a technological/protocol of an era that is game changing. AND very little of it is about making money with BTC. It is about:

decentralizing DNS
creating decentralized means of voting
tracking or "ledging" stock transactions/ownership (and government, etc.!)
decentralized electronic markets
more cryptocurrencies
decentralized exchanges

TONS of decentralized services - every governments worst nightmare, but inevitable. 
(The cat is out of the bag and the bag is no where to be found.)
And of note here, the only real "coming down" on us by the government has been to follow FinCen regulations... UM OK!

And just from an "end user" perspective (ha ha), what this amounts to is anybodies guess, but it sends chills down my spine more and more the deeper I get into it.

I pulled some of the ideas above from this article, really a brilliant and mind opening read. http://reason.com/archives/2013/05/20/the-top-3-things-i-learned-at-the-bitcoi
This Black Swan is really a Black Swan within a Black Swan (and all participants are anti-fragile) - see my sig for definition clarification

Got off tangent there, welcome to BTC

So, just a few days ago you had nothing good to say, really. What that you have observed has changed this?

Yeah it is! Really interesting. Why so many offers to sell above the current price?
Scare tactic or real?

And yet it is stable.

Ahhh, there is the coinseeker we all know and...
Come on now, you are putting BTC and the a lot of the community behind it in a negative light with statements like the bolded above.

If you want to see what is actually happening just follow the bitcoinchannel.com - One of the more interesting bits of news from Bitpay was 6 days ago: "Back in March I noted that the company was putting up mind-boggling growth rate numbers.  Incredibly, the tremendous growth rate continues as they added another 1,900 merchants in April and are currently signing up around 100 additional merchants a day.  " http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-05-16/peter-thiel-gets-bitcoin-bug

As long as our volume is minimally what it has been lately, I don't see it a problem selling off 3600 coins a day (Plus, who says all those coins are sold off. I'd bet they are not). If there is any problem, it is liquidity in Bitcoins.
The price stability lately is actually quite telling...

Do you remember about a week or so ago when you were spouting your crap how you were attacked by many individuals? (And then you took a breather from posting)
Now you come back, like you've turned a leaf, say your bullish and then start with this crap again? You are on so many peoples short list that it isn't funny.
Every time you open your mouth you lose respect around here.

To say what you did regarding conventions, to lump people together like that who attend conventions, is so disrespectful on many level.
But, again and as usual, you become defensive and start attacking people. Next you will probably bring up your wife and anecdotal stories about her and how bad people are on the forum.

Why don't you start working on being a nicer person if you ever expect to be taken seriously around here (and probably in the real world unless this is your alter ego.)

Good luck in that endeavor,
IAS

If you are going to quote yourself at least get it right, you said this "That's the entire purpose of a conference, is to make people think "things are happening". "
And that is a big smack in the face of a lot of people and I doubt anyone on these boards appreciates it.

I really don't see the effect though. If you want BTC's you buy them at a price that find ok. What difference does a wall make? And how many people actually use market depth?

Seems it's more a psychological game to those who partake in it???

Your prediction is past history though. I know just a week or two ago there were large bid walls following the price up. But I wouldn't say that exactly made people buy. Maybe some, I can see the effect it has on some people.

Ah, never mind my above post. 

Have you ever considered that maybe you are wrong?

Why should I, of all people, "know" about the BTC convention? What I do know is why BTC was started and that is for good reasons. So when you spout that crap it doesn't sit right with me, and judging by all the hard responses you get, it doesn't sit right with many on the board. Something to consider again, maybe you are just wrong. Nothing wrong with that. There are better ways of communication and if you just think of what communication is, by definition, you are failing at it (And I don't mean that judgmentally, just observationally.)

I don't have any worries about fundamentals. One worry that quite a few people have however is an outright attack by government. As stated on the recent (#8) "Let's talk BTC podcast" if an attack is to be successful, it needs to happen relatively soon. Before we know it (my guess is by late this year, early next) BTC use is going to be much much bigger than currently. The bigger it's acceptance into mainstream the smaller its chances of stoppage. Even if they came after it now (and I don't mean some minor FinCen stuff) it would still continue I'm sure, but it would really hurt things.

Anyway, for a real big attack to happen it would have to involve something quite strong/profound/etc. and I just don't see that happen. There just isn't a reason for that and it is hard to imagine something in the way of justification. The bankers have enough on their hands propping up collapsing currencies. Really, BTC is rather a compliment in the short term, but then again, maybe banksters don't want recovery?

That is a pretty entertaining, yet a realistic (and perhaps more than reasonable) idea to consider.

I have sort of been leaning towards individuals trying to maintain the price a bit with these walls, giving the appearance of stability or just to control wild fluctuations. Didn't give it much thought but perhaps we all should. Was never really sure what it was but I was thinking more at the individual level and not  involving complicity, or is that conspiracy?  Hey, where there is money (and perhaps a bit more involved here with all that BTC is) there will be people working in cooperation, at some level. the question is just where does that level end, and start for that matter?

Wonder what chance there is that the walls sometimes come from exchanges, also for personal gain?

IAS

Thanks for the info.

How are you tracking Bitcoin.de's available coins? I see it available on their marketplace section of the website, but is there also a record of it? (You have one maybe???)
I just looked and there are 4369 coins available. I think the other day it was at 7k but can't be sure.

The bolded is like saying "Hey, why is everybody running away, he only fired 10 shots and is almost out?"  

Do you realize what a 7% drop in Japans stock market is like, right after all the Quantitative Criticism they have received lately? Further, the European markets were down 2%, not sure about now.
The Plunge Protection Team (aka Federal Reserve) is at work on the American markets I'm sure.

Global confidence is low, and a few more drops like the above can set off a catastrophe. Just think of what losing 7% of value must be like to some people...

IAS

This sounds really really interesting. Who is going to give us easy online access first? 

Well, we know at least the security part of BTC is safe. The unsafe parts lie at the users level and of course in a bigger way at the government level.

Regarding that last point, look at what is happening to currencies all over the world. Essentially we have "managed" hyperinflation! Confidence is all that is keeping the system up. If a few more
stock market crashes happen like in Japan today, this ship can topple and that lack of confidence would just open up the flood gates to Bitcoin and other stores of value (see Cyprus - I spelled it right this time, please note). Now, in that way, what do you have to lose? (A government closing it down? A price crash? ) You need some store of wealth. Gold and Silver work but the banks and/or hedge funds have been naked short selling them and you can be sure that will continue as they do not want people to lose confidence in the Dollar, Euro, etc.
But people are still buying them up. So, safe to me is a relative thing. The whole reason why BTC is here right now.

When the stock markets start crashing the currencies will be right behind them (maybe not in that order) and then you will see a disconnect between dollars/Euros/etc. and gold/silver/btc. You will want to be holding something in your control, not a governments or states or military's.

If BTC is banned in China that is terrible new, no two ways around that. We want to be able to use BTC for purchases and stuff. It will be underground there but the point is to have a new global money system, maybe not "the" system.

Nikkei crashing I agree is good news for BTC and for those who don't agree with just printing money. It is stealing from savers.

The Gox lawsuit was great as it got people on their toes and started a diversification that was needed. Further this is opening up opportunities for other exchanges.

Be careful of statistics, they can show anything you want. Speaking of which...

China has 1.35 Billion People and the US has 315 Million. Now, the US is far and away the biggest BTC using country.
Now try to put your numbers together with my numbers. Remove 40% of the Chines population just on account of the fridges for surely if you don't have a fridge you won't have a computer. But hmmm, maybe you will have an android phone. Anyway, we'll play it safe. So, there is another 810 million people, that is 2.67 times the American population. Without going any further, see where I am going? And if we continue to have currency issues peoples awareness is just going to grow.

How many BTC you think we got anyway?  

We need very very very small adoption for BTC to be "successful". If and when it continues to get attention and appreciate you are going to get wealthy buyers from poor countries. Eventually, once the price stabilized you will get more people without any wealth what so ever buying BTC as a store of value. Just looking at the quantitative easing (hyperinflation) going on around the world, having a currency for and "buy" the people is going to sound a lot nicer...

I really hope the Chinese government doesn't attack it as I think it will affect adoption. But maybe your are right. There is a huge psychological component that is often quite hard to predict.

What if a small % of those 500k (per month) car owners started buying BTC, since they have "money"?

Or what if they start giving away a BTC with each car purchase or something like that?  Hey, I just thought of a really cool marketing ploy, in general

How? If your hoard and don't spend then 1 - the price will be stable and 2- people will use the remaining BTC's, taking advantage of the 8 decimal places, for commerce. It doesn't matter how many are in "hoard mode" as long as it is being used. Those 8 decimal places are brilliant. Who knows, we may have to move it up to 11.

And realistically, if the value is high, why would anyone want to hoard it? Clearly speculators would take profits. Not to mention the early adopters selling some to help make political change and change in general.

The VC's and projects going on now are moving BTC ahead. It is going to take time. If there is a need for BTC (and there certainly seems like one) then it will get used. We are talking lots of money to be saved.

You are right, people do forget about it being a currency and not to be hoarded, but at the same time value is being created by the dwindling supply. And when you use those 8 decimal places you have enough bits to do lots and lots of commerce with.

Hoarding, in the end, will have next to nothing to do with BTC's success or failure. Some holding (hoarding) actually helps the value. The early adopters, Satoshi, and many many users will make sure large scale hoarding never happens. But we are not even near that, lots of coins and years still to come. There is a point to this experiment...

Agreed, but can you tell us what we are dealing with here? Are we talking a currency, stock, commodity, protocol, technology, etc? This is the "problem" and when you add to that the world economic situation, crazy weather patterns, wars and on and on, it becomes an even bigger unknown.

We can't look at this like a regular currency, stock, etc. and we must consider the times. The clue we have is the direction is most probably up. The question is, how much and fast? We can probably agree that we don't know what we are dealing with here.

It is unique, just like the internet was unique when it came out. Comparing BTC to anything traditional is skipping over a lot of variables.

If you look back at the top of the candles on April 20, 21, 22nd, (http://bitcoin.clarkmoody.com/) that is exactly where we sit right now. And that was right before a move up. I would really like for us to be around $130 or so and sitting on that support, rather than below it.

IAS

Gotta love it...


Unfortunately, this video is not available in Germany because it may contain music for which GEMA has not granted the respective music rights.

People are moving off of Gox since the DHS thing, is my guess. So, volume is picking up elsewhere.

I'd like to see us stay above $127 or so, as that seems to be a support/resistance level from April 20-22. Would much rather be sitting on it that pushing at it.  

Next resistance level I see is that $135 range from April 3, 4 and 27.

Is this some kind of advanced reverse psychology that you are speaking?  
There was just a conference with lots of VC's there. So, some traders know of impending negative news and so are somehow driving the price up and risking lots of $$$ in the meantime?
You should write children's stories...  

Come on, you can come up with something more factual that that. How about the Japanese stock market COLLAPSED by 12% yesterday and that is a sign that Quantitative Easing (aka planned hyperinflation) doesn't work.

The Nikkei is up for a few reasons: 1 - They are printing A LOT more money there per suggestion from American Bankers. A LOT of that money goes into the stock market there, as it does in America. 2 - The artificially low interest rates create a situation where corporations are borrowing next to free money and buying back there stocks. Up 82% over last year. This reduces shares in the publics hands and therefor profits go up (with less shares to count for). 3. The artificially low interest rates cause savers to be penalized as savings is lowing value due to the inflationary environment. So, they put money in the stock market.

Now of course, the campaign to keep gold and silver down via naked puts is as strong as ever. They MUST not allow a rising gold/silver price to their money as the public knows the historical connection. So, they keep it down. See Gata.org.

Now, when you see the stock market fall 7% in one day, don't try to paint an inflationary induced rise in a positive way. It is up due to printing money, plain and simple.

When productivity goes down, unemployment up, etc. and the stock market is up HUGE, what the heck does that tell any sane person about the economy and the situation in general? We don't believe nor trust the what the government is saying, because we have learned better.

Thanks for the reminder, the chart and the laugh! 

I'm not really sure what you are trying to say and I am not angry at you. I actually have quite fun posting here. It's hard to know what another is feeling by looking only at their words.

Anyway, if you haven't noticed, BTC is a sentiment indicator. The reason BTC is doing what it is doing right now is because global currencies are being inflated, manipulated, etc. People are tired of it and are looking for something they can trust. Enter BTC. You can't say the price of BTC went up right after Cyprus happened but didn't have anything to do with it and not back it up. That is a very very strong thing to say minus Strong evidence. Well, you just attacked my, in your words, "disaster" message and never gave any information to the contrary. You are sort of clearly exposed now. What is your point? To attack, then present the correct opinion and don't just use aggressive language to try an make your point. Emotion is concerned with winning, not with truth, quite often. So give me facts.

There she blows! Wow that was fun to watch....

Was that a market order for '?' that went through?

I think he was being Tongue-in-cheek. The other alternatives have been getting shut down because they are centralized, in part anyway.
He meant a monopoly because the choices are getting fewer and fewer, but not due to traditional monopolistic reasons.

Agreed, and this is the anti-fragile nature of the Bitcoin Environment at work. Smack it and it adapts. "Cut off" a part (e.g. Dwolla) and it adapts and becomes stronger. This is like the internet of a few years ago on steroids. Clearly BTC is the internet but it is layering a whole new type of technology down. Might actually be a gold or platinum bullet. 

To eventually have a decentralized exchange of sorts would be a Godsend. Imagine a "smart" internet based, not centrally controlled, exchange that acts as perhaps a bank and or just exchange system... There we are for the long haul (until we no longer use money in its current state).

In what way big news? My first thought is that it is good for BTC as money has fewer places to go now.
Bad, perhaps one can make an argument that money laundering or drug money will come our way now, but that is true of any currency, really.

The big difference between BTC and LR, at a minimum, is you can't just shut down BTC and it is already being somewhat regulated.

In Germany on Bitcoin.de the price is holding steady at 97 Euro, as it was yesterday.

It is nice to see the other exchanges not being affected, much harder to manipulate a "distributed" system. Can't wait for the real thing...

Closing down Dwolla and LR as a funding source only inspires and sparks innovation.

Remember what happened after Napster was taken down? Enter Torrent. Well, our torrent, for starters, will be a true decentralized exchange.

We have battles ahead of us, such is life.

You have sort of grown on me. 


Looks like we have a few decent sized walls on either side of us, 128 ish and a broken up one at 135 ish.

I think the government, or at least those that are directing them, have already shown their hand. The FinCen "guidance" was like getting let into a club because you know the bouncers. They want Bitcoin and going forward it is not a question of if BTC survives or not, it is rather who gets control over it, whether they can co-opt it. It is just too close to a digital currency that could be used to track people and it is also close to one (with plug-ins) that can keep people anonymous.

I am pretty sure though that they are underestimating all that it is going to be. It is a Black Swan and Anti-Fragile (See my sig.)

If BTC (and it's technology) has not profoundly SHOCKED you yet, then you don't understand it. 

I don't think many people honestly get what BTC can be. It is like back in the early days of the internet, but now it is ^2 . There is just too much infrastructure, ideas, technology, brilliant experienced people, etc. behind it.

The sort of ironic thing is that the valuation of BTC slips people for a loop and then they really miss the bigger picture.

It is too early in the life of BTC for stability. If it was stable it wouldn't make any sense as we really don't know what it is. Think about that...  As we see what it can do, who adopts it, how it gets used, the power it can be, etc. then we are going to have an idea of it's worth. You can be sure it will be MUCH higher than current levels. And,  I don't say that as an investor/speculator, just do the math and integrate a bit of foresight.

Greed just won't matter as on the one hand those decimal places will always make it usable for those that want to use it, no matter how many are holding. Though, in the long run, I don't see that being a problem. On the other hand, as the value starts to go up and goes to values that don't seem possible (by regular stock, currency, commodity, etc. standards), people will sell. Those that don't sell know what Bitcoin is, but even they will sell some, because they know what Bitcoin is. To comprehend that, you sort of have to understand what Bitcoin is 

Welcome to the greatest social experiment the world has ever known.

IAS

I think Liberty Reserve is a factor but more a psychological one. I'm not sure we are seeing lots of LR users move into BTC, yeah some sure. But many people are seeing another "funding" mechanism closed down and there are fewer standing choices now. It is sort of like we are seeing our standing power. Really, doesn't at all seem like the government is after us. The best they could do thus far is to say, follow FinCen regulations and they shut a Dwolla funding source. (Most likely this will result in a fine and nothing more as it doesn't appear nefarious.)

I remember those "fake" ask walls, then I remember many of them getting eaten into or just plain eaten. We stopped seeing them. 

We are in an interesting phase of price discovery. Clearly a lot of coins are disappearing due to being put in a "savings account" and at the same time we are seeing more coins being used for donations, daily purchases, etc. I wonder how much the price will go up just based on more adoption via actual daily usage??? Really, that is an interesting question as Bitpay and the like are going to be doing the instant conversions so will be creating liquidity at the exchanges.

 As the price moves up (and at times violently) we are going to see people call tops and sell. Eventually, I imagine there will be a reasonable distribution, but the early adopters will always hold a portion as they believe in the greater purpose. They will further most likely re-"invest" in Bitcoin in a variety of ways - e.g., legal fund, VC, etc.

Just considering the current float of 11 million or so and the fact that the actual float is probably less than half that, I really would not be shocked at any price this year between what we are at currently and even $1000. I don't care so much about the price, but it is still a very interesting thing to consider as we are still trying to understand what this is...

How do you equate transaction volume to hoarding? I'm not saying people are not putting coins in paper wallets, but "hoarding" sounds awfully negative.

Now, even if 90% of coins were hoarded, what would it do?
The hoarders wouldn't see any value as they would be holding, right?
The 8 decimal places (100 million bits per BTC) would make it such that all transactions could still easily take place.
Eventually, some stability would be reached in the price as the volume of full BTC trades (as opposed to fractional trades) would go down, no?

The only thing that hoarding does is add value by decreasing circulating float. It doesn't seem to decrease the efficacy of what BTC is. Actually, it just attracts more people.

I just think too much worry is placed on the hoarding scenario.

IAS

So, would rising transactions but on less volume be a sign of "hoarding"?

I'm a bit confused by your question. Where did I predict anything? Me not being shocked by a huge price range possibility?

Yes, I am supposing a lot, but aren't we all? And, I'm doing it in a sense of querying, searching and such. We don't know what it is we are dealing with and hence a lot of what I said. But I am not trying to say I know.

edit - to answer your question. If I see more transactions with decreasing volume, I would think that day to day transactions of BTC is taking place and that people see the current phase of price formation as an opportunity to collect, since we are seeing most sells met with buys (limiting downside). (So yes, people are collecting coins). Also, as others mentioned, perhaps early adopters, by their very nature and caring, don't want to sell into downward price movement so we have a huge volume of users holding coins on our side. Probably a relatively rare situation in "markets", where things are mostly just about money.

First, to be fair, you should probably quote exactly what it is your are questioning me about.

Now, my basis:

Listening to The Daily Bitcoin show, quite a few times now they have mentioned how donations using BTC is a very big use of it in general. And, they said it is growing (on their show). I know from my own habits, that for some reason, it feels good to tip using BTC. I'm not basing my statement on me, but adding weight to what they said on TDB show.

Daily purchases going up is all but certain. Taken from: http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-05-16/peter-thiel-gets-bitcoin-bug
"Back in March I noted that the company was putting up mind-boggling growth rate numbers.  Incredibly, the tremendous growth rate continues as they added another 1,900 merchants in April and are currently signing up around 100 additional merchants a day."

Now, how else am I to interpret 100 new customers a day being added? I think it is pretty clear that business using BTC is increasing.

BTC as a currency is certainly being neglected by a lot of people, most notably it's speculators. But, it is also seen as a store of value, albeit a risky one (I know, ironic). I think many of us feel it's use as a currency is a given as the benefits, the TREMENDOUS benefits, are overwhelming. So, to me, it is matter of fact.

Lastly, you say I'm enthusiastic about BTC. Yes I am, but that is such an underwhelming statement to make considering what I really see happening.  
Honestly, what BTC is and once you factor in the underlying technology and it's uses, to say this is a huge thing is not enough imo. It is a Black Swan, right before our eyes and it certainly appears to be anti-fragile as well. (see my sig). The only worry I do have though is regulation/government. But my bet is they are hoping to co-opt BTC and not so much slow it down. (Oh, I can't recall right now what SR is...)

IAS

Coinseeker, I'm not trying to pick on you, but how can two posts, two posts apart no less, contain the following:

Post 1 - I'm a short term bear, long term bull.

Post 2 - In the end, I still think Bitcoin will die or at least be marginalized to black market nothingness.

As I brought to your attention before, and as others have brought up, something doesn't make in the picture you are trying to portray (about yourself).
And to boot, after you are questioned on your quoted comments, you make statements like "I'm too smart for you son.  Please go back to the kiddie table and stop trying to pick a fight where there currently isn't one."

Can you see the problem here?

IAS

Some people are probably out of the "game" but I'm sure most are finding new accounts. Any ideas or numbers here (for other exchanges)?

And here in Germany bitcoin.de's price is down .10 from yesterdays! That is what happens with low volume (1400 today so far) and low float (3800 right now).

I can only hope for cheap coins...

I think people are with families on the holidays, at least most people. (Maybe not the geeks...)

Welcome back the Coinseeker that we have been waiting on.   

Bitcoin is super fast, isn't that the point? I think you meant the confirmations? Yeah, they need to work on speeding that up and there is a work a round using a "trusted" buyer system. Sounds like Ripple, but with a money that they don't need to give away to be accepted. ehehe

Complicated - Well, considering it is pretty new, I'd say that is debatable. The VC money coming in will address this. Nothing shocking here. I remember the internet pre Netscape Navigator - THAT WAS COMPLICATED and look where it ended up. We are doing fine, but of course things need to be improved upon.

You are criticizing a very new technology that is still getting the bugs worked out and all the while is worth over 1.5 or so Billion dollars. Not bad. Imagine if it wasn't "complicated" where we'd be at. 


Patience Grasshopper, patience...

Actually, he does understand all that. He is here to spread FUD. You can see his alter ego's quite transparently. He is just trying to bring fear into the BTC equation.

I only reply to bring some as-semblance of balance to those reading his posts - so as they know they are FUD. We all do a pretty good job of that with Coinseeker.

I think Human history (and those that control it) have give people the idea that we, humans, are inherently bad. That is false, but when you control the past and present, you have a way of effecting the future. But, it does appear we are coming out of that mindset. This learning takes some time. 

The regulation part is just terrible - in some ways it does protect us but clearly in other ways it imprisons us (and perhaps that is the idea.) Just look at how much money it costs to get involved in money transmitting/trading - by just the cost it excludes small companies (who often bring innovation). Look at large companies involved in the drug trade - HSBC (8 billion laundered?), Wachovia (100's of Billions laundered), CIA - - it is clear regulation is not protecting many people but the criminals themselves. Sort of like being trapped in a matrix within a matrix. But again, we are coming out of it...

Well, we might have some rough days ahead but I would say the order book won't tell the whole story. I'm sure vested interests have buy programs to limit downside. If not, with BTC's growth, we can imagine buyers would surface pretty quickly. Long term picture here and perhaps we shouldn't worry too much about the short term.

I expect more "attacks" on funding mechanisms in a regulated centric way. But that will definitely fail as properly regulated (larger firms like Bitinstant and such) are or will fill those voids. It will become a PR war, throwing around words like "money laundering" and "terrorism" but we have HSBC (8 billion in drug money laundering) and Wachova (100's of billions in laundered drug money) on "our" side.  

BTC was really designed for what is coming as were the people supporting it, at least in part...

But if you argue adoption you are essentially arguing that companies of all sizes, as well as people, don't want to save lots of money. I just don't see that being a possibility here.
BTC can and will save lots of money to everyone involved. That is why it will succeed. I wouldn't worry to much about thinking "Will people use it?". They will be enticed to use it
in a variety of ways. Look at the Bitcoin store that offers electronics at prices lower than Amazon. What does that make Amazon think? Other retailers?

Our worry is governments/banks pretending to be regulators. That is why we must play our hand right and not blindly say "yes" to anything that gives us acceptance. We are in a position of power as the current system looks like it might be failing...

Don't confuse being right via guessing, with being right for the correct reasons. eheheh

I think things are a bit more complicated than any of us can understand to be honest.
Sit back and enjoy the ride, however slow or volatile it may be...

How much of an effect can shorting coins on bitfinex have to the price on Gox though? I would say none. (Unless the coins are "physically" borrowed and then sold on Gox.)
If you want to drop the price of BTC's on the Net, you better try to do so on the biggest exchange...

IAS

My bad, I thought the "eheheh" was enough to show I was playing with you. Just having fun...

Ever been to court and have a prosecutor read their "recommended sentencing"? I thought I was in the wrong court!
Seriously, they speak like they get training from a corrupt government - oh wait...

Good point you brought up and it crossed my mind. They are trying to propagandize something to be much larger than it probably was. Amazing, HSBC can admit to Laundering 8 billion in drug cartel money, Wachova can do 100's of Billions, and nothing happens to neither. The good thing is that most people know that now and it will probably effect what we are more than likely about to go, or get pulled into...

Thanks for the link. I like how he starts off - "This might be the biggest international money laundering case..."   NO - HSBC 8 billion and Wachovia 100's of billions.

And he went on to say "To the contrary, mobile and internet based financial technologies, including virtual currencies, have great promise to empower consumers, to encourage the development of innovative financial products and expand access to financial services. In fact FinCen issued guidance in March 2013 to bring clarity and regulatory certainty to businesses and individuals...."

" Those offering virtual currencies must comply with these regulatory requirements and if they do so they have nothing to fear..."

Come on. Stick to your FUD and stop bringing discordance to the forum. Did you sell those XRP's for that outrageous price you were asking btw?  

I guess laws to keep us "under control" to an extent. And when you watch the news all the bad in the world rarely, if ever, seems to be where you live. Notice that? I mean it usually isn't even in your country. It is like programming to pass ridiculous laws... but it is starting to fail. 

People are waking up, albeit slowly in the States...

When we treat other people as "competitors" then stealing and such when times get tough is a predictable outcome. But we have known no other form of government and economics. We are taught in the schools that Darwin was right, when nature shows us cooperation is right. (Even with Lions hunting prey, Nature is mostly a brilliant example of cooperation).

So, you can express your examples till the cows come home, but your (our) operating system is an artificially created one. See, we don't know what human nature truly is if we watch TV, experience wars, etc. because we have been programmed from an early age to believe the BS they have been feeding us.

There are examples of peoples in the world (e.g. - Kogi) who are quite peaceful and retreat in the face of fighting (they did). But they don't follow our culture. And as this sick operating system is replaced by a more cooperative one, peoples will look back at this time and speak with certainty of how wrong we were about "people are inherently evil".

Again, you don't know that. You are speaking like recent history is the proof of what human behavior is.

We have been led by the least among us. We have been led with money in mind and not compassion. Change the variables of the equation we currently live in, and you would not feel nor believe what you do.

Our educational system has been dumbing us down with Prussian "education" since the 1800's. Taking away and killing our creativity and curiosity.

Do the real research and you will see we have manipulated to feel and believe what we currently do.

But welcome to the apocalypse - the truth is being unveiled...

You believe your sick dream and let those peaceful of us LIVE ours.

Apocalypse means unveiling or uncovering. It doesn't mean destruction. Get over what they have been telling you, scaring you with. It is their ending, their way of business, not ours.

If things get tough I will act accordingly (probably, hard to really know), but right now we have a choice. Life isn't hypothetical, it is, is.

Again, you go an believe your reality and let us believe ours. Enough said...

I'll take ErisDircordias answer

If you want to submit to a central authority dictating how to live different aspects of your life for whatever reason (maybe you feel insecure about your own sense of judgement, are afraid of deviating from norms because of ostracism or just don't like to take responsibility) that's your choice. but PLEASE for the love of everything that is dear to you: let those who don't want a life like that be FREE to not join your game. As it turns out there's a big chance that the next major inventions and technological improvements will come exactly from these people.

And for the first time ever, that I have seen anyway,

MtGox - $130.03
Bitstamp - $130.53

From this day forward MtGox shall be known as "Magic of the gathering exchange" 

And yet, as I write this, MtGox is higher again.

Very interesting...

That scared me too. I won't bother checking the price.

Really, Bitstamp was more all of March than MtGox? Interesting. I guess now it is more meaningful due to the DHS thing...

The thinking is that since people can't easily withdraw funds, they will buy Bitcoins and then just transfer them off (and maybe sell them at another exchange).

But that last point doesn't seem to be happening judging by the price since the news (selling part, buying part has happened I'd say).

I think most of the guys here believe in what BTC is and what it represents. I just see continued buying pressure coming from many, no matter the price. Of course if you have thousands of shares, that might not be true. In that case I'd be working on PR, before the fiat currency (USD, Euro, etc.) collapse. In general, instead of putting extra money into a bank account with a 1% interest rate (which is losing buying power), just put a little here and there back into BTC.

Basically, we need to remind people of this opportunity and keep tabs.

I recommend writing down the following:
Date of recommendation for BTC
Name of person recommended to
Price of BTC on that day.

Then, every year or huge increase after that, you must remind these people (with an adjusted "profit" amount (I quote it, because it's much much more than profit, it's a revolution)...

Nice call from May 24th Its about sharing,
Its about sharing

 

Time to build up funds if we do break support, try to best "guess" the next bottom and build on your position.
There is just too much happening with BTC to run away. Great buying opportunity considering support (technically & somewhat fundamentally) has been building.
Considering this was a manipulative weekend sell that initiated things, should be an interesting week. Do those VC's and such that are buying into and around Bitcoin, bully up and support it? My guess is yes, but who knows.

I wouldn't look at it like that. It is Sunday and I'm sure a lot of auto sells are being triggered.
We will see what we got this week. And if that isn't much, time to reload for better prices.  
I can imagine how you old timers feel - totally unfazed by this. Nice feeling...

You forgot one thing. They did it in the middle of the night on a WEEKEND.

Great test...

We are sitting nicely on support but I don't like the bottom of big rid candles to define support. Hopefully we have a high volume selloff tomorrow and come back up to form a nice hammer.

5am - Who is up then?
11am - Got me there. But still, Sunday and most volume is from American trades (e.g. - Here in Germany we are at 1,200 on bitcoin.de)...

No, but to put a large sell order in on a weekend, at 5am is either manipulation or stupidity regarding the price you will get.
I didn't rule out the latter. But this is a speculation forum. 

Well said.

I'm a bit later to the game. Started on board at 59 Euro, though I tried buying long before that but there were just no places easily accessible here in Germany.
Anyway, after experiencing the recent bubble, I am now in a place of mostly calm when dips happen. I know enough about BTC to know that if the price
crashed I would load up (in the absence of terrible news anyway.)

 

Only risk what you can lose. Then, you are always fine.

And, think about a vacation, you get experience, some pics, souvenirs, etc. It isn't like buying a big item you can show people.
To me, the experience of Bitcoin has been more fun than most vacations.
It has been worth it thus far just based on the experience.
The rest is a bonus. 

I don't deny what you say happens (and I promise to buy more BTC's then ;-)
But, even though we may have broken and uptrend line, we are still sitting nicely on the support we have created since the first week of this month. Stranger things have happened.

Rampion - I hate to say it, but I am a bull. Maybe that is the wrong word though. I don't like labeling myself as anything, but I'm in this long term. Even if the price shot up, I want to remain a part of the biggest social experiment in the history of the world and not trade in and out of it.

That said, with my spending account I pre-ordered a Butterfly Labs Jalapeno today. I just thought in case the price drops I should spend my small reserve of coins, after all that is what they are for.
I know I may not even get the rig this year and when I do get it, it won't be able to mine anything but my point is to support the network in my own way. If it means just doing some of the transactions for .0001 BTC, then so be it. But in 15 years as my 5 BTC's are paying for my daughters college education I will also tell her I was helping a cause. And with some profit, as many of you will do, I will apply them to a greater good (outside my house!).

Hmmm, do I do the 7GH upgrade for $100 or hope that a firmware download is made available? Guess it won't matter come December/Jan or whenever it comes.

Rock on...

When "the others" (masses) start finding out, you will be asking about the $1000 wall, then the $10,000 wall. But we will be talking mBTC long before that - perhaps this year. 

I TOTALLY don't expect to break even. Not even close. I am getting it as a tea warmer and novelty device (but mostly to do my small part for the network).

Actually, I get the feeling we are going to see some Miners come out that blows our socks off. Perhaps they will be Chinese clones or the like, but I think by end of this year, 100 GH units will be not as uncommon as you might think.

I sold my Commodore 64 a while ago and wish I still had it for memories sake. So, I won't make the same mistake twice. And who knows, I might not even ever use the Jalapeno. Just sell it on Ebay in 10 years (or whenever BTC hits $10,000 each) for a lot. ehehhe

I can see your point and somewhat agree with you. The thing is, the Jalapeno's are small and don't use much energy (and are relatively quiet).

I won't look back years later and see how much it was worth in "current" BTC's as it was from my spending wallet.

That said, I certainly hope I didn't in a sense hurt the BTC community by supporting what many question to be a fraudulent company. But they certainly are shipping some units lately....

We have to consider news, at some point, from a large firm like Paypal or the like (acting as a funding mechanism) that will make any "current state" of things, explode on a dime.
We are taking part in the largest social experiment ever. Many shocking things will come with it.

That said, I feel what you are saying, but one never really knows when the direction will turn. Looking at past action, you would always do well to hold (unless you can call those tops and bottoms like a pro - but do you want to get caught with your pants down considering what we are talking about with BTC?)

It depends, do you want to exit on sideways movement and pay capital gains AND maybe see it go up and not down? And, it already went down hard - you are betting the correction is NOT over. We don't know.
It sure may go down, it is like we are between movements, but do you want to chance it?

The good thing is that a great announcement is innevitable and the longer we sit (moving sideways) the better we are.
Of course a bad announcement may come, but we've withstood a few hard ones fine. But another Cyprus probably means another run up and there are a lot more Cyprus' out there than DHS'...
We got guidance from the government and watching the news and researching shows that our economic system is NOT looking good. See Ireland, Greece, Italy, Spain, Japan, etc.

I'm following Gox like the rest of you, but we all know we can't give it the same importance since the exodus, that we once did. (e.g. - Those Bid Ask sums have not "made sense" recently due to a few reasons brought up here).

Anyone know the bid ask on the other exchanges, or maybe an overall average?

When one starts quoting from movies as proof, that is a bull signal. And I LOVED MATRIX! 

eheheh, as I said, I like the Matrix and all that it represents.

Regarding no news and hype diminishing. Well, two points, if the volume dries up and the price drops I think many of us will just buy more shares at lower prices.
Point two - We are seeing infrastructure for BTC being built now. The VC money is only speeding things up. So, we are approaching a point where we don't or won't need
hype any more. We will be saving people money on transactions for starters. This is where the fun will begin.

And that is why BTC is so exciting, in part anyway. We are in so many markets. We are a store of value, like a commodity in a way. We are a currency, a payment system (of sorts), etc.
More reason to be careful with making too big of an exit. Even when one considers fear based news like "The FED is looking into BTC..."

Yeah, MtGox is still king, but I was getting at the outflow of money confusing the data, in particular over the last two or three weeks, or so.

Hey there, thanks for the link. Bookmarked and following, and looking for that > 1 ratio  
Any more info on the charts or things to keep an eye out on? I'm still in the learning phase.

Appreciated,
IAS

edit - can you clarify what you do, as I see it already is a ratio (2nd chart on left)

It says it is an ask/bid ratio (not bid/ask ratio), so I'm confused a bit as to what I am looking for.
Can you walk me through an example, please? 

I'm glad you asked the initial question as it wasn't clear to me either.

TA is great, I use it all the time, but it does not follow rules like some are making it out to be. That might be more true in BTC as the programs are not fully in effect and even more so, BTC does not exactly fall under the typical stock, commodity, currency, etc. paradigm.

I think what TA does show in BTC is sentiment and habit, but I'm no expert. Just having some fun...  

And the ironic thing is his handle. 

No idea but thanks for the link. I looked at the wiki and it is based on Bitcoins blockchain, so it seems like it would be similar to NMC.

I still don't know why NMC is not going anywhere with their decentralized DNS???
I think the internet is quite reactionary and not necessarily proactive when it comes to politically bent things. e.g. - It took Napster getting owned to bring about torrent. (I'm not complaining).

Resolve where? That is the problem. But, all they need to do is create a plugin for chrome and firefox and that solves the problem to an extent.
Doesn't do much for mom and pop but the internet revolution was created by techies and it took capitalistic greed like AOL to get people to use it...

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=chaikin+money+flow


http://stockcharts.com/school/doku.php?id=chart_school:technical_indicators:chaikin_money_flow

Developed by Marc Chaikin, Chaikin Money Flow measures the amount of Money Flow Volume over a specific period. Money Flow Volume forms the basis for the Accumulation Distribution Line. Instead of a cumulative total of Money Flow Volume, Chaikin Money Flow simply sums Money Flow Volume for a specific look-back period, typically 20 or 21 days. The resulting indicator fluctuates above/below the zero line just like an oscillator. Chartists weigh the balance of buying or selling pressure with the absolute level of Chaikin Money Flow. Chartists can also look for crosses above or below the zero line to identify changes on money flow.

Interpretation

Chaikin Money Flow (CMF) is an oscillator that fluctuates between -1 and +1. Rarely, if ever, will the indicator reach these extremes. It would take 20 consecutive closes on the high (low) for 20-day Chaikin Money Flow to reach +1 (-1). Typically, this oscillator fluctuates between -.50 and +.50 with zero as the centerline.

Chaikin Money Flow measures buying and selling pressure for a given period of time. A move into positive territory indicates buying pressure, while a move into negative territory indicates selling pressure. Chartists can use the absolute value of Chaikin Money Flow to confirm or question the price action of the underlying. Positive CMF would confirm an uptrend, but negative CMF would call into question the strength behind an uptrend. The reverse holds true for downtrends.

Buying/Selling Pressure

Chaikin Money Flow can be used to define a general buying or selling bias simply with positive or negative values. The indicator oscillates above/below the zero line. Generally, buying pressure is stronger when the indicator is positive and selling pressure is stronger when the indicator is negative.

While this zero line cross seems simple enough, the reality is much choppier. Chaikin Money Flow sometimes only briefly crosses the zero line with a move that turns the indicator barely positive or negative. There is no follow through and this zero line cross ends up becoming a whipsaw (bad signal). Chartists can filter these signals with buffers by setting the bullish threshold a little above zero (+.05) and the bearish threshold a little below zero (-.05). These thresholds will not entirely eliminate bad signals, but can help reduce whipsaws and filter out weaker signals.

Calculation Quirk

The Money Flow Multiplier in Chaikin Money Flow focuses on the level of the close relative to the high-low range for a given period (day, week, month). With this formula, a security could gap down and close significantly lower, but the Money Flow Multiplier would rise if the close were above the midpoint of the high-low range. The chart below shows Clorox (CLX) with a big gap down and a close near the top of the day's high-low range. Even though the stock closed sharply lower on high volume, Chaikin Money Flow rose because the Money Flow Multiplier was positive and volume was well above average. Ignoring the change from close-to-close means that Chaikin Money Flow can sometimes disconnect with price.

Conclusions

Chaikin Money Flow is an oscillator that measures buying and selling pressure over a set period of time. At its most basic, money flow favors the bulls when CMF is positive and the bears when negative. Chartists looking for quicker money flow shifts can look for bullish and bearish divergences. Be careful though. Selling pressure still has the edge in negative territory, even when there is a bullish divergence. This bullish divergence simply shows less selling pressure. It takes a move into positive territory to indicate actual buying pressure. As an money flow oscillator, CMF can be used in conjunction with pure price oscillators, such as MACD or RSI. As with all indicators, Chaikin Money Flow should not be used as a stand-alone indicator. Marc Chaikin also developed the Accumulation Distribution Line and the Chaikin Oscillator.

Every time I see that image, it reminds me of this:

Nikkei down 4%. Man, is that like down over 20% or so in two weeks?

http://www.bloomberg.com/markets/stocks/world-indexes/

Thanks, I didn't know about the European info (odd considering I'm in Germany).
I have heard from a few different sources (reliable with other stock market top calls) that the DOW will hit 16000 or so max and then POP goes the weasel. That will also coincide with a fall of the dollar.
Not saying I believe that, but I am watching for that...

I understand that quite well. I prefer to just call it inflation, soon to be hyperinflation if they keep doing what they are doing. They are printing 85 billion new dollars every month. The banks that receive this are investing some of those $$$ in the stock market. The Fed I believe has as much as said that they are involved in asset (stock market) allocation. People who have money in the bank, hurt by artificially low interest rates are also putting money in the stock market. So, we have a sideways to falling economy, decreasing productivity, very high unemployment rates, people working 2 or more jobs and often being completely overqualified for what they are doing = A rising stock market. I guess most folks believe CNN, FOX, etc.

Anyway, the thing that is keeping things going is that people believe in the money. Money is essentially faith, we are seeing that with BTC. Intriniscally it has value for a few reasons, most notably its cryptographic security imo. Once people stop believing in the dollar, once they can't keep printing dollars to make the stock market go up (e.g. - worsening economy, rates that need to rise) = POP goes the weasel.

My point with the 16,000 level in the DOW was that, that is around when their game ends, regardless of printing more money or not.

I'm not sure about what you say on two levels:


1 - IF stocks go up intrinsically, why don't we see the same level of inflation with goods and services in general?
2 - And what is speculative about the Fed buying stocks with printed money? (I can see people buying stocks as being speculative but when their bank deposit interest rate is 1%, they are just moving money but yes that is speculation). What the Fed is doing seems to be funneling the "inflation".

I did say it has value intrinsically and I did say for a few reasons (and I am VERY familiar with Keisser and like the guy). I am saying, you still need faith for a money to work. Whether or not you see it as primary or secondary is just semantics.
If BTC was scarce but not secure (cryptographically), it wouldn't matter much, now would it? Bitcoin isn't anonymous. I would say it is pseudoanonymous (experts seem to agree here). You really have to know what you are doing to make it anonymous. I can imagine that if BTC follows money regulations, they will probably go after those trying to be completely anonymous. Not saying I like that, but can't imagine them not at least trying, just like they have been with torrent for years (and failing of course).

And by faith, that is not a bad thing. That is the center of money, that is what keeps it going. We all know BTC is valuable intrinsically, but the number of people I have to explain to what money is (that have lots of it, use it, etc.) just shows you people have faith in it. They don't understand it. They really have no idea on basic things like fractional reserve banking and such.

I wonder if he is talking about other uses for a new blockchain or the existing blockchain. If it is a new blockchain, then we are talking about things like namecoin (decentralized dns), decentralized voting, online ownership ledger, etc. If he is talking about the bitcoin blockchain, then that is interesting as it starts to build upon bitcoins blockchain with other services. I'd love to hear more about that. And don't get me wrong,
either of the preceding are transcending technologically. We are at a special place guys in our history. I only wish more could see it.

Behold the anti-fragile black swan (see my sig)...

+1
And I see coinseeker was at the heart of this. 

Is this from using your psychic powers or are you basing this on anything?  

If the whales have been sellers and not buyers over the last two weeks, then how did we go up roughly $10 and then back down to where we are now? And on relatively low volume? Not bad.
I'm not saying you are wrong, but if big sellers in the last two weeks saw us rise up $10 and then back down, doesn't that tell us something else? The market depth might be more manipulation, hard to know.

I don't deny we might head lower. I'm not buying at this level. My biggest concern is the government coming after us openly, not us "dipping" down.
What Bitcoin needs is NO PRICE MOVEMENT, just like we have basically been doing. If we get up there in price it might really come back to bite us with all the attention.
If a price rise happens as currencies are collapsing then we have a chance, as it becomes a store of value and people will fight to keep there money.
I'd say we've almost grown too quick till now, lately. A dip, as much as I don't want it, might be the best thing for us to stay below the radar for a while, but I think the buying will start heavy
at levels much below current levels.

What is stopping us right now? I think it is clear, the one thing people are worried about is the government stepping in and stopping us. The regulatory thing can be dealt with, in many ways.
IF we weren't worried about the government, where would we be right now price wise? Bitcoin is probably already seen as potentially an incredible store of wealth but the uncertainty with the government
is just a big risk for people. On so many levels (payment system, currency, store of worth, etc.) BTC can justify a much much higher price. If we weren't worried about the government this train would have left the station. We'd be over $1000 right now and worth it. Look at currencies around the world and their
problem. Really, this is an exciting place to be. Taking part in the largest social experiment the world has ever known is huge. Maybe that makes BTC sound cheap as it will live on in many forms regardless
of what the government does, so the experimental part is the immediate part.

I'm too afraid to sell the relatively few coins I have in the hopes of buying in later, even though at a much lower price. Perhaps I'm just lazy (paper wallet).  

I don't plan on selling for a few years, quite a few, so hopefully we don't sink to low. But, if we hit that 50-70 area, I might start accumulating more...

I enjoy reading your posts Rampion. You were talking about this the other day and I think I was split. There is a part of me that just doesn't want to trade out of something I believe in. Do you know what I mean?
But on the other hand, I'm thinking "Hey, maybe I can get more of what I believe in". And then there is the Angel over my shoulder saying "Don't be greedy, if BTC is successful, you will only need one." 

But realistically, I feel we go lower. The unknown variable is some good news coming out when we least expect it. If that happens on a down move after exiting a position, it creates a... headache. ehehehhe
I guess then, what you did, selling a smaller percentage (20% was it?) is reasonable. I'm debating that now...

And how about Coinseeker? Man, I really think it is two alter egos. Right now he is down. I don't know what to say. eheeheh
Not talking smack bro, just enjoying the diversity of the forum. We are sort of a soap opera here.

Anyway, I promise you this, if we do go substantially lower, say the 50 Euro level (no, not dollar level, there I would be taking loans out ;-), I will try to save every penny I can and buy more BTC... Because I believe in it...

If you really believe in BTC, perhaps a few dollars (or many) here and there doesn't really matter. When you see an opportunity to pick up a few (7.5k - I'm about 7.499 jealous) you do it.
I'm holding for the future, so I can imagine a guy with money, just buys it and says "I'll check again in 5 years."

Honestly, for some reason I was thinking John Belushi from Animal House!     (Man I loved that guy)
But now that you mention it, I LOL'd. thx...