Bitcoin
 

Has anyone invested in or holds Bitcoins?

How do they work exactly? Can you exchange them for more traditional imaginary currencies like UKP or USD?

It sounds like it could be a good thing. Or a bad thing. It could be the one world currency spoken of in Revelations.
And coupled with the US moving its embassy to Jerusalem, that could herald the building of the Third Temple. Or maybe the Third Temple already exists in an a research facility in Jerusalem, and that an AI will emerge that promises to solve all our conflicts and problems, and we worship it, but it turns out the AI is actually the antichrist.

But I digress. Can I buy a coffee with Bitcoin at the local Starbucks?
If a single Bitcoin is worth $15,000, how do you get your change?

Re: Bitcoin
 

It's this one.

Re: Bitcoin
 

Yes. I hold a fraction of a bitcoin as well as some litecoin and ethereum. You buy them (or fractions of them) using $, watch them rise and fall and then hope that you sell them off for $ before you lose everything. Some websites accept them as payment and you would pay something like 0.000001 bitcoin for a cup of coffee. coinbase.com is a very user friendly and supposedly trustworthy site.

I'm sure this goes without saying, but only invest what you can afford to lose. It's a fool's game/it's a genius's game. Not sure which.

Re: Bitcoin
 

Won't take long for it to all come crashing down.

Somebody has already stolen $70mil worth from a bitcoin site and they haven't got the slightest clue how, nor what to do - https://www.wsj.com/articles/million...ist-1512625176

Re: Bitcoin
 

Bitcoin is a highly volatile cryptocurrency that makes up an enormous speculative bubble. It may have some potential, but the potential that can be quantified with current technology is far less than the current market capitalisation.

Some people are going to get very rich from Bitcoin, and a few already have. But not the people posting on unrelated websites who know almost nothing about finance, and nothing at all about blockchain technology or cryptography.

Re: Bitcoin
 

I recently read an article about bitcoin ATM machines in England where you can deposit 'bank notes' and invest in bitcoin. One shop/store actually closed while a customer deposited a few thousand pounds, implying 'dodgy' dealings were going on!

Re: Bitcoin
 

Can't be any more dodgy than the Rothschilds and the Federal Reserve.

Re: Bitcoin
 

Oh. I'm sorry, for some reason I'd forgotten that you're a crazy conspiracy theorist.

Sure, go ahead and put your money in bitcoin. I'm sure it's safer and less volatile than denominated in a currency backed by one of those scary national governments, despite you knowing nothing about how cryptocurrency works.

Re: Bitcoin
 

What's the conspiracy? The Rothschilds are international bankers of enormous wealth. The Fed is a private group of bankers. That's not a conspiracy. That's fact.

Now there is a theory that the CIA is behind Bitcoin. I haven't read too much about it yet.
They certainly had seed money in Google.

Re: Bitcoin
 

Except that's obviously not what you said. You used the phrasing, "Can't be any more dodgy than..." I realise that you were deliberately vague and uninformative.

And no, I won't respond further.

Re: Bitcoin
 

I have about a third of a bitcoin, I got it back in 2013 and actually forgot about it until January of this year.

I'm going to hold out til the end of Q1 2018 to see where the price is at before selling it. At the end of the day - people keep saying it's useless and it's going to crash and burn in a hot, steaming pile of shit but it continues to defy the odds. If I lose my investment it's not the end of the world, it wasn't a significant sum when I got it anyway.

If it continues to rise like it has been then I'll be paying my car off with it. I certainly wouldn't invest now though with the price as high as it is and how volatile it's been.

Re: Bitcoin
 

Don't know how people can be taken in by an imaginary currency. I know most banks and investment companies take their customers for a ride with real money, but there is a limit. Much rather have the folding stuff in hand than something on a computer screen.

Re: Bitcoin
 

At the end of the day, it's all imaginary.
People trade in things that are perceived to be valuable. People have traded shells, tulips, beads. Reading about the Stanley/Livingstone's adventures, they traded with the locals using copper wire, bales of cloth and beads.

Humans decided gold was valuable and our paper currency was based off of that.
In theory, you should be able to go into your bank with your 20 pound promissory note and redeem it for gold.

And the bankers found out they can issue X number of paper notes more than they have actual gold to cover the debt. They're literally creating "money" out of nothing - because experience shows that not everyone will come in and claim their gold at one time.

Of course, if you issue too many paper notes and don't have the gold to back them in your reserves, you devalue the currency and can lead to hyperinflation.

Re: Bitcoin
 

Tulips.

Re: Bitcoin
 

South Sea Company may be a better investment.