I was speaking of the people who trust Pirate, not Pirate's motivations. As to his motivations, I think he had the ability to troll a still very volatile market, and used it for the lulz.
Fair enough. The lulz were probably a secondary benefit. Note how he said he wanted to make a point - broadcasting his moves with a small lead time would've allowed some major profit to be taken, and publicly warning to stop buying should've also resulted in at least a slowing of bids. Instead, strong buying continued.
The point Pirate made was that the Bitcoin market is much larger than the vocal minority suspects, and if that majority were to continue unabated, another confidence-destroying bubble would've formed. To conclude: without Pirate and other highly capitalized participants acting as a brake on speculative appreciation, the Bitcoin system would quickly become wildly unstable to a point where it is unusable for any but gamblers; not conducive to longevity.
Keep in mind that I am not advocating blind, wholesale trust in Pirate - it is just as important to regularly question the course he's charted. Eternal vigilance...
If you are customer of a bank that committed a fraud then your not complicit to that fraud. People can sell large amounts of coins whenever they want but not do so in a way of trying to manipulate the market by telling other regular traders you are going to lower the price and encouraging them to sell also.
Very true. At the same time, I have a lot of difficulty believing any court would absolve such a small cadre of participants from responsibility. This is not your traditional financial institution with thousands of clients. How many are involved? Maybe a couple of hundred at most? With that small of a group which is part of such a tightly-knit community, it would be nearly impossible to prove that any are at more than arm's length from the operation.
I just realized that if Pirate's BTC pool continues to grow by a modest 4% per week he'll have gathered all the available BTC (about 11 million) within about two years from now.
Yyyyyup! It can last quite a while, but interest rates will decline over the duration. The more the Bitcoin economy grows, the harder it will be to keep acquiring a high percentage of the supply. Enjoy it while it's here!
For those whom are still unbelievers: there are two active, opposing flows at all times. Managing a large fund is not manipulation, but navigation. Yes, the magnitude of the fund may cause disruption from time to time, but if run responsibly, it can have a highly positive effect.
In
this video, the building could be seen as representing the entire Bitcoin economy, and the counter-balancing damper as FPS&T. And remember: BS&T is a group effort composed of
multiple individuals' assets, not just Pirate's - he just directs/steers it.
