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Topic: Bitcoin: The Digital Kill Switch - page 2. (Read 55236 times)

newbie
Activity: 28
Merit: 0
September 04, 2013, 11:22:46 AM
Hi, OP, I have a question for you:

If Bitcoin was designed with malevolence in its forethought, and the plan is to someday aggregate 60% into someone's hands, then why would American lawmakers threaten the overall plan by trying to destroy Bitcoin via attacks on Dwolla and the largest trading network Mt. Gox?  Surely, they would appear to support Bitcoin, and encourage everyone to get involved, because that would only accellerate their plan.

Trying to steal the money at this early stage of their evil plan would derail trust in Bitcoin, and thus cause harm to their overall plan to one day seize total control of the system as they have everything else.

Maybe you will say that attacking Dwolla and Mt. Gox only solidifies the idea that Bitcoin is about freedom (since by now the American government has shown itself not to desire freedom in how they've erased it from America since the Patriot Act came into being) ... and encourage freedom lovers to invest first, paving the way for the slave-minded to join in later, when it's almost too late.  And with most of people's money at that future date then "digitally secured" in the crypto cloud universe, it will be easy for the government, with their new organic computers to crack all encryption and let them steal every last cent in the world all at once.

Is this what you're saying?  Or did I go too far in my understanding of your message?
hero member
Activity: 518
Merit: 521
September 04, 2013, 10:25:05 AM
Good find. Yup. Remember I told you that.

And look at the other angle I mentioned which is LNG exports from USA, and the suppression of the development of gas fields in the China Sea by the meddling USA (pretending to protect the Philippines from China, bullshit!):

http://www.dailywealth.com/2271/us-natural-gas-exports-fuel-world

http://pro1.contrarianprofits.com/135289
(after page loads, click to close the window, when it prompts you, choose Stay On This Page, then you can read the transcript instead of watching the video)

Now you see what the BP nonsense in the Gulf of Mexico was about. It is about them gaining control over the area, so they can do as they damn well please. You know BP is building a gas pipeline across the USA.

Big oil owns Australian natural gas:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324904004578538831952138920.html

Another angle:

http://armstrongeconomics.com/2013/09/04/syria-iran/

Quote
In Iran, the June elections ushered in a political change in the wind. President Hassan Rouhani won the election in Iran with a landslide. He campaigned on trying to get rid of the economic sanctions by engaging with the West. His victory was so impressive among the youth that he won even the very cautious backing of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to move forward and try engage with Western countries...

President Hassan Rouhani is preparing to travel to New York to attend the UN personally this month. This will be a real first for Iran. The US military strikes on Syria seem almost a desperate attempt to stop Rouhani’s diplomacy efforts

> Tuesday, September 3, 2013
> Will The United States Go To War With Syria Over A Natural Gas Pipeline?
> Michael Snyder
> Activist Post
>
> Why has the little nation of Qatar spent 3 billion dollars to support the
> rebels in Syria?  Could it be because Qatar is the largest exporter of
> liquid natural gas in the world and Assad won't let them build a natural
> gas pipeline through Syria?  Of course.  Qatar wants to install a puppet
> regime in Syria that will allow them to build a pipeline which will enable
> them to sell lots and lots of natural gas to Europe.
>
> Why is Saudi Arabia spending huge amounts of money to help the rebels and
> why has Saudi Prince Bandar bin Sultan been "jetting from covert command
> centers near the Syrian front lines to the Élysée Palace in Paris and the
> Kremlin in Moscow, seeking to undermine the Assad regime"?  Well, it turns
> out that Saudi Arabia intends to install their own puppet government in
> Syria which will allow the Saudis to control the flow of energy through
> the region.
>
> On the other side, Russia very much prefers the Assad regime for a whole
> bunch of reasons.  One of those reasons is that Assad is helping to block
> the flow of natural gas out of the Persian Gulf into Europe, thus ensuring
> higher profits for Gazprom.  Now the United States is getting directly
> involved in the conflict.
>
> If the U.S. is successful in getting rid of the Assad regime, it will be
> good for either the Saudis or Qatar (and possibly for both), and it will
> be really bad for Russia.  This is a strategic geopolitical conflict about
> natural resources, religion and money, and it really has nothing to do
> with chemical weapons at all.
>
>
> It has been common knowledge that Qatar has desperately wanted to
> construct a natural gas pipeline that will enable it to get natural gas to
> Europe for a very long time.  The following is an excerpt from an article
> from 2009...
> Qatar has proposed a gas pipeline from the Gulf to Turkey in a sign the
> emirate is considering a further expansion of exports from the world's
> biggest gasfield after it finishes an ambitious programme to more than
> double its capacity to produce liquefied natural gas (LNG)."We are eager
> to have a gas pipeline from Qatar to Turkey," Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al
> Thani, the ruler of Qatar, said last week, following talks with the
> Turkish president Abdullah Gul and the prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan
> in the western Turkish resort town of Bodrum. "We discussed this matter in
> the framework of co-operation in the field of energy. In this regard, a
> working group will be set up that will come up with concrete results in
> the shortest possible time," he said, according to Turkey's Anatolia news
> agency.Other reports in the Turkish press said the two states were
> exploring the possibility of Qatar supplying gas to the strategic Nabucco
> pipeline project, which would transport Central Asian and Middle Eastern
> gas to Europe, bypassing Russia. A Qatar-to-Turkey pipeline might hook up
> with Nabucco at its proposed starting point in eastern Turkey. Last month,
> Mr Erdogan and the prime ministers of four European countries signed a
> transit agreement for Nabucco, clearing the way for a final investment
> decision next year on the EU-backed project to reduce European dependence
> on Russian gas.
> "For this aim, I think a gas pipeline between Turkey and Qatar would solve
> the issue once and for all," Mr Erdogan added, according to reports in
> several newspapers. The reports said two different routes for such a
> pipeline were possible. One would lead from Qatar through Saudi Arabia,
> Kuwait and Iraq to Turkey. The other would go through Saudi Arabia,
> Jordan, Syria and on to Turkey. It was not clear whether the second option
> would be connected to the Pan-Arab pipeline, carrying Egyptian gas through
> Jordan to Syria. That pipeline, which is due to be extended to Turkey, has
> also been proposed as a source of gas for Nabucco.Based on production from
> the massive North Field in the Gulf, Qatar has established a commanding
> position as the world's leading LNG exporter. It is consolidating that
> through a construction programme aimed at increasing its annual LNG
> production capacity to 77 million tonnes by the end of next year, from 31
> million tonnes last year. However, in 2005, the emirate placed a
> moratorium on plans for further development of the North Field in order to
> conduct a reservoir study.As you just read, there were two proposed routes
> for the pipeline. Unfortunately for Qatar, Saudi Arabia said no to the
> first route and Syria said no to the second route.  The following is from
> an absolutely outstanding article in the Guardian...
> In 2009 - the same year former French foreign minister Dumas alleges the
> British began planning operations in Syria - Assad refused to sign a
> proposed agreement with Qatar that would run a pipeline from the latter's
> North field, contiguous with Iran's South Pars field, through Saudi
> Arabia, Jordan, Syria and on to Turkey, with a view to supply European
> markets - albeit crucially bypassing Russia. Assad's rationale was "to
> protect the interests of [his] Russian ally, which is Europe's top
> supplier of natural gas."Instead, the following year, Assad pursued
> negotiations for an alternative $10 billion pipeline plan with Iran,
> across Iraq to Syria, that would also potentially allow Iran to supply gas
> to Europe from its South Pars field shared with Qatar. The Memorandum of
> Understanding (MoU) for the project was signed in July 2012 - just as
> Syria's civil war was spreading to Damascus and Aleppo - and earlier this
> year Iraq signed aframework agreement for construction of the gas
> pipelines.The Iran-Iraq-Syria pipeline plan was a "direct slap in the
> face" to Qatar's plans. No wonder Saudi Prince Bandar bin Sultan, in a
> failed attempt to bribe Russia to switch sides, told President Vladmir
> Putin that "whatever regime comes after" Assad, it will be "completely" in
> Saudi Arabia's hands and will "not sign any agreement allowing any Gulf
> country to transport its gas across Syria to Europe and compete with
> Russian gas exports", according to diplomatic sources. When Putin refused,
> the Prince vowed military action.If Qatar is able to get natural gas
> flowing into Europe, that will be a significant blow to Russia.  So the
> conflict in Syria is actually much more about a pipeline than it is about
> the future of the Syrian people.  In a recent article, Paul McGuire
> summarized things quite nicely...
> The Nabucco Agreement was signed by a handful of European nations and
> Turkey back in 2009. It was an agreement to run a natural gas pipeline
> across Turkey into Austria, bypassing Russia again with Qatar in the mix
> as a supplier to a feeder pipeline via the proposed Arab pipeline from
> Libya to Egypt to Nabucco (is the picture getting clearer?). The problem
> with all of this is that a Russian backed Syria stands in the way.Qatar
> would love to sell its LNG to the EU and the hot Mediterranean markets.
> The problem for Qatar in achieving this is Saudi Arabia. The Saudis have
> already said "NO" to an overland pipe cutting across the Land of Saud. The
> only solution for Qatar if it wants to sell its oil is to cut a deal with
> the U.S.Recently Exxon Mobile and Qatar Petroleum International have made
> a $10 Billion deal that allows Exxon Mobile to sell natural gas through a
> port in Texas to the UK and Mediterranean markets. Qatar stands to make a
> lot of money and the only thing standing in the way of their aspirations
> is Syria.The US plays into this in that it has vast wells of natural gas,
> in fact the largest known supply in the world. There is a reason why
> natural gas prices have been suppressed for so long in the US. This is to
> set the stage for US involvement in the Natural Gas market in Europe while
> smashing the monopoly that the Russians have enjoyed for so long. What
> appears to be a conflict with Syria is really a conflict between the U.S.
> and Russia! The main cities of turmoil and conflict in Syria right now are
> Damascus, Homs, and Aleppo. These are the same cities that the proposed
> gas pipelines happen to run through. Qatar is the biggest financier of the
> Syrian uprising, having spent over $3 billion so far on the conflict. The
> other side of the story is Saudi Arabia, which finances anti-Assad groups
> in Syria. The Saudis do not want to be marginalized by Qatar; thus they
> too want to topple Assad and implant their own puppet government, one that
> would sign off on a pipeline deal and charge Qatar for running their pipes
> through to Nabucco.
> Yes, I know that this is all very complicated.
>
> But no matter how you slice it, there is absolutely no reason for the
> United States to be getting involved in this conflict.
>
> If the U.S. does get involved, we will actually be helping al-Qaeda
> terrorists that behead mothers and their infants...
> Al-Qaeda linked terrorists in Syria have beheaded all 24 Syrian passengers
> traveling from Tartus to Ras al-Ain in northeast of Syria, among them a
> mother and a 40-days old infant.Gunmen from the terrorist Islamic State of
> Iraq and Levant stopped the bus on the road in Talkalakh and killed
> everyone before setting the bus on fire.Is this really who we want to be
> "allied" with?
>
> And of course once we strike Syria, the war could escalate into a
> full-blown conflict very easily.
>
> If you believe that the Obama administration would never send U.S. troops
> into Syria, you are just being naive.  In fact, according to Jack
> Goldsmith, a professor at Harvard Law School, the proposed authorization
> to use military force that has been sent to Congress would leave the door
> wide open for American "boots on the ground"...
> The proposed AUMF focuses on Syrian WMD but is otherwise very broad.  It
> authorizes the President to use any element of the U.S. Armed Forces and
> any method of force.  It does not contain specific limits on targets –
> either in terms of the identity of the targets (e.g. the Syrian
> government, Syrian rebels, Hezbollah, Iran) or the geography of the
> targets.  Its main limit comes on the purposes for which force can be
> used.  Four points are worth making about these purposes.  First, the
> proposed AUMF authorizes the President to use force “in connection with”
> the use of WMD in the Syrian civil war. (It does not limit the President’s
> use force to the territory of Syria, but rather says that the use of force
> must have a connection to the use of WMD in the Syrian conflict.
> Activities outside Syria can and certainly do have a connection to the use
> of WMD in the Syrian civil war.).  Second, the use of force must be
> designed to “prevent or deter the use or proliferation” of WMDs “within,
> to or from Syria” or (broader yet) to “protect the United States and its
> allies and partners against the threat posed by such weapons.”  Third, the
> proposed AUMF gives the President final interpretive authority to
> determine when these criteria are satisfied (“as he determines to be
> necessary and appropriate”).  Fourth, the proposed AUMF contemplates no
> procedural restrictions on the President’s powers (such as a time limit).I
> think this AUMF has much broader implications than Ilya Somin described.
> Some questions for Congress to ponder:(1) Does the proposed AUMF authorize
> the President to take sides in the Syrian Civil War, or to attack Syrian
> rebels associated with al Qaeda, or to remove Assad from power?  Yes, as
> long as the President determines that any of these entities has a (mere)
> connection to the use of WMD in the Syrian civil war, and that the use of
> force against one of them would prevent or deter the use or proliferation
> of WMD within, or to and from, Syria, or protect the U.S. or its allies
> (e.g. Israel) against the (mere) threat posed by those weapons.  It is
> very easy to imagine the President making such determinations with regard
> to Assad or one or more of the rebel groups.
> (2) Does the proposed AUMF authorize the President to use force against
> Iran or Hezbollah, in Iran or Lebanon?  Again, yes, as long as the
> President determines that Iran or Hezbollah has a (mere) a connection to
> the use of WMD in the Syrian civil war, and the use of force against Iran
> or Hezbollah would prevent or deter the use or proliferation of WMD
> within, or to and from, Syria, or protect the U.S. or its allies (e.g.
> Israel) against the (mere) threat posed by those weapons.Would you like to
> send your own son or your own daughter to fight in Syria just so that a
> natural gas pipeline can be built?
>
> What the United States should be doing in this situation is so obvious
> that even the five-year-old grandson of Nancy Pelosi can figure it out...
> I'll tell you this story and then I really do have to go. My five-year-old
> grandson, as I was leaving San Francisco yesterday, he said to me, Mimi,
> my name, Mimi, war with Syria, are you yes war with Syria, no, war with
> Syria. And he's five years old. We're not talking about war; we're talking
> about action. Yes war with Syria, no with war in Syria. I said, 'Well,
> what do you think?' He said, 'I think no war.'Unfortunately, his
> grandmother and most of our other insane "leaders" in Washington D.C. seem
> absolutely determined to take us to war.
>
> In the end, how much American blood will be spilled over a stupid natural
> gas pipeline?
>
> This article first appeared here at the Economic Collapse Blog.  Michael
> Snyder is a writer, speaker and activist who writes and edits his own
> blogs The American Dream and Economic Collapse Blog. Follow him on Twitter
> here.
>
> http://www.activistpost.com/2013/09/is-united-states-going-to-go-to-war.html#more
hero member
Activity: 518
Merit: 521
September 04, 2013, 03:58:42 AM
Precious metals are a private money. They are absolute wealth.

Don't confuse these with the unit-of-account, which will always be something that expands fast enough in supply to allow the economy to grow 5% per annum without transferring the rise in productivity from the investors-at-risk to the savers of gold (buried in a hole or vault).

Also the unit-of-account should be able to pay for the most things (weighted by per capita expenditure) that people need. Thus it should not require a physical meeting to complete a transaction.

Precious metals are what you hold for insurance, i.e. if the unit-of-account system stops functioning. Even then precious metals don't always serve their purpose, because when the system fails, sometimes food is what people need most and no one will accept precious metals. This has happened numerous times during Dark Ages.

This is why I am becoming much more excited about the potential for a digital decentralized currency where the fixed rate of debasement (fixed before launch by the creators) can't be controlled by anyone. And which is anonymous so it can't be taxed. This will destroy the bastards who rely on feeding debt and socialism to the masses, because they have the power to tax and debase.
sr. member
Activity: 280
Merit: 250
August 30, 2013, 02:46:12 PM
Ditto how Microsoft turned Skype from decentralized to centralized.

One word: open source
Hey, that's two words.
hero member
Activity: 518
Merit: 521
August 29, 2013, 06:48:19 PM
Ditto how Microsoft turned Skype from decentralized to centralized.

One word: open source

Differentiate market from source code.

Money is a social institution, i.e. government gets called in when the majority isn't happy. My expectation is there are going to be billions of unhappy people between now and 2033.

Of course I don't know the future for sure.
legendary
Activity: 1764
Merit: 1007
August 29, 2013, 04:55:18 PM
Ditto how Microsoft turned Skype from decentralized to centralized.

One word: open source
legendary
Activity: 1498
Merit: 1000
August 29, 2013, 07:32:10 AM
This is my conspiracy theory slant. I don't necessarily believe there is such a conspiracy. I only present the arguments for everyone to contemplate.

Quote
> You mentioned one that BC might be a government operation because of certain features it has.
> What are those features that point to possible government involvement?

1. The following can be fixed in a new coin.

2. List of Bitcoin features that might imply NSA sponsorship:

a. Mining of new coins ends 2033 (drastically decreasing in 2020s). Mining (which is what makes the coin blockchain ledger decentralized and secure) will then be financed by transaction (tx) fees. But tx fees are optional, thus some miners could offer free tx fees. Thus imagine corporations such as Amazon (Bezos just bought the Washington Post) gaining a huge advantage by offering no tx fees, which they then earn back by getting favors from the government (e.g. tax loopholes, favorable regulation advantages, etc).

b. A cartel with 51% of the mining computational power can control the decentralized coin blockchain ledger. Imagine what a cartel of fascist corporations could do, same as point #a above. To make this worse, the Proof-of-Work (PoW) hash used for mining is 1000x faster on ASICs
(specially design custom IC chips), thus it is becoming dominated by those with big capital. I may have solved this problem. I designed a hash (only in my mind thus far) that (I think) makes ASICs (and game card GPUs) on level playing field with CPUs in our PCs. Thus the majority will always have 51% of the computational power in my coin design.

c. There was no anonymity built into Bitcoin. The coin ledger is a roadmap to/from everyone you've ever transacted FOREVER.

d. Bitcoin's blockchain ledger can't scale to Visa-scale. Thus clearly it won't work as a new currency for the world. Thus it appears to be a tracking device to catch all those liberty-minded individuals, then a non-solution come 2033 when it is time to morph to a new world order currency system. Thus they will just morph Bitcoin to centralized in order to scale it up to Visa-scale and get their digital tracking currency. Ditto how Microsoft turned Skype from decentralized to centralized.

e. Satoshi claimed to be Japanese, yet used American English vernacular. No one had every heard of him, never heard from him again, yet he hoisted such a perfect design  that no one else has thought of. This takes resources.
If NSA can't find him (probably we will never know) then he is NSA!
hero member
Activity: 518
Merit: 521
August 29, 2013, 06:43:36 AM
This is my conspiracy theory slant. I don't necessarily believe there is such a conspiracy. I only present the arguments for everyone to contemplate.

Quote
> You mentioned one that BC might be a government operation because of certain features it has.
> What are those features that point to possible government involvement?

1. The following can be fixed in a new coin.

2. List of Bitcoin features that might imply NSA sponsorship:

a. Mining of new coins ends 2033 (drastically decreasing in 2020s). Mining (which is what makes the coin blockchain ledger decentralized and secure) will then be financed by transaction (tx) fees. But tx fees are optional, thus some miners could offer free tx fees. Thus imagine corporations such as Amazon (Bezos just bought the Washington Post) gaining a huge advantage by offering no tx fees, which they then earn back by getting favors from the government (e.g. tax loopholes, favorable regulation advantages, etc).

b. A cartel with 51% of the mining computational power can control the decentralized coin blockchain ledger. Imagine what a cartel of fascist corporations could do, same as point #a above. To make this worse, the Proof-of-Work (PoW) hash used for mining is 1000x faster on ASICs
(specially design custom IC chips), thus it is becoming dominated by those with big capital. I may have solved this problem. I designed a hash (only in my mind thus far) that (I think) makes ASICs (and game card GPUs) on level playing field with CPUs in our PCs. Thus the majority will always have 51% of the computational power in my coin design.

c. There was no anonymity built into Bitcoin. The coin ledger is a roadmap to/from everyone you've ever transacted FOREVER.

d. Bitcoin's blockchain ledger can't scale to Visa-scale. Thus clearly it won't work as a new currency for the world. Thus it appears to be a tracking device to catch all those liberty-minded individuals, then a non-solution come 2033 when it is time to morph to a new world order currency system. Thus they will just morph Bitcoin to centralized in order to scale it up to Visa-scale and get their digital tracking currency. Ditto how Microsoft turned Skype from decentralized to centralized.

e. Satoshi claimed to be Japanese, yet used American English vernacular. No one had every heard of him, never heard from him again, yet he hoisted such a perfect design  that no one else has thought of. This takes resources.

hero member
Activity: 518
Merit: 521
August 28, 2013, 01:32:55 PM
Germany has recognized Bitcoin as "private money", i.e. as a currency for tax purposes, perhaps (still unclear) meaning you won't be taxed capital gains.

But I still think if the governments can't regulate it, they will try to tax it as capital gains. I think they are assuming by declaring it a currency, then they can regulate it.

The tax details are unclear:

http://www.spiegel.de/international/business/germany-declares-bitcoins-to-be-a-unit-of-account-a-917525.html
hero member
Activity: 518
Merit: 521
August 28, 2013, 03:09:34 AM
Best to click the following link to read the context of the discussion, in which I explained that Keynes(ism) never proposed to run deficits year-after-year, yet the failure of Keynesism is he assumed government was rational and self-limiting.

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.3024388

Agreed, but don't conflate and then assume it is because of a gold standard that the 1800s were more prosperous. They were because the USA was a frontier and the government was less than 10-20% of the GDP (now is it roughly 60 - 80% if include cost of complying with regulation and local govts, especially when the $5 trillion per year unfunded liability deficit is considered).

And don't conflate and say that inflation is bad. It is centralized inflation that is bad, because it helps to build the government. Decentralized inflation is absolutely necessary, M2 and nominal GDP grew by 5% per annum since 1790 in the USA. Without inflation, you can't grow the economy. The USA never had ONLY gold and silver as money, there were always fractional receipts from private banks. It was the decentralized nature (private banks making fractional receipts for gold) of the debasement that made the USA great during the 1800s. The downfall was that the receipts were fractional reserves. This allowed JP Morgan to bail out the Treasury and bankers took over the government by 1913. The decentralized digital currencies solve this problem, but Bitcoin has a flaw in that debasement stops (very bad).

Please read the math:

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.2895021

And more discussion on that (follow the sub-links too):

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.2930843
hero member
Activity: 518
Merit: 521
August 24, 2013, 04:42:11 AM
BRIC share of world (global) GDP had risen from 37% to 50% in a decade:



If the chart above doesn't appear, click here.

http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article41956.html

Quote
Today, the four BRIC economies are four of the world's ten largest economies, placing them at an entirely different rank of global damage potential, relative to the Asian NICs of the 1990s. The striking slowdown in BRIC growth rates is shown by a few figures. In 2007 China’s economy expanded by an eye-popping 14.2%. India managed 10.1% growth, Russia 8.5%, and Brazil 6.1%.

In 2013, using often disputed and controversial data form different sources including the IMF, China will probably grow by 7.5%, India by 5%, Russia by less than 2% and Brazil by 1.75%. India's rupee crisis signals that the above-cited forecast, for India, is already too optimistic. Present outlooks for Brazil place its likely 2013 GDP growth rate in real terms at about 1.6%.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-08-19/clouds-gather-over-asian-economies-as-capital-flows-back-to-u-s-.html

Quote
Asia’s role as the world’s growth engine is waning as economies across the region weaken and investors pull out billions of dollars.

The Indian rupee fell to a record low today, Thailand is in recession and Indonesian stocks have slumped about 20 percent since their peak. Chinese banks’ bad loans are rising and economists forecast Malaysia will post its second straight quarter of sub-5 percent growth this week.

The clouds forming in Asia as liquidity tightens and China’s slowdown curbs demand for commodities and goods are fueling a selloff of emerging-market stocks, reversing a flow of money into the region in favor of nascent recoveries in the U.S. and Europe. Emerging markets from Brazil to Indonesia have raised borrowing costs in 2013 to try to aid their currencies as the prospect of reduced U.S. monetary stimulus curbs demand for assets in developing nations.

“The eye of the storm is directly above emerging markets now, two years after it hovered over Europe and four years after it hit the U.S.,” said Stephen Jen, co-founder of hedge fund SLJ Macro Partners LLP in London and former head of foreign-exchange strategy at Morgan Stanley. “This could be serious for Asia.”

Of the $155.6 billion investors poured into developed-market equity exchange-traded products in the first seven months this year, North American funds received $102.4 billion or 65.8 percent, according to BlackRock Investment Institute. Japan attracted a record $28 billion, while Europe-focused funds got $4.3 billion. In contrast, $7.6 billion flowed out of emerging-market funds.
Swinging Back

“The pendulum is swinging back in favor of the advanced countries,” said Shane Oliver, Sydney-based head of investment strategy at AMP Capital Investors Ltd., which oversees about $130 billion. “It’s one of these things that happens once a decade or so when you see a turn in relative performance. We’ve entered a tougher, more difficult period” for Asia.

Capital is shifting as it always does:

http://armstrongeconomics.com/2013/08/22/no-single-investment-will-ever-be-perpetual-it-all-changes/

India is falling over the cliff:

http://soberlook.com/2012/05/indias-gdp-growth-hits-wall.html

http://www.businessweek.com/stories/2008-07-01/indias-economy-hits-the-wallbusinessweek-business-news-stock-market-and-financial-advice

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2013-08-14/india-restricts-foreign-exchange-outflows-to-stem-rupee-s-plunge

Indonesia is falling over the cliff:

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/f88cb13a-fb45-11e2-8650-00144feabdc0.html



http://www.economist.com/news/asia/21584032-rise-economic-nationalism-compounds-broader-worries-about-south-east-asias-giant-slipping

Thailand has entered recession:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-23751846

Brazil is falling apart physically and financially:

http://www.theguardian.com/business/economics-blog/2013/jul/25/brazil-real-economic-crisis-pope-francis

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/7dd98ed6-059f-11e3-ad01-00144feab7de.html

http://www.businessinsider.com/5-key-charts-on-brazils-economy-2013-6

http://www.financialsense.com/contributors/john-mauldin/2011/08/12/the-geopolitics-of-brazil
(see the geographic issue and map at above link)

China's collapse is underway, with debt growth outpacing GDP, meaning it has to borrow more and more just to sustain what it already borrowed, and it is accelerating away in a spiral:

http://www.businessinsider.com/chinas-credit-bubble-charts-2013-6

http://blog.mpettis.com/2013/08/the-changing-debate-over-chinas-economy/#comment-233

The strength in the Euro has been "capital contraction", which caused a slight blip up in GDP but will implode into itself:

http://armstrongeconomics.com/2013/08/21/thailand-enters-recession/

But even Germany is bankrupt:

http://armstrongeconomics.com/2013/08/22/the-european-debt-bomb-unbelievable/

The NET debt-to-GDP ratios are higher for the core of Europe, e.g. Germany, France, Spain, and Italy than for the other PIIGS.

-------------------------

hero member
Activity: 518
Merit: 521
August 24, 2013, 03:17:32 AM

The above is the reason I want to crash the system as soon as possible with a new decentralized digital currency (that can scale to Visa-scale, Bitcoin's current blockchain design can't). The sooner we can stop the youth from destroying themselves with debt, the better for the future.

Ok but what is your plan to redistribute money equally.
Your decentralized digital currency won't solve this problem.
If it succeed it will only allow the rich to escape tax.

It will also allow the poor and middle class to escape tax (and debt collection), and they pay most of the tax.

The solution is not to tax the rich more (impossible), but to tax everyone less, and shrink the parasites who rely on taxation.

Money should not be distributed equally, that is socialism. Rather it should be distributed to those who generate the most profitable returns.

Once you remove the ability to control the system by controlling the printing of money, then those who are now making money by gambling with other people's money (keeping the profits and charging the losses to the public) will go bankrupt.
hero member
Activity: 518
Merit: 521
August 23, 2013, 11:16:35 PM
Best to click the following link to read the following discussion in context:

http://blog.mpettis.com/2013/08/the-urbanization-fallacy/#comment-689

Quote from: Shelby a.k.a. AnonyMint
I am 48, so technically I am not still in the youth (mirror don’t tell me that!), but we X-gen were dominated by the boomers so we have to extend our range to the next generation to make our biggest impact.

Note that the two leading journalists publishing the Snowden revelations are Glenn Greenwald age 46 and Laura Poitras age 48.

The leaker Snowden was age 29, who believes everything might work out okay if the people become aware of what is going on. His naivety got him stuck in Russia, because he didn't plan for the near-term reality that the political transformation he wants will require years or a decade or more. There is an interim reality which we X-gen look at realistically.

In the link I provided upthread [in the thread at the link at the top of this] about traits of us X-gen, we are untrusting and see through BS to the truth behind the curtain. We don't believe in "don't worry, everything will work out okay", because it didn't for us until we strived to make it so. Thus, our idealism is measured in results.

Timing is important. Gold will go higher than $2300, but first it will come back down again to $1050 or below (after this Fall 2013 deadcat bounce). Because capital is flowing out of the rest of the world into the dollar, and a stronger dollar and booming USA equities meaning a rush out of gold temporary. Until the dollar gets too strong, the US Treasuries interest rates too high (choking off the USA economy), exports to rest of world cratering, and the ingress capital flow stops or reverses, then the world collapses and then gold rockets as the only remaining safe haven. Yet don't forget we have the decentralized digital currencies coming as another outlet for capital yet this is probably too small to absorb $40 trillion (but we will see, I'll be content if I gain 0.0001% = $40 million of that for my programming efforts).

Quote from: Suvy
Many of those students will easily be able to pay off that debt if they get the kind of jobs that provide them higher incomes.

You and your astute STEM fields student body are not the problem.

My point is that a significant percent (probably the majority or nearly so) are pursuing liberal arts not STEM degrees, the aggregate statistics show they are accumulating significant per capita debts, they are able to support themselves (tuition, boarding, food stamps perhaps) with this funding (would otherwise be unemployed given the bad economy), thus the economy will implode faster once they can't borrow more, and they will have no choice but to throw their political support to socialism (along with the boomers) to tax higher than the Laffer limit. Remember debt is always future taxation, even if you write it down the misallocation cost was already incurred. Just think about the effects of getting the wrong kind of degree, of not being young any more, of having kids already, etc..

On top of that, I want to reiterate my point from my prior comment, that as we write down the capital stock, the remaining capital is going to be scarce and so interest rates will skyrocket. Thus the (strictly undischargeable in bankruptcy) student loan debts will grow, not shrink. It is your non-linearity point about interest rates and debt rising beyond 100% of GDP (an individual's annual income). Thus this will become a 15% discretionary income garnishment tax (paid to the bankers or the government is the same now, same entity) for 25 years by law.

The new proposals are for all new federal student loans to be indexed to Treasuries plus 1 or 2%, and Obama's version has no cap on the interest rate!

Even homebuyers are locking in 5/1 ARMs because the spread between fixed rate mortgages increased by a percentage point this summer. Crazy.

The above is the reason I want to crash the system as soon as possible with a new decentralized digital currency (that can scale to Visa-scale, Bitcoin's current blockchain design can't). The sooner we can stop the youth from destroying themselves with debt, the better for the future.
hero member
Activity: 518
Merit: 521
August 23, 2013, 11:15:19 PM
To successfully play the inheritance tax the riches should employ layers of legal structures like trusts over holdings over corporations and so on. Using simpler structures increases the risk of government attack, the heirs should be properly distanced from the capital while remaining the beneficiaries. Usage of too long legal chains is dangerous because of raiders attacks, there will be too many doors where they can put the foot in. So properly created (and maintained, and renewed, and disposed) structures are expensive and while the government gets nothing at the due time,

Easier is put your money in a perfectly anonymous decentralized digital currency, then transfer it to your heirs anonymously.

One might tell the government they bought gold bars and buried them, but they were stolen.

Disclaimer: I am not giving financial nor tax advice, consult your own professional advisor.

Edit: I'm sorry, may be I missed where you stated it - what kind of debasement do you mean? "One point" inflation, proportional decentralized inflation, demmurage or something else?

Creating new coins forever:

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/poll-ranking-new-features-for-decentralized-currencies-279340
http://blog.mpettis.com/2013/08/the-urbanization-fallacy/#comment-644
hero member
Activity: 518
Merit: 521
August 21, 2013, 11:00:24 PM
Thus over time the rich can no longer get more than 2% return. So what do they do? They turn to lending at a guaranteed interest rate provided by a public backstop, because it is the only way they can deploy their capital safely (because even if they are successful 90% of the time, it doesn't offset only a 2% upside).
Properly implemented inheritance tax will either cure such risk averse human beings or put hoarded capital into new flow after their death.

Incorrect.

1. A tax will always be gamed by vested interests, c.f. Some Iron Laws of Political Economics.

2. Capital sitting in a hole for a lifetime before being dishoarded is orders-of-magnitude too slow.

Debasing decentralized digital money removes the ability for any vested interests to capture and manipulate the debasement. And it is continuous, not waiting for a death event.
hero member
Activity: 524
Merit: 500
August 21, 2013, 02:18:24 PM
Thus over time the rich can no longer get more than 2% return. So what do they do? They turn to lending at a guaranteed interest rate provided by a public backstop, because it is the only way they can deploy their capital safely (because even if they are successful 90% of the time, it doesn't offset only a 2% upside).
Properly implemented inheritance tax will either cure such risk averse human beings or put hoarded capital into new flow after their death.
hero member
Activity: 518
Merit: 521
August 21, 2013, 11:47:50 AM
I am referring to item #6 is the following document:

http://silverstockreport.com/2013/6-myths-inflation.html

The following is unarguable. I will refer any more of the above genre of nonsense to the following proof.

A Gold-only Economy:

1. Miner adds 2oz per year.
2. Investor invests his 100oz per year.
3. Workers are paid 1oz per year by investor.

The workers buy their production with their salaries as funded by the investor. The miner can also buy this production. So the maximum return on investment for the investor is 102oz per year, i.e. 2% per year. This is if the investment doesn't fail, so the risk is the investor will get 0oz back.

This economy can never grow, because no investor is going to take that loss (downside) risk for that tiny amount of upside return.

A rebuttal point is that some investors can lose and some investors can gain, thus providing for the winning investors to earn more return than the money supply increases.

But the problem is that capital will over time move to those who are consistently able to increase production. Thus over time the rich can no longer get more than 2% return. So what do they do? They turn to lending at a guaranteed interest rate provided by a public backstop, because it is the only way they can deploy their capital safely (because even if they are successful 90% of the time, it doesn't offset only a 2% upside).

On top of that, the workers (consumers) will not turn over their money as fast, i.e. they will sit on it, if the production is increasing faster than the money supply is growing, because they are gaining value for the risk-free action of sitting on money.

Thus the 2% upside potential is reduced to a negative potential on the upside. Loss-loss proposition for investors. So they become usurers, no other choice.

Understand that inflation is necessary to bleed money from the risk-adverse workers to those who know how to manage risks-- the successful investors. Even the Bible says money will grow wings and fly away. It must be this way.

Also it was never the case that the money supply in the USA was only metal. There always existed loans and fractional reserves.
hero member
Activity: 518
Merit: 521
August 21, 2013, 11:46:41 AM
Long term any cryptocoin will need P2P exchange features INTEGRATED, something like Ripple but without it's known issues (centralization, distribution of wealth, eponymity etc).

There is a lot of talk in the forum but what I discovered lately seems very promising to me:
http://bitslog.wordpress.com/2013/05/20/p2ptradex-back-from-the-future/
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/p2ptradex-p2p-trading-between-cryptocurrencies-91843

He is the same guy behind this:
http://certimix.com/products/

Cheers

EDIT: http://qixcoin.com/

Good idea. Sergio appears to be quite talented.
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