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Topic: Bitcoin volatility paradox (Read 2889 times)

hero member
Activity: 727
Merit: 500
Minimum Effort/Maximum effect
August 08, 2013, 12:30:39 AM
#21
Economic equilibrium, the study of quantity, demand, supply, and above all behaviour. The possible price of something can be approximated pretty close,... it's just knowing when it will be at any given point that is the problem; Behaviour, it changes everything.
  It seems Bitcoin was designed with a very volatile base amount, a little psychological limit: 21 million coins... that are subdivided to 8 decimal places or more. I think that all the monetary statistics are kept in standard units, only in exchanges do you see more than 3 decimals beyond the point. What happens when you try to add humans to determine it's value? Anything can happen, maybe it's just the way that the things you use to interact with Bitcoin are designed that are the problem, maybe it's the mindset that has to change the way we understand.

 I'm sure there are a lot of reasons for Bitcoin's fluctuations, but to attribute them to a single cause is not seeing the whole picture, it's a big world out there. The major fluctuations depend on how Bitcoin is being used, speculation, purchases, exchange, money transfer, stock, time stamp, savings,etc different uses will have different effects on it's price. it's something to think about. My personal thought is that the design would be more economically viable with more than 1 billion available coins, but this design choice creates an extra hurdle, for it to be more useful, the economy. How much can you do with the purchasing power of only 1 billion dollars? more coins more buying power for a whole economy, but with this it requires a lot of demand to move the price or a lot of people who know how valuable it truly is.

Hence, instability, the design forces equilibrium, people must reach a concensus on ,"how much is it worth?" and "What would be useful?"
full member
Activity: 236
Merit: 100
August 01, 2013, 09:15:49 PM
#20
The beauty about bitcoin is stability. Unlike fiat currencies, it does not fluctuate with political instability. The reason for the recent price adjustment is the reward value halving. We will see such an opportunity at the next reward halving. Until then I can only see it fluctuating very little around 100 usd.

Nonsense.  While supply is known, demand fluctuates wildly and unpredictably.  And the recent bubble had nothing to do with the reward halving.  If you don't think the price will escape the range 60-140 in the next 3 1/2 years, I'll happily make a bet with you.
hero member
Activity: 605
Merit: 500
August 01, 2013, 03:53:35 AM
#19
The beauty about bitcoin is stability. Unlike fiat currencies, it does not fluctuate with political instability. The reason for the recent price adjustment is the reward value halving. We will see such an opportunity at the next reward halving. Until then I can only see it fluctuating very little around 100 usd.
sr. member
Activity: 453
Merit: 254
July 28, 2013, 04:15:10 PM
#18
Stable prices allow adoption from consumers.
As adoption increase, the price increase slowly.
As in increase slowly, the orders packet around the band of oscillation are wiped out. And they are the great majority of them.
As these orders are wiped out (usually by someone noting the raising trend), the new demand find not much to buy and the price increase.
As the price increase, more people understand what is happening and run to buy.
This cause a bubble and the later comers enter when the price in higher than the value.
The later comers don't find anyone to sell their coins at higher prices where the first movers start to sell and realizing profits.
Prices correct themselves lower until some new equilibrium in found.

As bitcoin is growing, the oscillations will be smaller with the time.
Last year oscillation in august was huge, but it is nothing if compared on a liner chart with today prices.
The reason the oscillations will be smaller, is simple: as the bitcoin economy grow, the same money will not impact the price in the same way.
At 10 $/BTC 1M $ is 100K BTC, at 100$/BTC is 10K BTC.
To move the price up 10% you need at least ten times more US$ than before.

If BTC go to 1000$ they will need 100M USD to move the price up as much as they can do now with 10M USD.
full member
Activity: 236
Merit: 100
July 28, 2013, 01:44:15 PM
#17

 bmdavi3Smack-Fu Master, in training:
It's probably true that those who live in Cyprus are not the ones directly responsible for driving up the price of Bitcoins right now, but that doesn't mean the Cyprus crisis isn't at least partly responsible for the rise. I live in the United States, but I read about what's happening in Cyprus just fine. I imagine lots of people do. When those who are on the fence about buying Bitcoin read about a story like this, I imagine "government / bank seizing / freezing bank accounts" might be enough to push them over the edge and make the purchase.

That statement makes more sense to me than the Quote from an "expert" on virtual worlds on the site...

So you think money is unsafe in a bank, so you move it into drastically less safe environment like Bitcoin economy, where it could be stolen by hackers or, more likely, have most of it's value wiped out by another lightning fast crash. I mean, 50% price drop in a matter of hours, if this would happen in Wall Street, you'd have flocks of people jumping from buildings.

The Wall Street suicide scenario you're referring to is where years or decades of stock gains are wiped out.  You're comparing that to bitcoin losing 1 week's worth of gains?  Not exactly suicide worthy.

With bitcoins, as long as you keep your key secret, no one can take them from you.  That's something at least you can control.  When you money is in a bank, you don't have control.  Granted bitcoin price is volatile, but you still own them, and bitcoin supply isn't at the whim of some central authority.  So the only factor that really affects bitcoin price is future demand (and speculation thereon).
newbie
Activity: 21
Merit: 0
July 28, 2013, 08:51:51 AM
#16
yes, you are. bitcoins have indeed a limited supply, and stability in the price does indeed raise demand which in turn raises the price.
BUT hughe price increases usually come with observable causes in the real world: more news being posted and switch from cpu to gpu was the first jump in price, since gpu sales in the high end market went through the roof. The second jump was cyprus declaring bank accounts to be frozen, and asicminers/fpga's coming into play.
Note that btc prices still rose independent from those jumps, but those jumps were clearly visible nonetheless. And the famous bubble bursts were not real bubble bursts; both were made artificially (the first mt.gox? being hacked and the second mt.gox inability to process the huge amount of new customers and the resulting downtime/delay driving fears of another hack ).

And if you watch the graphs a little you will notice that the "buuble bursts" have only driven the bitcoin prices to a little more or less than before the jumps.ss

I don't think Cyprus crisis had that much to do with 2nd BTC bubble, it as a factor sure, but after Cyprus most of the Bitcoin speculators where still in Canada and USA, and why would a banking collapse would cause people to adopt Bitcoin which is still less safe than keeping your money in the bank.
http://arstechnica.com/business/2013/03/experts-pour-cold-water-on-claim-that-cyprus-crisis-caused-bitcoin-boom/


 bmdavi3Smack-Fu Master, in training:
It's probably true that those who live in Cyprus are not the ones directly responsible for driving up the price of Bitcoins right now, but that doesn't mean the Cyprus crisis isn't at least partly responsible for the rise. I live in the United States, but I read about what's happening in Cyprus just fine. I imagine lots of people do. When those who are on the fence about buying Bitcoin read about a story like this, I imagine "government / bank seizing / freezing bank accounts" might be enough to push them over the edge and make the purchase.

That statement makes more sense to me than the Quote from an "expert" on virtual worlds on the site...

So you think money is unsafe in a bank, so you move it into drastically less safe environment like Bitcoin economy, where it could be stolen by hackers or, more likely, have most of it's value wiped out by another lightning fast crash. I mean, 50% price drop in a matter of hours, if this would happen in Wall Street, you'd have flocks of people jumping from buildings.
legendary
Activity: 1302
Merit: 1007
July 27, 2013, 11:23:06 PM
#15
yes, you are. bitcoins have indeed a limited supply, and stability in the price does indeed raise demand which in turn raises the price.
BUT hughe price increases usually come with observable causes in the real world: more news being posted and switch from cpu to gpu was the first jump in price, since gpu sales in the high end market went through the roof. The second jump was cyprus declaring bank accounts to be frozen, and asicminers/fpga's coming into play.
Note that btc prices still rose independent from those jumps, but those jumps were clearly visible nonetheless. And the famous bubble bursts were not real bubble bursts; both were made artificially (the first mt.gox? being hacked and the second mt.gox inability to process the huge amount of new customers and the resulting downtime/delay driving fears of another hack ).

And if you watch the graphs a little you will notice that the "buuble bursts" have only driven the bitcoin prices to a little more or less than before the jumps.ss
Usually more, and I hope it stays that way.
full member
Activity: 236
Merit: 100
July 27, 2013, 01:43:15 PM
#14
yes, you are. bitcoins have indeed a limited supply, and stability in the price does indeed raise demand which in turn raises the price.
BUT hughe price increases usually come with observable causes in the real world: more news being posted and switch from cpu to gpu was the first jump in price, since gpu sales in the high end market went through the roof. The second jump was cyprus declaring bank accounts to be frozen, and asicminers/fpga's coming into play.
Note that btc prices still rose independent from those jumps, but those jumps were clearly visible nonetheless. And the famous bubble bursts were not real bubble bursts; both were made artificially (the first mt.gox? being hacked and the second mt.gox inability to process the huge amount of new customers and the resulting downtime/delay driving fears of another hack ).

And if you watch the graphs a little you will notice that the "buuble bursts" have only driven the bitcoin prices to a little more or less than before the jumps.ss

you're making up stories to explain the past:

  • "The second jump was cyprus declaring bank accounts to be frozen" <- wrong. jump started january, cyprus happened sometime in march. cyprus certainly helped the hype, but it wasn't the sole reason for the bubble
  • "and asicminers/fpga's coming into play" <- fpgas started in late 2011, asics started hitting late february, why would mining tech change cause hype?
  • "the first mt.gox? being hacked" <- 2011 bubble burst before the hack.

You don't seem to understand what a jump and a bubble burst are.
http://venturebeat.com/2011/06/19/popular-bitcoin-exchange-mt-gox-hacked-prices-drop-to-pennies/
that was the cause for the first burst. a burst is NOT a slow prize drop, it's a sudden and massive fall in value (hence burst; not dribble...). The prize drop before was a normal low imo. The agressiv hacking attack was the cause for a hughe amount of confidence loss and the slow recovery afterward.
same for the "jump" that started in january. that is no jump, a jump is a sudde and massive rise in value. you can see that the jump started actually late march, early april; with the eu financial crisis at it's peak and after cyprus' banks unfroze bank accounts.
Also, with fpga's I did not mean the little fpga board constructions but the massive gh units. which came into play late 2012 with asics starting in early 2013.


Where are you getting this nonsense?

The 2011 mtgox hack happened 11 days AFTER the bubble pop.  Look it up.
New mining equipment has no effect on bitcoin price, it's the other way around.
And while you're not as obviously wrong about Cyprus, you're still basically wrong because it was just one bit of fuel for speculation, not ALL of it.



http://images.dailytech.com/nimage/20501_large_BitCoin_Transactions_Gox_2.jpg
I gave you sources for my statement, you gave none; if you would be so kind as to elaborate further I would be very grateful. I don't like to rummage the internet for hours just to find nothing substantial...
There was always a price increase AFTER new mining hardware were being sold, why should it be dependant on the prize? that's complete and utter bullshit, sorry. Miners buy their hardware not because the prize is high but because they casn get an edge over other miners. That was so with cpu -> gpu ->fpga->asic and will continue as long as there people who want a bigger piece of the pie.
And Cyprus was not all of it, in Germany we like to call it "Unzufrieden mit der Gesamtsituation", which basically means all is fucked up. There was the European crisis, tzhe dollar was weak because the us struggle to meet it's debt limit and a general FUD about financial investments. Amd guess what was stable? Gold and bitcoins.

If you insist.  http://bitcoincharts.com/charts/mtgoxUSD#rg60zigHourlyzczsg2011-06-01zeg2011-06-30ztgSzm1g10zm2g25zv
That chart shows the bubble peak on June 8 and then the hack and subsequent shutdown on June 19.

Did you really have to "rummage the internet for hours" to just look up the prices in June 2011?

Can you really not understand the connection between bitcoin price and demand for mining hardware?  If the price of bitcoin doubles overnight then the *exact* same mining rig will start generating twice as many dollars for whoever owns it.  You don't think that is going to increase the demand for those mining rigs?  Of course it does. 
sr. member
Activity: 279
Merit: 250
July 22, 2013, 09:23:08 PM
#13
I wrote about five 'paradoxes' of Bitcoin in this thread, the first of which is similar to your supposition: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=253792.20

Long story short they aren't really paradoxes and they are effectively self correcting.
legendary
Activity: 804
Merit: 1002
July 22, 2013, 04:07:29 PM
#12
what exactly is volatile in bitcoin price?

$90 to $100 usd and back? $260 to $50 and then halfway in between?


volatility is based on historic volatility, throw some bollinger bands around bitcoin's exchange rate and let me know if your theory still holds
to whom are you referring?
hero member
Activity: 546
Merit: 500
July 22, 2013, 04:05:27 PM
#11
what exactly is volatile in bitcoin price?

$90 to $100 usd and back? $260 to $50 and then halfway in between?


volatility is based on historic volatility, throw some bollinger bands around bitcoin's exchange rate and let me know if your theory still holds
legendary
Activity: 804
Merit: 1002
July 22, 2013, 04:03:06 PM
#10
yes, you are. bitcoins have indeed a limited supply, and stability in the price does indeed raise demand which in turn raises the price.
BUT hughe price increases usually come with observable causes in the real world: more news being posted and switch from cpu to gpu was the first jump in price, since gpu sales in the high end market went through the roof. The second jump was cyprus declaring bank accounts to be frozen, and asicminers/fpga's coming into play.
Note that btc prices still rose independent from those jumps, but those jumps were clearly visible nonetheless. And the famous bubble bursts were not real bubble bursts; both were made artificially (the first mt.gox? being hacked and the second mt.gox inability to process the huge amount of new customers and the resulting downtime/delay driving fears of another hack ).

And if you watch the graphs a little you will notice that the "buuble bursts" have only driven the bitcoin prices to a little more or less than before the jumps.ss

you're making up stories to explain the past:

  • "The second jump was cyprus declaring bank accounts to be frozen" <- wrong. jump started january, cyprus happened sometime in march. cyprus certainly helped the hype, but it wasn't the sole reason for the bubble
  • "and asicminers/fpga's coming into play" <- fpgas started in late 2011, asics started hitting late february, why would mining tech change cause hype?
  • "the first mt.gox? being hacked" <- 2011 bubble burst before the hack.

You don't seem to understand what a jump and a bubble burst are.
http://venturebeat.com/2011/06/19/popular-bitcoin-exchange-mt-gox-hacked-prices-drop-to-pennies/
that was the cause for the first burst. a burst is NOT a slow prize drop, it's a sudden and massive fall in value (hence burst; not dribble...). The prize drop before was a normal low imo. The agressiv hacking attack was the cause for a hughe amount of confidence loss and the slow recovery afterward.
same for the "jump" that started in january. that is no jump, a jump is a sudde and massive rise in value. you can see that the jump started actually late march, early april; with the eu financial crisis at it's peak and after cyprus' banks unfroze bank accounts.
Also, with fpga's I did not mean the little fpga board constructions but the massive gh units. which came into play late 2012 with asics starting in early 2013.


Where are you getting this nonsense?

The 2011 mtgox hack happened 11 days AFTER the bubble pop.  Look it up.
New mining equipment has no effect on bitcoin price, it's the other way around.
And while you're not as obviously wrong about Cyprus, you're still basically wrong because it was just one bit of fuel for speculation, not ALL of it.



http://images.dailytech.com/nimage/20501_large_BitCoin_Transactions_Gox_2.jpg
I gave you sources for my statement, you gave none; if you would be so kind as to elaborate further I would be very grateful. I don't like to rummage the internet for hours just to find nothing substantial...
There was always a price increase AFTER new mining hardware were being sold, why should it be dependant on the prize? that's complete and utter bullshit, sorry. Miners buy their hardware not because the prize is high but because they casn get an edge over other miners. That was so with cpu -> gpu ->fpga->asic and will continue as long as there people who want a bigger piece of the pie.
And Cyprus was not all of it, in Germany we like to call it "Unzufrieden mit der Gesamtsituation", which basically means all is fucked up. There was the European crisis, tzhe dollar was weak because the us struggle to meet it's debt limit and a general FUD about financial investments. Amd guess what was stable? Gold and bitcoins.
full member
Activity: 236
Merit: 100
July 22, 2013, 01:37:18 PM
#9
yes, you are. bitcoins have indeed a limited supply, and stability in the price does indeed raise demand which in turn raises the price.
BUT hughe price increases usually come with observable causes in the real world: more news being posted and switch from cpu to gpu was the first jump in price, since gpu sales in the high end market went through the roof. The second jump was cyprus declaring bank accounts to be frozen, and asicminers/fpga's coming into play.
Note that btc prices still rose independent from those jumps, but those jumps were clearly visible nonetheless. And the famous bubble bursts were not real bubble bursts; both were made artificially (the first mt.gox? being hacked and the second mt.gox inability to process the huge amount of new customers and the resulting downtime/delay driving fears of another hack ).

And if you watch the graphs a little you will notice that the "buuble bursts" have only driven the bitcoin prices to a little more or less than before the jumps.ss

you're making up stories to explain the past:

  • "The second jump was cyprus declaring bank accounts to be frozen" <- wrong. jump started january, cyprus happened sometime in march. cyprus certainly helped the hype, but it wasn't the sole reason for the bubble
  • "and asicminers/fpga's coming into play" <- fpgas started in late 2011, asics started hitting late february, why would mining tech change cause hype?
  • "the first mt.gox? being hacked" <- 2011 bubble burst before the hack.

You don't seem to understand what a jump and a bubble burst are.
http://venturebeat.com/2011/06/19/popular-bitcoin-exchange-mt-gox-hacked-prices-drop-to-pennies/
that was the cause for the first burst. a burst is NOT a slow prize drop, it's a sudden and massive fall in value (hence burst; not dribble...). The prize drop before was a normal low imo. The agressiv hacking attack was the cause for a hughe amount of confidence loss and the slow recovery afterward.
same for the "jump" that started in january. that is no jump, a jump is a sudde and massive rise in value. you can see that the jump started actually late march, early april; with the eu financial crisis at it's peak and after cyprus' banks unfroze bank accounts.
Also, with fpga's I did not mean the little fpga board constructions but the massive gh units. which came into play late 2012 with asics starting in early 2013.


Where are you getting this nonsense?

The 2011 mtgox hack happened 11 days AFTER the bubble pop.  Look it up.
New mining equipment has no effect on bitcoin price, it's the other way around.
And while you're not as obviously wrong about Cyprus, you're still basically wrong because it was just one bit of fuel for speculation, not ALL of it.

legendary
Activity: 804
Merit: 1002
July 21, 2013, 02:45:16 PM
#8
yes, you are. bitcoins have indeed a limited supply, and stability in the price does indeed raise demand which in turn raises the price.
BUT hughe price increases usually come with observable causes in the real world: more news being posted and switch from cpu to gpu was the first jump in price, since gpu sales in the high end market went through the roof. The second jump was cyprus declaring bank accounts to be frozen, and asicminers/fpga's coming into play.
Note that btc prices still rose independent from those jumps, but those jumps were clearly visible nonetheless. And the famous bubble bursts were not real bubble bursts; both were made artificially (the first mt.gox? being hacked and the second mt.gox inability to process the huge amount of new customers and the resulting downtime/delay driving fears of another hack ).

And if you watch the graphs a little you will notice that the "buuble bursts" have only driven the bitcoin prices to a little more or less than before the jumps.ss

you're making up stories to explain the past:

  • "The second jump was cyprus declaring bank accounts to be frozen" <- wrong. jump started january, cyprus happened sometime in march. cyprus certainly helped the hype, but it wasn't the sole reason for the bubble
  • "and asicminers/fpga's coming into play" <- fpgas started in late 2011, asics started hitting late february, why would mining tech change cause hype?
  • "the first mt.gox? being hacked" <- 2011 bubble burst before the hack.



You don't seem to understand what a jump and a bubble burst are.
http://venturebeat.com/2011/06/19/popular-bitcoin-exchange-mt-gox-hacked-prices-drop-to-pennies/
that was the cause for the first burst. a burst is NOT a slow prize drop, it's a sudden and massive fall in value (hence burst; not dribble...). The prize drop before was a normal low imo. The agressiv hacking attack was the cause for a hughe amount of confidence loss and the slow recovery afterward.
same for the "jump" that started in january. that is no jump, a jump is a sudde and massive rise in value. you can see that the jump started actually late march, early april; with the eu financial crisis at it's peak and after cyprus' banks unfroze bank accounts.
Also, with fpga's I did not mean the little fpga board constructions but the massive gh units. which came into play late 2012 with asics starting in early 2013.
donator
Activity: 2772
Merit: 1019
July 21, 2013, 08:53:03 AM
#7
yes, you are. bitcoins have indeed a limited supply, and stability in the price does indeed raise demand which in turn raises the price.
BUT hughe price increases usually come with observable causes in the real world: more news being posted and switch from cpu to gpu was the first jump in price, since gpu sales in the high end market went through the roof. The second jump was cyprus declaring bank accounts to be frozen, and asicminers/fpga's coming into play.
Note that btc prices still rose independent from those jumps, but those jumps were clearly visible nonetheless. And the famous bubble bursts were not real bubble bursts; both were made artificially (the first mt.gox? being hacked and the second mt.gox inability to process the huge amount of new customers and the resulting downtime/delay driving fears of another hack ).

And if you watch the graphs a little you will notice that the "buuble bursts" have only driven the bitcoin prices to a little more or less than before the jumps.ss

you're making up stories to explain the past:

  • "The second jump was cyprus declaring bank accounts to be frozen" <- wrong. jump started january, cyprus happened sometime in march. cyprus certainly helped the hype, but it wasn't the sole reason for the bubble
  • "and asicminers/fpga's coming into play" <- fpgas started in late 2011, asics started hitting late february, why would mining tech change cause hype?
  • "the first mt.gox? being hacked" <- 2011 bubble burst before the hack.

sr. member
Activity: 826
Merit: 250
CryptoTalk.Org - Get Paid for every Post!
July 21, 2013, 03:18:00 AM
#6
BTC Prices have and always will be purely the result of speculation and emotional reactions.  The so-called BTC economy has no ability to effect the price of BTC because it is both incredibly small AND dose not use to set prices, it uses USD and converts that to BTC.  It can no more support the price of BTC then can a tourist in a resort who exchanges USD for the local banana republic currency and then buys from the locals who mark the gringo and haggle for a dollar value before converting it to the local currency.  The purchases don't actually provide any kind of support to that local currency and it can be hyper inflating all the while these trades are being done.
legendary
Activity: 804
Merit: 1002
July 19, 2013, 03:38:43 PM
#5
yes, you are. bitcoins have indeed a limited supply, and stability in the price does indeed raise demand which in turn raises the price.
BUT hughe price increases usually come with observable causes in the real world: more news being posted and switch from cpu to gpu was the first jump in price, since gpu sales in the high end market went through the roof. The second jump was cyprus declaring bank accounts to be frozen, and asicminers/fpga's coming into play.
Note that btc prices still rose independent from those jumps, but those jumps were clearly visible nonetheless. And the famous bubble bursts were not real bubble bursts; both were made artificially (the first mt.gox? being hacked and the second mt.gox inability to process the huge amount of new customers and the resulting downtime/delay driving fears of another hack ).

And if you watch the graphs a little you will notice that the "buuble bursts" have only driven the bitcoin prices to a little more or less than before the jumps.ss

I don't think Cyprus crisis had that much to do with 2nd BTC bubble, it as a factor sure, but after Cyprus most of the Bitcoin speculators where still in Canada and USA, and why would a banking collapse would cause people to adopt Bitcoin which is still less safe than keeping your money in the bank.
http://arstechnica.com/business/2013/03/experts-pour-cold-water-on-claim-that-cyprus-crisis-caused-bitcoin-boom/


 bmdavi3Smack-Fu Master, in training:
It's probably true that those who live in Cyprus are not the ones directly responsible for driving up the price of Bitcoins right now, but that doesn't mean the Cyprus crisis isn't at least partly responsible for the rise. I live in the United States, but I read about what's happening in Cyprus just fine. I imagine lots of people do. When those who are on the fence about buying Bitcoin read about a story like this, I imagine "government / bank seizing / freezing bank accounts" might be enough to push them over the edge and make the purchase.

That statement makes more sense to me than the Quote from an "expert" on virtual worlds on the site...
newbie
Activity: 21
Merit: 0
July 19, 2013, 02:37:17 PM
#4
yes, you are. bitcoins have indeed a limited supply, and stability in the price does indeed raise demand which in turn raises the price.
BUT hughe price increases usually come with observable causes in the real world: more news being posted and switch from cpu to gpu was the first jump in price, since gpu sales in the high end market went through the roof. The second jump was cyprus declaring bank accounts to be frozen, and asicminers/fpga's coming into play.
Note that btc prices still rose independent from those jumps, but those jumps were clearly visible nonetheless. And the famous bubble bursts were not real bubble bursts; both were made artificially (the first mt.gox? being hacked and the second mt.gox inability to process the huge amount of new customers and the resulting downtime/delay driving fears of another hack ).

And if you watch the graphs a little you will notice that the "buuble bursts" have only driven the bitcoin prices to a little more or less than before the jumps.ss

I don't think Cyprus crisis had that much to do with 2nd BTC bubble, it as a factor sure, but after Cyprus most of the Bitcoin speculators where still in Canada and USA, and why would a banking collapse would cause people to adopt Bitcoin which is still less safe than keeping your money in the bank.
http://arstechnica.com/business/2013/03/experts-pour-cold-water-on-claim-that-cyprus-crisis-caused-bitcoin-boom/
full member
Activity: 236
Merit: 100
July 18, 2013, 01:36:38 PM
#3

Quote
BUT hughe price increases usually come with observable causes in the real world: more news being posted and switch from cpu to gpu was the first jump in price, since gpu sales in the high end market went through the roof. The second jump was cyprus declaring bank accounts to be frozen, and asicminers/fpga's coming into play.
Note that btc prices still rose independent from those jumps, but those jumps were clearly visible nonetheless. And the famous bubble bursts were not real bubble bursts; both were made artificially (the first mt.gox? being hacked and the second mt.gox inability to process the huge amount of new customers and the resulting downtime/delay driving fears of another hack ).

And if you watch the graphs a little you will notice that the "buuble bursts" have only driven the bitcoin prices to a little more or less than before the jumps.ss

None of this is relevant, and I think much of it is just wrong.  But I don't want to argue about what caused price changes because it doesn't matter.  I never said that stability was the only thing driving demand, it's just one thing.

I'm referring to long periods of time here - there appear to only have been 2 cycles of the oscillation I'm talking about.  There was a stable period until Spring 2011, and then unstable until early 2012.  Then stable again until early 2013, then unstable until now.

I'm saying this cycle contributes to itself.  Stable prices contribute to unstable prices, and vice versa.
legendary
Activity: 804
Merit: 1002
July 18, 2013, 12:50:50 PM
#2
yes, you are. bitcoins have indeed a limited supply, and stability in the price does indeed raise demand which in turn raises the price.
BUT hughe price increases usually come with observable causes in the real world: more news being posted and switch from cpu to gpu was the first jump in price, since gpu sales in the high end market went through the roof. The second jump was cyprus declaring bank accounts to be frozen, and asicminers/fpga's coming into play.
Note that btc prices still rose independent from those jumps, but those jumps were clearly visible nonetheless. And the famous bubble bursts were not real bubble bursts; both were made artificially (the first mt.gox? being hacked and the second mt.gox inability to process the huge amount of new customers and the resulting downtime/delay driving fears of another hack ).

And if you watch the graphs a little you will notice that the "buuble bursts" have only driven the bitcoin prices to a little more or less than before the jumps.ss
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