Topic: I'm All In - Sold My House! - page 63. (Read 112579 times)

Run, Forrest.

Rewind to the beginning of 2009. I had a pension fund with skandia, it was managed and was split between three middle of the road ETF's. It had obviously suffered a bit due to the events of 2008.

A while before that I'd got a MacBook Pro, which I'd bought primarily as a result of having got an iPhone some time before that. I did this on the recommendation of a friend who's opinion I respected when my then current (linux) laptop was stolen, and I was trying to find a replacement.

I saw the products Apple was putting out. They seemed to value quality over price. I liked what I bought. I believed in them as a company.

So much so that I took my pension and moved it to a SIPP. For those that don't know a SIPP is a wrapper that allows you to control how your pension pot is invested. After forking over the fees necessary to switch providers (gotta love the financial industry taking a bite out of everything you do) I put it all into AAPL stock.

At the time, the sentiment towards AAPL was the same as the sentiment towards BTC right now. Anyone that I told what I had done said I was crazy, I shouldn't risk my future on some crazy gamble. As it turns out over the next few years I averaged out of AAPL and diversified into a few other companies. This was the "sensible" thing to do. I hated doing it, but I knew I probably should. Wouldn't you know it, if I'd just left it in AAPL I'd be doing far better - even after the slide from $700 back down to today's prices.

The point of this anecdote, is that I bought AAPL because I believed in it. I know full well it could have gone the other way. I feel exactly the same way about BTC.

To be clear, what this post means is that I would rather lose all my money investing in things that I fundamentally believe are great. I think if you play it safe every single time life throws an opportunity your way, then the only thing you can be sure of is that you will never, ever, realise the benefits of those opportunities. Whilst some people might be cool with that, what they fail to miss is that they don't guarantee that bad stuff won't happen.

Humans are shit at risk. Risk is probability, life is outcomes. Life doesn't do probabilities, it is concrete outcome. The probability of something having happened is no consolation to the person it happened to.

If bad shit is gonna happen to me, then I'd like to have been the person responsible for it, rather than the person who blames their shitty luck.

I am also becoming increasingly convinced that we haven't, or at least feel that we are going a good bit lower than where we are now at least testing the previous low if not actually breaching it.

Trading has been very strange lately. Absolutely nothing and then big bursts all at once, both to upside and to downside......as though there were very little organic interest but some big fishes are making big splashes all at once. Dangerous times. Most holders of Bitcoin are holding for future USD gains. Most Bitcoin trading is done by speculators looking to make USD gains in the present. But the whole game is held together by increasing interest at prices that don't scare away new capital. If Bitcoin isn't making people money, or even losing people money, then why hold it?

What is needed to support price is increased functional adoption, which will come but saving for some economic crisis, will take some quite some time. Otherwise, another mad rush into Bitcoin is required. I am sure this will happen again at some point but I can't see where it is going to come from at the time being.

This decision was made in March of last year.  Please don't use the OP to judge current sentiment (although you might use the replies for that purpose).  (I am not making any predictions about a sustained reversal though)

Blood propaganda ... reminds me Topsy the Elephant ...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkBU3aYsf0Q

:-(

The more blood and guts there is now, the more trusted it'll be in the future if it can pass beyond it.

It's appalling what many Bitcoiners have been subjected to in terms of scams and failures. If it is still standing once the majority of evil has been flushed out of the ecosystem, that can bode well for future strength.

I think this year might be the key one for leaping beyond its nefarious early history.

why is this not in the media yet

reversal of what?

When I saw this thread a dark realization came upon me, we had not yet reached a sustained reversal.

the best advice anyone on here can give you is this:
HODL!

Yes - thats my concern too.

Whenever I read stuff written by Bitcoin sceptics they never seem to preclude the idea of a cryptocurrency - they just seem down on Bitcoin in particular. Silk Road ? I dunno. Its like they are waiting for a new clean sexy cryptocurrency and then they'll be ready to jump on board. But not yet, and not with bitcoin. Maybe they are pissed off at not having had the insight to have adopted it earlier, or some such.

Of course, as time goes on (and on), the BTC protocol becomes stronger and more trusted (if only for being still present/with us/having survived) - and so, wether the sceptics like it or not, it will slowly but surely creep into the collective consciousness.

And I reckon that when it comes to cryptocurrencies a timeserved apprenticeship is a big bonus. For every Mt. Gox BTC is one step closer to graduation (I hope)


With regard the OP ...


...this.

that's why the moat full of alligators and sharks was invented.

    This was a good move, and everyone should follow suit. Bitcoin is naturally superior to fiat, and this will be proven by those who are willing to shift from the decaying banking system to the world of personal responsibility and freedom.

   It's too bad you are doing it just to get rich. If we do see a protracted bear market, you may be tempted to sell in the kind of stampede mentality that could set the development of bitcoin back quite a bit. As a security I would recommend buying another house when the price is between 5-10k $. People should refrain as much as possible from supporting the illegal and immoral wars and trade policy of the nation states and avoid transacting in fiat because it's the right thing to do. Speculation, however, is not a win-win.

   And remember that with great power comes great responsibility- while it may seem like a nice fantasy to escape to a private island somewhere, there could be hordes of people starving in tent cities who kept all of their money in fiat until it was too late, and we will all be better off if we devote some of our wealth to taking care of these people- in the end, you could consider it an investment in peace and stability, because if things get bad enough, the people's whose pension funds collapsed and whose bank deposits became worthless could very likely build a raft out of old refrigerators and storm your island.

     You can also buy gold with bitcoin- diversification is a good idea if you want more security.

yeayyy congrats man! wish you luck

It's interesting how just about anyone who has ever said that fail to explain how, just saying.

You are under 25, gamble while you are young, why the hell not.

But i agree with some of the other sentiments on here, you would have been better off to have sold for whatever you could have got for it in 2013 and bought BTC with whatever you could come up with. You would be sitting on 5k bitcoin instead of a few hundred.

but you have more than me, so way to kick ass. I do think that Bitcoin still has the potential to go to zero though, just saying......

Because, of course one can use poker chips to send money across the world for just a fraction of the cost than it does via a wire transfer...

for me BTCBTCBTC means never get bored ...

Hope for you it's not the first ... $10 would suck