Topic: Wall Observer BTC/USD - Bitcoin price movement tracking & discussion - page 26704. (Read 26610084 times)

Actually this is true. But can you pay with dollar bills straight to dell? No not on their website, obviously. You must have a bank account together with a card. And for that it will be fees. Also if you would like to move your USD around the world it will be fees and lots of restrictions. Bitcoin is free!!!

Most importantly also the magical unicorn method for sending USD- I think this is the answer Jorge deserved for this simple question- hence that is why I gave that answer to start with.... y'know what they say "ask a stupid question, expect a stupid answer"

Explanation

The ATM is another layer between you and the banks.  Namely, the cash is deposited into the ATM company's bank account, and transfered to the bank account of some exchange in order to buy moer bitcoins.  The fee of that BT is included in the ATM fee.

Granted that there need not be any BT for localbitcoin transactions that are paid in cash; but  that requires meeting the BTC seller in person, which is not the most convenient thing in the world.  (I read an amusing tale of such a transaction, somewhere on this forum, that took several hours and ended with the buyer feeling obliged to help the seller load some heavy furniture onto a truck.)

Mining and donations would fall into the cases of "have BTC", rather than "have USD".


Well, indeed Dell is offering a discount for BTC purchases, but:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/dell/10980089/Dell-jumps-on-the-Bitcoin-bandwagon.html
I wonder how much Dell overcharges for Alienware computers?   (I tried comparing prices in the catalogs below, but could not find comparable configurations.)

Dell catalog:
http://outlet.us.dell.com/ARBOnlineSales/Online/InventorySearch.aspx?c=us&cs=22&l=en&s=dfh&brandid=2201&fid=4450

Alienware catalog:
http://www.dell.com/us/p/alienware-17/pd.aspx

In general, payment from USD in your bank to USD in the merchant's bank via bitcoin cannot be cheaper than paying directly in USD, since the latter is just one BT, the former is two BTs and other stuff in the middle. The bitcoin path may seem to be cheaper only because the second BT is hidden in the Coinbase fee, and the first BT is paid beforehand and thus does not feel like it is part of the payment.

I didn't say it's a long term stable state, did I? But for now, it seems to be the "small profit takers" that run the show. Until, indeed, the switch is flipped again and we see another "resistant" run-up. Which might take a while.

Before that, I expect a small scale version of the same dynamic, but one that is still sensitive enough to the profit takers' actions. Say, another week or more of the current sideways, maybe even a re-test of lower levels, and then another leg up to 800, 900.

If this is really true, then to me, that would imply that there are fewer and fewer people willing to sell BTC within this price range.

Yes, Jorge.  Most of us here realize that you are a troll, and that is why you frequently ask such stupid questions and make such unimportant comments.

There is NOTHING inconvenient about the answer to your question, except that you should be able to figure it out yourself if you were more involved in buying and selling bitcoins.  Instead, you claim to have NOT purchased any through any service.

There are a variety of ways to acquire bitcoins by wiring money or by handing cash to someone or by mining or by earning them through a service or sales of a product.  Once you have the bitcoin(s), then you can use them to acquire Dell products or services (Dell chooses whether or NOT it wants to convert back to fiat and/or when to convert back to fiat, if it is going to convert).

3d MACD divergence turned red on all exchanges, for the first time since May.

Volume on down days is getting smaller while volume on up days is getting bigger, relatively speaking, on average.

That dynamic is providing energy to coil the spring for the next leap.  It works until it doesn't work.  The scalpers pick up the nickels, while the hodlers ride the steamroller.  The scalpers end up 50% in on average, or less if they short.  When the game shifts, that's a lot of capacity that needs to be filled suddenly in order to tag along for the upthrust.  We've seen this switch flip a few times since the GBL (Gox bankruptcy low).  One day it will stick in the On position, and money will flow until the circuit breakers blow.

Show the volume 

Explanation

Cavirtex with crazy spikes.

I disagree with the market being a lot more "professional" at this point and I don't think anyone is making much money by taking small profits in this ranging market. This sort of short term low volatility has happened before, when the market was presumably less professional, right? The "strong 'irrational' trends towards a new ATH" do not happen unless a lot of new people (mostly speculators) are introduced into the market. I feel as though the stability we have seen is just the bulls running out of money (see maxed out leverage on bitfinex by crazy people, who have probably lost 10% of their trade money from interest already), but also few are bearish enough to start selling much because this is bitcoin and it will be big in the future.

The thought that the market might be more professional now made me think about something else, though. We all want another bubble to begin and everyone says it will start when the "institutional" money arrives from Wall Street. Well, I don't think professionals are going to participate in a bubble, and they definitely will not keep buying after we go past the ATH because they will realize its way to risky at that point. However, the ETF will allow a lot of regular people to trade bitcoin so that might propel the price beyond at that point.

Well, strictly speaking, actually no, in order to obtain a bitcoin it doesn't require a BT, it's just the exchange part that requires it. Since you asked specifically for it I thought it could be useful to recap some of the available methods. Still, there are other ways to obtain bitcoins that don't involve a BT.

Just to name a few: localbitcoin (peer to peer exchange), ATM (Robocoin/Lamassu), mining (as unfeasible or expensive it may seem, it's still a valid method), donations (remember the "Hi mom, send bitcoin here" sign a few months ago?), or even salary (yes, there are employers who offer this opportunity to their employees).

As per your question, I'm not aware of exchanges accepting credit cards. Too much fraud risk, generally speaking (Oh, the irony).


Questionable assertion. Anyone could benefit from a discount offered in BTC prices at the present time, even while currently possessing 0 BTC.
 
If the company A ("Dell") offers the possibility to either

1) Purchase an item at full USD price or
2) Purchase an item with a x % discount if priced through BTC

I'd say that if the discount is greater than the expenses for the BTC conversion you end up paying a lower price, whether you have "cheap" BTC or not.

Explanation

See why I would rather not buy bitcoin?  Exposure to the stuff ruins one's vision so that even the simplest stupid question becomes utterly incomprehensible, even if repeated in boldface -- if the answer turns out to be inconvenient. 

Thank you!  The answer did not have to be that detailed; the important point is that  turning USD into bitcoin requires a bank transfer (BT) of some sort. (Out of curiosity, are there exchanges that accept credit card?).

So, for a domestic internet purchase, the best payment method is as follows:

(1) If you have USD, and the merchant accepts USD, you just send USD to the merchant:
  USD in your bank  >--[BT]--> USD in merchant's bank

(2)  If you have BTC, and the store really accepts BTC, you send them the coins with a blockchain transaction (TX):
  BTC in your wallet >--[TX]--> BTC in merchant's wallet

(3) If you have BTC, and the store accepts only USD, but has a Coinbase (or Bitpay) account, you send the coins through Coinbase:
    BTC in your wallet >--[TX]--> BTC in Coinbase wallet  >--[**]--> USD in Coinbase's bank >--[BT]-->  USD in merchant's bank

(4)  If you have BTC, and the store accepts only USD, and the store does not have a Coinbase/Bitpay account, you must sell the BTC yourself:
   BTC in your wallet >--[TX]--> BTC in Bitstamp's wallet  >--[**]--> USD in Bitstamp's bank >--[BT]--> USD in your bank >--[BT]-->  USD in merchant's bank

(5) Finally, if you have USD, and the store accepts only BTC, you should look for another store.  There is a good chance that the merchant is either a fanatical bitcoiner who believes that ideological purity is more important than profit and client satisfaction, and threfore may go bankrupt before filling your order; or is a scammer who thinks (naively, perhaps) that he has better chances of evading justice by taking your bitcoins instead of your dollars.  (Examples abound of both.)

The ">--[**]-->" in (3) and (4) above stands for "sell the BTC for USD on some exchange".  That is the point when the day traders who buy bitcoins today get to pay the bills of the old bitcoiners who are spending the coins that they bought before November.

By the way, it is not quite correct to say that "Dell gets the bitcoins, and may decide to sell them".  Rather, Dell may opt to receive the entire payment in USD from Coinbase, or to keep some fraction in BTC in their Coinbase account, which they may latter sell or withdraw.  In either case, it is Coinbase, not Dell, that sells the bitcoins that are not kept.

And there is no indication in Dell's website that they intend to keep any of the bitcoins.  On the contrary, there are indications that they leave the handling of bitcoin entirely to Coinbase.  For one thing, if you pay the wrong bitcoin amount, Coinbase will reject the payment and refund you by returning the bitcoins to your Coinbase account; but if you return defective merchandise, Dell will send you the refund in USD, no matter how you paid for it.

For purchasing goods overseas, going through BTC could be an interesting alternative even if you have USD rather than BTC, since it would replace one international bank transfer by two domestic ones plus exchange fees.  However, it seems that Dell and many other merchants do not accept "bitcoin payment" (that is, national money via Coinbase or Bitpay) for overseas purchases; and the higher risk of loss in transport makes credit cards more interesting in that case.  As for paying hotel bills and such whlie traveling overseas, prepaid debit cards still seem to be the cheapest and more convenient option.

So, that would explain why the price does not rise on such "good news": not because of "damn sheep" and "stupid weak hands", but because those news are irrelevant to most people -- except  for Coinbase and BitPay, and for the bitcoiners who wish to unload some old cheap coins.

Low volume only bothers day traders though. If people are not keeping their coins on exchanges and are trading less in general then that doesn't bother me. The only thing that matters is how much someone is willing to pay. I dont care if we do 1mm BTC a day in volume or 5k if Im not a trader. Dont worry if/when another bubble happens it will happen regardless and when that time comes there will be no shortage of people flying money and coins into exchanges, but granted during these "down times" the voume is greatly reduced and GOX can be named as a contributing factor.

Lets remember though, counter party risk was among the reasons I first got interested in Bitcoin. The whole be your own bank and dont let the bankers gamble your money away. Therefore it stands to reason that I wouldnt keep coins/fiat on exchanges and it took an event like GOX to remind people of that. It could be argued then, that if you beleive this low volume is due to people not keeping coins on exchanges then this is a positive in regards to people understanding the fundamental principles of Bitcoin.

But as I said, I wouldn't fear as once the train moves for whatever reasons people will quickly forget about the lessons they learnt and will go back to day tarding, staring at the charts hoping for that $10 move so they can close their short and make 0.0001BTC

Ideal szenario in terms of mainstream-trust? Some big US-stock-broker that starts a bitcoin exchange.

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