Topic: Why is bitcoin going for more than $20 on eBay? (Read 5985 times)

Considering the continued utility of sites like Let Me Google That For You, I think you overestimate the average luser's search skills.

Don't sell unless you are shipping something physical.

100% scammers in my exerpience on eBay, PayPal openly admit that I can buy a digital good, claim I never received it, and get my full refund with no problems. The lady on the phone admitted to facilitation of fraud so long as it is a digital good. I was angry, but shall do no more instant transactions on eBay. All stolen cards and fraudsters.

Always sell a physical good to help protect yourself. If anyone needs help with the physical goods part, I have beautiful unfunded, custom printed, notes for sale complete with tamper evident stickers. https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/for-sale-beautiful-paper-bitcoins-unfunded-custom-printing-any-amount-120221

It only costs $1.70 to ship one of these to people and they get their BTC in 3 days usually. That $1.70 includes delivery confirmation and is created using PayPal's shipping system. Overall, it is still less of a hassle than MtGox. It helps to weed out scammers, it makes you more legit in PayPal's eyes. Some buyers upgrade to priority shipping and that is going to add a few more dimes to your profit.

Yeah, but I think they are talking about physical goods. I mean could take them to court and prove wrong because I do have proof, but it's not worth over $15.

Isn't the customer required to return the merchandise?

I concur with other responses... For a lot of people, $20 on eBay is easier than dealing with Dwolla & MtGox.
That is one thing that I like about Virtex.  I can create an account, walk to a branch of their bank, make a cash deposit, and buy BTC five minutes later... 

I tried that, made screenshot of submitted wallet, transaction, my wallet and it didn't work. They told me the buyers account got stolen and even if they receive goods they reserve the right to get their money back.
I was like 

Same reason for buying 1st one, got it from bitmarket.eu, then started buying them from bitmarket.eu and selling on eBay at a reasonable markup.

ran into the chargeback game, then ebay de-listed a bitcoin auction saying it wasn't allowed.  I stopped after that, I value my eBay account even though they are fucking evil. 

what is the rule now?  Can you win paypal disputes with blockchain verification now?

It is of course is not as popular, but eBay is just turned from the auction for users like it used to be into big corporate marketplace.
Then you try to compete with all those companies...

I didnt know about eBit. Seems to be a great egay alternative. 

They can't take it indefinitely, just for 6 months 

Omg, that is so crazy to hear. There are some crazy people out there, and PayPal pretty much didn't listen to you.
I know they can freeze you for any reason, but there has to be a good reason otherwise you can sue them. They are in the US and law works here.
They cannot just take your money without a good reason, that's what I mean.

No license is required to sell seeds. My auction listing had pictures of opium poppies and a link to the wikipedia page for papaver somniferum. this is where mom clicked... saw the word heroin and instantly the seeds were a drug and I was shut down. The same seeds that you get on a bagel. HEROIN DEALER?

Papal can freeze your account for pretty much any reason.

Did your business with poison-garden seeds required some kind of license? If you were licensed then it would be illegal for PayPal to freeze your account.

As for physical bitcoins, have you tried adding signature confirmation, I don't know if it does much but it does adds seller protection.

Oh an have anyone ever tried eBid. It has auctions worldwide and fees are much less than eBay, or eCrater.

Well, the auction was for a penny and the bitcoins were free (delivered digitally). I had two ebay accounts. The first hit a limit (new), so I tried to use my old one and that was when they sent the mail to me. All the activity happened during the course of two weeks.

I saw your post bout PayPal divorcing you. Can you tell me a little bit about your account?

My questions are...

Did you ONLY sell bitcoins?
How long were you a member for?
Did you only sell digital delivery?
You said you only had 3 chargebacks and many voluntary refunds. What time span did the chargebacks happen in? 1 month? 6 months? more?

In my past experience with PayPal I believe PayPal to be generally lazy. They only seem to act when someone complains. Do you feel a competitor may have "narked you out" ?

I used to run a seed selling business on eBay back in 2003-2007. I specialized in poison-garden seeds. Some of which can be considered drugs. I had that PayPal account closed over a $2 poppy seed packet sale and the complaint came from a concerned mother. I had refunded her payment when she contacted me, I was very pleasant with the woman and felt the issue was handled well by me and was shocked when PayPal canceled my account. After the 180 days, It took an additional 6 months to recover the frozen funds. At the time there was NO WAY to speak to anyone on the phone.

I'm really going to begin to worry if they are canceling paypal accounts for people who are shipping physical bitcoins (me).

On a more positive note, I got my paypal account back in the end by providing them a bunch of information and agreeing not to sell poisonous seeds anymore. Attempts to explain how lots of innocent vegetables have poison seeds fell on deaf ears at PayPal. They ALWAYS assume the seller to be a liar and the buyer to be a judge/jury/executioner. I have been an eBay seller since 1998 and have been using PayPal since it was X.com.

Yeah they are getting scarce because paypal is banning them 

If you're just going to reverse the transaction anyway, $47 isn't that much money.

Could also be digital delivery sellers are getting scarce

Just seen this and about died
http://www.ebay.com/itm/1-Bitcoin-1-0-BTC-Digital-Currency-/181001007600?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item2a248031f0

jeesh come buy coins from me lol

I like that last line, it sounds so much better than "we are getting ripped off less."

One minor correction, independent sellers on eBay set the price without any guidance or assistance from eBay. On MtGox independent sellers can establish a price, and the current market price is available to all without effort.

Cheers

ebay has enormous fees which is why it costs more, and the fact that you'll be scammed afterwards by paypal is probably a risk must equal reward factor in the price

if you sold bitcoin printouts or a CD/USB drive with the priv keys on it and physically shipped it to a validated paypal address you may have a leg or two to stand on but are still open to scams

You know it was funny finding mtgox years later after being a magic the gathering fan and using the site so long ago. Made me do a double take.

eBay/Paypal will not look at videos sent to them as proof of anything.

Once again... NEVER, EVER... (ever) SEND BITCOINS DIGITALLY THROUGH EBAY/PAYPAL SALES.

Always ship them a physical product. Always use the integrated shipping tools with PayPal.

There are several very nice printing options available with a multitude of designs.

http://print.printcoins.com by RobKhor is my favorite as it has the most designs available (and more on the way).
search github for aristus for a command line application which prints on a turing note.
bitinstant.com has a javascript based note printer.

I'm always into scamming the scammers so here's what you do.  Grab a little camera and film the screen showing their e-mail with their BTC address.  Then open the client, copy and paste, and hit send.  If they initiate a chargeback, paypal or a CC processor asks you for any additional evidence you might have that proves you sent what they bought.  Send them the video.  Then that scamming jackass who initiated a chargeback or paypal complaint and thought his big pile of money was coming right back is totally out that money.

I wonder if anyone currently employed at eBay even remembers auction web programmer turnover is 5 years on average.

Very early on, eBay was known as AuctionWeb:


I still have the registration email from when I signed up for AuctionWeb in May 1997.  The link given at the end, http://www.ebay.com/aw/, returns 404. How much work would it have been to put in a 301 redirect?  

Thanks. I wish you'd send me a huge in depth info about the bASIC as well if you had time. Thanks!

Even if you send a physical item, which is how I sell on eBay, there is still a chance someone can charge back.

Many PayPal chargebacks are actually initiated through the buyer's credit card company.
If you run your own CC gateway, people can still charge back, use stolen cards, etc.
If you run your own CC gateway, you lose what little seller protection that PayPal offers.
If you run your own CC gateway, you have more ability to dispute chargebacks but you also have to provide your own infrastructure to validate buyer addresses.
If you run your own CC gateway, eBay is not going to be as easy to work with to resolve disputes.

Not trying to talk you out of it, these are just things to consider before jumping into a coins for CC venture of any kind. There are some failed attempts at this service which you can find by searching this forum.

Here is what I don't understand - the chargebacks on PayPal I understand..

But what if I set up a CC gateway and accept payments, would it be the same?

What if on eBay I set up to sell a printed voucher and mail a physical representation?

To be frank, bitcoin on eBay is often drug money.
Drugs make honest people do bad things and are a magnet for dishonest people.

Mostly it is a matter of retail markup.

Sell something retail at maybe 40% markup, you only really lost 60% of the retail price when you get scammed.

If you know where I can but bitcoins at 60% of retail so I can resell them I'd love to know about it!

So basically whatever price you can buy them for, mark them up the usual kind of amount you charge on bags of sugar or cups of coffee or whatever, then add extra for the higher rate of scams on eBay compared to in your own shop with your shotgun or baseball bat under the counter...

-MarkM-

Thanks for that explanation. I'm interest in knowing why bitcoin is more susceptible to this abuse, especially if there is a physical item involved. How would this differ from other items? Is it because ebay or paypal can require a seller to accept a return?

It's always a risk that someone will abuse the system and chargeback even after receiving a physical item.
If a chargeback happens, paypal freezes the funds until the issue is worked out.

Main reason for chargebacks... stolen account. Also the easiest thing to spot/avoid.

Can someone explain the risk of selling BTC on ebay? How is disputing a transaction on ebay different for bitcoins than for other items?

Also, it seems to me that if you send something in the mail (one of those print-your-own notes or a casascius coin, even) so that you can verify receipt, it should be fine.

It actually was:

http://web.archive.org/web/20070525044536/http://mtgox.com/gwt/mtgox.php

eBay sets the eBay-market price of bitcoins, MtGox sets the MtGox-market price of bitcoins. The market in the tiny town at the top of the loneliiest mountain, beyond the gorge of gargyles and the deepest pits of despair sets its own market-price of bitcoins.

"Market price" is, in short, a term that has two components, one of which is "market". So first you gotta find the scope/redius/locus or the market whose price you are trying to determine.

How many people participate in eBay?

How many in MtGox?

It can probably reasonably be argued that the market price of bitcoin is $20 but that there do exist niche geek clubs where one can, purportedly, and possibly not without some rigamarole, obtain them cheaper.

-MarkM-

HAHAHAH now I'll never unsee that acronym

MtGox means "Magic the Gathering Online Exchange". Enough said pro & con about that here previously... 

In terms though of being [put your adjective here], i think it's no worse than the name "eBay"... 

Man I would be too scared to sell BTC on ebay with the potential for chargebacks

But the exchanges are revealing publicly what someone is willing to exchange bitcoin for. The exchanges reveal what hundreds or thousands of people are willing to exchange bitcoin for. The market participants collectively set the price of any market and that means that mtgox gives much more information about the market price of bitcoin than ebay does.

Me too, and for the same reason.

A Bitcoin is worth whatever someone's willing to exchange for it, be it US dollars or peanuts. The same is true of any other currency or item. To suggest that the exchange rate on MtGox or any other exchange sets the value of a Bitcoin is a very limited view.

As for the price on Ebay, if one were to purchase a Bitcoin on MtGox for $12.00. turn around and sell it on Ebay, it would need to be sold for around $14 in order to break even because of the fees.  $20 is not unreasonable considering the potential for charge-backs.

And the EFT fees at MTGox are $35 last I checked.  So...there's that.

No... I don't believe it goes like that at all.

People buy bitcoins for $20 on eBay cause they want them now and they don't want to give their bank account information to MtGox for 1 goddamn bitcoin so they can buy stuff they want. (WTF does MtGox even mean).

I sell $20 coins on eBay too all day every day. Scammers abound though. The price is $20 because checking out buyers is a hassle. Thats the tax you pay for me having to email you and call you and weed out the scumbags.

If you meet me in person at the dunkin donuts, i'll sell you coins for $15.

If you want the going rate, you gotta go through an exchange and wait and wait and wait for transfers from your bank to theirs and you probably didn't want to use your real bank so you had to go open a new bank and they want a minimum balance and OH FUCK IT, i'll spend $20 on eBay. DONE.

Someone who stumbles upon bitcoin will do the following.


www.google.com
(bitcoin)

And this is what pops up

Bitcoin - P2P digital currency
bitcoin.org/
Official site offering documentation, forums and the open source client software which permits to send and receive bitcoins

Bitcoin - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitcoin
Bitcoin (sign: B⃦ , Ƀ, ฿; abbrv: BTC) is a peer-to-peer digital currency created by the pseudonymous entity, Satoshi Nakamoto. One Bitcoin is divided into ...

Mt.Gox - Bitcoin Exchange
https://mtgox.com/
Exchange which allows users to trade US Dollars for Bitcoins and vice versa.

I doubt they cant figure it out.

Someone new to the bitcoin community doesn't know about bit instant but obviously they know about ebay.  That's the majority of the problem there.

BitInstant? I know the 4% commish is a bit of a damper but the service is there, and I hear it's reasonably speedy too.

I bought my first bitcoin on ebay... just wanted to get one!

How is this a big mystery?  What do you have to do right now to take your USD and buy bitcoins?  That's the answer.  Use a sketchy 3rd party financial company based on some island somewhere or whatever like Liberty Reserve or Dwolla (US-based but still super sketchy).  Or have MTGox do a wire transfer for like a $35 fee.  Doesn't anyone realize that if someone made a non-pain in the ass method for buying BTC, the price would go through the roof and we'd all get rich?

It's such a hassle right now, if someone wants BTC, the extra fee on ebay is worth it to use a well known purchase and payment infrastructure like ebay/paypal.

Also listing and closing fees and paypal fees have to be considered so it's not like he's getting $20.

Of course they
Where do you get that idea from?  

So if I hack your PayPal account and send $10,000 to a friend of mine as long as I (the hacker) leaves positive feedback then it is irreversible?   Awesome.  

But this is the seller's profile, and apparently buyers left positive feedback for him. Once buyer leave positive feedback, paypal will not reverse the transaction.

It is cheaper!
$0 (after chargeback) is cheaper than $14, $12, even $10.

That works something like this:

The buyers buy, then reverse their transaction after the seller has left positive feedback.

Look at this guy's history:
http://feedback.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewFeedback2&userid=allimsell

He is able to consistently sell at least half of the listing of bitcoin for much more than $20 per coin, and same thing happens with other bitcoin sellers too. Why are people buying at $20+ when they could've gotten it for the market price everywhere else. I mean it's cheaper to just buy a casascius physical coin, and get the btc this way. I don't get it.