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On 1/29/2021 at 8:55 AM, FLEA said:

Well, I guess you have a problem with AOC supporting riots to murder cops this summer right? Remember when she said riots should make people feel uncomfortable? Or are we being disingenuous? I actually have a lot of respect for AOC but this was a missed oppurtunity for her. Nothing about her comment is bipartisan, it's actually quite polarizing. She should have taken the higher road on this one. 

 

Basically, she just jeapordized the chances of this movement to have meaningful change for the average person by risking politicizing the issue; because she can't get over her own political ego. Unsat.

At some point people will realize she's the (D) version of Trump. I suspect her political fortunes will be similar.

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26 minutes ago, Lord Ratner said:

At some point people will realize she's the (D) version of Trump. I suspect her political fortunes will be similar.

She'll be elected president, do a terrible job, get impeached, and attempt to get her supporters to overthrow the results when she loses her re-election bid?

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36 minutes ago, pawnman said:

She'll be elected president, do a terrible job, get impeached, and attempt to get her supporters to overthrow the results when she loses her re-election bid?

She'll be popular due to a failure of our institutions to protect the American Dream for regular citizens, rise because she is willing to say politically unpopular things that alienate her from the establishment but ingratiate her with her base, use social media to bypass the usual structures and speak directly to her followers, lack any sort of real understanding of the system she wishes to change, continually say things that are factually wrong, not offer a face-saving route for her opposition to side with her, and ultimately fizzle out because she can't make the transition from activist to diplomat and appeal to a broad spectrum of voters.

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19 minutes ago, Lord Ratner said:

She'll be popular due to a failure of our institutions to protect the American Dream for regular citizens, rise because she is willing to say politically unpopular things that alienate her from the establishment but ingratiate her with her base, use social media to bypass the usual structures and speak directly to her followers, lack any sort of real understanding of the system she wishes to change, continually say things that are factually wrong, not offer a face-saving route for her opposition to side with her, and ultimately fizzle out because she can't make the transition from activist to diplomat and appeal to a broad spectrum of voters.

Wait are we talking about AOC or Trump I can't tell? 

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17 minutes ago, FLEA said:

Wait are we talking about AOC or Trump I can't tell? 

Yes.

Back on topic, purchased my first crypto today through PayPal.  Went with Ethereum, but for a very small amount... just getting my foot in the door.  Any thoughts on how it compares to the other cryptos available on PayPal? (Bitcoin, Litecoin, and Bitcoin Cash)

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8 minutes ago, skosh said:

Yes.

Back on topic, purchased my first crypto today through PayPal.  Went with Ethereum, but for a very small amount... just getting my foot in the door.  Any thoughts on how it compares to the other cryptos available on PayPal? (Bitcoin, Litecoin, and Bitcoin Cash)

I decided I was going to get into Bitcoin when it was around 12k after the crash, but didn't end up pulling the trigger before it went parabolic. I do think there's a long-term proposition for Bitcoin, analogous to gold and silver. I don't think it's ever going to replace currency because governments are never going to allow their currencies to be replaced, but you're not allowed to spend gold and silver at the grocery store either.

 

I happen to have a fancy new graphics card, so I'm mining etherium (ether), but that's only like 10 bucks a day. I still intend to buy into crypto on a meaningful level, but I just can't make any sort of justification for either of them at their current levels.

 

I think it's going to come down to whether or not you believe there's a market correction on the horizon. If there is, then cash is the only safe haven. Take a look at March and look at what happened to the usual places to hide your money when the stock market goes bad. All of them were down. The market is so heavily leveraged right now that when a real correction occurs, it seems like everybody is forced to sell everything in order to cover their bets. And considering how decimated both silver and crypto were during the last downturn, I would not be surprised to see a similar phenomenon. Granted I don't think it will go back down to 5,000.

 

Also, I would seriously look at Kraken as your exchange. Much more flexibility, much better terms, and the most interesting vision of the way forward. I believe they're somewhat close to getting the first no kidding crypto bank opened up in Wyoming, which will allow for a level of flexibility and exchange between regular and cryptocurrencies that has not existed before.

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I use Coinbase Pro and I like it a lot. I have 45% in each of Bitcoin and ethereum and the rest in small random coins. I think ether has the highest upside for the year at this point.  The hard part is watching the volatility and not panic selling and just learning the cycles. The crash shouldn’t happen until the end of this year. Overall it’s speculative but I have 145% returns since March. 

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43 minutes ago, Lord Ratner said:

I decided I was going to get into Bitcoin when it was around 12k after the crash, but didn't end up pulling the trigger before it went parabolic. I do think there's a long-term proposition for Bitcoin, analogous to gold and silver. I don't think it's ever going to replace currency because governments are never going to allow their currencies to be replaced, but you're not allowed to spend gold and silver at the grocery store either.

 

I happen to have a fancy new graphics card, so I'm mining etherium (ether), but that's only like 10 bucks a day. I still intend to buy into crypto on a meaningful level, but I just can't make any sort of justification for either of them at their current levels.

 

I think it's going to come down to whether or not you believe there's a market correction on the horizon. If there is, then cash is the only safe haven. Take a look at March and look at what happened to the usual places to hide your money when the stock market goes bad. All of them were down. The market is so heavily leveraged right now that when a real correction occurs, it seems like everybody is forced to sell everything in order to cover their bets. And considering how decimated both silver and crypto were during the last downturn, I would not be surprised to see a similar phenomenon. Granted I don't think it will go back down to 5,000.

 

Also, I would seriously look at Kraken as your exchange. Much more flexibility, much better terms, and the most interesting vision of the way forward. I believe they're somewhat close to getting the first no kidding crypto bank opened up in Wyoming, which will allow for a level of flexibility and exchange between regular and cryptocurrencies that has not existed before.

Interesting idea since the whole point of crypto currencies was to remove the neccessity of banks after the 2008 financial crash. 

As far as it replacing regular currency, that has more to do with merchants than governments. If merchants began to accept it in mass, I think the USG is going to have a very hard time slowing it down. 

So things that will make it difficult though is the requirement to pay people in USD and pay taxes in USD. But you could also get around that by paying people minimum wage in USD and the rest of their wage in crypto. 

 

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11 minutes ago, FLEA said:

Interesting idea since the whole point of crypto currencies was to remove the neccessity of banks after the 2008 financial crash. 

As far as it replacing regular currency, that has more to do with merchants than governments. If merchants began to accept it in mass, I think the USG is going to have a very hard time slowing it down. 

So things that will make it difficult though is the requirement to pay people in USD and pay taxes in USD. But you could also get around that by paying people minimum wage in USD and the rest of their wage in crypto. 

 

Agreed, but I suspect once we come even remotely close to crypto being accepted as currency, the govt will step in.

 

There's a 0% chance the governments of the world relinquish their ability to manipulate the currency. I think any belief to the contrary requires ignoring the last 50 years of fiscal policy.

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41 minutes ago, Lord Ratner said:

Agreed, but I suspect once we come even remotely close to crypto being accepted as currency, the govt will step in.

 

There's a 0% chance the governments of the world relinquish their ability to manipulate the currency. I think any belief to the contrary requires ignoring the last 50 years of fiscal policy.

Right but the question is how? What are they going to do short of mandating US companies pay in USD and shutting off the internet? 

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17 hours ago, Majestik Møøse said:

How could you not? Investing 10% of that salary at 7% ROR yields $1m liquid in 23 years. Not even counting real estate appreciation, which is how most people get there. Inflation not accounted for.

https://smartasset.com/investing/investment-calculator#OCfdEpDGFU

I'm assuming you are being sarcastic.  $1m is chump change.  

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3 hours ago, FLEA said:

Right but the question is how? What are they going to do short of mandating US companies pay in USD and shutting off the internet? 

Just disallow US companies from accepting crypto as payment. I don't think it'll be difficult for them to do. Making it go away? Super hard, maybe impossible. But making it too inconvenient to use for practical purposes (like it is now), much easier.

 

It can be a store of value like gold, but if crypto replaces the USD, it'll be a blockchain that the .gov controls, can add or remove coins at will, control the mining fees, and ultimately centralize the mining operation. It's just too far of a reach for me to believe they would allow for the decentralization of money. And the "how" would be the easy part.

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3 hours ago, Swamp Yankee said:

I'm assuming you are being sarcastic.  $1m is chump change.  

Yeah, I get it, $3m is the new $1m.  But there is a surprising divide, even amongst military officers, between those with no investments and those who know how to make money work for them.  So I never know which one I’m talking to, although I guess it’s the latter in this thread.

Some pilot friends of mine were giving Biden shit for having a $9m net worth - as if it were indicative of corruption - even though he has made the equivalent of six figures since the 1970s.

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7 hours ago, skosh said:

Yes.

Back on topic, purchased my first crypto today through PayPal.  Went with Ethereum, but for a very small amount... just getting my foot in the door.  Any thoughts on how it compares to the other cryptos available on PayPal? (Bitcoin, Litecoin, and Bitcoin Cash)

Plenty of upside in all of those projects, however, private institutions (smart money) are not buying litecoin, eth, or anything else besides BTC. Also BTC is the only one with a fixed supply—21m coins. Forget bitcoin being used as a world currency, but imagine half of the SP500 companies putting some exposure on their balance sheet, TD Ameritrade, Fidelity, Merryl, etc. allowing you to invest your 401k in BTC, it will be used as a store of value to fight inflation akin to gold... Just my .02 don’t waste your time on anything besides BTC or ETH unless you’re good at researching undervalued altcoins and have a high risk tolerance. 

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8 hours ago, Dangerzone said:

Also BTC is the only one with a fixed supply—21m coins.

Entirely untrue. ADA, BCH, BNB, XRP, LTC, LINK, XLM. All have fixed max supplies, and those are just the top 10. There are hundreds of cryptocurrencies with similar structures to BTC.

BTC is actually still in the process of inflation, by the way, with 18.6M currently mined and 2.4M still to be produced in the future.

On a side note, tons of people - myself included - hate BTC when compared to many other cryptos. Originally envisioned as “peer to peer cash” that wouldn’t require a bank, it now takes at least 10 minutes to send most transactions and costs $20 regardless of how much you’re sending.

Sending $10 to your bro? That will be $30. Oh, also, the energy costs are INSANE and entirely unsustainable, but that’s another topic.

Elon Musk investing in BTC actually convinced me that it really is dumb money that makes the world go round. But if Tesla can exist with a P/E ratio of 1300, there’s apparently a lot of dumb money. People will pump whatever the mainstream media will talk about. And now that people on BO are speculating about BTC, it’s probably getting close to time to sell.

Another fun fact: it takes approximately 4 times more energy to send a BTC transaction over the network than it does to charge a Tesla.

Source: have a pretty wide crypto “portfolio” and have for years. Was invested in BTC but am ENTIRELY divested from it for the last 4 years. Still made a little over 1100% this year on crypto currencies that aren’t so useless. 

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13 hours ago, Negatory said:

BTC is actually still in the process of inflation, by the way, with 18.6M currently mined and 2.4M still to be produced in the future.

it now takes at least 10 minutes to send most transactions and costs $20 regardless of how much you’re sending.

Sending $10 to your bro? That will be $30. Oh, also, the energy costs are INSANE and entirely unsustainable, but that’s another topic.

Good points, that’s the beauty of the whole thing is it costs energy to produce those blocks and every 4 years the reward is cut in half. Yeah BTC while 12 years in is still kind of equivalent to early stages of the internet, still has a lot of development to happen. BTC was not intended for you to buy chocolate with it as you eluded to due to the high and slow transaction costs, what it lacks with that it gains in security from how the blockchain and cryptology was setup. 
You should checkout the lightning network and what strike is going to do, if you haven’t already heard about that. Very interesting stuff.

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3 hours ago, Dangerzone said:

Good points, that’s the beauty of the whole thing is it costs energy to produce those blocks and every 4 years the reward is cut in half. Yeah BTC while 12 years in is still kind of equivalent to early stages of the internet, still has a lot of development to happen. BTC was not intended for you to buy chocolate with it as you eluded to due to the high and slow transaction costs, what it lacks with that it gains in security from how the blockchain and cryptology was setup. 
You should checkout the lightning network and what strike is going to do, if you haven’t already heard about that. Very interesting stuff.

Yeah, I get where you’re coming from but count me as a skeptic. Where some see security and beauty, I see an imperfect technology that didn’t fulfill its original vision with significantly better alternatives (personally, for example, I believe eth will eclipse BTC in market cap in the next few years). It will be interesting to see if they can actually make second layer things like lightning network make sense or complete their rebranding to digital gold.

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On 2/9/2021 at 10:30 PM, Majestik Møøse said:

Yeah, I get it, $3m is the new $1m.  But there is a surprising divide, even amongst military officers, between those with no investments and those who know how to make money work for them.  So I never know which one I’m talking to, although I guess it’s the latter in this thread.

Some pilot friends of mine were giving Biden shit for having a $9m net worth - as if it were indicative of corruption - even though he has made the equivalent of six figures since the 1970s.

I agree on the divide.  I was actually in the former group while on active duty, although that was quite awhile ago.  Back then, $1m was an unfathomable number.  I went to grad school then entered the startup world.  I do have some play money in the short term market but even now I'm relatively conservative and long-term focused with regard to traditional investments.  I decided to keep that part of our lives simple so I can devote my effort to new technology development.  I just focus on net worth and liquid that allows a reasonable take.  After trial and error as well as some initial naivete I've been fortunate with a few home runs that have provided comfortable results.  

True on Biden.  If anything, he has no more corruption than the typical career politician.  

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38 minutes ago, Clark Griswold said:

Inflation fighting....

I’m considering shifting some cash to TIPS to hedge my bets and preserve cash principal

Any other recommendations?


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Clark, with the yields so low, the formula for inflation outmoded (in my opinion), and the fact that you owe taxes on the return, I'm not sure how useful TIPS are. There's a school of thought that Market and real estate are the best inflationary hedge...Time will tell; let us know what you decide to do.

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Clark, with the yields so low, the formula for inflation outmoded (in my opinion), and the fact that you owe taxes on the return, I'm not sure how useful TIPS are. There's a school of thought that Market and real estate are the best inflationary hedge...Time will tell; let us know what you decide to do.

Will do, good point (taxes on interest)

As to RE and equities, you may be right but as I just sold my investment property (probably moving so I wanted to start to roll up my footprint) and now have the equity in cash to think about protecting/growing
Equities, nervous about a correction, everything seems overvalued

I’m not pessimistic, but it seems like the late 70s again with potentially stagflation


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