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OFFICIALMonthly Skeptics Discussion - September 2023 (self.CryptoCurrency)

submitted by CryptoSkeptics

Welcome to the Monthly Skeptics Discussion thread. As the title implies, the purpose of this thread is to promote rational discussion about cryptocurrency related topics but with an emphasis on skepticism. This thread is intended to be an outlet for critical discussion, since it is often suppressed.

Please read the rules and guidelines before participating.

 

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  • Share any uncertainties, shortcomings, concerns, etc you have about crypto related projects.

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[–]raymv19870 / 3K 🦠 6 points7 points  (10 children)

The biggest question I've always had is....are these REALLY a viable currency or just speculative assets? One of the things I imagine that makes folks hesitate to buy things with crypto is the thought of "what if the price goes up?" This is why a little fiat inflation is actually a really good thing. Helps stimulate spending.

What do you think? Actual currency, or just a speculative asset?

[–]gilmeye54 / 10K 🦐 4 points5 points  (5 children)

If you look outside of America and Europe you can find a lot of people that NEED crypto as a way to not lose all their money. I don't know if BTC is what they need, maybe a good stable coin. They don't need to make a profit, they need not to lose everything

[–]No-Elephant-Dies2K / 2K 🐢 4 points5 points  (2 children)

One thing that makes crypto a godsend is it's ability to enable anyone on the planet to hedge against inflation, especially with the traditional stock market being rather restrictive and not easily accessible in some countries. Crypto is also financial education in itself. I now understand money way better than before I signed up to the crypto train.

[–]gilmeye54 / 10K 🦐 2 points3 points  (1 child)

And not American inflation.... but 90% yearly bullshit. And protection from the government just takes your money.

[–]raymv19870 / 3K 🦠 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Exactly. I see too many dudes who've been calling for American hyperinflation and aren't tired of being wrong

[–]raymv19870 / 3K 🦠 2 points3 points  (0 children)

This makes sense. Those countries who actually have crazy inflation would get use out of this as it functions similar to gold as an asset without having to store or hide a bunch of gold

[–]stormdelta0 / 0 🦠 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That's still not really "currency", because it's still pretty impractical for actual day-to-day use, and it applies to most other foreign assets too, not just cryptocurrencies.

Plus that use case wouldn't work without speculative gambling from first world countries subsidizing/stabilizing the price.

[–]stupidcupid1120 / 1K 🦠 2 points3 points  (1 child)

At this point, it is clear that NOT ALL CRYPTO can be used as a form of payment. Some can act as a standard form of payment, some are used as gas for on chain activity and for validation of transactions, some for data storage & communication some as a hedge against inflation, some for tokenization of real world assets.

So all in all, crypto isn't going to be a single use asset. They are gonna be influencing just about everything we know.

[–]Warm_Examination405Permabanned 2 points3 points  (0 children)

And some are going to be used as a scam...

[–]Fun-Investigator3256Permabanned 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Crypto as a means of payment might not be within our lifetime. Maybe in the next 1000 years. Not this decade, not this century.

[–]roadbowler0 / 2K 🦠 5 points6 points  (8 children)

BTC is so slow, its just not fit for day to day use. I still think most people see BTC/Crypto as a way to make money (Fiat), rather than seeing it as the future.

[–]gilmeye54 / 10K 🦐 5 points6 points  (1 child)

BTC is like a savings account. It's not meant to be fast. Just really reliable and safe.

[–]roadbowler0 / 2K 🦠 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yeah fair point

[–]superduperdude92919 / 12K 🦑 4 points5 points  (2 children)

I think your right about btc being adopted more so as an asset. When it comes to projects being adopted as currencies there are simply better options available like Nano, or LTC. The tech is there, it exists, and it does what BTC set out to do, and does it better. When you look at all the available options BTC just doesn't hold up as viable relative to projects that have since come after it.

[–]iShakeBanano0 / 871 🦠 1 point2 points  (0 children)

absolutely coins like nano having fast transactions and no fee are perfect fit for day to day use. but thn again too much volatile

[–]Fun-Investigator3256Permabanned 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Brcollish! Fast, feeless, fixed supply. Can’t wait for everyone to use XNO. Hahahaha!

[–]No-Elephant-Dies2K / 2K 🐢 1 point2 points  (1 child)

a way to make money

Also as a way to preserve the value of their money

[–]stormdelta0 / 0 🦠 0 points1 point  (0 children)

So do index funds, only with less risk / volatility and a much longer proven track record.

[–]Resident_Plankton1K / 1K 🐢 2 points3 points  (2 children)

Does eth even do anything other than make shitcoins on itself. Dont just say defi

[–]Fox_n_Roll0 / 7K 🦠 1 point2 points  (0 children)

ahem... defi

[–]vmguld241 / 241 🦀 0 points1 point  (0 children)

DeFi in general is big enough. Banking the unbanked of the world by giving them a way of lending money for rates that are seen in the western world.

[–]Fox_n_Roll0 / 7K 🦠 2 points3 points  (1 child)

Can we also share critical opinions on Moons here?

In my opinion Moons are bad as an investment for outsiders of this sub, most are hold by whales which make them burtally centralized and got no value instead of voting power on a reddit sub.

As we had seen before most polls are made to reduce moon distributions for "normal" submemebers, see the recent poll on CCIP-073 and CCIP-030 that was made retroactive which should be a big no-no in general.

And as votes get counted by moons, the normal users can't stand a chance against moon whales in polls.

submember holders get punished for selling earned moons which just brings subwhales even more power.

It’s sad but true for people outside of this sub and because of this I can't see Moons gaining real value besides a speculative gambling altcoin for investors

[–]AutoModerator[M] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Here's more information about CCIP-073 and CCIP-030. You can view information about r/CryptoCurrency Improvement Proposals here on the official wiki page.

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

[–]ADT062K / 722 🐢 2 points3 points  (0 children)

BitCoin was created by the banks, and in reality is the single largest rugpull waiting to happen in the history of humanity.

Prove me wrong.

[–]Silver-dutch0 / 6K 🦠 2 points3 points  (2 children)

I’m eagerly waiting for the halving and all the events in 2024, even now in September you read great adoption on a daily base. But their is a big doubt I’m having , because it seems everyone is anticipating on it and expecting the biggest bullrunn ever. What if the hype can’t live up to the test and the etf’s already priced in. Don’t get me wrong I’m still holding no matter what, but maybe it’s better to lower the expectations for the next couple off months and let it ride out. Dca and stick to you’re own mission

[–]stormdelta0 / 0 🦠 1 point2 points  (0 children)

You're correct to be worried, because most people here don't understand supply and demand, or that macro economic conditions have changed.

  • "Supply" means the units people are willing to sell at a given price. Cutting the block reward in half does not mean cutting the supply in half.

  • "Demand" is how many units people willing to buy at a given price. Nothing about the halving forces demand to remain constant or go up even if the supply really was halved.

Moreover, past bull runs depended on ever increasing pools of new users buying into it - but the last one was already about as mainstream as you can get, there were literally superbowl ads for it.

And of course, interest rates are high now. This was not the case at any other point in cryptocurrencies' history. High interest rates => money/credit is more expensive => less money to dump into speculative investments.

Could the price pump? Maybe, but I wouldn't expect anything particularly impressive.

[–]SNVOR1K / 1K 🐢 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I share these concerns to be honest, I’m not sure the world’s economy is quite in the right place at the moment. Although a lot can change before the halving I guess, and it may end up being a self-fulfilling prophecy because of the hype and expected bull run.

[–]roadbowler0 / 2K 🦠 1 point2 points  (1 child)

I'm certain that currency in the future will be digital, but sadly I just can't see anything other than a state-backed, centralised and traceable coin taking over.

The powers that be simply won't allow crypto to take over. Luckily for them I think most people in the world would trust this approach more and not understand the power of decentralisation.

[–]stormdelta0 / 0 🦠 -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Most currency is already digital FYI, and has been for awhile.

[–]Rogueofoz 1 point2 points  (0 children)

What would happen if Tether falls?

What if days before the BTC halving there is a black swan event and Tether gets wrecked?

What if it takes years for crypto to recover and basically next bull run gets "cancelled"?

Wouldn't then people that bought into the BTC cycles panic and sell, we could have a downward spiral that could maybe threaten crypto.

I think that is one of my biggest feara

[–]elidevious0 / 5K 🦠 1 point2 points  (1 child)

Have any of you watched this YouTube video “Crypto: The World’s Greatest Scam” https://youtu.be/ORdWE_ffirg?si=LY297EU1POGE2ScM by James Jani?

It’s surprisingly good. Made me have to do a bit more thinking and research.

It easy to call crypto a scam and pyramid scheme at this time in it’s life cycle. The lack of everyday uses for the average person is starting to bother many, and I get it. However, crypto has become a part of my daily financial success and I still believe we are right on the cusp of breakout everyday applications.

Either way, it’s worth watching. I’d love to hear what others think.

[–]stormdelta0 / 0 🦠 2 points3 points  (0 children)

As a software engineer, there are few if any real everyday applications, because the engineering tradeoffs simply don't make much sense in practice.

The biggest issue is ironically security, because cryptocurrency is built for the kind of threat model represented by hackers in hollywood movies more so than real life.

Real world security isn't just about what's secure on paper, it's looking at the whole picture holistically, taking into account how humans actually behave, and avoiding single points of failure. Cryptocurrencies stake everything on a single layer of security, that is inevitably and irrevocably catastrophic for the user if the user makes a mistake or if anything goes wrong between the user and the chain.

Sure, you can mitigate the problem by building abstractions and centralized systems, but if you're going to do that anyways, there's not much technical merit in using a blockchain in the first place.

[–]mricecream4290 / 3K 🦠 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I actively love crypto as a concept & I love it as in investment.

The issue for me is that everybody outside of us seeing as it as a bunch of scams to be avoided, Ponzi schemes, money used to buy drugs and so on.

How do we change this narrative & more so - how do we actually get crypto to be a part of many peoples day to day lives?

On top of that - it’s also annoying a lot of the tax regulations in many countries make reporting crypto losses/gains etc. very complicated. So why would people want to go through this headache and even use crypto day to day if there’s any additional level of stress compared to their native currency.

[–]ghochumal9K / 12K 🦭 0 points1 point  (4 children)

Do you guys think someone as big as blackrock can theoretically buy the majority of bitcoins and control the market at their will? And if yes is there anything that can be done against this?

[–]Matth3w_956K / 7K 🦭 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I think this is possible in theory. The majority of coins is already in the hands of few companies though and nothing has really changed so far

[–]Rogueofoz 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Not sell?

At the end of the day for BTC miners really control the chain, if BlackRock buys enough computing power to have 51% of all hashrate, then they can take control of BTC

[–]gilmeye54 / 10K 🦐 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Trying to move the price is really hard and risky and even if they get 20m out of the 21m we can continue to buy and move around that 1m, no real change. I think as more big guns buy BTC and lose the keys the value will sky rise

[–]stormdelta0 / 0 🦠 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Theoretically, sure, but they wouldn't actually have any real reason to do so, and the benefit would be slim; bitcoin liquidity is already thin to begin with.

As a vocal critic of cryptocurrencies, something like this isn't on my list of potential negatives - and believe me, that's a very long list.

[–]Arash_RezaePermabanned 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The few days ago green market shows that bitcoin can retreat and reach his all time high according to the next halving that happens in next year but we have synos move here some up some down and eventually in the specific date we hit ath in somewhere in mid 2025

[–]Omnomnomnivor30 / 2K 🦠 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If you're holding onto stables which ones do you think are the safest hold, recent news with Binance is they're gonna slowly cut-off support for BUSD, sure they give the option to convert it but this raises a concern on how this happen on a stable coin.

This is for people who are not fond of shorting or longing and just wanna relax with their stables and then look back when there's an opportunity for purchase.

[–]vijnsko 1 point2 points  (2 children)

Is bitcoin, like it was intended, ever going to replace the regular fiat currencies? If you look at human psychology, all humans are very selfish. Almost all, if not 100%, investors of crypto trade their crypto to earn more money (dollar euro, yen etc). Investors will keep trading to get a bigger amount of said currency

With how the world works in this age i don’t see a place where crypto will take over the regular fiats. But will just become a technology helping companies to become more digital and secure for easier payments in crypto, which will be turned into regular currencies. Crypto will become a part of the ‘technology stock market’ eventually.

[–]stormdelta0 / 0 🦠 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Even ignoring other factors, as bitcoin exists today, it quite literally can't replace normal currencies even if everyone was 100% in favor of it.

It's simply too slow. Even if lightning worked perfectly and had no other downsides, the transactions aren't "real"/settled until they make their way back to the real bitcoin chain. And that means channels need to be opened and closed with some regularity.

But every channel open/close requires a normal BTC transaction... I'm sure you can see where this is going. You're looking at real settlement times in the range of YEARS if you want to onboard even a fraction of the population. And that's a best case scenario that ignores many other issues with lightning/btc generally.

For a detailed technical overview of issues with lightning, I recommend this.

But will just become a technology helping companies to become more digital and secure

As a software engineer who works in the security space, I don't see a future for cryptocurrency here either. The threat model it's meant to solve looks more like a hollywood film than what we deal with in the real world.

[–]vongutom0 / 2K 🦠 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'm more of an optimist, but I couldn't help but think that we are not getting a bull run after the halvening due to the current economy, also the fact that crypto is not as new or considered a novelty anymore compared these past few years.

[–]X2WE 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I’m getting a little worried about the overall crypto market given that even equities are getting weaker day by day. Feels like no one new wants anything to do with crypto. way too many scams have scared people away