Is cryptocurrency a scam?

Cryptocurrency is probably a scam, but so are most other things. :slight_smile:

Me.
A percentage of my pension savings is in BTC

What percentage and how old are you?

Good for you. Still borderline speculative, I imagine you though you would put the money in there and it would multiply.

40yo
25%

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTR7RTBhW/

$6.4m Taiwan crypto exchange conspiracy

ACE founder David Pan was arrested on Jan. 4 with 13 other suspects for their alleged role in a cryptocurrency scam perpetuated over three years,

I don’t know this ACE crypto exchange .
There’s a new one called Tokenise that’s from Taiwan, at least I think it’s new.
Maicoin and Bitopro are legit.

1 Like

What do you expect? The whole thing is just a waste of computational resource.

Why can’t crypto mining be based on useful work done on computers? There’s so much computationally intensive tasks out there that could be done than just sitting there crunching numbers for no useful output.

Isn’t that what money is supposed to represent? A measure of value and a trade medium?

Distributed computing is nothing new. If your gpu mining crypto actually did something, animate 3d renderings, simulate weather patterns or whatever?

Governments issue fiat currencies because people trust them, they have a track record of trust. When that trust is gone, Argentina happens.

I spotted a Bitcoin ATM up near Nanjing E Road this morning, it was the shoddiest looking setup, has anyone here used one in Taiwan?

It’S cool we got these in Taiwan but as far as I know you can’t cash out in fiat, only buy BTC. Kind of scammy if you ask me.

It’s only a scam if you get scammed. I bought some then sold it , all linked to a Taiwanese bank a count.
I never thought of using it to withdraw cash.

2 Likes

A measure of value that is constantly being devalued.

It’s all about trust. If the trust is being eroded, then inflation happens. Also it seems inflation is “good” and deflation is “bad”, so the government maintained a 3% inflation.

I think it’s the other way around.

Also inflation is usually caused by an increase in the money supply, not by lack of trust.

Inflation is good. But mostly for the government.

Deflation is bad because it causes businesses to lose money as now the stuff they sell is worth less, and thus causing layoffs, and banks to recall loans which is worse. It’s what caused the great depression.

What other countries do is price controls but even that has to be done carefully, or else it causes shortages. Of course that never happens in America because “free market”.

That’s taking the deflation out-of-context. Prior to the great depression there was rampant inflation which led to an unsustainable boom in both asset prices and goods. It was only after this when they tried to reign in the inflation via tightened monetary policy that deflation and the great depression occurred.

Price controls are usually implemented when runaway inflation occurs.

Suppose you sell goods like say burgers. Your burger is say 300nt for a meal.

But let’s say market condition now forces you to sell that burger for 200 instead. Perhaps cost for your supplies have also fallen but if you run a sustainable business, cost for the food shouldn’t exceed a third of the price anyways.

But your wage hasn’t changed, neither has rent. So now you’re forced to lay people off because your revenue has fallen quite a bit.

Knock on effect is now workers who either got pay or hours cut, or are laid off now can’t afford to eat, so your sale also falls.

I think small deflation over time should be good for everyone, but big businesses operate on such tight margin that even a few percent is enough to cause some of them to fail, meaning now millions are out of work. Airlines for example makes like maybe 4 bucks per passenger. Deflation would drive them out of business.

My point was that by their design fiat currencies are in a constant state of loosing value. Not from lack of confidence (although that will eventually happen), but from an increase in the monetary supply. Those who have early access to the newly created money get the most benefit while it has the most value.

My purpose was not to debate whether or not inflation is better than deflation.

Bitcoin, by its design, will never increase its supply beyond 21 million. Therefore it has a mechanism that preserves value better than fiat currencies, even if there are short-term price swings.

1 Like

So which new crypto currencies do you suggest. I like your views about this. Let’s say Bit Coin is very unlikely to lose its total value as it has a finite limit to amount produced , but as it’s been around for long people investing now very late in the game. Therefore which newer crypto is worth getting into ?