This is a fair question and something I should of addressed in my initial post.

In the gold/silver thread I used losing 80%+ of value (in dollar terms) a horrific event for gold/silver investors....so I guess to remain consistent, I'll just use 80% again. That 80% figure is just randomly pulled out of my ass though, so it's not some specific definition of anything and I'm open to be shown why we should apply a different % (maybe 70%, maybe 90%)

I'll apply the same rule here. 80% drop from where it is today = I am right, otherwise you guys are right.

Within the next 6 months it can go as low as $60 and as high as $4k. We will hit the low if China, US or EU change their minds and actively start working against bitcoin. Because if one of them does it is likely they will convince the others to do the same. We can hit the high if regulations stay the same or improve and if Amazon or someone similar starts accepting bitcoin.

So my advice is buy some coins and enjoy the ride, it will continue to be a wild one.

Silver is a bubble because it went up for years on end and went back down slightly over 50%? I guess pretty much every stock known to man is a bubble too.

In 5 years,

I will be able to travel to Nepal with my Bitcoin wallet and exchange for local Rupee at a 1% fee. Perhaps at an ATM, perhaps at a local Bitcoin supported business. At the end of my trip I will be able to exchange my Rupee back to Bitcoin for 0 fees. Doesnt matter if Bitcoin is $10 or $10,000 USD.

I will be able to purchase groceries with Bitcoin, in person or on the internet, where the seller will share the savings incurred by not transacting in credit cards.


As for price, somewhere between $5k-$10k

I think you're vastly overestimating the importance of first mover advantage here. This is a whole new revolutionary field, it's seems strange to believe that bitcoin should maintain a dominance simply because it got here first.

I dont understand when people say stuff like this... is this estimation just based on nothing? Like were you successful in some random area of life and now you are overconfident and think you can valuate a never before seen cryptocurrency?

Merrils analysis claims bitcoins at maximum conceivable saturation would be worth around $1300. Wedbush claims the only way for bitcoins to pass 2k is for them to take over 5% of the world currency transaction market in the next few years, a staggeringly high and likely unrealistic number.

So again, why do you think they are going to 5-10k?

did you even read the merril analysis?

I'm bullish on bitcoin for a lot of reasons. The most simple reason is I don't want to bet against a couple hundred thousand nerds that are all emotionally and financially committed to the same thing.


Between 2-4k by the end of 2014.

It's not due to number of speculators, speculation exists in all currencies. The problem is with it's small total dollar value. Combined with an uncertain political future it makes it very sensitive.

As Bitcoins price increases, it will become decreasingly volatile.

The fact it's been volatile since inception is not an indication it will be volatile going into the future. Perhaps it will take 3 years to reduce to what you consider an acceptable level of volatility, perhaps 20 years. In the grand scheme of things, it's a short term problem.

I think a lot of us, given our poker backgrounds, look at the success or failure of btc as strictly related to it's price. I do think that is important, but I think in terms of the technology and protocol, decentralized crypto currency will be around for a long time. Some of the recent episodes of the podcast "Let's Talk Bitcoin" have opened my eyes a bit to how people in African countries are already used to using their phones to transfer currency (with big fees) and people in Argentina are hungry for a place to put their wealth that isn't controlled and devalued every year by corrupt/incompetent government.

I am still very ignorant on these types of world problems and obviously the podcast above is biased, however it does help me realize how needed this type of technology is and the ideology behind it.

I have no idea how BTC solving those two problems would relate to it's current price but it is interesting to me to hear about how BTC is not just a new/better paypal or credit card as most of us probably view it.

This video explains the future value very well

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KFeB7dbvsDo

The question I always ask about BTC is what is its intrinsic value or what is it backed by? Then I realize nothing and thus it's worth $0 in the long-run

this

thread lacks: I think this BECAUSE ...

It's not simply first mover, it's the network effect. Everyone else is at a huge disadvantage, even if superior. And even if superior in some way, there are ways to adapt and include such features in Bitcoin, and a huge incentive to do so.

Bitcoin is not a company but a protocol, and protocols can be very difficult to replace once adopted.

There have been 5 years for everyone else to get in the game, and there has been zero innovation or improvements from the 100s of junkcoins out there.

I'm not saying it can't be done, it simply will be a VERY hard obstacle barring some niche uses, and it almost certainly won't be filled by the current alts.

Nothing has "intrinsic value". Everything's value is 0 in the long run.

A country's currency is backed by it's economy and wealth which have intrinsic value. The USD is backed by a 17 trillion GDP and the wealth of America if need be. BTC has none of these things

Other factors working against BTC are the many other digital currencies out there and future competition/innovation

The intrinsic value is that it can be transferred anywhere, anytime, for a nominal fee without a trusted third party. It's backed by people who find those to be a useful traits in a currency.

Utility doesnt equal intrinsic value. And being "backed" by people isn't fundamental value.

So where to I cash my dollars in for a percentage of the US GDP?

Nothing is intrinsically valuable.

Gold was not valuable before there were humans walking on earth.

Before the invention of the combustion engine oil was considered a horrible pollutant. Oil was useless to us until we learnt how to use it.

Value is a subjective property in the eyes of the people doing the valuation.

Silly statement. If you mean naturally like when someone found the first piece of gold ever and had no idea of its industrial uses then sure... But bitcoin will never have a country's economy backing it, nor the wealth of a population, which inherently means it has no intrinsic value.

I want to redeem my dollars for US GDP, since I am just finding out they are backed. Where can I do this?! Come on, you can't just put out this secret information stuff and not follow up.

Why would your USD entitle you to the production of other people in USA? A USD isn't equity in the US government

You said it was backed by the US economy.

I want to redeem my dollar for this! Show me how.

Go buy a Ford