I think I'd like to do a short piece that focuses somewhat on bubbles.
For the last quarter of last year, or more, I began to hear from every common man the dire warning that Bitcoin was about to burst.
Perception is reality to an extent.
What many people don't seem to realise is the way that it will burst.
And that it already has burst.
We are basically just waiting for the naysayers to have their time, before we get right back to climbing that mountain to $50k.
Firstly: The bubble wont burst to 'zero' or 'near zero' bitcoin will almost surely come to rest on a round dollar value. I expect that this may be 10k dollars, 5k would be rough, but we would be mostly okay. Before too long the sheer weight of people who were clambering to get their hands on BTC at prices of $15k or more will realise that Bitcoin is cheap, now.
The bubble has already burst.
Now is the time for those who were crying for it to realise their opportunity to purchase. Once Bitcoin begins rallying, and ideally after a successful Segwit2x hard fork (which may put the power of mining once again into more hands), I don't expect it to return to these prices in quite a while.
We have already seen an all time high of over $20k, bit coin will return there, and surpass this figure.
Part of what makes the whole ecosystem so valuable (not counting the transparency and traceability aspects) is that the emerging technologies, the Alt Coins, are often creating and providing valuable services, these services all ultimately are redeemable for Bitcoin. This means that many of these services quite literally have a value 'underneath' Bitcoin, which contributes to pushing it up as the service grows.
Let me give you a simple example.
MedCoin. A currently fictional coin, which if it now gets made I'd like a small (permenant) cut from transaction fees :)
#USawItHereFirst
So, MedCoin could be used to store every diagnosis, as well as every drug taken, it could sync with your calendar to remind you when to take medication, and it could incentivise completion of the medicine course, and follow up visits to the doctor. This ability for any doctor to access 'all of your medical history' would assist with diagnosis. Its still a touch futuristic, but perhaps the platform comes with an AI that can also chug your medical data to assist with suggestions and possible diagnosis.
This MedCoin platform is now providing a service to people, a valuable service, because people are finding it easier to get a diagnosis, and ultimately they are rewarded for looking after themselves; there may be perks for physical activity etc.
As a happy MedCoin user, everytime I get 1000tokens, I redeem them for some Bitcoin, then when its a good time, and if I need to I sell that bitcoin into my local currency.
With this example we can see how an Alt currency can provide something of 'undeniable value', and due to the coin being redeemable in Bitcoin, ultimately, the value of that unrelated system becomes a part of why Bitcoin itself is valuable.
Any way. For those who are in doubt, firstly think long and hard about what you were doing 15th -18th December, cause that was your time to sell. If you're still holding bitcoin now and getting itchy about your potential losses, remember in the future there will be a myriad ways to interact with the digital ecosystem, you're buying your tickets to that party now. And just food for thought before you let those coins go, 1% of a Bitcoin is 1 million stoshis.
I do believe that this will be the 'year of the Alt Coin' I don't think we shall see Bitcoin doin thousands of percents this year, I would say its likely to do between 200% and 400% this year. But once again, don't expect this, don't bank on it, play it safe, and realise that Alt Coins are figuring out which among them shall become true 'diamonds' in terms of service, value and adoption, and that at least some of the gained value in Bitcoin shall move in the direction of which ever Golden Alt Coin lifts its shiney mane. Its very possible that some of those tokens may grow thousands of percents this year.
Whatever your position, there is little denying that humanities new ability to 'indelibly recall' and to ' perfectly count' each Coin in each transaction is going to be valuable to our world for many years to come.
As it was so clearly put by Nigel Green from the De Vere "our digital world needs digital money"
-> Really glad than things have clamed down a bit, the plummet below 10k dollars was exhilarating and very panicked. Ultimately the people that invested in the last 3 months were pretty worried, but the incoming pressure of adoption and divisibility with ecosystemic digital marketplace interaction shall surely continue to be an upward trend for some time.
-> Really enjoyed a save by SBD as I invested short term in it to recover some BTC losses. Sold some today after some really good performance. It was especially nice to see SBD being up around 16% even with BTC being down some 5%.
Question:
Do you think that governments truly have power to regulate Cryptocurrency??