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Bitcoin The Almighty Buck

Bitcoin Crashes Below $30,000 As Cryptocurrency Free-Fall Accelerates (hothardware.com) 135

Posted by BeauHD from the what-goes-up-must-come-down dept.
The price of bitcoin has come crashing below the $30,000 mark for the first time in a month. "At the time of this writing, Bitcoin is trading at $29,694.34," writes Paul Lilly via HotHardware. "That's down from around $31,000 yesterday, and less than half of where Bitcoin peaked at in April of this year, when it topped $60,000." From the report: Will it go back up? Probably, but for Bitcoin investors, there are definitely reasons to be cautious, outside of the normal volatility associated with cryptocurrencies. For one, China is cracking down on cryptocurrency in general. As such, crypto miners recently dumped a bunch of used GeForce RTX 3060 cards on eBay for relatively cheap (compared to what they had been selling for), as well as ASIC hardware, the latter of which is what Bitcoin miners use these days. But it's not just China.

Malaysian police recently seized and then steamrolled 1,069 ASIC mining rigs after discovering that miners had illegally tapped into a power grid to steal electricity for their operations. Talk about sending a strong message. In addition, six people were arrested, jailed, and fined (but hey, at least they weren't steamrolled). Tighter regulations in various territories could affect Bitcoin's value, too. For example, US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said lawmakers must "act quickly" to construct and adopt new rules on stablecoins. "Bringing together regulators will enable us to assess the potential benefits of stablecoins while mitigating risks they could pose to users, markets, or the financial system," Yellen said in a statement. "In light of the rapid growth in digital assets, it is important for the agencies to collaborate on the regulation of this sector and the development of any recommendations for new authorities." It's worth noting that other cryptocurrencies are down too. Dogecoin is down more than 5 percent to $0.16, while Ethereum dropped more than 3 percent to $1,755.99. Just over two months ago it was at nearly $3,900.
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Bitcoin Crashes Below $30,000 As Cryptocurrency Free-Fall Accelerates More

Bitcoin Crashes Below $30,000 As Cryptocurrency Free-Fall Accelerates

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  • Another daily shitcoin article. (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Who cares? It's a global money laundering cult.

    It may have held some interest to the tech community a decade ago with blockchain but now it's exposed just as a drain on the global energy grid.

    Enough.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by baenpb ( 1343241 )
      Yep. At best, bitcoin is a failure and disappointment. At worst, it's evil and destructive. The latter is becoming more true every day it seems.

    • It's not just that, it's a pyramid scheme to sucker in stupid assholes as well.

      Greatest thing I ever did was chicken out when my buddy convinced me to buy $200 worth of Bitcoin at $11 a piece to buy LSD on silk road. Figured it was a honey pot for idiots and held onto the coins. Finally sold them after preaching on Twitter for years that it was the greatest investment of our generation. Pump and dump.

      Still can't believe people are dumb enough to drive the price as high as they have and that's after selling

  • Pyrite Pete's failed prediction (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward

    On Monday April 26, 2021 @02:16AM UTC, Pyrite Pete[1] had said: [slashdot.org]

    Wait 1-2 months, and BTC will be twice its value.

    That was back when bitcoin had already fallen, and down to about $47K at the time. Over two months ago. It is now sitting at about $29.8K (and it's struggled to get back to/maintain 40K).

    Now that's what I call a prediction #FAIL!

    [1] no, not that Pyrite Pete [slashdot.org] - the one [imgflip.com] that always posts as AC.

    • Let us not forget this gem [9cache.com].

    • Came into the comments section looking for exactly this. That guy has been trying to rain make for months on this, and I don't know if it's just foolish optimism, or if he's trying to convince people to buy in so he can cash out.

      Either way, they are WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG, as has been pointed out many times, by many people.

  • HEY PYRITE PETE LOOK HERE!! (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    According to Coindesk right now:

    Bitcoin YTD returns: 1.95%
    Ethereum YTD returns: 140.51%
    Dogecoin YTD returns: 3,503.64%

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Dude, crap like Doge went from $0.0025 to $0.65 and back to $0.17, all over the span of a year. All fueled only by Elon Musk tweets.

      Yeah, it yielded great "returns", but in the same sense a winning lottery ticket does. No one in their right mind would've put money on Doge as an investment back then.

    • Upset with the high price of BTC? Just wait, it'll go down.

      Upset with the low price of BTC? Just wait, it'll go up.

      Surprised we haven't seen HFT for BTC yet, since it's the ideal medium for it.

      • HFT is literally impossible with Bitcoin. IIRC, the maximum number of transactions the network can handle today is 4... per second. All over the globle.

  • 30k? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by burtosis ( 1124179 ) on Tuesday July 20, 2021 @06:29PM (#61602615)
    Isn’t 30k 10k more than the last space rocket launch bitcoin rode on? Even if you bought at the very peak of the last spike it’s still up 50%.

    • wahh? i'm seeing peaks in the last year at $40K in January and four more over $50K after that, in what universe don't you lose your shorts buying at a peak?

      This this is toxic waste and gambling chip only, not money.

      • 2018 was the last major price spike to $20k when everyone who bought in at the top were told they were financially ruined. Not sure if you’ve been paying attention but the entire market is unstable these days and a 50% gain in 3 years isn’t that bad. The value of any currency is backed by what people believe it to be, even if that belief is a guaranteed commodity.

        • Re:30k? (Score:5, Insightful)

          by iggymanz ( 596061 ) on Tuesday July 20, 2021 @07:18PM (#61602747)

          talking about currency is irrelevant, bitcoin fails all tests of being money. It is a gambling token only. So you have your definition of "last major spike" and I have mine, where mine has it losing people's shorts.

          toxic waste.

          • Re:30k? (Score:4, Insightful)

            by ArchieBunker ( 132337 ) on Tuesday July 20, 2021 @07:35PM (#61602779)

            Futures and stocks aren’t really money either but here we are. I tried to buy gas with Apple stock but the cashier was not amused.

            • Perhaps we'd quit holding bitcoin to the standard of currency, if they'd stop referring to themselves as currency... it's like, I don't know, as if we could forgive luge riders from referring to themselves as athletes.

            • Nobody ever said that futures and stocks are equivalent to cash, and accepted in trade for goods and services. That's a nice straw man you just knocked the hell out of.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by leptons ( 891340 )
              There is no functional difference between stocks and gambling. And no functional difference between cryptocurrency and gambling.

        • Saying "even if that belief is a guaranteed commodity" shows an awareness of fiat's advantage, but doesn't actually address the difference between a belief and a guarantee.

          • Fiat currency is not backed by any guarantee what so ever.

            • In the US, the dollar can be used to pay all debts public and private. But I suppose this feature is not inherent to fiat.

              • That is a feature of legal tender. It is common that fiat money is created for the purpose of being legal tender, but there is no requirement to have that connection. And there are cases where the connection does not exist.

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by rtb61 ( 674572 )

        It's not even a gambling chip, bitcoin is a capitalism religious token, the belief in capital worth with ZERO real actual worth, entirely imaginary, virtual. It's like they have taken a game token, assigned religious value to it's worth and the greater the belief the greater the capital value a measure of religion than of anything to be considered of value.

        One thing clearly bitcoin has achieved that no other imaginary device has achieved, the profitable means by which to steal electricity from providers. A

        • Well, I suppose the first question you have to answer regarding the unsupported, by asset value, of Bitcoin, is why fiat money is very much different.

          And this is very US centric, although probably not that much different from most other nations' monetary policy, but printing dollars you have no viable plan to recuperate, to place a salve on an economic downturn, does little else than depreciating the value of your fiat currency, leaving the folks who've saved a bit better than average to lean towards alter

          • Re:30k? (Score:5, Interesting)

            by ceoyoyo ( 59147 ) on Tuesday July 20, 2021 @08:08PM (#61602873)

            Inflation reduces the value of currency. If your savings are in currency, well, you're doing it wrong.

            Inflating currency makes it worth more now than it will be in the future, which gives people incentive to spend it instead of hoarding it, which is exactly what you want to happen.

            That's why no government will seriously let bitcoin become a dominant, uh, thingy, whatever it is. The ability to control your national currency is extremely important for national security. Maybe the most important thing.

            • Re: (Score:1)

              by Anonymous Coward

              "which is exactly what you want to happen"

              Unless you want people to be able to save for retirement.

              • They don't want you to save for retirement by hoarding currency.

                There is a reason central banks target a couple % inflation and not zero or deflation.
                Money needs to be spend and invested to keep things going.
                Otherwise nobody will invest or spend, since it's cheaper to wait until later. Not much of an economy with only the barest of essentials made and purchased. Expect very high unemployment as an extra bonus.

    • The "very last spike" peaked at ~$64k, not three months ago. What're you talking about?

  • It's still 3 times as high as it was a year ago. (Score:5, Informative)

    by jonnythan ( 79727 ) on Tuesday July 20, 2021 @06:32PM (#61602627)

    Some perspective:

    A year ago, Bitcoin was under $10,000. The first time it ever hit $30,000 was in January of 2021.

    Yes, it rocketed up to $60,000 briefly in April, but it has just slid back to where it was to start the year. It's not like it's in a freefall that has erased years of gains.

    • I hate Bitcoin, and want to see the huge waste of energy con just die, but $1000 (or 3%) daily drop is hardly a "crash" for bitcoin.

      • If the money in your bank account was in Bitcoin (Score:4, Insightful)

        by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Tuesday July 20, 2021 @07:31PM (#61602773)
        And you needed to use it to pay your bills you might think differently about losing 3% of your net worth. He's kind of wild price fluctuations or why Bitcoin is completely useless as a currency for anything besides money laundering and drugs, e.g. things where you don't particularly care if the value of the currency you're trading in suddenly drops in value because the profit margins are so high.

        And remember this is an idle speculation there's been a lot of talk about paying people directly in Bitcoin. Imagine if your boss created a cryptocurrency and paid you in it, and had a store where you could buy your groceries using that currency and you had a mortgage for a home in that currency. A currency of Boss created and almost certainly would be in control of. You could pretty readily do that with Bitcoin because it's finite nature makes it prone to currency manipulation by big players. If Warren Buffett or Jeff bezos decided they wanted to take control of the Bitcoin market I'm pretty sure either of them could do it.

      • I'm sorry, but that a 3% drop in a single day (with an accumulated drop of 45% so far over the year!) is considered "normal" for BTC really tells you all you need to know about its financial merits. As an investment, or as vanilla currency.

    • So, you're saying BTC is already below the value it had when 2021 began.

      You can play the "if you invested in XXXX you're still up!" at any time, if you pick the right one, but that's of little significance - that's not how investment works. The trend for BTC (and pretty much all cryptocurrencies) over the past ~6 months is disastrous.

    • Wait a few months, it's going back below $10,000. Any exchange that lists Tether is insolvent right now as we type. Very likely USDC too.

      • Legit question: how are "stablecoins" such as Tether not a massive scam?

        The current market cap for USDT is ~$62bn; if you think Bitfinex has that much money in the bank, or loans to back it up, i have a beautiful bridge near San Francisco to sell you.

        • They're a complete and total scam. Even if fully backed 1:1 by cash their entire reason for existing is to circumvent money laundering laws. That's their "legit" purpose before becoming the largest counterfeiting operation in the history of mankind.

    • Ya, people see a rapid rise in price and they get excited about getting in on the game. But a rapid rise is definitely a sign of instability. Investments are better with a nice shallow consistent slope rather than being a roller coaster ride where you puke at the end.

    • Some perspective:

      A year ago, Bitcoin was under $10,000. The first time it ever hit $30,000 was in January of 2021.

      Yes, it rocketed up to $60,000 briefly in April, but it has just slid back to where it was to start the year. It's not like it's in a freefall that has erased years of gains.

      And that sort of behavior in a currency is supposed to be good?

    • on the price you bought it at.

  • a.k.a. best time to buy, but nobody will (Score:3)

    by clambake ( 37702 ) on Tuesday July 20, 2021 @07:09PM (#61602721) Homepage

    except the whales who already understand how it works.

  • the power grid can't take Crypo also the crime (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Joe_Dragon ( 2206452 ) on Tuesday July 20, 2021 @07:10PM (#61602727)

    the power grid can't take Crypo also the crime tied to it.

  • A suitably talented programmer can create his/her own coin. The Dogecoin creators said they created Dogecoin in 2 hours. There are thousands of cryptocoin types [coinbase.com] out there. The question I think each coin advocate should ask is, "What makes this coin type superior to the other coins?"

    • First mover advantage, and installed user base. This is why it is so hard to unseat facebook. Even though some of the people who use facebook hate it, they kind of have to stay because everyone else is on it.

      Ethereum was also relatively early, and it also has features bitcoin lacks. So I think bitcoin and ethereum will be the two to watch. The rest (to me) are just a joke. Digital currencies run by governments are just a total co-opting of the whole point of bitcoin, which is to take control of the money su

      • However, we may see government coins or digital currencies get adopted anyway.

        The US dollar is, for all intents and purposes, largely digital already.

        I really don't get what a government would benefit from by adopting cryptocurrencies, specially in their current form. For starters, if you're a government you want currency to be as centralized as possible. Something like BTC has no leeway for monetary policies.

        • Well, things have been going that way for a long time. I use cash for a lot of stuff, and still pay some bills by writing checks.

          But to answer your question, I think the main reason a government would adopt something resembling a cryptocurrency would be simply to head off adoption of a cryptocurrency they don't control and have good visibility into. The US dollar and the ability to exclude people or countries from using it are very important tools in the arsenal of the US government. The feds can freeze ban

    • Well... not a whole lot, really. There's currently 4000 cryptocurrencies floating around, and they're all small variants of 3-4 different ideas.

  • Whenever these stories come up, I think of this [youtu.be]. If Futurama had been made a few years later, Groening would probably have replaced "Wall Street" with "Bitcoin".

  • Investors and business are in conflict (Score:4, Insightful)

    by hAckz0r ( 989977 ) on Tuesday July 20, 2021 @09:00PM (#61602977)

    As soon as I had heard that Bitcoin was going to be traded on the open market I knew it was doomed as a long term investment strategy. Can you make money by trading it? Sure. But you need to realize that it is now volatile by design. Crypto currency has no inherent value of its own. Its only worth is what other people think it will be worth tomorrow, therefore its easy to manipulate using the media to change how people feel about what it is worth. In contrast to gold or stocks there is noting to sell off if the value tanks. With Gold it still has some usable industrial value and with companies you can always sell of the building, IP, and other assets in chapter 7 to recoup and repay some of the liabilities. With Crypto, when investors think it is worthless, it actually is.

    Since stocks or gold have at least a minimum fundamental value there are bounds on how much the price can fluctuate. Often when the price for a stock goes too high people punch the numbers to look at future business trends and company assets and a market adjustment takes place. The price then comes back to a more reasonable value. With Crypto there are no fundamental bounds on how high or how low it can go. Its easy to hype or spread rumors that make it look more or less attractive after which the person doing that manipulation will buy or sell a huge chunk of shares to make a profit while everyone else rides out the volatility wave that was produced by that media hype. Those people actually doing the manipulation are of course clairvoyant of that media hype and know exactly when to buy or sell.

    This ability to manipulate the price of Crypto is completely at odds with the people actually trying to use it for daily business. For them stable is better, but instead the inherent volatility is like trying to use a credit card where you don't know what added fees or rebates the credit company is going to charge you with each purchase. You can't plan a business if you can not trust the value to be at least fairly constant. Investors on the other hand only make money with the commodity being unstable, so they make it that way on purpose. Investors therefor love volatility because then they have the possibility to make even more money, while the businesses find it increasingly harder to use/accept it and any retirement portfolios can no longer be counted on.

    • > Often when the price for a stock goes too high people punch the numbers to look at future business trends and company assets and a market adjustment takes place.

      Tesla?

  • I'm so glad I didn't ever invest in this cryptocurrency shitcoinc whatever the latest hype is called!

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by ebvwfbw ( 864834 )

      You missed out on a hell of an opportunity. I know a few multi-millionaires that bought bitcoin. I picked up on it years ago. I made a lot of money on it. Got in, didn't get greedy and cashed out. I didn't make a killing and that's ok. I made money.

      Today IMHO only the gamblers buy bitcoin. Governments are already destroying asic machines via a steam roller. It's just a matter of time before it's banned. That train is coming down the track.

  • How to play the bitcoin game (Score:3)

    by Opportunist ( 166417 ) on Wednesday July 21, 2021 @02:29AM (#61603487)

    It takes a bit of money, but a million should be good enough to participate.

    1. Create a webpage about bitcoins.
    2. Create a bunch of sock puppet accounts on Reddit. This is the main investment because you have to endure reading and writing on a bunch of those drivel-filled subs. Nobody said it would be pleasant.
    3. Keep posting on Reddit and fill your webpage with coin-related stuff. Most of it you can crib from other coin pages, or do what they do, just invent a thing or two from time to time. It's not like anyone can verify any rumor in this reality soap. From time to time, astroturf on Reddit to shill for your page so it starts to gain some traction.
    4. Let the whole shit continue for about half a year or so. When you notice that your page has some clout and something is actually happening in the coin world (like, say, China cracking down on miners) it's time to strike.
    5. Launch some heavy hitting rumor on your webpage that the market is about to crash. Make all your sock puppets chime in and warn everyone in every remotely coin related Reddit of this terrible development and recommend as the expert that you are now that it's time to get out of the market while you still can.
    6. Gobble up the cheap coins.
    7. Wait 6-12 months.
    8. Goto 1

  • Comment removed (Score:3)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Wednesday July 21, 2021 @02:46AM (#61603515)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • Bitcoin up 4.05%

  • Computers are having shortages. That was probably $100,000 worth of hardware they destroyed.

  • Just pass a law making it more lucrative and beneficial to allow campaign contributions to receive donations in crypto, and then suddenly all the politicians will be perfectly fine with Bitcoin and other crypto.

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