The next focusIR Investor Webinar takes places on 14th May with guest speakers from WS Blue Whale Growth Fund, Taseko Mines, Kavango Resources and CQS Natural Resources fund. Please register here.
"Bitcoin likes those numbers"
Indeed, currently sitting at $26,431.20 as I'm typing, unbelievable, this is a true risk on pump.
The FED and other US regulatory authorities will be wincing at this, because bailing out USDC deposits has sent the wrong message. It's ironic that Fiat is bailing out Crypto and it wouldn't surprise me if authorities are now looking at ways to punish Crypto going forward, since the current price rises are the same as putting two fingers up at the FED.
Nothing has changed my opinion that Crypto and Bitcoin are a waste of space and resource, and I still believe it will all eventually end in tears.
Everything sorts itself out in the end; As the Mandalorian's say, "This is the way", although things didn't work out very well for their World!
"FIAT is destined to fail and the debts are only getting bigger by the second"
Well good luck with that, but if economic Armageddon does come to pass, Bitcoin would be less useful than bird droppings. This fantasy hype around "Digital Gold" is illogical and non sensical. If you really do believe that the banking system will collapse, with the end of Fiat, I suggest you invest in tinned products, Gold sovereigns, and prepping supplies. It might also be worthwhile buying a property somewhere isolated to shelter while anarchy ensues. What's far more likely is that regulators will incrementally clamp down on Crypto and squeeze the life out of it, bit by bit, they'll probably start by closing banks who provide liquidity to the crypto community.
A housing collapse has been predicted for as long as I can remember, and all its ever done is dip slightly and come back stronger than ever. Bitcoin is obviously being pumped by the Crypto exchanges and Whales, since who would logically invest in Bitcoin or crypto right now, considering the weekend events? If small retail are still piling into Crypto, all they're doing is bailing out the Whales over time.
This US enthusiasm is all about the FED and speculation that US rate cuts are in the pipeline, but all that would do is stoke more inflation down the road; At some time you have to pay the Piper, the current US optimism is likely to be short lived and possibly engineered to bail out the big players.
"Bitcoin pumping"
Soon to be dumping.
It defies belief that anyone would put money into Bitcoin with the closure of Silvergate and Signature Bank, since they were both important in providing liquidity into Crypto Markets. In my opinion, the crypto markets are so manipulated the prices are an act of fiction, at some point the whole thing will fizzle to nothing and many will wonder where their money's gone.
I'm looking at topping up Lloyds as soon as I can add more to the ISA's, around three weeks on Thursday. I'll have to see what's happening around that time.
"This is starting to look like it will get ugly"
That'll depend on the media and whether some of the other banks are also at risk. The FDIC and US authorities are probably contacting all the banks to determine the score. It's ironic that these sorts of things always emanate from the US.
I enjoy watching Peter Schiff, he's a proper doom and gloom merchant. There's no doubt about it, banks have seen unrealised losses of their bond and equity assets in the last year, but this is unlikely to be an issue for the Big Banks. It's telling that Silvergate, and SVB, lending/deposits are aimed at high risk niche sectors, with both sectors heavily impacted by rises in interest rates.
The reason the market is so jumpy, is due to fear of unknowns around contagion. It'll be really interesting to see what happens in the next week, this could all just blow over and people will wonder what it was all about, or there could be a string of US small bank failures and the FED may step in and introduce emergency measures. Much will depend on the US banking customers reaction, and whether or not they panic.
Unless the US authorities guarantee the full deposits at SVB, I don't see this being the end. During the 2008 Financial crisis the UK protected deposits in full, but from what I've read they're only willing to protect SVB UK depositors up to the FSCE limit of £85,000.
“The Bank of England, absent any meaningful further information, intends to apply to the Court to place Silicon Valley Bank UK Limited (‘SVBUK’) into a Bank Insolvency Procedure.
“A Bank Insolvency Procedure would mean that eligible depositors are paid out by the FSCS as quickly as possible up to the protected limit of £85,000 or up to £170,000 for joint accounts.
“SVBUK’s other assets and liabilities would be managed in the insolvency by the bank liquidators and recoveries distributed to its creditors.
“SVBUK has a limited presence in the UK and no critical functions supporting the financial system.
“In the interim, the firm will stop making payments or accepting deposits.”
https://www.cityam.com/silicon-valley-bank-uk-says-it-will-be-put-into-insolvency-this-weekend/
Covid's irreparably damaged the commercial real estate sector, with businesses realising they don't need desk based personnel coming in 5 days a week. The result is many businesses are downsizing office space and only asking employees to come in a couple of days a week, and allowing them to work from home the rest of the time.
What I didn't agree with, in Kevin's video, is that office space can't be easily repurposed into living accommodation. It isn't difficult to gut the floor of an office building and partition the space into apartments, and top floor penthouses could bring in large rentals, or command high valuations.
There are a ton of commentators suggesting the FED should pause rate hikes, many of them with vested interest in Crypto and Tech startups, but they seem to forget the lessons from history. If the FED pause too soon, then there's a chance inflation could flare up with a vengeance. Fighting inflation is like fighting a Forest fire, if they don't keep dousing the embers, and go home too early, the whole Forest could reignite worse than before. Inflation needs to be killed off completely before they look at pausing, the FED may go for a 0.25% increase with the next hike, but 0.5% would be more sensible in my opinion. The FED should ignore the flack.
"That's me liking your posts btw "
Cheers, I only said that on the QBT page to wind that guy up.
"I enjoy watching the All-In Podcast on YT and last week they were discussing Silicon Valley start up abandonment and funding issues which is their speciality sector."
It's because the era of free money is coming to an end, the Financial World will have to be a lot more careful, going forward, where they direct their investments. Crypto is one example of low interest rate driven investments, zombie tech is another. Companies like WeWork, marketed as a tech startup when it was just a dressed up clone of Regus, apparently Softbank lost $10 Billion on that investment; They should have talked to me, as soon as I saw WeWork touted as revolutionising office space, I thought that's exactly the same as Regus, and I don't even have a background in that sort of business.
"US Banks all got hit yesterday, interesting times"
No doubt it'll hit my Lloyds shares. I want to top up the ISA's next month so it's not a bad time for the market to take a hit, I just hope the drop continues into April.
Bitcoins currently falling like a stone in the sea.
https://www.google.com/finance/quote/BTC-usd
It amazes me that Bitcoin is holding above $21,000, in view of the collapse of Silvergate Bank. The vested interest players (Whales), must be furiously bailing out the Crypto boat to prevent it from sinking during the storm; The only problem is the boat has taken damage and it's leaking at the same time as waves crash over the side. How long before the boat sinks, or capsizes?
Not sure what happened then, I'll start again.
I nearly posted on QBT yesterday, to express my opinion that what they're trying to achieve is likely unachievable. Their AI algorithm would have to look at the unchangeable data, making up the block, then calculate changes to the Nonce with the aim of reducing the SHA-256 Hash below the target Hash. Each change of the Nonce will alter the whole SHA Hash, so their AI algorithm will have find a way to alter the Nonce and efficiently reduce the Hash. Even if they achieve their goal, they then have to convince miners to incorporate the algorithm into their Farm's. With the halving coming in next year, would miners want to share their profits? And if all the miners managed to get a 30% speed boost, the Proof of Work algorithm would increase Bitcoin difficulty to maintain validations at 10 minutes per Block. I decided not to post on there, as they get upset very easily.
I nearly posted on QBT, to express my opinion that what
"nChain are actively working on CBDC's using Bitcoin SV which although I may not welcome CBDC's makes me look closer at Bitcoin (sv) as an interesting and for the most part overlooked investment opportunity"
Why would Central Banks use Bitcoin BSV though? It relies on proof of work and granted you can have an unlimited Block size, but why not use proof of stake for CBDC's, with the various stakeholders being the different Central Banks managing their own currencies?
If they do introduce CBDC's, the Central Banks will control the issuance and validation of tokens, so it'll be controlled centrally anyway. I'd be surprised if they went for a Proof Of Work model, but what do I know? It's just my opinion and I know very little about the associated technologies.
They just make it up as they go along, it's a Security, a Commodity, I don't know; How do you classify a pet rock? Personally I view them all as Gambling Tokens in an online Casino, since they have about the same utility as a Casino Chip.
I have toyed with investing in these, they're much cheaper than a Bitcoin Token and far more useful:
https://www.aquarterof.co.uk/milk-chocolate-casino-chips?source=affwin&awc=978_1678138673_e80b74634c9ed652ce2a7c105e61ad0f
"Craig is the inventor of Bitcoin, and established nChain in 2015, where his ideas have led to several thousand patent applications."
Blockchain was conceived well before 2008 and anyone can create their own Blockchain, so I'm pretty sure any patents will be challenged in many different ways.
https://kriptomat.io/blockchain/history-of-blockchain/