- Jul 15, 2014
- 28,767
- 47,903
I'm with ya... here is the short answer for ANYTHING: if you do not PHYSICALLY possess it, you merely hold a paper or virtual derivative of perceived value. So, you can physically possess gold and silver. Having a paper or online brokerage claim to them is virtual. Owning a stock is now a virtual claim to something tangible. A dollar bill is a paper claim to a mere promise of "full faith and credit"... All of those things can go "poof." Yes, I agree with you regarding crypto... it's a virtual claim to something that doesn't exist and only has perceived value... like the dollar... ;)I agree with your point about Boeing (or Kodak, etc.) and I hate the USG picking winners (and thus de-facto "losers"). As for Bitcoin versus gold, at least gold has actual uses - and if nothing else I have yet to meet a female who didn't like it and want to take physical possession! To my way of thinking, there is no comparison between virtual currency and anything else you might invest in. To include actual currency. It may totally be my lack of a complete understanding - and God knows I have had to sit through a bunch of lectures on how it works - but I will leave the investing in it to others. I am fully willing to admit that a lot things discussed in this thread are way outside my wheel house and thus not where I put any money. I am rooting for you though!
FTR - I am fully willing to be educated and disabused of my ignorance! (Just understand it might be like teaching a special ed class.)
Here's another way to look at it. For EVERY product EVER, marketing people will tell you that acceptance of a new product follows an "S" shaped life cycle where the "S" is stretched vertically and the top and bottom tails are pretty flat and the horizontal axis is "time" and the vertical is "acceptance." It takes a long time for initial 5% acceptance, then, if accepted, shoots up near vertical to 90%+ in a very short period of time, then acceptance tails off over time for the last bit of acceptance. Well, with cryptos, we are well past the 5% acceptance to the point of the Fed exploring it and every major wall street player having more than a finger in the arena. They allow futures trading of it as a further derivative... so, is everyone "bought in?" No, not even close. Are we beyond the point of acceptance to where it is not going to die? Absolutely.
Here's a pic to make the idea easy... and as you see, with technology, time to acceptance and growth is compressed massively... Crypto has moved passed the "critical mass" for greater acceptance...