[Amey Kulkarni]

Originally Posted by nutcracker

Fast forward to this year, So far, I have lost money in the seven figure range (INR) in crypto. In retrospect, the stories I'm hearing from my circle, it feels like crypto trading is just another fancy name for gambling.

My two cents and of course not a Financial advise.

First rule of trading. Loss is not accounted for unless you sell. HODL as they call it for HOLD is what pays the most dividends. Patience is the key and one has to stay mentally strong during Bear markets.

While entering the market, one needs to understand the market sentiment. You cannot be buying at All Time Highs. The markets as they go up will also come down or vice versa. If you invested all of your money during end of 2021, I can understand your pain but before that you should've been in profit until the last few months. The market was in a bull run.

Always keep a belief and vision for the mid to long term and Do Your Own Research before jumping into any markets. You also need to strategize your portfolio majorly by Large Caps which relatively crash lesser compared to mid or small caps. Keep some money on the side to Dollar Cost Average and never go all-in; in order bring down your buying price in a bear market.

Cheers,
Amey

[yashg]

Originally Posted by RiderZone

The type of tweets Saylor puts out are designed to appeal to a very specific kind of person, and that's someone who is willing to put money into something on pure faith, motivated by FOMO, a distorted sense of how the world works, and a severe lack of social intelligence.

Exactly. Crypto shills like Saylor target vulnerable low to middle income people who think the odds are stacked against them and the only way they are going to make it big in life by gambling on things like crypto.

Congratulations on staying away from this ponzi.

On the technical front, there are zero uses cases for Blockchain other than storing transactions for magic internet money.

[stanjohn123]

Originally Posted by m8002?

For the benefit of the members, can you please elaborate on the use cases that you are optimistic about.

1) The coin you hold is completely yours. Can store it in your hardware wallet and carry it where ever you go. It can be in millions or billions but it's with you always.

2) Highly secure, just don't lose your private key.

3) Can instantly transfer your funds using Tron or Xrp anywhere across the world at fraction of the cost of regular money.

4) Super fast transaction times.

5) Smart Contracts. TN govt already started using blockchain technology to store land records like Patta and Chittas.

6) Web3.0 and Metaverse. Future of social networks.

[Quoter]

Originally Posted by m8002?

How is a smart contract between 2 parties different ( and better ) and the current regular contract between the same 2 parties?

Please don't confuse smart contracts with a simple paper agreement between 2 parties. Smart contracts essentially trigger (if, then) statements automatically without any human intervention (or option for human intervention). In a way, the contract itself guarantees its execution. The current use cases are built around multi party contracts instead of simple 2 party contract, even though their are pilot use cases for 2 member contract as well.
Let me take a simple example. Current telecom regulations in India do not permit any one player to have a more than 50% market share in any circle. Currently, this process works on reporting done manually on a monthly basis by telcos with some delay. In case of a breach in 50% market share there is a long drawn process to bring it down. Now let's replace this with a smart contract between all telecom players. This contract will be linked real time to the number of subscribers of each players in their own system without any sharing of data between the players. Only the blockchain hosting the contract gets access to this data. As soon as any one player breaches this 50% limit, the smart contract notifies the system of the erring telco and prevents it from selling any new mobile connections. Additionally, since the chain works real time, every time a competing telco sells a new mobile connection, it also allows the dominant telco to sell additional connections by keeping the market share updated on a real time basis. Now you may say all of this can be achieved with regular tech solutions as well. The benefits of a blockchain in this case are:
- The data is secured in the blockchain with no tampering permissible
- There is no access of data between the parties. Only the blockchain gets the data and the parties get to see only the output
- It is much cheaper to build this using existing blockchain solutions. Over a period of time there will be ready solutions for all the different contracting requirements thus making it easy to build and implement these contracts in as much time as it takes to sign an actual paper contract instead of building a new system from scratch (which can take a few months at least).
As I mentioned in my original post, don't think of crypto assets as currency, think of them as a part of the code which will be used to implement some of these use cases.

[Samurai]

Originally Posted by Quoter

Now you may say all of this can be achieved with regular tech solutions as well. The benefits of a blockchain in this case are:
- The data is secured in the blockchain with no tampering permissible
- There is no access of data between the parties. Only the blockchain gets the data and the parties get to see only the output

I am an openssl user for over 20 years, and used the RSA SDK before that. Basically, I have used public-private key encryption since the late 90s.

What additional security blockchain offers over a solution using the good old openssl ?

[apachelongbow]

Originally Posted by Romins

For the same reason, I don't invest in mutual funds or shares. I would rather stay poor with minimal returns on my FDs, than lose all my money during a pandemic. I have to admit my ignorance, beyond a certain point I don't understand the stock market.

It's actually a fallacy..what we all do is perform systematic investments.
No matter you keep your money in a bank (4% interest) , a FD (6%) or a mutual fund sip @10%, what you are doing is increasing your savings. You keep doing this for the next 10/20 years and you will be far richer due to the power of compounding.
On the other hand one must never speculate without knowledge. Trying to get fantastic returns within 2/3 years on stocks, commodities, gold, bitcoin etc requires market knowledge as well as a bit of inside information.

[m8002?]

Thanks for some of the points. I am playing the devils advocate to get more clarity.

Originally Posted by stanjohn123

1) The coin you hold is completely yours. Can store it in your hardware wallet and carry it where ever you go. It can be in millions or billions but it's with you always.

Isnt it the same now? I am pretty sure you are not paid in bundles of currency notes. You bank balance, MF, bonds are all just a digital number. How is crypto different?

Originally Posted by stanjohn123

2) Highly secure, just don't lose your private key.

Well, my bank balance is secure even without me keeping another "secure" private key. Now we can discuss about banks going bankrupt, but the chance of your crypto wallet going bankrupt is way higher. Even the so called "stable" coin crashed by 99%. Atleast in the case of banks, we can fight and hope the govt. of the day does something. Whats the recourse in case of crypto?

Originally Posted by stanjohn123

3) Can instantly transfer your funds using Tron or Xrp anywhere across the world at fraction of the cost of regular money.

4) Super fast transaction times.

Aren't they the same? And even today, I can transfer money in a second between accounts. I am yet to come across a need to transfer it any faster. And 2 day limitation for international transfer is not a limitation of the current system but an artificial delay put in by the governments. So why cant the govts. apply the same for Crypto in future? For illegal stuff, crypto is the way to go!!
Cost depends on the vendor and cartelization. Rupay and UPI have brought down transactions costs drastically. Price increase can happen to Crypto later similar to how Swiggy, OLA etc started increasing the pricing over time.

Originally Posted by stanjohn123

5) Smart Contracts. TN govt already started using blockchain technology to store land records like Patta and Chittas.

I can accept that as a valid use case to avoid(or atleast track) falsification and prove providence. But the system works only when all the parties ( govt. and the land owner )sign the contract and both can view/track the providence anytime. Not sure if that is the case.

Originally Posted by stanjohn123

6) Web3.0 and Metaverse. Future of social networks.

Would help if you can expand that a bit more. People are buying and selling digital assets in the gaming world for ages using a normal wallet. What is bitcoin bringing new to the table?

[stanjohn123]

Originally Posted by m8002?

Thanks for some of the points. I am playing the devils advocate to get more clarity.

How is your money yours, when you have to stand in line to get your own money and that too only a certain limit during demonetization ?

When IMF freezes your funds abroad, due to your govts fight or misunderstanding with foreign countries, how is your money safe ?

When you go to a bank, the employees treat you as if they are doing you a favour by letting them keep your money there , huge delays in resolving issues like NEFT payment delays.

The stable coin that crashed recently was always flawed and was an algorithm based coin pegged to UST. The mechanism was such that it could fail anytime and those who were aware did not invest in it. There are other stable coins which are pegged equally to physical dollar and those won't fall like this.

I don't think anything I say will change your mind, so let's not waste each others time. There will be people who believe and won't believe in crypto. I'm not here to convince or change anyone's mind. I just stated my opinion on it.

[Quoter]

Originally Posted by Samurai

I am an openssl user for over 20 years, and used the RSA SDK before that. Basically, I have used public-private key encryption since the late 90s.

What additional security blockchain offers over a solution using the good old openssl ?

I am not a technical person who codes (not for 15 years now). However, I do understand a bit of tech from the business side of things so will try to answer. I believe encryption and blockchain are independent methods of securing and go side by side. Most blockchains (or all public ones, perhaps) are encrypted. The keyword for any blockchain is decentralisation. If your use case requires centralised control, blockchain may not have an appropriate solution.

What a blockchain does over and above all the traditional methods of security is this. When the blockchain algorithm is written, it determines the manner in which the algorithm can be changed in the future. This generally requires the consent of a significant number of participants in the blockchain. Hence, it is extremely difficult to hack into a blockchain and tamper with records. If someone hacks into any one participant and does transactions on the blockchain, by default there is traceability for every action. This tracing can be done even a few years later if required as the chain automatically maintains all records. Thus, there is no escaping for such actions since you can trace in as much depth as you want to, not just today, but even 10 years down the line. The records are almost impossible to tamper with.

All of the above btw is independent of the use case of blockchain for cryptocurrencies, which may or may not survive because of regulatory reasons. What may work are the blockchains which are being used for other real world use cases such as smart contracts.

[Samurai]

Originally Posted by Quoter

I am not a technical person who codes (not for 15 years now). However, I do understand a bit of tech from the business side of things so will try to answer.

Oh, never mind then. I am a businessman who still does crypto-programming in C++, so I understand how blockchain works.

I asked the question because you said blockchain can do more than traditional programming techniques. Blockchain is merely an application of cryptography, a very wasteful one because of the electricity cost. It can't do anything traditional cryptography can't, since it is built on it. The popular banking applications like credit cards, UPI, Paytm, etc., use regular cryptography which is very secure by current standards.

What blockchain does is make many copies of the transaction and spreads it across many parties, so if any copy is changed, the other copies can be used to detect the changes. Meanwhile traditional methods rely on trusting one single entity like a bank. So the former is very expensive, latter is very cheap. This is why Bitcoin could never become a real transactional currency, if I make a ₹20 purchase, and the cost of recording the transaction is ₹200, how can it really work? Meanwhile, traditional methods will cost fraction of a paisa, so it is not even levied to the parties, like in case of UPI. Credit cards do charge some amount, again they are very small amounts.

Blockchain is useful in high value applications like real estate registrations, that is where we can see some real world usage.

[neeravnaik]

Originally Posted by RiderZone

Bitcoin, and why I haven't bought any

If you're someone who's succesfully gambled with crypto, I have big respect for you. "Behti Ganga mein haath dhona" is easy to say, but not so easy to do. For people like me with limited attention spans however, Bitcoin continues to be a trillion dollar red flag.

Amazingly well written post. Great clarity of thought in knowing yourself and a common sense view of what is happening around us. In investing knowing oneself is half the battle.

Not going to argue about Bitcoins as I am not knowledgeable enough. I have not invested enough time in studying it. What has put me off is that first of all it is a difficult concept and does not appeal to mind used to common sense. The attitude of the whole crypto crowd also puts me off which the OP has demonstrated so well.

The smart brains have now packaged a lot of crypto into terms like FD, stablecoins etc. To lure a lot of people who somehow are made to believe about guaranteed returns. They will not talk about the risks.

Crypto people will quickly point out that even stock market has scams. But the entire equity market is not a scam. It is a way to buy part ownership into a business where you also get a vote . Now some of these businesses can be scams or want to scams their shareholder. But the entire concept to equity investing is not scam and this has been established over years. Once you make this argument the. Counter becomes increasingly crazy like going to Ask questions like “what is even money” etc.

One thing I have learnt in personally finance that there are no guaranteed returns above FD rates.

IF you do not understand something better to get a good financial advisor who can help you. Problem is there are very low odds of finding a genuine advisor. Old generation was sucked in investing into insurance products by various relatives who are LIC agents. I got lucky pretty early in career i met a good conservative mutual fund distributor who advised me to SIP into good fund houses with long track record.

THere is a blog called freefincal which is written by a IIT M prof who has studied the personal finance space and writes very objectively with data and common sense. It has helped me a lot as I realized finally I have to take my own decisions with my investments.

[SoumenD]

Originally Posted by SoumenD

I just invested a few thousands due to FOMO only earlier this year via Vauld. It has a way to invest those coins as FD as well. But now when crypto market crashed and I wanted to average out by putting in more, they don’t even allow investing through INR anymore. Weird!!! So now my investment is at -50% and I have no way to average out.

My cousin (18 year old) is very bullish on crypto and I see folks like him being way more interested in crypto than 30/40+ generation. They keep talking about air-drop and all where they can earn some fractional coins for free. They spend quite sometime trading (small amount) on Binance, CoinDCX pro etc. I feel am too lazy to even try and understand. Yeah am around late 30s & MFs is as far as I get

And VAULD freezes withdrawal as well. Got a mail today from VAULD mentioning they are freezing all withdrawals. Thankfully I didn't get a chance to average out and that helped in keeping my losses minimal. Normally I never trust these 3rd party platforms but this time FOMO got the better of me

Meanwhile the same cousin is blaming government taxation and everything else under the sky now

[m8002?]

Originally Posted by SoumenD

And VAULD freezes withdrawal as well. Got a mail today from VAULD mentioning they are freezing all withdrawals. Thankfully I didn't get a chance to average out and that helped in keeping my losses minimal. Normally I never trust these 3rd party platforms but this time FOMO got the better of me

Meanwhile the same cousin is blaming government taxation and everything else under the sky now

It was only expected since most of these exchanges have algorithms doing arbitrage trading.

But the sad part is the crypto believers are OK with these exchanges simply blocking the money. But are worried about banks where they have to wait in an ATM for 2 min at the max to withdraw.

[evil_grin]

Originally Posted by RiderZone

Bitcoin - why I didn't buy

I got to know about Bitcoin way back around 2014 when the value was around $700. Even back then it felt overvalued because it had no real world use. I considered putting say 5k rupees in it as a trial but then backed out because your investment wasn't secure. There were people hacking into exchanges/wallets and taking all your Bitcoins. So I stayed out.

I don't regret it because I wouldn't have anyway put in enough amounts on speculative investments to make a difference.

[Amey Kulkarni]

Originally Posted by SoumenD

And VAULD freezes withdrawal as well. Got a mail today from VAULD mentioning they are freezing all withdrawals.

Meanwhile the same cousin is blaming government taxation and everything else under the sky now

Here’s your answer to what’ll probably happen to VAULD. And to answer to your second point, I agree with your cousin. While, the entire world is moving in a direction towards simplifying taxes for Crypto, India is moving to another.

LINK - https://www.protocol.com/amp/nexo-vauld-2657612668

India’s trading volume is no more significant in the crypto space and doesn’t bother the entire market cap either.

Cheers,
Amey