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Comment by sillysaurus3 | Hacker News Reader

This article is delusional if it thinks the swings have anything to do with the bitcoin civil war. Bitcoin has always been volatile, and will continue to be volatile. It's a gambler's currency.

People always try to assign a reason to things. We don't like accepting that there just aren't any reasons. But as someone who has seen bitcoin go up and down and back again over years, there really isn't a reason for it besides "people decided to buy or sell." And those people aren't operating with logic. It's speculation.

People were saying the exact same things about Silk Road. If Silk Road closes, bitcoin will go down! Nope, didn't happen.

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I think you're underestimating just how big a deal the split was. It could have lead to Bitcoin being split into two distinct currencies, and this was happening on a very short and defined timeline (July 21st and August).

The swings absolutely were caused by anxiety/relief around this event.

Not a chance. The volatility surrounding this event was at or below the normal levels of BTC volatility.

I've been watching this closely, and the price seems to be driven by the Segwit2x signaling rate. We're close to the %80 activation and when it looked like we weren't going to make it we saw a decline, and when hash power switched signaling and the price recovered.

The reason the hash power signaling is not so stable right now has a technical reason-- Bip-91 is rushed, the Segwit2x proposal was rather late in the game and this is a system which, by design and prudence, should not be changing with quick untested commits.

While I tend to agree with you, correlation doesn't mean causation.

This comment is as simple (in thinking) as the article. You said bitcoin has "always" been volatile. Well, everything is volatile. But the volatility of bitcoin is not constant, it is changing and bitcoin has gone through periods of stability making it less volatile than gold and closer to normal currencies.

Here is the volatility index: https://www.buybitcoinworldwide.com/volatility-index/

You can notice that bitcoin went in the last few months through a volatility peak that didn't correct and is now surging again (in volatility).

It just looks like market manipulation (which is not illegal in an unregulated market). Pump the price up to make huge profits shorting on the next big dump (August 1?), then buy a lot and pump it again.

This was written 2 days ago: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-manipulate-bitcoin-market...

It's a gambler's currency.

It's a gambler's {x} could be understood to mean, "prioritizing the desires of players of games of chance." A casino that has many rigged games (beyond the tuning of the odds in favor of the house) wouldn't be considered to be a "gambler's." If you're saying that buying bitcoin is "a gamble," then this may be true, contingent on how much information you're operating on. I'd say that things are happening to Bitcoin, and the more information one has on these things, the more you can narrow down what will happen to the forks.

Yeah well, it was a volatility spike.

https://vlab.stern.nyu.edu/analysis/VOL.BTCUSD:FOREX-R.GARCH

Many times you can't know the reason, and in an investing sense this is perhaps functionally equivalent to there being no reason. But that doesn't mean there is no reason.

Although I agree, the swing might have reasons, people and systems behind, too. Ignorance doesn't mean that something didn't happen.

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