JPMorgan's Dimon says Bitcoin 'is a fraud' | Hacker News Reader

JPMorgan's Dimon says Bitcoin 'is a fraud'

reuters.com

11 pointsoblib15 comments

Dupe of https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15229765

Um, what differentiates bitcoin from a stock on the open market (other than the technicalities, centralized vs decentralized)?

Stocks are just virtual pieces of paper saying you own X amount of something. So is bitcoin. Stocks are valued not by some formula, but by the constant battle between buyers and sellers. So is bitcoin.

The only real differences are that stocks are somewhat more protected (SEC and all that) and are not treated as property like bitcoin. I guess if you own enough stock you can steer the company you own to some degree, whereas with bitcoin the developers have more of a say than the holders.

Other than that, whether you like bitcoin or hate it, it has many more similarities to the stock market than differences, and anyone who spends their day in the stock market then turns and thumbs their nose at bitcoin seems a bit hypocritical.

Bitcoin's entire value proposition by its backers is use as a currency, but you are correct that it is much more like a stock than like a currency. However, unlike (most) stocks it has no value aside from what it can be sold for.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffreydorfman/2017/05/17/bitco... has more.

At the very least stocks have well defined metrics tied to company financials with which value is quantified.

Plus they can also pay directly in dividends.

Stock: A security issued by a corporation that represents an ownership right in the assets of the corporation and a right to a proportionate share of profits after payment of corporate liabilities and obligations.

JP Morgan has it's own (Etherium derived) blockchain system for transactions and smart contracts, Quorum.

https://www.jpmorgan.com/global/Quorum

Sounds like Jamie Dimon's got a serious case of the hypocrisy going on.

The impression I'm getting is that the banks are now realizing it's probably too late for them. For the last 7 years they had some chances, but now with a $150 billion market cap for crypto, they can't purchase any significant share of the technology anymore. That ship has sailed.

So now they can only resort to shit flinging and disparaging remarks like "Bitcoin is a fraud". While at the same time trying to make their own altcoin...

No, he specifically separated out the blockchain technology from the currency component.

Via FT Alphaville [1], he says, "I’m going to be really clear in this one. Forget the blockchain, that’s a technology… But… the currency isn’t going to work." The article also points this out, but doesn't differentiate it which has the effect of making him sound hypocritical.

> JPMorgan and many of its competitors, however, have invested millions of dollars in blockchain, the technology that tracks bitcoin transactions. Blockchain is a shared ledger of transactions maintained by a network of computers on the internet.

[1]: https://ftalphaville.ft.com/2017/09/12/2193624/money-creator...

"Dimon said that if any JPMorgan traders were trading the crypto-currency, “I would fire them in a second, for two reasons: It is against our rules and they are stupid, and both are dangerous.”"

I assume the way they would do it is by investing in hedge funds or elsewhere who also invest in crypto.

Crypyo transactions are largely speculative not transactive so he is right, crypto is currently a pump and dump fraud. Plus the only way in besides mining is to reveal your identity so the premise is largely broken for most people.

here's a video with his explanation.

https://www.cnbc.com/2017/09/12/jpmorgan-ceo-jamie-dimon-rai...

TD;LR - blockchain tech separate from cryptocurrencies, governments will shut bitcoin down, price is purely speculative and has no real use. Nothing you haven't heard before

The pertinent question for him would be whether it's a bigger fraud than Mortgage-Backed Securities and Collateralized Debt Obligations.

Unlike JPMorgan that's like squeaky clean.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com