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Comment by grey-area | Hacker News Reader

If you're just speculating on the price going up, and don't actually want to use coins to pay for something, it might be worth having a look at these charts before you do buy any:

http://bitcoincharts.com/charts/mtgoxUSD#rg360zigDailyztgSzm...

http://bitcoincharts.com/charts/mtgoxUSD#rg730zigDailyztgSzm...

by the time mainstream publications like the BBC are reporting on spectacular gains in an asset, it's far too late to invest speculatively in the hope of finding a greater fool and cashing out before the inevitable crash, even if you believe in the long-term future of this currency.

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Disagree. When I can get a bank account with a UK bank denominated in bitcoin (at whatever cost), then it's too late to invest speculatively. Until then, the barriers to entry are exerting downward pressure on the price.

The current price hike is made in China. Better to look there for hints as to when the bubble will burst.

+1. In my opinion, the Chinese government has effective control over the price of bitcoins right now. Obviously they can't dictate the price but, if they decide to restrict bitcoin trading, the price would plunge.

It would plunge temporarily, for sure, but not for long. Plus, why would the Chinese government do it?!

To prevent people from shifting their wealth from CNY into USD.

Putting their wealth into Bitcoin isn't putting it into USD - on the contrary. The Chinese exchanges are all in CNY, dollar isn't mention there at all, which creates a number of issues like psychological levels being different and CNY/USD ratio varying on its own.

You're missing the point.

China has implemented capital controls to prevent individuals from moving large amounts of wealth out of China. See http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/asia-pacific... for some background (or just do a Google search for china capital controls).

A Chinese citizen could conceivably bypass those controls by (1) depositing renminbi (i.e. CNY) into a BitChina account, (2) buying bitcoins, (3) transfering them to a non-Chinese exchange (e.g. MtGox, BTC-e, BitStamp), where they (4) sell them for USD.

This is true, but both BTCChina and OKCoin have no option, but to start working with the Chinese government (BTCChina already started) and will provide control mechanisms, which isn't necessarily a bad news for Bitcoin as people try to present it. Also, due to major mining operations happening in China, there's inflow of capital to China, so, I don't think the government will have a problem with that.

Looks like its making a move now. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-25233224

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