Bitcoin price goes on wild ride

[Tikey]

http://money.cnn.com/2013/04/03/inve...ice/index.html

The price of the virtual currency bitcoin, already volatile in recent weeks, went through wild swings in overnight trading Tuesday and Wednesday.

According to prices quoted on Mt.Gox, the main trading exchange for bitcoins, the value of one bitcoin ricocheted from $106 to as high as $147, then back down to $125, then to $141. They were trading around $139 per bitcoin in afternoon trading Wednesday.

Two weeks ago, a bitcoin was worth only $47. When Mt.Gox started tracking prices in mid-2010 the price stood at only 5 cents per bitcoin.

Investors have been pouring into bitcoins and gold in recent weeks, as authorities in Cyprus imposed a tax on top bank depositors and placed limits on bank withdrawals in order to pay for a European bailout of the banking system there.

Bitcoin is a four-year-old digital currency developed by a hacker who still remains anonymous. It's designed to allow worldwide payments with extremely low processing costs.

Societe Generale currency analyst Sebastien Galy said the market for bitcoins is likely to remain volatile. New investors are flooding into the market to try to cash in on the wild price swings.

He said that as more people purchase and trade bitcoins, the currency's supply is supposed to increase. But some traders are buying and holding the bitcoins in an effort to limit supply and drive up the prices.

"It's a fascinating, very small niche market," Galy said. "There's a limited amount of supply that's available, and it creates waves of upswings. It's a bit like the gold rush in California. Everyone is rushing into and it and everyone is over-excited. But that makes it very risky. It should come with significant warnings of buyer beware."

[Zelkova]

Yeah...the price went up high enough for me to consider mining. I took a look at my rig specs only to find that theyre pomegranate and it would take me 4 months to mine 1 bitcoin. NOOPE.

[Polantaris]

Was just talking about this at work, because apparently one of my coworkers was mining. We basically came to the conclusion that I did a long time ago, that the amount of money you'd spend mining one due to energy costs from your PC, as well as the potential cost of PC repairs due to overuse (PCs are not meant to be at 100% capacity at all times, especially GPUs, at least in my experience), would make mining a complete waste of time and potentially cost you far more than you gain.

[FenixR]

Bitcoins should be approached more on the "Buy Low-Sell High" mentality for people without Supercomputers for mining. Then again i dunno if many people did that before because the price of the bitcoin as been so low that not many though it could ballistically increase like this.

[CroM]

Bitcoins should be approached more on the "Buy Low-Sell High" mentality for people without Supercomputers for mining. Then again i dunno if many people did that before because the price of the bitcoin as been so low that not many though it could ballistically increase like this.

Except... what price is low and what price is high?

[FenixR]

Except... what price is low and what price is high?

Thats the beauty of commerce. You never know, you just kinda go with the flow.

Sometimes you win, sometimes you don't. But if you don't risk anything, don't expect to win anything.

[Polantaris]

Bitcoins should be approached more on the "Buy Low-Sell High" mentality for people without Supercomputers for mining. Then again i dunno if many people did that before because the price of the bitcoin as been so low that not many though it could ballistically increase like this.

Yeah I would agree that's basically the only way to profit from them.

Except... what price is low and what price is high?

Apparently for a while coins were under $10. I would say that's low.

[Kabanaw]

At this point the smart money is on completely ignoring bitcoins.

[FenixR]

Yep, the recommendation now is to sell if you want to sell and if you had any Bitcoins previous to this boom, and/or wait it out and see if this is just a bubble waiting to pop plummeting the prices once again.

[Locked]

Bitcoins are a currency.

Not a get rich quick scheme.

[Polantaris]

Bitcoins are a currency.

Not a get rich quick scheme.

Currency with a very volatile worth.

[Locked]

Currency with a very volatile worth.

Any fiat currency that is traded in the forex is volatile to an extent, the only issue bitcoins have is that its backing is artificial. It's still a currency, not a get rich quick scheme.

[hadriel]

Any fiat currency that is traded in the forex is volatile to an extent, the only issue bitcoins have is that its backing is artificial. It's still a currency, not a get rich quick scheme.

And that makes it a very, very dangerous game.

Hadriel

[Polantaris]

Any fiat currency that is traded in the forex is volatile to an extent, the only issue bitcoins have is that its backing is artificial. It's still a currency, not a get rich quick scheme.

I never said it was a get rich quick scheme. I was trying to imply that due to the volatile worth of the BitCoin many people try to pretend that it is.