CryptoCurrency

I only defend banks against misconceptions that people have about them. Trust me, I’m certainly no fan of banks, I just somehow found myself working for one - you see so much BS when working for them (just like any large corporation really). The Prime Minister only called for a Royal Commision into the banking industry because the banks requested it. They requested it because all the negative press about banks lately is hurting their image in the community and a Royal Commision will help fix it. I completely agree that it’s all corrupt and they’re all mates.

Back on topic with Crypto, I just can’t believe in some big industry conspiracy where AU banks are denying Crypto investments because some people reckon that it’s the future of currency and trading. It’s more likely some system flag, where someone has used this particular Crypto site/hub/portal/platform thing for money laundering or other illegal activity and it’s now flagged as suspicious, transactions are blocked and by the sounds of it, some people who have traded on it have had their accounts closed for violating terms and conditions related to using accounts for illegal activity.

To put it into perspective, its takes months and years to do anything at these large corporations. I can go through 6 different versions of a PowerPoint presentation until it’s signed off and finalised 9 months later. Meanwhile across the road a building has been demolished, the site excavated, a 22 story apartment building put in its place and now hundreds of people live there and go about their daily lives. In the same time it took to get some slides that no one will even read approved by different managers! These large corporations are extremely inefficient, and while I’m just a low level shitkicker and I’m certainly not privy to any important conversations, I just find it really hard to believe that the above has happened because the banks are trying to send a message about crypto. They very well may be anti-crypto, but I think given how badly everyone hates banks at the moment, they woudn’t go about sending that message in this way.

Also, my understanding is only one site/platform has been blocked, is that right? Wouldn’t they block all of them if they were truely trying to stop their customers from buying any crypto currency?    

EDIT: Smithers, if I wanted to learn about getting started in investing/day trading in this, where should I turn? I’m thinking I want to throw a couple of grand in and see I can make some easy and quick money. I know it’s gambling, and nothing long term but the more you guys go on about it the more interested I am. 

I just find it strange that right as the hype and media coverage of cryptocurrencies reaches its peak, that's when the banks decide to act. If it were just red flags popping up on their systems this whole time due to their policies and procedures then why haven't they been closing accounts for years and years?

Also, according to this, a lot of the banks don't even have a policy regarding cryptocurrencies.

www.businessinsider.com.au/bitcoin-investors-accounts-frozen-big-four-banks-2017-12

"Its terms and conditions for business accounts do not mention cryptocurrency payment services, though includes the broad statement that it “may exercise its discretion to close an account due to unsatisfactory conduct or for any other reason it considers appropriate”.

For any other reason it considers appropriate... so basically the banks can close accounts whenever they want for whatever reason they want.

Anyway, you now want to put some money into what a few months ago you were calling a silly fad? Well, we're making progress!

The wallets thing is pretty simple, most of the trading sites that allow you to purchase various types of crypto will have wallets for all the crypto they sell. For instance if you purchase some bitcoin, it goes into your bitcoin wallet. If you purchase some Ripple, it goes into your Ripple wallet. Just think of the wallets as like mini bank accounts for each different type of crypto. The wallet will tell you how much of that type of crypto you have, its current value in australian dollars and will allow you to send and recieve your crypto to other exchanges if you choose.

I use coinspot.com.au. It's one of the sites that were affected by the bank thing and didn't allow new deposits but now they are accepting deposits again so they must have sorted it out. There are other Aussie sites like the btcmarkets one fordy uses but they have also been affected by the bank thing and they only offer a few of the main types of crypto. Coinspot has loads of different ones available.

Day trading in crypto is really hard. I've tried it but have lost more than I made. It's a great way to make some quick cash but also a great way to lose all your money. It's too unpredictable. You would be much better off researching the different coins available and putting your money into something that you believe has a good future and then just sitting back and watching the value rise over time. Litecoin is a really safe bet, it's going to have a big year. If I were you I would probably spend all of your money on Litecoin. Cardano is my favourite cheap crypto at the moment. It has a great team behind it. They're still in the early stages of development though. TRON could also be huge because the founder, Justin Sun is a Chinese billionaire who is very well liked in China. The TRON coin is still in its infancy but he's already forming business partnerships with Chinese companies.

At the moment price increases in crypto world are mainly occurring due to hype and FOMO (fear of missing out), rather than any of these new coins having any actual use. A flood of new investors are coming in, they read something good about a cheap coin and pile in. A lot of these coins may not even end up actually reaching their end goal or being useful. There is also a tactic being used where people will go to the reddit page of a coin and spread fake bad news about it, hoping to scare newbies into selling their coins and driving the price down so they can buy the coin cheaper and profit when it rises again. You just have to do a lot of research and play your cards carefully.

My biggest piece of advice is to not worry about falling prices in something you're invested in. Things go up and down like a yoyo. I bought 250 Ripples for a dollar when I first started but then it started dropping and I panicked and thought oh man, it could drop all the way down to near zero so I sold all of it when valued at 70 cents. If I had just held on, I could have sold that Ripple when it was valued at nearly $5 a few weeks ago (Currently Ripple is worth about $3).

A few days ago my entire crypto portfolio was worth about $2200. As of today it is at about $1500. But I no longer care, because I am pretty certain in a few months it will probably be valued at about $4000. And by the end of the year, even if I did nothing, I'm pretty certain it would be worth in excess of $10,000.

Here's a good vid for newbies to crypto that you should watch:

Also, regarding your query about wallets - btcmarkets do not use or require one.

I chose to use BTC simply because it was easier to get verification, someone else I know gave it the thumbs up, and, because they only trade in a small number of coin types, I haven't been tempted into buying anything other than the coins I read up on. Ripple and Litecoin will probably be all I bother with, at least for the time being.

Alright, what I just said is pretty confusing. Basically when you buy crypto on an exchange, the crypto is stored on their site but you can do whatever you want with it, it's yours and you don't need an external wallet. But effectively the crypto is not "yours" until you send it to your own wallet or offline storage device such as a Nano Ledger S. If the exchange site gets hacked and crypto is stolen, you've lost your crypto. Personally, I'm not too worried about that happening and am happy to keep my crypto on the exchange sites in their "managed wallets". The security on the exchange sites is very good. Might look at storing it offline at some point though.

Man I'm always late for shit like this, if I invest now everything will surely crash and burn.

Wouldn't the sudden surge of investors due to media coverage etc. Bring the type of people who will only be in it for a quick buck? It seems that's what a lot of people I know and around here are doing- would a massive influx of investors who mostly sell after 6 months to a year eventually make it crash?

I have absolutely no idea about this but everyone talks about it like it's just some sure fire way to make money but that simply can not last.

The market has already "crashed" many times, depending on how you define a crash. And each time it has bounced back to an even higher point. Basically, this has occurred because there are experienced investors and wealthy people and a lot of institutional money who are just sitting back waiting for those crashes so they can buy at a cheaper rate. So the prices don't stay down for very long with everyone rushing in to snap up a bargain. Prices were plummeting across the board yesterday due to the Korean exchange incident and the ignorant fools come rushing out saying the bubble is going to pop. I was looking forward to buying some cheap Litecoin, but today everything is already back in the green. If a bunch of people who are in it for a quick buck decide to cash out, there will be a whole bunch more people rushing in to buy at the cheaper prices. But why anyone would cash out early when prices are constantly rising I don't understand anyway.

So you're saying that it will just keep rising then? How can that be sustained?

Well cryptos are currently only worth 700 billion. Compare that to say the dot com bubble, which burst at 3 Trillion. There is a lot more money to come into cryptos yet, even if it is just a bubble thats going to burst. But I dont think it is. 

Well those tangible assets didnt turn out to be very tangible did they? The point Im making is people threw 3 Trillion at something they didnt even understand. The same could easily happen with crypto. You think people are gonna keep investing in stocks where they can get a return of like 5% per year when they can get returns of 4000% per year in crypto? I dont care that crpto has no tangible assets, the figures speak for themselves.

Is this not just a type of pyramid scheme? Good on the fellas that got on it early but the way people talk about it like it's just guaranteed massive returns (which over time it has been), seems crazy to me. It's working now but all these hyped up little investors are just gonna come in and drop cash, make profit and run. That's simply not sustainable.

Well bitcoin certainly wasn't created as a pyramid scheme. The people who say that its useless and is a pyramid scheme are like the people who said the internet was useless when it first came out.

It seems crazy because it is crazy. I don't know how sustainable it is long term, but I just wanna make a nice chunk of cash out of it while I can.

The fact that I and a lot of other people want to make money out of it in the short term says nothing about the long term value of crypto. Bitcoin was created in 2008. If it were just a fad it would have already died out long ago. The blockchain technology behind it actually has a use. 

Try looking back over the history of bitcoin. It once went from $5000 all the way back down to $1000 and people were saying the same things then and saying it was over and people should have cashed out at $5000. Then it went all the way up to $25,000 and they looked like fools. This dip is nothing but a chance for people to buy more before it skyrockets again.

BTW it went even lower right before Xmas and then bounced back to 20K