As Bitcoin nears $700, Coinbase out of coins to sell

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6756307

by johnyzee • 13 years ago

52 68 13 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

From coinbase.com:

"Due to higher than normal buy volumes, we are unable to provide exact price quotes right now.

Instead of pausing buys entirely, we decided to give people the option to purchase bitcoin at the market price in a few days. Once your USD funds arrive, we will exchange them to bitcoin at the market price at approximately Friday Nov 22, 2013 at 07:56AM PST.

Note that you can cancel your order at any time up until your bitcoin arrive from the transfer history page.

The market price of bitcoin changes frequently. Below are some recent prices to give you an idea. These do not guarantee what the price will be in a few days."

gphil• 13 years ago

I just sold my pet Bitcoin that I bought for $80 a while back. This is getting crazy, I wonder who the buyers are?

smaug7• 13 years ago

The Chinese

triptychs• 13 years ago

Saw it at $600 today and sold mine too. Made enough to pay rent, not to mention the other odd things I've gotten with my BTC over the past 2 years... it was fun, but I think I'm done with it.

I'd also like to know who is buying IN at this point. Anyone on HN have some insight?

BlackDeath37• 13 years ago

I bought about a week ago. Of course, it was at $315 then, not ~$600. I'd like to buy more, but I'm not made of money.

davidw• 13 years ago

Greater fools: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greater_fool_theory

dan1234• 13 years ago

I bought 0.1BTC last Wednesday for £25.85. I thought I might have overpaid for it but, at the time of writing, it's now worth around £40.

cbr• 13 years ago

    I'd also like to know who is buying IN at this point.

People who think bitcoin has >2% chance of becoming a major world currency? http://www.jefftk.com/p/bitcoin-exchange-rate-as-a-predictio...

aboodman• 13 years ago

I read that as "sold my pet for bitcoin". that would have been funnier.

krelian• 13 years ago

I wonder who the buyers are?

Cryptolocker victims?

bdamm• 13 years ago

I've been wondering if a recent surge in cryptolocker efficacy has powered this storm of interest. But that would imply over a billion dollars has been sent to a single person or group. That just cannot last for very long. And surely people would have been making news reports about being forced to buy bitcoins to pay off cryptolocker.

hughlomas• 13 years ago

As far as I'm aware, CryptoLocker demands $300 or 2 bitcoins in the first 3 days. The average person isn't going to try to get bitcoins to pay, and right now no one would even want to, 2 bitcoins are far more expensive than the $300 option. Supposedly after the first three days your only option are bitcoins, but the price jumps to 10.

Symantec estimates that 3% of people that are infected choose to pay [0]. So what fraction of that pay in bitcoins?

[0] http://www.theguardian.com/money/2013/oct/19/cryptolocker-at...

mrb4• 13 years ago

The buyers are mostly China. 1 bitcoin is currently trading at $770 (¥4700) on https://btcchina.com

PS: you already made your investment back. Keep 0.5 BTC for the long term. Those who sold at the first bubble at $30 regret it. Those who sold at the second bubble at $270 regret it too. Those who sell during this third bubble at ~$700 will regret it too.

unclebucknasty2• 13 years ago

Those who sold at the first bubble at $30 regret it. Those who sold at the second bubble at $270 regret it too. Those who sell during this third bubble at ~$700 will regret it too.

Is that to say that its price is infinite? I mean, at some point, someone will not regret it right?

BTW, I am one who regrets selling at $297 just last week (even though I saw a 3x return), so I don't quibble with that. And, had I held on to it, I likely wouldn't sell now, given its trajectory. My idea was to take profits, let it plummet (as it has before), then get back in. Problem was, it just kept running after I sold it!

So, the challenge is we just don't know where it's going. To say someone who sells now will regret it is dicey at best. As much as I think I agree with you, it's anybody's guess.

thenmar• 13 years ago

Bitcoin will rise in value forever: proof by induction

deftnerd• 13 years ago

I bought 35 at about $100 each and sold 9 a few days ago when it was $450 so I got my initial investment back out plus a few bucks. From this point on, I'm just going to hold it to see what happens or use it for the occasional online service that accepts BTC and provides a discount for it.

Everyone keeps on talking about how it's impossible for a currency to keep rising like this and have it be useful for commerce, and to some extent I agree. I, however, have started to see the Bitcoin price as the cost of a share into a new world-wide equivalent of the Federal Reserve.

There will only ever be 21 million shares of ownership issued, and I purchased some just to see what happens. It's kind of exciting to me

mcdougle2• 13 years ago

I'm kind of in the same place. Bought 1 bitcoin for the novelty a while back, sold a chunk of it yesterday to get my money back, and now I'm waiting to see how high it'll go. If it breaks $1k I'll probably sell a bit more to get a profit and then hold on to a tiny fraction to wait and see if the bubble bursts.

That's kind of how BTC has been since I've been sort of paying attention to it -- it acts a lot like a stock.

simias2• 13 years ago

People who see the price rise and don't want to miss out I think. Most of that is just speculation, I speculate.

Now will it be sustainable and the price will keep increasing at a slower pace and make bitcoin a "solid" currency that people will want to use for other purposes than speculation or will it crash and burn like it already did in the past...

Investing in bitcoin right now is nothing more than gambling. You may win big but you may also lose everything. I don't like to play with money so I chose to remain a curious bystander.

emrikol• 13 years ago

I've splurged on tiny things and donations over the years with my old CPU-mined bitcoins. I'd completely forgotten about my wallet until things started getting crazy at $300 a week or so ago (was it that short?).

I was lucky enough to find 1.02BTC still sitting there, and now I can only hope that I can get Coinbase to verify my bank account before anything pops.

wuliwong2• 13 years ago

I too have the feeling that this is the peak but when I think about why, I don't have any reason other than this is the highest price to date. With a relatively small total valuation you're susceptible high volatility. Bitcoin has had lots of peaks and valleys but over its brief history. But, the peaks have always been higher than the valleys. Is there any reason to suspect this trend to stop? I think the underlying driving force for the overall increae in valuation is the adoption of bitcoin as currency. As far as I can tell, this is increasing pretty rapidly and will most likely continue increaseing.

jscheel• 13 years ago

I'm pretty sure I have a wallet that I dumped a couple of bucks into when bitcoin was first starting out. Problem is, I have no clue where it might be, or even what computer it might be on. Laaaame.

bru• 13 years ago

I did the same at the time. I know in which computer mine is. But I know I trashed that computer not long after...

Ascendency• 13 years ago

There should be a bitcoin recovery service, those coins could be worth serious amounts of money, now.

Andrenid• 13 years ago

Yeah I have 3 bitcoins that were given to me at the very start by a friend who was into it. I shrugged it off as something that'd never take off. Now I've been digging around through my box of old HDDs and USB sticks!

buro9• 13 years ago

Same here. The result of early mining, but now effectively lost as they're on none of the USB sticks I have and I suspect one of these Linux installers was the culprit.

sliverstorm2• 13 years ago

It will be interesting to see how these "lost" bitcoins are handled long-term when quoting things like market capitalization.

Perhaps we can start flagging wallets with no activity since [date when BTC value exploded] as "probably lost". A crude heuristic, to be sure, but perhaps useful.

lupinglade5• 13 years ago

Anyone want to sell me 1 BTC over PayPal? Its really hard for us Canadians to purchase bitcoin here :( The hoops are ridiculous.

aroch2• 13 years ago

The answer will always be "No!" because you can easily reverse a paypal transaction

lupinglade5• 13 years ago

I can prove my reputation no problem.

narcissus• 13 years ago

Where exactly in Canada are you? Also, have you tried cavirtex.com?

lupinglade5• 13 years ago

Ontario. I am currently trying to sign up with cavirtex, but its a slow process and they need a photo ID with an address, which I don't seem to have?? I've contacted them, but no reply so far.

jamie_ca• 13 years ago

+1 for cavirtex, I've only been cashing out, but trading is easy, and cash withdrawals via direct deposit to my bank account have Just Worked. I assume about the same going the other way.

lupinglade5• 13 years ago

So, I called Cavirtex, and they put you on hold saying there are 6 people in line then you just get a fixed voice mail anyway. Apparently there aren't any real phone reps at cavirtex. Disappointing.

BlackDeath37• 13 years ago

Check localbitcoins.com. And avoid mentioning Paypal.

wellboy• 13 years ago

You can buy via paypal from virwox.com to buy litecoins and immediately exchange them to bitcoins on the virwox. Then you can send them to a bitcoin address.

Just takes 3 mins :)

lupinglade5• 13 years ago

Thanks! Looking now

simias2• 13 years ago

This is not the place for this.

kelvie• 13 years ago

I think we have the easiest time possible with Cavirtex...

Also, there's a bitcoin ATM in Downtown Vancouver, if you are in the area.

MarkPNeyer• 13 years ago

send your email address to mneyer@gmail.com and i can hook you up

sliverstorm2• 13 years ago

Where has it been nearing $700? https://btc-e.com/ reports a high of $595

mrb4• 13 years ago

btcchina.com - high of $801 (¥4879)! See http://bitcoincharts.com/markets/

Also coinbase.com - high of $660 a few hours ago

pbhjpbhj2• 13 years ago

This kinda suggests there is a huge arbitrage potential, no?

andreipop• 13 years ago

Is anyone operating a reliable bitcoin options market?

simplemath• 13 years ago

bitfinex

BlackDeath37• 13 years ago

You can cancel on Coinbase? Why was I never able to find this option?

makomk• 13 years ago

It's not that they've run out of coins to sell, it's that by the time the transaction completes they'll potentially be selling the Bitcoins for far less than they're worth - it's an artifact of Coinbase's business model. (Part of the problem IIRC is that people can back out of transactions after Coinbase have quoted them a price, meaning they can make a profit from a rising market at Coinbase's expense.) Same happened last time a bubble blew up in the Bitcoin price.

altero• 13 years ago

Perhaps it is time to roll out alternative crypto-currency. Bitcoin has way too much attention and speculation.

d0ugie• 13 years ago

so.. you think much less liquidity and turnover in a currency will help solidify its value (and keep the bid/ask spread tight)?

DonGateley• 13 years ago

The 30 day delay in effect at the time I bought at $125 to test my first use of the system is the only reason I have three Bitcoin instead of 20. By the time I was approved for quicker purchase the booster rocket had kicked in and I simply couldn't believe the price increase to $200 could last. Ah, well. Story of my life.

doggy• 13 years ago

Based on the huge discrepancy between the supply of bitcoin (which is algorithmically regulated) and the demand (China, institutional investors, etc), some have predicted that the price of Bitcoin will increase to between $500,000 and $5,000,000 per unit within a three-year time frame. Whether this will happen or not, only time will tell. But what its telling us now is that Bitcoin has already increased 50x over the last 12 month.

As Bitcoin nears $700, Coinbase out of coins to sell

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