rising bitcoin symbol. As prices slowly start to rise, is another “moonshot” in the works? or… [+] bitcoin already peaked?
On November 7, 2021, bitcoin hit a record high of $68,789. It settled that day at around $65,500. bitcoin investors were convinced that the moonshot was in effect and that $80,000 was just around the corner. after that, $100,000. Was that the price of the moon landing? there is one? Or, has bitcoin already had its moon landing?
Reading: Already its bitcoin
When central banks start implementing their prized central bank programmable digital currencies, things like the fedcoin will put an end to all this “bitcoin moon” talk. Ray Dalio said he wouldn’t be surprised if they banned it.
dalio said this in 2021:
bridgewater associates founder and billionaire ray dalio believes the federal reserve is likely to one day… [+] ban bitcoin, limiting its price and, of course, its use case. (photo by kimberly white/getty images for techcrunch)
“In the 1930s, in the war years, the short-term interest rate was 1% and the yield on bonds was 2.5%. therefore, it was profitable to buy those bonds, finance them with 1%, and then get 2.5%. that could put a lid on it. but because those two assets, cash and bonds, were such bad investments relative to other things, there was still a movement toward those other things, and then the government banned them, meaning things like gold. They banned gold. that’s why also banning bitcoin is a good chance.”
dalio may be wrong. I think he is right. if so, the moon landing has already occurred.
justin sun, permanent representative of grenada to the world trade organization and founder of tron public blockchain, an autonomous decentralized organization, believes that bitcoin will surpass its record reached in November.
“I think bitcoin 100k is just a matter of time,” he says. “Maybe it’s impossible to put a timeline on it, but I honestly think this is something we’ll see in the next few years, if not the next few months. there are so many great players in the game now. there are countries that are creating regulation around the adoption of bitcoin”, he says, without mentioning the two best known: el salvador and, more recently, russia. although it seems that the central bank of russia is asking sberbank to make its own digital currency, called sbercoin.
“Just a few years ago, it would have been unheard of to have a company, let alone a country, jump into the cryptocurrency space,” says sun. “Now it’s just a question of who’s next? I think this is the path to $100,000.”
bitcoin moon: the relaunch
led by russia, emerging market central banks are learning a very important lesson in real time. Its dollar reserves are not safe from a vindictive and angry Washington (or Brussels, in the case of the euro).
“the west can freeze their nation’s money at any time,” says lunafi founder and CEO george porchester. “If you are the People’s Bank of China and you have about a trillion dollars in reserves and you just saw what happened to Russia, what are you going to do? It’s going to shift reserves into truly sovereign assets, which at the moment are just gold and cryptocurrencies, of which bitcoin remains the most liquid option,” Porchester says. “For the next decade, any central bank that wants sovereign currency reserves that can’t be attacked will consider bitcoin.”
but can’t be attacked? seriously?
remember that coinbase managed to seize some 25,000 Russian accounts, banning those customers from accessing their funds.
canadian prime minister justin trudeau in berlin on march 9, 2022. he was criticized by some … [+] european parliamentarians for suppressing political speech. he also banned bitcoin transactions. (odd andersen/pool via ap)
justin trudeau, who had just returned from being criticized by the european parliament for his dictatorial chinese-style actions against peaceful protesters, blocked the bitcoin addresses of some activist trucker accounts.
the long arm of us law is also targeting el salvador’s bitcoin now. they used to be a dollar country. But in February, three senators, led by Senators Jim Risch (R-Idaho) and Bob Menendez (D-N.J.), introduced a bill called the El Salvador Cryptocurrency Accountability Act. bitcoin is under pressure like never before, and it is being led by powerful governments and their fedcoin dreams. that, I think, is putting a lot of heavy hurdles on the bitcoin launchpad.
“by recognizing bitcoin as official currency, el salvador opens the door to money laundering cartels and undermines the u.s. interests,” says senate foreign relations committee chairman bill cassidy (r-la.), “if the united states wants to combat money laundering and preserve the dollar’s role as the world’s reserve currency, we must address this problem head on. ”
In this case, washington is messing with a sovereign economy’s choice to use bitcoin instead of dollars. El Salvador hasn’t had its own currency since 2001. And since adopting Bitcoin as legal tender last year, it has become the subject of a bill in the Senate.
The bill will likely never come to a vote on the floor. but it is a testament to how washington thinks about bitcoin. if it can curb demand, it will.
“The problem with centralized systems is that they create a psychological distance between those who have authority and those who don’t,” says temujin louie, director of marketing for public blockchain protocol wanchain in singapore. “These decision makers take actions that ignore the needs of the masses. this is also true for centralized finance. decentralized finance, and this is generalizable to all decentralized systems, better guarantees the rights of the masses.”
This is nothing new.
Western governments have had bitcoin in their sights for a couple of years now. we are only now beginning to see governments taking legitimate action.
christine lagarde, president of the european central bank, has called bitcoin a threat. (photo by… [+] thomas lohnes/getty images)
bitcoin has been described as a “threat” by christine lagarde, president of the european central bank.
“lagarde warned about russian oligarchs using crypto to avoid sanctions, however there is little evidence to support this,” says jacob kowalewski, chief strategy officer at london-based t3rn, who describes himself as a smart contract hosting platform. “People need to be careful and balanced about what they pay attention to about bitcoin, be it good or bad. There’s been a lot of incredibly positive news lately, like the eu parliament committee rejecting an outright ban on the proof-of-work consensus system used by bitcoin. this shows that the same entities that demonize cryptocurrencies clearly see the utility of bitcoin.”
in canada, savvy crypto users figured out ways to circumvent trudeau’s bitcoin ban.
despite the war in ukraine, bitcoin is climbing again after falling off a small cliff in early march.
Bitcoin values doubled between 2014 and 2016, going from around $400 in September 2014 to $800 on December 25, 2016. It rose exponentially in 2017, its first serious moonshot. maybe it was the preparation for the “big one”.
In late 2017, bitcoin peaked at around $20,000, before crashing without any government pressure or an economic downturn, back to around $3,500.
For those who love the bitcoin moon analogy and all its hope and promise, the world’s largest cryptocurrency took off in March 2020 and gave them a reason to feel validated. his graph looked like a real rocket launch.
more adoption of bitcoin in emerging markets
Bitcoin is primarily a technology-driven, private way of transferring value between two people. no government owns bitcoin. at best, they can freeze wallets, which people can open on other platforms, or switch to other cryptocurrencies that are not on the government’s radar.
See also: What is Causing the Bitcoin Boom?
bitcoin? why not? the president of argentina, alberto fernandez, is open to the use of bitcoin. … [+] the IMF warned in March. (Photo by Tomas Cuesta/Getty Images)
“If people rely on bitcoin technology to transfer $100,000 from one bitcoin to another person, then it is not incomprehensible that bitcoin could be worth $100,000,” thinks mikhail karkhalev, an analyst at cryptocurrency exchange currency.com. “The number of coins in circulation is getting smaller and smaller every month and the number of long-term holders is bigger and bigger. the old rule of the market is that the scarcity of a commodity leads to an increase in its value. the demand for bitcoin is very high, and the current mood could turn positive as soon as the economic and political situation stabilizes. it’s just a matter of time.”
james taylor, chief commercial officer of unizen, a london-based digital asset exchange, says countries with struggling economies and volatile stock markets, whether due to wars, disrupted supply chains or inflation, will turn to people in bitcoin.
“We already see this in eastern europe and it will spark a movement in latin america and all the other countries that are struggling because of the dollar-denominated financial system,” says taylor.
Argentina is increasingly interested. and that is why the international monetary fund is warning them against it. Argentina is the largest loan from the IMF, followed by war-torn Ukraine.
acceptance among distressed states like that supports a second moon launch.
“I think markets will remain range bound this year for now,” Taylor predicts. “But there will be great advances in Latin American and Caribbean adoption. these countries will reduce regulatory hurdles for crypto firms on board, which will be the main reason for the next bull market.”
as they used to say on merritt island, florida, in the days of the space shuttle:
“attention everyone (bitcoin investors), this is the entity that performs the launch status verification. check that you are ready to resume the count and go to the pitch. otc?”
“Orbiter test driver ready.”
“to be confirmed?”
“the tanker reinforcement is ready”.
“ptc?”
“payload test is ready”.
“lps?”
“launch processing system is ready”.
“houston flight director…?”
“wait”.
See also: Does ARKK hold DocuSign? [Solved]
