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Ask HN: What is "Wall Streeters" take on bitcoins

10 points by khoury ↗ HN
I guess I'm not the only one who became interested in bitcoins even though I never really had any interest in the stock market, gambling or anything else like that.

So for someone coming from the stock market, for example, how does speculating in bitcoins differ from say stocks? Day trading? The future of bitcoins? I'm just curious how this whole thing looks from their perspective.

I can imagine they see some familiar patters in both the behavior of new speculators and the value of the trading instrument it self. Just like an older programmer can se behavioral patters in new programmers in terms of how they think of code, why they go with a certain new cool framework, etc. Maybe it's just a strange comparison, I don't know.

Discuss.

8 comments

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genericacct
They laugh at it of course. What else can you do about a "currency" invented by an unknown entity, loved by videogamers and whose total circulation is below the GDP of mongolia?
ropman76
First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win
Hoozt
As if fiat currency were so much more stable; as if "modern" currencies such as the euro hasn't been a complete fiasco. I don't see your point here, although, it does actually answer the question in some way, at least if you are part of the group of people mentioned in the topic.
deeths
By the obvious definition of "Stable" of "Not subject to sudden or extreme change or fluctuation," I don't understand how you can compare the stability of Bitcoin as in the same league as traditional currencies.

BitCoin's 1000% rise in 3 months would seem to put it well outside the traditional conception of stable. Keep in mind, since the benefit of currency stability is to protect both buyers/borrowers and sellers/lenders, a rise is as damaging to stability as a fall (just impacting a different segment of the transaction).

While there are a few examples of fiat currency experiencing hyperinflation, it's almost always been the result of extreme political uncertainty. In a normally functioning political environment, the change in currency value may still be significant, but tends to be fairly stable (even if it changes, it changes within a predictable range).

That's clearly not the case with bitcoin.

soneca
Too much straw men on these answers. I have lot friends in finantial (though not exactly in Wall Street, as I am in Brazil, they tend to think the same way), and the opinions are divided between being a big thing, being a dangerous thing and being a thing to risky and unstable to actually become big someday. But none is "laughing at it" as a toy (anymore).
Avalaxy
Day trading isn't really possible with Bitcoin imho. Of course you can trade, but trying to apply traditional analysis methods is useless. There are 2 good reasons for this:

1) the volume is (still) very low, and a lot of wealth is in the hands of just a few people, meaning that they can single-handedly let the market crash.

2) most of the people who have bitcoins don't even have experience with trading, yet they're trying to trade. This results in a very, very unpredictable market because a lot of people will panic sell and take unlogical steps that a professional trader would never take. It also means that the price is mostly driven by hype, not by any fundament.

I think most traders will stay away from bitcoin untill it's a bit more stable. Personally I'm very bullish, and I'm in with 3.2 BTC, but just don't expect that your knowledge of trading is applicable to bitcoin trading, it's very different.

my_username_is_
I talked to my cousin, a hedge fund partner, about this over thanksgiving. He said that he thinks that it has a chance, and it's something that people and governments have been looking for. If governments just keep printing money with no limits and no end in sight, why should people continue to keep solid faith in those currencies?

He did say that most of his co-workers don't necessarily agree, but some are hedging their bets