Bitcoin

Bitcoin is the “Hoover” of Crypto-currencies. I remember being told to hoover up, even when we no longer owned a Hoover. “It’s a Moulinex Mum” was my standing reply. It made no difference. I doubt that those au-fait with Crypto-currencies would know what a Hoover is, they are too young. More likely their collective term for a vacuum cleaner is a Dyson. So let’s not beat ourselves up for referring to all crypto-currencies as Bitcoin. But they are not all the same. Bitcoin is just one of 1365 crypto-currencies.

Wanna buy a Bitcoin?

Lately it’s hard to go a day without someone mentioning Bitcoin. What is it? Why is it so valuable? Should I buy some? How do I buy some?

I’ve had a Coinbase account on my phone now for 9 months. I just couldn’t bring myself to buy something I didn’t understand. Would I have lost money if I had bought? Hell no! I would have made £1000’s even after it almost halved in value over the last week or two.

Certainly in America, Bitcoin and the crypto-currency craze has truly reached the mainstream and the implication of that is as of yet unknown. What we do know is that it’s attracting every shady criminal and scam artist in the world. And why not? There really is tons of money to be made. I hope the following sheds some light on what Bitcoin is and isn’t.

Blockchain

Let’s start our discussion with the technology which made Bitcoin possible called “blockchain”. In very simple terms the blockchain technology is a record of all transactions ever done in Bitcoin. Imagine a gigantic piece of paper that lists every transaction ever completed. Then imagine that there are thousands of copies of this paper, and all of them are automatically updated when any two people agree to exchange Bitcoins. Every time a transaction takes place all these copies are checked for consistency to make sure you actually have the Bitcoins you claim to have. If everything checks out the new transaction is added to all the pieces of paper at once.

This is the heart of the truly genius idea that is blockchain, and it is what makes it possible to have certainty over a Bitcoin balance someone owns, without needing any central party (like a bank) to verify it. If all the pieces of paper agree then the balance is correct, and trying to doctor or fake all the pieces of paper at once is impossible. The best (and worst) thing about this technology is that it has been made available for absolutely FREE to anyone who wants to use it.

Bitcoin is simply the oldest known use of the blockchain technology. Someone, a long time ago (in technology terms), decided to create a coin called a “Bitcoin” using blockchain and started trading it with other people. This was quickly picked up by all types of criminal and illegal activity providers as a way to exchange money without having to go through a bank. Fast forward a few years and everyone and their mother wants to own one because they saw it on TV.

Crypto-currencies or e-coins

The best (and worst) thing about blockchain technology is that its FREE, which means anyone can create a coin out of thin air, name it whatever they like, and start using it to trade with other people. It quite literally takes less than 24hrs to do so for someone with mediocre tech skills. The only difficult part is convincing fools, sorry, I mean investors, that the coin you created is worth something. This simple fact has led thousands of scam artists throughout the world to create their own coins and sell them to unsuspecting retirees and “I wanna get rich quick” targets.

You may have heard there is a limit to the number of Bitcoins that can be created and therefore the supply is limited, which in turn is used as a justification for its price. For a number of technical reasons this is true, however, there is absolutely no limit to the number of crypto-currencies that can be created. Have you heard of Bitcoin Cash? How about Bitcoin Gold? Bitcoin Silver? Ethereum? Litecoin? There is an even a Dogecoin, as in Doge-coin. Yes I am NOT kidding, Google it. It was created as a joke and it now has a 700 million dollar market cap. Yup, they all exist, 1,365 different coins as of last count, and thousands more will be created as long as people are willing to throw real money at them. So much for the “you can’t make more of it!” argument.

Intrinsic Value vs. Market Value

How is it possible that something so easily created and with nothing to it other than a name and a story can be worth so much money? It all comes down to the difference between intrinsic and market value.

Market value is simply determined by the difference between supply and demand. If the demand exceeds supply at any point in time then the price will go up and vice versa.

Let’s look at a ticket for the F.A. Cup Final. It’s created with a face value equivalent to hiring a seat that faces a football pitch for a duration of 90 mins. When the tickets sell out – because demand is greater than supply – the price of a ticket can go up if someone wants to swap their 90 minute experience for cash. Tickets priced at £10’s can change hands for £1,000’s prior to the game. However it doesn’t matter how much it cost, 5 minutes after the game has ended the ticket is worthless. Instead of being able to sell it to the highest bidder from hundreds of fans, you couldn’t give it away. Nobody will pay anything to stare at grass growing for 90 minutes. It’s market value was temporarily £1,000’s, it’s intrinsic value is that of a small piece of paper. Precisely £0.

Petrol has intrinsic value because you can burn it to move your car. In turn your car has intrinsic value because it can move you from place to place. Your shares have intrinsic value because they are expected to eventually pay you dividends. Your home has intrinsic value because you can sleep in it and it can keep you warm and dry. Your £10 note has intrinsic value because the UK government guarantees you can pay taxes with it and buy local government services with them.

The intrinsic value of anything is simply the tangible value it provides and may or may not equal the market value at any one time. A good way to think about intrinsic value is as a floor to the value of any object. If the market value falls below that floor, enough people will simply choose to use the object rather than sell it, since they get more value out of keeping it. This in turns reduces supply and increases price back up to intrinsic value.

If there is a sudden interest in a product, market value often goes far above the intrinsic value, and then settles back down once the hype dies down. Thus financial bubbles of all kinds are born.

In some cases calculating intrinsic value is fairly easy (bonds, loans, mortgages, investment real estate) and in other cases it’s much harder (new technologies, your own home, time spent with family).

The good news is that calculating the intrinsic value of Bitcoin is extremely easy!

Let me get my calculator out…. Drum roll please…… It’s exactly….. £0!

It’s essentially the same thing as printing your own fraud-proof monopoly money. Should people stop wanting to buy your monopoly money, the only intrinsic value it will have is a certain bathroom function, which is still more than you can do with an e-coin.

Coins vs tech

Normally investors disagree on the intrinsic value of something and bring up arguments such as the future potential of a technology to justify various valuations. However, remember, Bitcoin is NOT a technology, it is an electronic piece of paper with transactions listed on it. Just a bunch of 1’s and 0’s in a bunch of computers backed by absolutely nothing. Block-chain itself is a very valuable technology freely available to anyone, however, you are NOT buying blockchain when you buy Bitcoin, you own none of the tech behind it.

To illustrate imagine that someone had found a cure for cancer and posted the step-by-step instructions on how to make it on-line, freely available for anyone to use. Now imagine that the same person also created a product called Cancer-Pill using their own instructions, trade marked it, and started selling it to the highest bidders. I think we can all agree a cure for cancer is immensely valuable to society (blockchain may or may not be, we still have to see), however, how much is a Cancer-Pill worth?

Initially, with no one else making cancer curing pills, and people hearing about the trade-marked name, it’s very likely the profits would be quite large and the price of the pill ridiculously high. However, as the money flows in, another person would without a doubt create a pill using the same freely available instructions and call it Cancer-Away. Cancer-away may not initially be as recognisable as Cancer-pill, so it might fetch a smaller price, but eventually both prices would converge as they are essentially the same thing. Over time, with more and more cancer curing pills with different names arriving on the market, the price of all of them would converge to something very close to the cost of production (ie. materials + time to make it). I think we can all agree this is a good thing, as it means the maximum number of people will be able to cure their cancer at the lowest possible price.

How does this apply to Bitcoin? Well, Bitcoin is simply the initial Cancer-Pill, but as mentioned above there are now 1,365 different “pills” in production and counting. While creating a cancer pill, even with step-by-step instructions, would require some materials, equipment and incur some costs, the production of a random generic e-coin costs pretty damn close to £0. All you need is a website and some hype.

The bottom line is that while a cancer pill is very valuable, it would not be a good investment to buy up the pills for far above the cost of making them, if the formula for making them is freely available to anyone. Similarly buying Bitcoin, or any other e-coin, is a bad investment even if you truly believe block-chain technology will change the world.

No, not at all, the technology used in creating Bitcoin is great. However, at this time, I’m not aware of anyone offering a good practical use for it. The problem with the current crop of e-coins and blockchain applications is easy to illustrate.

Imagine for a second a world where only Bitcoin exists and you are going to buy some milk. What would be the price printed on that milk carton?

1 BTC? Or 1.5 BTC Or 2 BTC?

Aside from the fact that, at current prices, this would be some seriously expensive milk, the answer is that no price could be printed. That’s because if a price was printed, a poor grocery employee would have to sit there with an eraser and pencil, and every minute or so change the price. And then by the time you got to the cash register, the price would have changed again.

The point is that a real currencies primary “intrinsic” value is as a medium of exchange or a measuring stick for value. If a centimetre on a tape measure was constantly changing in physical size, it would not be particularly useful to ask for a 6 centimetre nail. It might end up being the size of a lamppost .

The thing that makes crypto-currencies such a speculative craze right now, their stratospheric increases in value, is also the reason the current crop will likely fail in their intended use as currencies. However, out of the ashes of that, it’s likely that a new use of blockchain will emerge. The decentralised fraud-proof ledger might be used to keep track of balances in another exotic currency called the US dollar or the Euro.

Genuine Investment Opportunity

I have for sale;
2 Tickets for the 2017 F.A. Cup Final – great seats
A June ski lift pass for The Portes du Soliel – Including Avoriaz
An opened bottle of Chateau Petrus 1982 750ml
One red sock.
A 1970’s space hopper – only a 3” slash.

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