CryptoURANUS Economics

Saturday, August 4, 2018

Bubble: Defined in CryptoCurrency

A bubble is a large increase in prices for the whole economy or a part of the economy, followed by a massive, rapid drop.

It’s important to notice that a bubble is only a bubble if it applies to an entire economy or part of the economy. If the massive price swings are just between you and your circle of friends, it’s probably not a bubble.

Famous historical examples of bubbles are the Dutch Tulip bubble of the 1630s, the Dot-Com bubble of the 1990s, the housing bubble of the early 2000s and some like to say the Bitcoin bubble of 2017.

Let’s first look at the definition of “natural price”.

Natural price is an amount of money being charged, set by the cost of producing a product. For example, if it costs $3.00 to produce 12 duck eggs, than the natural price is $3.00.

If demand goes up from unreasonable, unnatural causes, then prices will shoot up.

Here’s a ridiculous example of a bubble with duck eggs:

Let’s imagine that Joe buys 12 duck eggs every week from a duck farmer for $5. Under normal circumstances, the price will probably stay fixed at $5. But then let’s say the Kardashians tell the world they love duck eggs and themselves eat 3 every single day!

Suddenly millions of people also want duck eggs and the duck farmer is overwhelmed with of customers asking for his eggs. When Joe asks the farmer for his usual 12 eggs for $5, Bill who watched the Kardashians offers more money for those same eggs.

Joe offers $10 for 12 eggs.
Alice hears Bill’s offer and wants the eggs even more and offers $20.
Susy hears Alice’s offer and offers a massive $50. In minutes, those $5 eggs are worth 10X at $50!

Several weeks later, the Kardashians and their friends don’t care about duck eggs. Silly Susy may have stocked up on hundreds of eggs, but now the Kardashians don’t care and neither does she. Susy begins to sell her duck eggs and the price of duck eggs drops rapidly.

Now Joe can continue buying his duck eggs for $5. The bubble has popped.

Prices only go up for two reasons:

An increase in demand as we’ve seen above ora decrease in supply.

If the farmer’s ducks always make 24 eggs each week but this week they only make 12, the farmer could charge Joe more than $5 simply because they both want those 12 eggs.

By definition, a bubble must burst, if it doesn’t, then it wasn’t a bubble to begin with.

Friday, August 3, 2018

Blockchain: Defined in CryptoCurrency

Blockchain

Blockchain can take many forms, but at its core it is a distributed database, shared across millions of users, in-line with the workings of peer-to-peer networks. Similarly to cloud services such as Google Documents, it is “out there”, but instead of being stored on some central servers, the whole network serves as a server. Everyone on the network can view the data stored on the blockchain and add their own. The blockchain network is designed to continuously synchronize the data, making sure that every user has access to the same information. Once data are added they cannot be retroactively manipulated.

Blockchain is defined as computer technology, used to prove that a group of people came to an agreement about something. Blockchain recordings are permanent and very secure, preventing manipulation. The first example of blockchain technology are the recordings of bitcoin transactions.

Why is it called blockchain?

The ledger, or database, consists of blocks of data. The blocks are being added to the blockchain at regular intervals after being verified by users using cryptographic calculations. These blocks are timestamped and chained one after another, creating a never-ending chain of blocks - the blockchain.

Why is blockchain revolutionary?

There are five main features that make blockchain the next big thing in tech, and why it will be used in a growing number of applications.

Safety and Security

The information on the blockchain is stored everywhere across the whole network and does not have a single point of entry. There’s no central server that can be hacked or destroyed.

Stability and Robustness

The blockchain network can consist of millions of computers, the so-called nodes, and so there’s never any server downtime. The data is available 24/7, all the time, which makes it ideal for financial markets, where a minute of downtime can cause losses of up to hundreds of thousands.

Decentralized and Transparent

Blockchain cannot be controlled by any single entity. There is no central authority that can change the rules of the blockchain. How the blockchain behaves is a public knowledge and any changes need to be accepted by the majority of the blockchain users.

Incorruptible

The validity of the blockchain is verified at regular intervals, so it lives in a state of constant consensus. Once added to the blockchain, a block cannot be retroactively modified without having to alter all subsequent blocks. So altering any unit of information (a block) would require having a 51% network power. While it is possible in theory, it is unlikely to happen in reality. Furthermore, such attack would be immediately recognized by the rest of the network and corrective steps could be employed.

Who created blockchain?

Blockchain relies heavily on cryptography. The theoretical groundwork for its existence was laid in 1991 by Bayer, Haber and Stornetta. Then, in 2009 Satoshi Nakamoto used the theory and turned it into reality with Bitcoin, the first decentralized digital currency. Early-adopted by thousands of internet and technology devotees, the Bitcoin blockchain soon got enough users to provide the necessary security and robustness, and so eight years later the value of a non-existent virtual coin could reach a value of 7160 USD in November 2017.

What are the possible uses of blockchain?

Blockchain can be publicly accessible or closed. Public blockchains are ideal candidates for digital voting and copyright protection, land registry and others. Any database from unalterable birth citizenship certificates and digital identity storage could be ported to blockchain. Using blockchain for money transactions alone, the original use of blockchain, could save investments banks up to $12 billion a year.

But blockchain use doesn’t stop with databases. Further and wider use of the blockchain technology is expected. Cryptocurrencies younger than Bitcoin, such as Ethereum, have started using the blockchain to automatically execute smart contracts, pay for invoices, etc. The advanced use of the blockchain technology is sometimes called Blockchain 2.0 and it can involve distributed file storage, prediction markets, truly connected Internet-of-Things, decentralized businesses and e-government, and further improvements to sharing economies and services such as Uber or Airbnb.

Blockchain future

Intel, Microsoft, JP Morgan and others, all these companies are investing heavily in the technology. Bank of England considers blockchain genius. There is no doubt that blockchain will reshape the way the world of finances, the internet and information technology work today. First movers are already researching and developing their applications of the technology and digital currencies that utilize the blockchain in new ways such as Ethereum or IOTA are on the rise and publicly available for use.

Blockchain About History and Use:

Blockchain relies heavily on cryptography and the theoretical groundwork for its existence was laid in 1991 by Bayer, Haber and Stornetta, before Satoshi turned it into reality in 2009.

Blockchain consists of timestamped blocks that include the transaction data and a hash (encrypted) pointer that links them to the previous block.

Once added to the blockchain, a block cannot be retroactively modified without having to alter all subsequent blocks - which would require to beat the majority of the Bitcoin’s peer-to-peer network power, which already in 2013 had a combined might of 500 supercomputers.

Besides its use in Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, the blockchain is a revolutionary piece of technology that could be used to record any important events, data, documents or transactions.

Major banks and financial institutions are already experimenting with the blockchain technology. Many experts consider it the biggest invention since the Internet.

Cryptocurrencies younger than Bitcoin, such as Ethereum, have started using the blockchain to automatically execute smart contracts, pay for invoices, etc. The advanced use of the blockchain technology is sometimes called Blockchain 2.0.

Since the blockchain is spread across the whole network and not centrally stored in one place it cannot be attacked, altered or deleted; it is an ideal database for digital voting, copyright protection, digital identity storage, birth, citizenship and ownership certificates and more.

Further and wider use of the blockchain technology is expected.

Bitcoin-[BTC]

Bitcoin [BTC]:
Bitcoin (BTC) is the first decentralized digital currency, or cryptocurrency. The Bitcoin network is peer-to-peer and transactions take place directly between users, without an intermediary. Transactions are verified by a network of nodes and included in a public ledger, called a blockchain, through a process called mining. Bitcoin was invented by an unknown person or group of people under the name Satoshi Nakamoto, and released as open-source software in 2009.

About Bitcoin:

Bitcoin is defined as a digital cash that started the cryptocurrency movement.

It was created in 2009 by an unknown person or group who went by the name, Satoshi Nakamoto.

Bitcoin does not rely on government/bank created money.

Bitcoin uses peer-to-peer technology to operate with no central authority or banks.

The managing transactions and the issuing of bitcoins is carried out collectively by the network.

Bitcoin is the first decentralized cryptocurrency.

The Cryptocurrency Bitcoin reputation has spawned copies and evolution into a new space of AltCoins.

Bitcoin is thelargest variety of markets and the biggest value.

Bitcoin having reached a peak of 18 billion USD - Bitcoin is here to stay.

With Bitcoin there can be improvements or flaws in the initial model however the community and a team of dedicated developers are pushing to overcome any obstacle they come across.

The Bitcoin is also the most traded cryptocurrency and one of the main entry points for all the other cryptocurrencies.

The price is not organic, is unstable, and Bitcoin have bull/bear up and down by 10%-20% in a single day.

Bitcoin is an SHA-256 POW coin with 21,000,000 total minable coins.

The block echange time is 10 minutes.

History of bitcoin

Source: From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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Number of bitcoin transactions per month (logarithmic scale)

Bitcoin is a cryptocurrency, a digital asset designed to work as a medium of exchange that uses cryptography to control its creation and management, rather than relying on central authorities.^[1] The presumed pseudonymous Satoshi Nakamoto integrated many existing ideas from the cypherpunk community when creating bitcoin. Over the course of bitcoin's history, it has undergone rapid growth to become a significant currency both on and offline – from the mid 2010s, some businesses began accepting bitcoin in addition to traditional currencies.^[2]

Introduction:

Bitcoin was launched in January 2009 by a programmer or a group of programmers going by the name Satoshi Nakamoto.

It started simply as a decentralized electronic cash.

Decentralization was an important aspect, because all previous attempts to establish a digital cash with a central authority had failed.

The sole motivation for Bitcoin’s:

Bitcoin's creation seems to be the desire for a better payment system for eCommerce.

A system that’s more secure, faster and reliable compared to the system of deposit and credit cards over-viewed by a central authority.

Plus the transaction costs are incomparably smaller and stay the same regardless of the amount sent or received.

Bitcoin can be sent and received anywhere in the world, right away.

The big advantage of Bitcoin, as a currency, is its absolute independence of governments, banks and any central authorities.

In addition:

Transactions occur directly between pseudonymous people (their real names are not known), meaning there are no banks or middlemen.

Each transaction is recorded on a digital record kept by many people across the world known as the “blockchain”.

The data on the blockchain is publicly available and stored on many computers.

Because there are so many copies being simultaneously maintained, the transaction and banking data is very safe and virtually impossible to manipulate.

Individuals protect their bitcoins using their digital wallet.

A wallet is software that can only be accessed by using a key, which is a long string of letters and numbers.

Bitcoin’s price has risen into the thousands of dollars, but you can still own bitcoin by purchasing a fraction of it for dollars.

Because of bitcoin’s popularity, it has become an anchor in the cryptocurrency market. T

hat means, as the price of bitcoin goes up and down, the prices of other cryptocurrencies move too.

Ref: Bitcoin Wiki

[BGP] Byzantine Generals Problem: Defined in CryptoCurrency

Byzantine Generals’ Problem is defined as a situation where spread out units need to coordinate their behavior or action but cannot trust each other to get organized.

Byzantine describes the Byzantine Empire, this was the eastern part of Europe controlled by the Roman Empire from approximately 330 AD to 1453 AD.

Byzantine Generals’ Problem is a made up, historical situation where multiple generals and their individual armies have surrounded a city to attack it. The majority of the generals must somehow coordinate a decision to either attack or retreat at the same time, otherwise the situation will end in a major failure.

The main problem preventing coordinated action is low trust. Reasons for low trust may include:

The generals are far enough apart that they cannot communicate directly or even see each other, so they must trust their messengers to deliver messages.

One or more generals may be a traitor and could send false messages to the other generals.

One or more messengers may be a traitor and could send false messages to the other generals.

The enemy city may catch a messenger and send false messages.

This Byzantine Generals Problem is commonly brought up when talking about cryptocurrencies.

The digital record, known as the blockchain, must verify and record identical information simultaneously across many thousands of computers and none of the computers can be trusted as a reliable source.

Bitcoin provided a unique solution to this problem known as mining:

All computers verify the maximum number of transactions that can be stored at one time.

The computers then compete to solve a very complicated math problem. Their motivation is a reward in bitcoin.

The first computer to solve the problem would not only be rewarded, they would also record the transactions into the blockchain. Included in this recording is proof that they solved the math problem.

Now the winning computer sends out their updated blockchain to the other computers.

The other computers quickly and easily verify that the math problem was solved and also verify/update their recordings.

The process repeats and all computers are again trying to solve the math problem.

Thursday, August 2, 2018

Bag Holder: Defined in CryptoCurrency

Bag Holder

What Is a Bag Holder?
A bag holder is an informal term used to describe an investor who holds a position in a security that decreases in value until it descends into worthlessness. In most cases, the bag holder stubbornly retains their holdings for an extended period, during which time, the value of the investment goes to zero.

Bag Holder Example(s):
A bag holder refers to an investor who symbolically holds a “bag of stock” that has become worthless over time. Suppose an investor purchases 100 shares of a newly public technology start-up. Although the share price preliminarily rises during the initial public offering (IPO), it quickly starts dropping, after analysts begin questioning the veracity of the business model. Subsequent poor earnings reports signal that the company is struggling, and the stock price consequently plummets further. An investor who holds onto the stock, despite this ominous sequence of events, is a bag holder.

Suppose an investor purchases 100 shares of a newly public technology start-up. Although the share price preliminarily rises during the initial public offering, it quickly starts dropping, after analysts begin questioning the veracity of the business model. Subsequent poor earnings reports signal that the company is struggling, and the stock price consequently plummets further. An investor who is determined to hang onto the stock, despite this tumultuous sequence of events, is a bag holder.

The History of Bag Holders:
According to the website Urban Dictionary, the term “bag holder” hails from the Great Depression, where people on soup lines held potato bags filled with their only possessions. But the term has since emerged as part of modern-day investment lexicon. A blogger who writes on the subject of penny stock investing once quipped about starting a support group called “Bag Holders Anonymous.”

Disposition Effect:
There are several reasons an investor might hold on to under-performing securities.

1.) neglecting one's portfolio, and only be unaware of a stock’s declining value, and an investor will hold onto his position, because selling it means acknowledging a poor investment decision in the first place.

2.) There is a phenomenon known as "the disposition effect", where investors tend to prematurely sell shares of a security whose price increases, while stubbornly retaining investments that drop in value.

This translates into an investors psychologically hate losing more than they enjoy winning, so they consequently cling to the hope that their losing positions will bounce back.

A phenomenon known as "the prospect theory", where individuals make decisions based on perceived gains, rather than perceived losses. This theory is by the example where investor receives $50, rather expected $100 and lost half the amount in negative returns.

Sunk Cost Fallacy:
The sunk cost fallacy is an where investor may become a bag holder.

Sunk costs are unrecoverable expenses that have already occurred.

Suppose an investor purchased 100 shares of stock at $10 per share, in a transaction valued at $1,000.

Now, If the stock falls to $3 per share, the market value of the holding is now just $300. Therefore the $700 loss is considered a sunk cost.

Investors may wait until the stock slingshots back up to $1,000, to recoup their investment, but the losses have already become a sunk cost and should be considered permanent.

In this think-tank perspective, any investors holding onto a stock long enough to drop in value is known-as an unrealized loss, which is not reflected in their actual accounting until the sale is complete; [the begining].

Atomic Swap: Defined in Cryptocurrency

DEFINITION of Atomic Swaps:

Atomic swap is a smart contract technology that enables exchange of one cryptocurrency for another without using centralized intermediaries, such as exchanges.

Atomic swaps can take place directly between blockchains of different cryptocurrencies or they can be conducted off-chain, away from the main blockchain. They first came into prominence in September 2017, when an atomic swap between Decred and Litecoin was conducted.

Since then, other startups and decentralized exchanges have allowed users the same facility. For example, Lightning Labs, a startup that uses bitcoin’s lightning network for transactions, has conducted off-chain swaps using the technology.

Cryptocurrencies and decentralized exchanges, such as 0x and Altcoin.io, have also incorporated the technology.

BREAKING DOWN Atomic Swaps:

As it occurs today, the process for exchanging cryptocurrencies is time-consuming and complex. This is due to several reasons. For example, the fragmented nature of today’s cryptocurrency ecosystem presents several challenges to average traders.

Not all cryptocurrency exchanges support all coins. As such, a trader wishing to exchange her coin for another one that is not supported on the current exchange may need to migrate accounts or make several conversions between intermediate coins to accomplish her goal. There is also an associated counterparty risk, if the trader wishes to exchange her coins with another trader.

Atomic swaps solve this problem through the use of Hash Time-lock Contracts (HTLC). As its name denotes, HTLC is a time-bound smart contract between parties that involves the generation of a cryptographic hash function, which can be verified between them. (See also: Understanding Smart Contracts.)

Simply, atomic swaps require both parties to acknowledge receipt of funds within a specified timeframe using a cryptographic hash function. If one of the involved parties fails to confirm the transaction within the timeframe, then the entire transaction is voided and funds are not exchanged. The latter action helps remove counterparty risk.

An example of an atomic swap transaction is shown below:

Suppose Alice is a trader interested in converting 101 bitcoins to an equivalent litecoins with Bob. She submits her transaction to bitcoin’s blockchain. During this process, Alice generates a number for a cryptographic hash function to encrypt the transaction. Bob repeats the same process at his end by similarly submitting his transaction to litecoin’s blockchain.

Both Alice and Bob unlock their respective funds using their respective numbers. They have to do this within a specified timeframe or else the transfer will not take place. Atomic swaps can also be used in conjunction with a lightning network to conduct off-chain exchanges. (See also: Bitcoin's Lightning Network: Three Possible Problems.)

ATH: Defined in CryptoCurrency

ATH: Defined in CryptoCurrency

What is Record High:
ATH: Defined in CryptoCurrency as the term “All-Time-High” relates to the highest price that an asset has achieved on an exchange, for the current trading pair that is being referenced.

For example, if a share of stock in XZY Corp comes to IPO at a price of $5 per share, then trades as high as $20 per share, before falling to $10 in a certain period of time, we could say that the “All-Time High” for the XZY Corp share price was $20.

In the bull-run of late 2017, many cryptocurrencies set new All-Time High records, with Bitcoin setting a new ATH in mid-December.

Each cryptocurrency exchange has a different ATH value for Bitcoin. In some markets, each coin was being traded above the mark of $20,000, but many consider that Bitcoin’s ATH was approximately $19,665.

The ATH value represents the theoretical maximum price that one could have sold the particular asset for, and also represents the maximum price that another trader was willing to pay for that asset, during that period.

However, given the fractional nature of most digital assets, it is possible that the ATH was derived through the trade of a fraction of an asset, rather than a full coin or token.

For example, during the height of a bull-run, a trader may make a purchase of 0.1BTC for $5,000 just before a big drop.

Proportionally speaking, this would give Bitcoin a new ATH at the price of $50,000 per unit of BTC, although only 0.1 BTC ever traded at that price.

The concept of All-Time High may also be applied to the values of market capitalization (market cap).

In early January 2018 - a couple of weeks after Bitcoin’s ATH - the market cap of the entire cryptocurrency market reached an ATH of about $661.2 billion.

The opposite of ATH is the “All Time Low” (ATL) which is used to refer to the lowest price point an asset has traded at, typically only recorded after an asset is listed and begins trading on an exchange.

Another similar perspective:

A record high is the highest historical price level reached by a security, commodity or index during trading.

The record high is measured from when the instrument first starts trading and updates whenever the last record high is exceeded.

The values for record highs are usually nominal, which means they do not account for inflation.

BREAKING DOWN Record High:

All-time record highs typically represent significant price news for companies and markets.

Investors may be enticed to purchase stock, believing this company will continue to perform well in the future.

Companies that constantly reach record highs quickly catch the eyes of prospective investors, while those who repeatedly hit record lows tend to scare off buyers. On the other hand, investors employing a more contrarian strategy may look at record highs as an indicator that a stock will go down in price, presenting an opportunity for shorts.

Many investors will sell out of a "fear of heights," especially repeated record highs, if a stock starts edging upward into uncharted territory.

Some economists say this is because record highs feel and sound unnatural to investors, even though achieving a record high can be viewed simply an example of a market or security doing exactly what it is supposed to do, as long as the government keeps printing money and the economy keeps growing.

Price increases don't always go up in a straight line, and overall, prices go up more than down, so when someone sells at a record high, the odds are not in their favor.

The Psychological Trap of Record High vs. Cost Basis:

As a market or stock moves higher, more investors get locked into the psychological trap of not buying back in after taking profits because a stock's price is higher than when they sold.

Economists and analysts point to the fact that human beings are behaviorally predisposed to latching onto the price at which a stock is bought.

This study basing those decisions on how the current price compares with their cost basis.

Preferred method is an unemotional approach to buying and selling should be more a question of a stock's current valuation, not historical price.

Of course whether a price is at a record high or low, a smart investor will also look at the business prospects of a company.

If it is well run, and business prospects for the company appear to be in line with future growth, it may make sense to ignore the distraction that a record high or low may be.

There are so many factors that play into the price of a stock, and often times, company financial fundamentals and business health aren't always what investors react t

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