Cryptocurrency as the next significant stage for computing technology, not just an investment

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A pastor in Denver who said that God told him to sell cryptocurrency that could not be cashed is facing civil charges, along with his wife, for marketing a digital coin that prosecutors said was “practically worthless” and using the proceeds to support a “lavish lifestyle.”


In a video addressing the complaint last week, Mr. Regalado said that he did not want investors to be “mad” at the prosecutors.

“They have to do this,” he said. “I mean, if you think about this: We sold a cryptocurrency with no clear exit. We did. We took God at his word and sold a cryptocurrency with no clear exit.”

  On 11/3/2023 at 12:01 AM, Nebraska said:

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/11/02/the-emails-texts-photos-that-could-put-sam-bankman-fried-in-prison.html

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NEW YORK, March 28 (Reuters) - Sam Bankman-Fried was sentenced to 25 years in prison by a judge on Thursday for stealing $8 billion from customers of the now-bankrupt FTX cryptocurrency exchange he founded, the last step in the former billionaire wunderkind's dramatic downfall.

He has vowed to appeal his conviction and sentence.

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https://www.reuters.com/technology/sam-bankman-fried-be-sentenced-multi-billion-dollar-ftx-fraud-2024-03-28/

  On 3/28/2024 at 6:24 PM, Rubin Farr said:

 

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too little

  On 3/28/2024 at 6:52 PM, logakght said:

too little

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if he does the entire 25 it seems fair since he'll probably go crazy in there. also, a prison in america for that long while climate change is happening is going to absolute hell towards the end when prisons are the lowest thing on the priority list for federal and state governments. such as it is. 

but whatever. i mean.. if he was treated on a proportional scale where sentences are handed out based on dollar amounts, who and how people were taking advantage of etc then it's probably not long enough since some dude who stole a tv from a local shop in 1970 is probably still in jail somewhere because he's black. 

i hope this starts a trend of real jail time for financial crimes. having some actual laws in places and enforcing them would be nice but the banks do whatever the fuck they want and only get fines if that. 

edit: read that the prosecutors were asking for 40-50 years prison time. he got roughly half what they were asking. apparently he's not handled the jail time up to now very well. 40-50 years doesn't seem out of line as a sentence.. but neither does 25. really. in 25 years is anyone going to remember this guy? i hope he serves all that time and doesn't get some parole in 7 years or commuted sentence by a future president. he seems aloof and unaware of being a criminal and instead has said "mistakes were made" but didn't ever take responsibility for his shit show.  he got more time than michael milken who got ten years. he was pardoned by trump. milken is still worth billions, was banned from trading etc.. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Milken

wtf. such a shit show. 

re: Gamestop:

They made a movie about the Gamestop thing. Its actually pretty good, explains something quite complicated quite well, and frames the story as little guys vs the billionaires who have the power to gratiuitously bend the rules of the game. By some random chance I saw this movie in a cinema and it was quite surreal seeing r/wallstreetbets memes on a massive screen. Paul Dano plays Roaring Kitty who was the kindof ringleader of the whole thing. I like Paul Dano. If you've got a few hours and want to watch something interesting, I recommend it.

The movie ends with the situation as it was about 3 years ago, which is that Roaring Kitty testified before congress and then said goodbye and stopped posting, stopped updating his youtube channel etc. At the time it was reckoned he was worth about $35million, so like everyone I assumed he cashed out and was living a comfortable, quiet life somewhere. He disappeared from public view.

But then yesterday he re-appeared:

With this reddit post GME YOLO update – June 2 2024 he revealed that he still owns the stock and has infact been adding to it for the last 3 years. He now holds 5 million shares and so owns roughly 2% of Gamestop, with potential ways of owning about 5% depending on options. The value on June 2 was $210 million.

This is quite amazing and for the people holding Gameshop shares this is roughly akin to a religous leader rising from the dead

A redditor explains:

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TLDR: the smartest ape in the room, who was one of the first to point out that GameStop stock is undervalued and HEAVILY SHORTED , decides to return to make another post of his investment position and he shut down rumors of him setting off into the sunset with the cool $40 million he won and had every right to never say anything again.

BUT NO.

You know what this fool does? He doesn’t double down. He doesn’t quadruple down. He 5x his position almost.

He’s here. We’re all here. Supporting one of the most heavily shorted stocks in all of history. We’ve caught all the wealthy rich scums with their pants down right now and they are on the hook for this super massive short position.

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its making international news

BBC: GameStop shares jump after investor claims stake

  On 6/3/2024 at 10:03 PM, zazen said:

re: Gamestop:

They made a movie about the Gamestop thing. Its actually pretty good, explains something quite complicated quite well, and frames the story as little guys vs the billionaires who have the power to gratiuitously bend the rules of the game. By some random chance I saw this movie in a cinema and it was quite surreal seeing r/wallstreetbets memes on a massive screen. Paul Dano plays Roaring Kitty who was the kindof ringleader of the whole thing. I like Paul Dano. If you've got a few hours and want to watch something interesting, I recommend it.

The movie ends with the situation as it was about 3 years ago, which is that Roaring Kitty testified before congress and then said goodbye and stopped posting, stopped updating his youtube channel etc. At the time it was reckoned he was worth about $35million, so like everyone I assumed he cashed out and was living a comfortable, quiet life somewhere. He disappeared from public view.

But then yesterday he re-appeared:

With this reddit post GME YOLO update – June 2 2024 he revealed that he still owns the stock and has infact been adding to it for the last 3 years. He now holds 5 million shares and so owns roughly 2% of Gamestop, with potential ways of owning about 5% depending on options. The value on June 2 was $210 million.

This is quite amazing and for the people holding Gameshop shares this is roughly akin to a religous leader rising from the dead

A redditor explains:

its making international news

BBC: GameStop shares jump after investor claims stake

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had completely forgotten about this movie.. watched it today. it does a good job of explaining it. well written, i'm sure has left out some details as it's impossible not to w/something like this but uses good techniques for telling the story from many viewpoints.  i liked it nad it's funny with the added twist of revealing some of the financial fuckery that happened and i'm sure continues to happen. 

worth watching for sure. good cast. 

^ this whole thing is a crock of shit and will change nothing. just another dumb reddit bandwagon.

  On 6/4/2024 at 11:41 AM, usagi said:

^ this whole thing is a crock of shit and will change nothing. just another dumb reddit bandwagon.

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if anything it made a generation of young people aware of how shitty the system is. the movie ends up with letting the viewer know that even though there was evidence of collusion between hedge fund daddy and robin hood that they dropped the investigation. so, it's not hiding that fact. but also lets the viewer know the one hedgefund daddy had to close his fund because he lost so much money by shorting gamestop. 

  On 6/4/2024 at 5:59 PM, ignatius said:

if anything it made a generation of young people aware of how shitty the system is. the movie ends up with letting the viewer know that even though there was evidence of collusion between hedge fund daddy and robin hood that they dropped the investigation. so, it's not hiding that fact. but also lets the viewer know the one hedgefund daddy had to close his fund because he lost so much money by shorting gamestop. 

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this is news? that the whole thing is rigged in favour of those who already have wealth and power? we all witnessed the "too big to fail" banks being bailed out in the wake of the GFC instead of being held to account. there has been no better recent example than that. young people, particularly in the US, are already aware of how bad the system is because it directly negatively affects their lives and prospects every day (debt, healthcare, rents, jobs, etc). I doubt some shitty Apatow-type comedy movie is going to clue them in much more, especially for people not on reddit who are too busy trying to make ends meet irl.

all this shit has done is give a few people who already had a decent amount of money the illusory revenge of getting one back at the fat cats by jumping on a bandwagon and somehow beating them at their own game. let's quietly ignore the fact that even playing the game makes you complicit in the bullshit. at best, these few people won one game, not the tournament, by momentarily rigging the deck in their favour. there has been no difference to working or middle class people's lives as a whole, no institutional or systematic change. if one hedge fund folds, what changes exactly? do hedge fund guys learn anything? will any of the 'apes' making a killing on manipulating these shitty companies' stocks share their winnings around for any meaningful collective benefit? I'd like to see some proof or analysis that it has been any real good (not that it exists because there is no real good to demonstrate).

I support cryptos and the idea of freedom behind that. In my opinion is far from getting something more tangible, now is just a passive to speculate like crazy and that's a pity. We cannot negate that there is an impact on society, for better and for worse.

  On 6/4/2024 at 7:18 PM, usagi said:

this is news? that the whole thing is rigged in favour of those who already have wealth and power? we all witnessed the "too big to fail" banks being bailed out in the wake of the GFC instead of being held to account. there has been no better recent example than that. young people, particularly in the US, are already aware of how bad the system is because it directly negatively affects their lives and prospects every day (debt, healthcare, rents, jobs, etc). I doubt some shitty Apatow-type comedy movie is going to clue them in much more, especially for people not on reddit who are too busy trying to make ends meet irl.

all this shit has done is give a few people who already had a decent amount of money the illusory revenge of getting one back at the fat cats by jumping on a bandwagon and somehow beating them at their own game. let's quietly ignore the fact that even playing the game makes you complicit in the bullshit. at best, these few people won one game, not the tournament, by momentarily rigging the deck in their favour. there has been no difference to working or middle class people's lives as a whole, no institutional or systematic change. if one hedge fund folds, what changes exactly? do hedge fund guys learn anything? will any of the 'apes' making a killing on manipulating these shitty companies' stocks share their winnings around for any meaningful collective benefit? I'd like to see some proof or analysis that it has been any real good (not that it exists because there is no real good to demonstrate).

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which is why i said "a whole new generation" figured it out with firsthand experience.  it's a coming of age type thing for a bunch of college kids who have already been filled with doubts about everything related to the system they live in have had it confirmed yet again.  

  On 6/4/2024 at 7:18 PM, usagi said:

all this shit has done is give a few people who already had a decent amount of money the illusory revenge of getting one back at the fat cats by jumping on a bandwagon and somehow beating them at their own game.

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I agree with that, I don't see this as a really exciting form of activism or anything, just a sortof interesting internet thing. Sociologically interesting. And its interesting that they have a sortof leader figure who has just jumped back into the limelight to kick some arse. And it highlights some of the hypocrisy in the supposedly beautiful system of markets ("free market discipline for you, government bail outs for me"). I have no skin in the game. I still recommend the film though!

  On 6/4/2024 at 8:25 PM, zazen said:

I agree with that, I don't see this as a really exciting form of activism or anything, just a sortof interesting internet thing. Sociologically interesting. And its interesting that they have a sortof leader figure who has just jumped back into the limelight to kick some arse. And it highlights some of the hypocrisy in the supposedly beautiful system of markets ("free market discipline for you, government bail outs for me"). I have no skin in the game. I still recommend the film though!

 

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hypocrisy indeed. 

  On 6/4/2024 at 8:25 PM, zazen said:

I agree with that, I don't see this as a really exciting form of activism or anything, just a sortof interesting internet thing. Sociologically interesting. And its interesting that they have a sortof leader figure who has just jumped back into the limelight to kick some arse. And it highlights some of the hypocrisy in the supposedly beautiful system of markets ("free market discipline for you, government bail outs for me"). I have no skin in the game. I still recommend the film though!

 

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they see it as activism though. so ultimately, lionising DFV or any of his blind followers as robin hood figures of justice is basically misguided. I can't get past that hollowness so this thing holds little fascination for me even from a removed academic pov. to me this is yet another example of an online bandwagon that purports to change something but actually achieves nothing and was never about achieving anything in the first place.

  On 6/5/2024 at 12:33 AM, usagi said:

they see it as activism though. so ultimately, lionising DFV or any of his blind followers as robin hood figures of justice is basically misguided. I can't get past that hollowness so this thing holds little fascination for me even from a removed academic pov. to me this is yet another example of an online bandwagon that purports to change something but actually achieves nothing and was never about achieving anything in the first place.

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  On 6/5/2024 at 2:53 AM, ignatius said:

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  On 6/5/2024 at 10:20 AM, usagi said:

 

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https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/112601639679885930

"I don’t think Trump’s speech will gain him a lot of new voters among Bitcoiners." - Marc van der Chijs

NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump promised to make America the world leader in bitcoin and other digital currencies if elected, likening the crypto-verse to “the steel industry of 100 years ago.”

Trump said — to rapturous applause from the Nashville crowd — that if elected, he would fire current Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Gary Gensler, whom the crypto world has come to view as its chief opponent in government due to his agency’s rulings on digital tokens and lawsuits against bitcoin exchanges.

"I was excited to hear what Trump had to say about #bitcoin then I [fell] asleep listening to him ramble and pander to the crowd" - Mike Doan

The price of Bitcoin actually fell following Trump's remarks, indicating a muted response.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/trump-hails-crypto-largest-bitcoin-conference-rcna163925

https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/113005603392033479

https://www.theblock.co/post/310034/huge-defi-announcement-teased-by-two-of-trumps-sons-may-be-called-world-liberty-trademark-records-show

i love how intentionally vague this is: a trading market or a cryptocurrency?

^^^

My son introduced me to two partners, Chase Herro and Zak Folkman, who are exceptionally bright people ...These guys are as smart as any currency traders I’ve ever met. And they began talking to me about decentralized finance, which means frictionless finance, and why it made sense for people. And about the forgotten, who can’t get credit out there.

As I began to understand that, I said, ‘Who would understand this better than the Trump family?’ And we had a meeting initially with Eric, Don Jr., and the president and his counsel. And we said, ‘Let’s go pursue it. - Steve Witkoff for World Liberty Financial

https://www.cnbc.com/2024/09/16/trump-crypto-world-liberty-financial.html

https://fortune.com/crypto/2024/09/17/trump-crypto-blockchain-world-liberty-financial/

p.s. World Liberty Financial founders include Donald Trump Jr., Eric Trump and Barron Trump, as well as Witkoff’s son, Zach Witkoff.

  On 9/17/2024 at 4:35 PM, Nebraska said:

^^^

My son introduced me to two partners, Chase Herro and Zak Folkman, who are exceptionally bright people ...These guys are as smart as any currency traders I’ve ever met. And they began talking to me about decentralized finance, which means frictionless finance, and why it made sense for people. And about the forgotten, who can’t get credit out there.

As I began to understand that, I said, ‘Who would understand this better than the Trump family?’ And we had a meeting initially with Eric, Don Jr., and the president and his counsel. And we said, ‘Let’s go pursue it. - Steve Witkoff for World Liberty Financial

https://www.cnbc.com/2024/09/16/trump-crypto-world-liberty-financial.html

https://fortune.com/crypto/2024/09/17/trump-crypto-blockchain-world-liberty-financial/

p.s. World Liberty Financial founders include Donald Trump Jr., Eric Trump and Barron Trump, as well as Witkoff’s son, Zach Witkoff.

 

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The crypto grift will be strong. I wonder how long until their first hack?

  On 9/17/2024 at 5:21 PM, chenGOD said:

The crypto grift will be strong. I wonder how long until their first hack?

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don't think they're worried about that as currently it seems more to be in line with a rug pull or money laundering:

In addition to the platform itself, World Liberty Financial will come with a governance token, WLFI, which will provide owners the right to vote “on matters of the platform.” Approximately 63 percent of the tokens will be sold to the public; 17 percent are set aside for user rewards, and 20 percent will be reserved for World Liberty Financial team compensation.
https://www.wired.com/story/trump-world-liberty-financial-crypto-defi/

hopefully his supporters take this opportunity as a litmus test; can they trust enough with their personal finances? 

  On 9/17/2024 at 8:44 PM, Nebraska said:

don't think they're worried about that as currently it seems more to be in line with a rug pull or money laundering:

In addition to the platform itself, World Liberty Financial will come with a governance token, WLFI, which will provide owners the right to vote “on matters of the platform.” Approximately 63 percent of the tokens will be sold to the public; 17 percent are set aside for user rewards, and 20 percent will be reserved for World Liberty Financial team compensation.
https://www.wired.com/story/trump-world-liberty-financial-crypto-defi/

hopefully his supporters take this opportunity as a litmus test; can they trust enough with their personal finances? 

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Definitely a rug pull. ML maybe not so much...he had casinos and apartments for that.