Quote from: ravenjt on April 15, 2015, 12:28:46 PM

Quote from: oblivi on April 14, 2015, 09:12:56 PM

In long term hold games like this the more patient win, but sometimes it's good to realize if we are bubbled or not. That is very hard to do tho, and you can risk missing a perfect spot for moon.

This just doesn't fit with the reality we have observed since November 2013 (although does fit with before then).
Since Nov 2013, we have witnessed a fairly steady decline, through a series of downward steps, from 1,100 ish to 220 today. This process continues, some 17 months after it began.

This is a remarkably slow and predictable bursting of a bubble. Past bubbles, including past bitcoin bubbles, deflated much more quickly, in a matter of days/months. Even historical bubbles, like the tulip bubble, all deflated within a year.

I would have thought that in this age of instant information, bubble bursting should be instant. But no, even after 17 months the realisation that the price is going to fall has still not fully been reflected by traders. Crazy.

It must be due to fanatics, holding up the price (at huge financial loss to themselves), rather than letting it find its new equilibrium level.

I do agree that remnants of a depressed market lingering for this long is surprising, but a bubble course did take place in a matter of 6 months from November 2013-April 2014. It just so happened that a balancing bull trend overlapped from October 2013-July 2014 (Surprisingly, if you overlay two trend charts that simulate those types of movements and use exponential and stochastic balancing of prices during those two time frames and you'll see a very strong model fit to actual prices).

That said, I think the elongated effect had a lot to do with a significant resistance to prop up price related to news and financial players rather than just fanatics.

Comparing to the last bubble, this time period is similar to how things were in July 2013. The difference is that instead of China and ASICs affecting the trend, it will likely be major financial parties that end up impacting the price trend.

Nonetheless, it is "crazy" how much "faith" still exists, but it makes sense since people in general also tend to believe in weathering storms and similar things.