Re: What's Stopping Someone From Buying From one Exchange, Selling in Another?
"What's Stopping Someone From Buying From one Exchange, Selling in Another?"
Nothing
Although, as others have mentioned, the high price of coins now has made the fees enough to kill any profit potential.
Back when coins were $4 each, you'd only incur a fee of less than $0.03 per transfer, which means buying at $4 (anywhere) and selling for $5 (anywhere) would make a nice profit. But at $120/coin (at the time of writing this) you will incure a fee of $0.72 per coin per transaction, which means you'd need a gap of more than $1.50 between your buying and selling prices to see any return. It's possible to find a gap that large over time, but not between exchanges with an immediate buy-sell maneuver
Nothing
Although, as others have mentioned, the high price of coins now has made the fees enough to kill any profit potential.
Back when coins were $4 each, you'd only incur a fee of less than $0.03 per transfer, which means buying at $4 (anywhere) and selling for $5 (anywhere) would make a nice profit. But at $120/coin (at the time of writing this) you will incure a fee of $0.72 per coin per transaction, which means you'd need a gap of more than $1.50 between your buying and selling prices to see any return. It's possible to find a gap that large over time, but not between exchanges with an immediate buy-sell maneuver
Shouldn't the BTC/USD price fluctuate more? Going from $4 to $5 is a 25% increase. A 25% increase from $120/BTC would be $150/BTC.
It's because people are outbidding each other. They only need to add (subtract) $0.01 to(from) their price to be the most attractive offer. So if 100 people outbid each other by $0.01 each, the price will move $1. People aren't outbidding each other by a percentages, which is why (in general) the movement speed isn't affecte by price (aside from driving more people to try to participate in the bidding war).