Quote from: tiCeR on Today at 12:39:30 PM

Quote from: JayJuanGee on August 30, 2024, 10:17:12 PM

Quote from: tiCeR on August 30, 2024, 09:16:50 PM

Quote from: ginsan on August 30, 2024, 09:06:55 PM

[edited out]

You would be surprised about how many old people prefer to die with a lot of money in the bank and under their pillow instead of buying watches, cars or go on a cruise. Many of them own a house or two because they prefer to be independent. But the main reason is what once you reached a target you worked towards for many years because you always thought you want pure luxury all day long, there is something going on with many people that keeps them from sending their money without thorough consideration.

I believe that bitcoin is such an asset. Sure if you are a whale and you are sitting on a bag of 30,000 BTC like Tim Draper, selling some wouldn't hurt you, but often times even these people keep this asset. Draper bought at just over $600 and still holds 29,600 BTC. Why? Why wouldn't someone who bought for a little less $18 million not sell for $18 billion? It's a question someone should ask themselves before they consider getting rid of their holdings because they feel like buying a new car.

Wow. You don't need to use any such extreme examples of someone who might well be set for life with bitcoin and potentially leading a relatively modest life, and even someone who is sitting on 100 BTC and with hardly any other assets may well have put himself into a position of being somewhere close to a whale in terms of potentially being able to live off the bitcoin with anywhere between $5k and $10k per month worth of spending (withdrawing that much from the bitcoin holdings every month - or the equivalent monthly amounts on a quarterly or yearly basis), and also it would quite likely be the case that the bitcoin value in terms of dollars would be growing in value faster than his withdrawal of the BTC and also faster than the rate of the debasement of the dollar, so even if he is living off of his bitcoin at such rate of between $5k to $10k per month, he could reassess where he is at every few years to decide whether he might be at liberty to increase his income and still have a BTC stash that is sufficiently sustaining its value. So sure, there could be lifestyle considerations and also considerations if he is ONLY supporting himself or if he is also submitting an family, and of course, where he is at in the world will likely affect his expenses, too.

The example wasn't meant to be a suggestion or anything. Of course everyone can do as they please. But I think there is this misconception that everyone thrives for a target and then blows up all savings on a luxury life. I have seen quite a few people where I wondered why they live that modest lifestyle despite being very wealthy. And I had the pleasure to talk to some of them and it was always the same: when they are young, they think once they have the first million, it must be the Ferrari immediately. Of course some do buy a Ferrari then, but many do not.

As you mentioned before, targets are something people set to have a goal they are thriving for, but that doesn't mean once that target is reached they will instantly change their course of action.

Of course, the worse course of action after reaching the target would be to switch from buying and then into immediately selling it all.. .but surely people do those kinds of things, and yeah, maybe they are using bitcoin to save for something like a house or a car.. so they could have some consumption or investment good or something that could be considered a combination of the two.

Quote from: tiCeR on Today at 12:39:30 PM

In relation to bitcoin it could be price or quantity.

I think that we should be attempting to measure based on both, and some people do want to continuously increase their BTC until reaching their target level and others might be searching for a dollar value of their stash, and others might want the BTC stack to be worth a certain quantity of years of expenses, and surely in the last several years, my own valuations of my stash have been trying to consider its value in terms of the 200-WMA, yet at the same time, any of us know that if we make actual sales of bitcoin, we would be selling them at spot price, yet if we are mostly holding them, we still can consider valuing the ones that we are holding in terms of some kind of a more stable indicator rather than ONLY bouncing around with the spot price.

Quote from: tiCeR on Today at 12:39:30 PM

And part of my example was a whale called Draper and there are many more, I checked the number of the biggest wallets and whether the number of wallets > 1 BTC,>10 BTC, >100 BTC, >1,000 BTC ever changed. There was a guy here somewhere claiming that I think smart money is selling at the moment. Seems to not be the case as the number of all whale wallets did at least remain relatively stable for many years. You could argue that from end of 2023 >10,000 BTC wallets dropped from 120 to around 100. But from 2021 to 2023 it first increased from 80 to 120. And ever since 2014 the number of whale wallets >10,000 remains at today's level. It is around 100 wallets. Even if someone empties their bag, someone else seems to be buying it. Obviously there are fluctuations and people took profits over the course of so many years, but there have still been whales gobbling up tons of BTC.

I did not miss the points that you were making, and in some sense, we were making different points. Your points are surely valid, and there can be some value in terms of seeing what "whales" are doing.

You likely could see that I try to consider more in terms of what each of us can do in order to become our own version of a whale, which is my example of a person with 100 BTC pretty much being set for life if he knows how to manage his BTC.... Surely someone with thousands of BTC is even more of a whale, yet I have my doubts if they are participating in threads like these. but yeah, maybe some of them might from time to time.. yet at the same time, someone with thousands of BTC may well have various other income streams but even if we were to take someone like the draper example, and if you might suggest that over 10 years his 30k BTC stash went down to 29,500-ish, and so over the last 10 years, he might have had lived off of and/or spent 500 BTC for his personal consumption (if maybe we were to assume that the 30k BTC were to be the ONLY thing that he has, which with Draper many of us already knows that he is a venture capitalist, so he has other investments besides merely the 30k BTC that he bought in 2014 during the fed auction.

Quote from: tiCeR on Today at 12:39:30 PM

I think those are important indicators for the small guys around here. They may not do that research, read from someone that smart money is leaving the market and then they slowly get into a panic mode and decide to sell immediately at or below their target as if it was a smart decision and a relief. But when you look at the hard facts, bitcoin is doing amazing. Rhetorics about it are changing in all parts of society. Politics, banks, many institutions, former critics and so on. This may not immediately be reflected by price, but I believe it will. Bitcoin has a very strong pull effect as it is brutally resilient.

I cannot argue with any of this, and yeah more and more BIG money is getting drawn into bitcoin, while at the same time, some of the smaller players and those accumulating bitcoin can get distracted by bitcoin's volatility, so each of us surely need to keep some kind of an ongoing BTC accumulation strategy including potentially having several BTC accumulation targets along the way, so it may be a bit unrealistic for a brand new investor who ONLY has a budget of $100 per week for bitcoin to be expecting that he is going to reach 1 whole bitcoin any time soon, and with that kind of a budget, he may well not even reach 1 whole bitcoin in 10 years, unless he is expecting increases in his bitcoin budget and/or possible abilities to invest more at periodic times in the coming 10 years, and I am not even suggesting that there is a need to focus on 1 bitcoin, since the need is more likely to focus on however much BTC that each of us is able to accumulate within our own financial and psychological means.

Quote from: ovcijisir on Today at 01:48:07 PM

Quote from: tiCeR on Today at 12:39:30 PM

You could argue that from end of 2023 >10,000 BTC wallets dropped from 120 to around 100. But from 2021 to 2023 it first increased from 80 to 120. And ever since 2014 the number of whale wallets >10,000 remains at today's level. It is around 100 wallets. Even if someone empties their bag, someone else seems to be buying it. Obviously there are fluctuations and people took profits over the course of so many years, but there have still been whales gobbling up tons of BTC.

I would like to point out that during last few years there was big change in population that owns BTC. Few years ago the most owners of BTC wallets were individuals, but now with ETF funds more and more BTC becomes ownership of the banks, trusts and other organisations.
https://river.com/learn/who-owns-the-most-bitcoin/

Of course, the ETFs are buying bitcoin to represent the ETF share ownership of individuals, institutions and/or governments who are buying such ETF shares, and yeah, of course, it is not the same as directly owning the BTC... which can be a bit problematic in regards to bitcoin's being used for direct transactions, which is what brings power to BTC and power to individuals who hold BTC... and surely some might even consider ETFs and other forms of third party interference with BTC direct ownership to be attacks on BTC.. which is not completely untrue.