^ a short term uptick was necessary and expected...before resuming the overall medium term downward trend...the pattern remains: lower highs and lower lows...that pattern has not been broken yet....
How can you say that after checking out the 12 hour chart, such as below:
We have just seen the biggest move up for 2 months. A new pattern is emerging. At some point reversals have to happen, unless it is in terminal decline. I remember watching the Enron share price in late '01 (didn't have any, fortunately) and it just kept going down and down. When it hit $8 the Bloomberg guys were having a fit saying that it must turn around soon. It didn't, the company collapsed and it went to zero. Unless Bitcoin is in terminal decline we will not see a permanent downtrend. In fact the last four years has shown it is the ultimate financial instrument on the planet. I think it will remain so, based on remarkable fundamentals, and so do many other people.
Microsoft were the biggest tech company for a while because they were the first to introduce the PC.
Bitcoin is the first cryptocurrency so everyone jumps on board.
But then Apple came along and innovated its way to a higher market cap than Microsoft.
Some alt currency will come along, and people will want to jump in early to catch the rise up and you'd just end up with heaps of different alt cryptocurrencies popping up everyday all driven by the desire of their creators to essentially make money out of thin air.
You answered your own question with this example.
How companies entered the market to challenge Microsoft? Many. How many succeed? A couple. Why did they succeed? Innovation
So the people who invested money they could lose at over $200, are definitely holding. This is going to create a bigger scarcity than before, as they won't sell up until bitcoin recovers its value. If you look at the asks vs bids graph now, there is plenty of bids but hardly any asks up to $160 http://bitcoincharts.com/markets/mtgoxUSD.html
I think if these holders can hold their resolve for a few days chances are the price will go back up. Thoughts?
PS.- I dont care if the price goes up or falls. I hold so little bitcoin its irrelevant, just fascinated by all the drama