Industry Experts Believe Bitcoin Headed to $6,000

There's an old saying, "Don't let the fox watch the henhouse." This may well be true when it comes to crypto-industry insiders and their opinions about the price of Bitcoin. But whether anti-Bitcoin fanatics like it or not, the price is steadily climbing toward the $6,000 mark.

Bitcoin liquidity, adoption

With the price of Bitcoin climbing toward the elusive $6,000, the reasons behind this rise are a point of contention. With the industry in an uproar, some market leaders link the rise in price to the increase in Bitcoin liquidity. For example, Luis Cuende, cofounder of Aragon said:

"I think the rise in Bitcoin prices reflects the enthusiasm that the public has into Bitcoin being a digital currency and new technical solutions like SegWit, that enable more scalability and new solutions for instant payments."

Not everyone thinks that Bitcoin is a good choice for currency, especially since prices fluctuate so rapidly and massively. Nevertheless, in countries like Argentina, where the fiat currency is effectively valueless, Bitcoin may well be the only option. According to David Henderson, Founder of Sweetbridge:

"A quick look at Bitcoin's price history (the two pizzas famously ordered by a developer for 10,000 BTC in 2010 would be worth about $30 million each today!) shows the challenges in using this as a transactional currency or as collateral, as the fluctuations are significant and frequent, unlike most fiat currencies. That said, it can provide an alternative in countries where the local currency is heavily controlled, restricted and subject to very high inflation."

Bitcoin vs. gold, other assets

Additionally, beyond the liquidity issue, Bitcoin is also carrying its weight as an asset in itself, and has even been suggested as a reserve currency. According to Yonatan Sela, SVP Business Development, YouNow:

"The soar in the price of Bitcoin isn't surprising, and I expect that while price fluctuations will continue, in the long term Bitcoin will continue to rise in price far beyond $6,000, especially if you buy into the thesis that Bitcoin could become the prominent digital reserve currency. The main reserve currency in the world is gold, with a market cap of ~$7 trillion USD. Bitcoin is currently at ~$94 billion which is less than 1.5% of that. Even if it stays just 2% of gold, it will surpass the $6,000 price point."

Other leaders were quick to point out that the asset characteristics of Bitcoin are only just now becoming mainstream. As more and more people discover Bitcoin, the price will only trend higher.

In fact, the fear, uncertainty and doubt (FUD) caused by comments from Jamie Dimon, Larry Fink and others simply adds to public awareness, which in turn drives up prices. Per Serafin Lion Engel, CEO and Founder of DataWallet:

"Bitcoin proves to be an antifragile asset which, due to its characteristics of immutability, transparency, and disintermediation, thrives in a world of ever-increasing political and socio-economic uncertainty. Comments, such as Jamie Dimon's, drive the Bitcoin hormesis we are currently witnessing, where adversarial comments by renowned beneficiaries of the current centralized system simply add to the strength of the Bitcoin ecosystem. Furthermore, it also simply boils down to exposure: The more people hear that about Bitcoin, the more people will adopt Bitcoin since its benefits over the past financial system are so abundantly clear."

However, most industry experts see that the power of Bitcoin is not only in its technology, but in its longevity. As the oldest and most stable cryptocurrency, it has the trust of the digital currency community. Eyal Herzog and Galia Benartzi Co Founders of Bancor said:

"What's interesting here to remember is that Bitcoin has at least 4 years of momentum accumulation before Ethereum. This is a great reminder that real value networks don't just spike into existence. They take time and dedication to build and take real root. We should keep this in mind as we look at new alt coins and somehow expect them to skyrocket in days or weeks."

 Bitcoin instability and volatility

In spite of the huge run up in price over the last few days, the value of the cryptocurrency may well see substantial volatility. Even if Bitcoin does hit $6,000 (which appears quite likely), the price may see another massive drop, just as it did when the $5,000 price point was first touched. Further, any negative news may cause some unrest in the price. According to Bharath Rao, CEO of Leverj:

"The Bitcoin price has moved from under $1,000 at the beginning of the year to around $6,000. The price should certainly be expected to fluctuate quite a bit, both due to the uncertainty and promise of new technology. We believe that Bitcoin is not yet mainstream and will continue to grow in value as more financial use cases move to crypto. Buying and holding Bitcoin has outpaced every single traditional investment since 2009 and is likely to continue to do so for several years."

Bitcoin long term?  

Among experts, most see the strength of Bitcoin being assured, at least in the short term. While anti-Bitcoin pundits may critique the platform, the reality that Bitcoin has achieved some consensus for mainstream acceptance is clear. According to Rob Viglione, Co-Founder of ZenCash:

"It's always tough to say what's driving prices, but what we do know is that there's more demand for Bitcoin now than ever. A big part of that is due to the fact that it has steadily achieved more mainstream credibility and that there's now a robust global conversation. For those of us who study cryptocurrency characteristics, there's growing consensus that we're witnessing the birth of a new asset class, and that's huge."

However, many see fundamental flaws within the structure of Bitcoin technology - particularly with block creation. The continued production of blocks depends on substantial electrical use and huge output of resources. Some say that Bitcoin, with its Proof of Work (PoW) protocol, may well be overtaken by other altcoins with the Proof of Stake (PoS) protocol. Technical experts see a need for change, like Lior Yaffe Core Developer at NXT ARDOR:

"The recent increase in Bitcoin's value is likely due to it being the de-facto exchange currency between the fiat and crypto worlds, much the same as the US dollar is between fiat currencies. It is quite obvious that Bitcoin is not going to replace any fiat currency any time soon due to scaling issues and the waste generated by the POW process. Going forward I predict that most innovation in the crypto world in the mid to long term will take place on POS based blockchains, but being the bridge between the worlds gives Bitcoin a huge short term boost."

The move toward $6,000 is not only encouraging because of the price point for Bitcoin holders. To some industry experts, the price shift is really reflective of the power of Bitcoin and Blockchain technology to truly change the world. According to Carl Bennetts Co-Founder of Status.im:

"Reaching milestones against fiat currency certainly aren't inconsequential, but what's far more interesting to me is the long term trend at play, and what this signifies for the future of blockchain technologies. While 6,000 USD certainly reflects some market maturity, what's truly exciting is that we're slowly edging towards mass-adoption, a world of true financial self-sovereignty, and an open financial system that brings fair access the anyone with an internet connection."

Generally, the consensus among industry leaders is that the Bitcoin bull will continue to run, and $6,000 will be achieved.

Boomer Dad Jamie Dimon Can’t Stop Trashing Bitcoin

JPMorgan C.E.O. Jamie Dimon is a genial Wall Street executive who is also known for occasionally launching into rants that we imagine are reminiscent of lectures he gave his children in high school about the dangers of drinking and drugs. Bitcoin is "a fraud" that will eventually blow up, Dimon fumed last month at the Delivering Alpha conference. "It's not a real thing, eventually it will be closed. It's worse than tulip bulbs," he said, referencing the tulip bubble that struck Holland during the Dutch Golden Age. "It won't end well. Someone is going to get killed." Any JPMorgan trader he caught trading bitcoin could expect to be "fire[d] in a second," he warned. He added that the only people he would expect to be using the digital currency are drug dealers and murderers.

Dimon doesn't seem to have a problem with the blockchain technology that makes bitcoin work: JPMorgan was a "founding member" of another cryptocurrency initiative, the Enterprise Ethereum Alliance, and created its own cryptocurrency product, Quorum. But unlike other well-known figures on Wall Street who have begun to embrace bitcoin itself—like Bill Miller, whose top holdings are said to include the digital currency, and Fundstrat's Tom Lee, who spent 15 years at JPMorgan and said he sees bitcoin hitting $6,000 by next year and $25,000 by 2022—Dimon thinks bitcoin is a scam. While JPMorgan trades bitcoin for clients, the bank notes that "they are not JPMorgan orders. These are clients purchasing third-party products directly."

And when you're a boomer dad like Dimon—who has joked about his "formerly smart daughter" who apparently owns two bitcoins—you don't just change your convictions because something is suddenly popular or because millennials tell you to. Which is apparently why, despite declaring just yesterday that he was "not going to talk about bitcoin anymore," Dimon couldn't help but comment on Friday, in response to a question at the Institute of International Finance's conference, that anyone who buys bitcoin is an idiot in for a fall.

"I could care less about bitcoin," Dimon told the audience. "The blockchain is a technology which is a good technology. We actually use it. . . . Gold bless the blockchain. Cryptocurrencies, digital currencies, I think are also fine. JPMorgan moves $16 trillion around the world every day, we don't do it in cash, it's done digitally. If it can be done digitally with the blockchain, so be it. But it will still be a dollar cryptocurrency."

"What I have an issue with is a non-fiat cryptocurrency," he continued. "I don't personally understand the value of something that has no actual value. You all can do whatever you want and I don't care. I could care less what bitcoin trades for, how it trades, why it trades, who trades it. If you're stupid enough to buy it, you'll pay the price for it one day. . . . The only value of bitcoin is what the other guy will pay for it."

In an interview with Bloomberg, financier Mike Novogratz, who has raised $500 million to start a hedge fund that will invest in cryptocurrencies, said "Jamie Dimon gets paid to worry about bitcoin because he's a rent-taker. The decentralized revolution is about going after the rent-takers. His bank is in the crosshairs of the cryptorevolution. So he's playing defense. He's going to lose."

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Gary Cohn is basically being held at the White House against his will

Why has the former Goldman Sachs president chosen to stick around in the train wreck that is the Trump administration, despite his evident displeasure about his boss basically going to bat for neo-Nazis and white supremacists? According to my colleague William Cohan, it's because Trump refuses to let him quit.

He eventually got an audience with the president. They talked about Trump's upsetting response to Charlottesville. Trump told him, "Is it really so bad?" according to the same person familiar with what transpired. Cohn conveyed to Trump how upset he was and that he wanted to resign. He unburdened himself to Trump. Trump told him to "think about it" and not to act rashly. Cohn emerged from the encounter with second thoughts. "I've been asked to think about it," he said, according to the source. That night, Cohn headed to his house in the Hamptons and to a 30-person dinner party, where he arrived two hours late, at the home of Lloyd Blankfein, the C.E.O. of Goldman Sachs and his former boss. Over the weekend, he spoke to his wife and family, and others, about his concerns. His angst continued unabated. Cohn returned to Washington determined still to resign.

He asked Kelly for an appointment with Trump on August 21. But that was a tough day for Trump. The president was hunkered down, focused on the speech he was to give that night, in Arlington, Virginia, about the 16-year-old war in Afghanistan. Kelly told Cohn that his meeting with Trump would have to wait. Kelly offered Cohn the chance to see Trump, in the Oval Office, a day later, before Trump flew to Yuma, Arizona. Cohn accepted. This was Cohn's showdown meeting with Trump. It was a "long conversation," the source said, where Trump did everything from yelling at Cohn that his staying with him in the White House was a matter of his "national duty" to trying to cajole him into sticking it out, using more of a light touch. Interestingly, Trump was clear to make a distinction with Cohn. His "duty" was to "the country" not to Trump personally. He refused to read or to take Cohn's letter of resignation. A White House official disputed that Trump specifically asked Cohn to stay on as national economic adviser. "The president encouraged Gary to make his own decision," the official said. (For his part, Cohn declined to be interviewed about what happened.)

Jared Kushner can't stop screwing up his disclosure forms

Jared Kushner, White House senior adviser and First Son-in-Law, whose agenda currently includes solving the opioid crisis, overhauling the government's I.T. infrastructure, bringing peace to the Middle East, and "reinventing the entire government," messed up another one of his forms again. Per *Newsweek:*

Jared Kushner "enriched himself" by not revealing his ownership of a real estate tech business that raised millions of dollars while he served in the government, said a member of the House Judiciary Committee, calling it part of a pattern of unethical behavior that he believes should cause the White House Senior Adviser to be stripped of his security clearance. Congressman Ted Lieu told Newsweek that Kushner's failure to list a company called Cadre on his initial financial disclosure forms—an oversight that could mean millions for the president's son-in-law—is an ethical lapse that should have severe ramifications. "It appears [Kushner] ended up being the beneficiary of that omission," said Lieu, a California Democrat. "He enriched himself by failing to disclose the asset."

According to Kushner's lawyer, the failure to list Cadre was simply an "administrative error." Previous "administrative errors" on Kushner's part have included leaving out roughly 100 contacts with foreign nationals on his initial SF-86, including the time he and his brother-in-law met with a Kremlin-linked lawyer in Trump Tower, and registering to vote as a female.

Surprise: fintech start-up run by guys who allegedly propositioned female employees, offered women money to lose weight is dropping its expansion plans

Back in September, Mike Cagney, the C.E.O. of financial technology start-up Social Finance (a.k.a. SoFi), announced that he would be stepping down from the company, which may or may not have had something to do with allegations that, among other things:

• The company's chief financial officer until May, Nino Fanlo, "would commonly make comments about the physical appearance of female employees and touch their shoulders in ways that made them uneasy," like the time he allegedly commented on a female job applicant's breasts in full view of several staff members.

• Fanlo said that "women would be happier as homemakers; and once told two female employees he would give them $5,000 if they lost 30 pounds by the end of the year, according to more than a dozen people who heard the comments and witnessed the weight-loss offer."

• The corporate culture seemed to be modeled after a frat house; one former employee, Yulia Zamora, told the Times that she was propositioned by a male supervisor on numerous occasions and that "you would find people having sex in their cars and in the parking lot. It was a free-for-all."

• One manager forced the company to twice replace a toilet after breaking it while having sex with an employee in the company bathroom.

• A senior executive allegedly started sexting a female employee while they were both at the same holiday party, threatened her professionally after receiving no response, left the party drunk and crashed his car, and was later promoted.

Online lender Social Finance Inc. said Friday that it is pulling its application to open a bank, retreating from one of its most ambitious goals just weeks after its chief executive resigned as lawsuits claimed sexual harassment and a toxic workplace culture at the company. In June, SoFi had asked Utah state regulators and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation to bless its plan to launch a wholly-owned banking subsidiary that would offer customers deposit accounts and credit cards. Michael Cagney, then chief executive of SoFi, had written in a letter to shareholders over the summer that the company was "optimistic that the FDIC will move expeditiously to approve our application."

"With SoFi's leadership in transition, we're withdrawing our application with the FDIC for now," a SoFi spokesman told The Wall Street Journal, adding that a bank charter "remains an attractive option when the time is right" and that the company still plans to offer customers its own deposit accounts "through a partner bank in the near future."

Even Wall Street is disgusted with Harvey Weinstein

It's low on his incredibly long list of problems, but while he's riding out the news cycle at a $2,000-a-night rehab facility, disgraced movie mogul Harvey Weinstein might want to reflect on the fact that even Wall Street, whose track record when it comes to sexual harassment might rival Hollywood's, is repulsed by him. According to the New York Post, Goldman Sachs is said to be "exploring options" for its stake in the Weinstein Company in the wake of allegations Weinstein sexually harassed or assaulted nearly three dozen women. "There is no place for the inexcusable behavior that had been reported, and we strongly condemn it," a spokesman for Goldman told the Post. In related news, The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday that Weinstein's eponymous film and television studio is "exploring a sale or shutdown and is unlikely to continue as an independent entity." (Bob Weinstein, Harvey's brother and company co-founder, denied that T.W.C.—whose contract with Harvey seemingly allowed for sexual harassment—was contemplating either option.)

BlackRock's Fink warns global surprise could drive major market correction (Reuters)

Fink calls bitcoin an 'index of money laundering' (CNBC)

Saudi Arabia Weighs Giving Up on International Listing for Aramco (W.S.J.)

Trump's Interior Secretary Is Running His Agency Like He's the Queen of England (The Hive)

Wells Fargo profits tank as it sets aside $1B for legal costs (Reuters)

Wells Fargo CEO says it 'feels like forever' since he took helm (N.Y.P.)

Jack Dorsey's Week from Hell Gets Worse (The Hive)

Tim Hortons releases 'Buffalo spice' latte (U.P.I.)

EtherDelta Demonstrates ICO is Not Necessary for Success as Ethereum Application

EtherDelta has become the most successful decentralized application (dapp) in the history of Ethereum, and it is currently solely accountable for 14 percent of all transactions in the Ethereum network.

Over the past year, blockchain startups have raised more capital through initial coin offerings (ICOs) than venture capital investment, securing over $1.3 billion in 2017 alone. Some of the most successful ICOs have raised hundreds of millions of dollars, with Tezos securing over $232 million.

But, the vast majority of blockchain startups that have conducted successful ICOs and raised large amounts of capital are yet to demonstrate successful use cases of Ethereum at a large commercial scale. Some ICOs have not even released the alpha version of their software.

The inefficiency of ICO-conducting blockchain startups and the lack of preparation in terms of product delivery and software development have triggered criticisms from the cryptocurrency sector. In an interview with JoongAng, a major South Korean finance news publication, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin also criticized a flaw in ICOs:

"In general, open-source protocols are very hard to monetize, and so the fact that in this particular area, we actually do have a way to monetize protocol development is something that we should be thankful for. However, they also have their flaws, and I think many of these flaws arise from the fact that even though the ICOs are happening on a decentralized platform, the ICOs themselves are hardly centralized; they inherently involve many people trusting a single development team with potentially over $200 million of funding."

Recently, EtherDelta has proven to the global cryptocurrency sector that a multi-million dollar ICO is not necessary to succeed as a decentralized application. EtherDelta has developed a decentralized exchange that supports an active user base that utilize the platform on a daily basis to trade cryptocurrencies. Essentially, EtherDelta has evolved into a decentralized version of ShapeShift, the popular cryptocurrency trading platform.

Although many users and investors on the EtherDelta decentralized trading platform have complained about the inefficiency of the platform, as Buterin emphasized during his interview with JoongAng, it will be difficult for decentralized applications with active user bases to operate smoothly without the implementations of various scaling solutions. More importantly, decentralization comes with its costs and inefficiency; there is a trade-off between security and flexibility.

Buterin noted that it could take anywhere from two to five years to bring the Ethereum network's scalability to an enterprise level and for dapps like EtherDelta to scale, it would need the Ethereum network to become more flexible and stable.

"I would say two to five [to scale the Ethereum Network], with early prototypes in one year. The various scaling solutions, including sharding, plasma and various state channel systems such as Raiden and Perun, are already quite well thought out, and development has already started. Raiden is the earliest, and its developer preview release is out already," said Buterin.

Rather than conducting an ICO for a premature product, software, and codebase, a better and a more transparent way to approach the cryptocurrency market is to develop a working piece of software, build an active user base and continue to develop the software as the Ethereum blockchain network matures.

To this date, EtherDelta remains as one of the few decentralized applications on the Ethereum protocol to operate with consistency and with regular users.

More to that, as the demand for decentralized exchanges and protocols increase as BTCManager reported, the popularity of dapps like EtherDelta will increase at an exponential rate.

In regions like China and India, wherein legality surrounding cryptocurrency trading remains unclear, EtherDelta (and similar platforms) are set to emerge as major cryptocurrency trading platforms that are decentralized, transparent, and open.

Bitcoin.org Operators Aim to 'Denounce' Segwit2x Participants

On October 6, 2017, the web portal Bitcoin.org announced it was "denouncing" the Segwit2x hard fork and companies involved with the project. The site plans to publish a banner on every page of the website explaining the "risks of using services" that are associated with the November 2MB fork and development team.

 Bitcoin.org: 'S2X Companies Will Be Called Out by Name'

Things are getting pretty climactic in the land of bitcoin, as many cryptocurrency proponents are warring over the Segwit2x hard fork that's expected this November. On October 6, the two anonymous owners of the website Bitcoin.org, 'Theymos' and 'Cobra Bitcoin,' stated they would soon be posting a warning on every page about the risks of Segwit2x and every company involved with the fork will also be mentioned.

"On 2017-10-11 at noon (UTC), Bitcoin.org is planning to publish a banner on every page of the site warning users about the risks of using services that will default to the so-called Segwit2x1 (S2X) contentious hard fork," explains the site's first warning message. "S2X companies will be called out by name."

To ensure that we only warn users against companies that will actually put user deposits at risk, we urge all companies to publicly clarify their stance before the above date, either by a highly-visible public statement or by commenting on Bitcoin.org issue #1835 (or by doing both).    

Lead Segwit2x developer Jeff Garzik is not surprised by the move.

During the original discussion on Github concerning whether or not Bitcoin.org should add the denouncement warning, a few individuals were against the action. Cobra Bitcoin the 'other' leader of Bitcoin.org says he's made the Segwit2x risk warning a "red alert" because he thinks the November hard fork is "possibly the greatest threat to Bitcoin."

The cryptocurrency proponent and Cornell University professor, Emin Gün Sirer‏, called the Bitcoin.org denouncement an act of religion. "Denounce?" asked the professor. "As heresy, I assume."

I like the choice of religious language — Scientific discussions left the building years ago.

The Curious Case of Bitcoin.org's Commandments and its Tethered Wiki Page

The operators of Bitcoin.org want businesses to state their intentions towards the fork and declare they will not call Segwit2x "BTC" before the next published warning. According to the post, "miner's actions cannot be used as a justification to redefine Bitcoin." This statement is similar to the article Theymos posted to the 'Bitcoin Wiki' website on August 8 called, "Bitcoin is not ruled by miners." Companies are not allowed to default to "S2X software," says Bitcoin.org but "providing access to S2X-coins is acceptable, however."

"Although bitcoin.org condemns contentious hard fork attempts such as S2X, we consider it tolerable for companies to support S2X in ways that do not contradict the above three points, such as by supporting both Bitcoin and S2X simultaneously as separate cryptocurrencies," details Bitcoin.org's first announcement.

Theymos: 'Targeting Those Involved With Segwit2x'

Of course, the entire community has been quarreling over this announcement on forums and other forms of social media. A vast majority of the r/bitcoin crowd supports the website's announcement, while the other side of the debate believes the website's decision is absurd. Theymos, who is also the lead administrator of the Reddit forum r/bitcoin, states on the forum's announcement thread, "this bitcoin.org blog post is mostly targeted at the involved companies and other in-the-know people," explains the owner of Bitcoin.org.

"A much more detailed article aimed at a wide audience will be published in about a week — In the meantime, you can see here for background info," he adds.

What do you think about Bitcoin.org's recent announcement? Let us know what you think in the comments below.

Images via Shutterstock, Bitcoin.com, Twitter, and Bitcoin.org.

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