RetireJapan

TokyoBoglehead wrote: ↑Tue Jan 10, 2023 2:02 am I am currently waiting for Kraken to tell me how to unstake my ether. (Very small, .34 Eth. Thank goodness that's all my crypto).

The entire space is very huge pain to navigate. I'm planning to sell and never look back.

My advice.

A. Have a cold wallet, don't stake.
B. Use a VPN and a separate dedicated device to buy and sell.
C. Use multiple exchanges. Bitflyer was reliable.
You can also go, Yen-> Bitflyer -> Ripple - XRP -> Binance

7-seasons.com wrote: ↑Tue Jan 10, 2023 1:08 pm

TokyoBoglehead wrote: ↑Tue Jan 10, 2023 2:02 am I am currently waiting for Kraken to tell me how to unstake my ether. (Very small, .34 Eth. Thank goodness that's all my crypto).

The entire space is very huge pain to navigate. I'm planning to sell and never look back.

My advice.

A. Have a cold wallet, don't stake.
B. Use a VPN and a separate dedicated device to buy and sell.
C. Use multiple exchanges. Bitflyer was reliable.
You can also go, Yen-> Bitflyer -> Ripple - XRP -> Binance

Thank you! It is the wild west of technology and markets. I'm fairly deep into it.

Can you unstake on the website right now somehow? I just used the site to buy and transfer out - decentralize. Call me an old curmudgeon but staking still feels risky to me even though I'll buy speculative shit fairly easily.

I've got wallets galore, exchanges not so much. I'm going to go with Bitflyer in the end. Coincheck requires me to accept them selling out my info to 3rd party cunts right upfront so that was a red flag right away. Thankfully didn't go through any documentation before learning that.

adamu wrote: ↑Tue Jan 10, 2023 10:36 pm Tangential musings because I said everything I had to say about exchanges in the other thread.

I'm fascinated by crypto, but I still don't understand it.

Then again, I don't understand fiat currency either. That's not worth anything, but everyone treats it has having value.

David Grebner says the difference is that the government says you need to pay your taxes using fiat currency*, however the guy going around collecting aluminium cans to sell them for some change is probably not concerned about taxes, so I still don't know.

Maybe if enough people think it's valuable, it's valuable? And if enough people stop thinking that, it's not? Again, the difference seems to be the government. But in the worst case the government can fall, too.

One thing I'm sure about, not having money and having to rely on social structure would be a huge pain. I quite enjoy strangers doing my bidding because I give them the magic numbers.

*Maybe. Watch this space. I'm trying to read his book but at the rate of about a page a month...

TokyoBoglehead wrote: ↑Wed Jan 11, 2023 12:26 am

adamu wrote: ↑Tue Jan 10, 2023 10:36 pm Tangential musings because I said everything I had to say about exchanges in the other thread.

I'm fascinated by crypto, but I still don't understand it.

Then again, I don't understand fiat currency either. That's not worth anything, but everyone treats it has having value.

David Grebner says the difference is that the government says you need to pay your taxes using fiat currency*, however the guy going around collecting aluminium cans to sell them for some change is probably not concerned about taxes, so I still don't know.

Maybe if enough people think it's valuable, it's valuable? And if enough people stop thinking that, it's not? Again, the difference seems to be the government. But in the worst case the government can fall, too.

One thing I'm sure about, not having money and having to rely on social structure would be a huge pain. I quite enjoy strangers doing my bidding because I give them the magic numbers.

*Maybe. Watch this space. I'm trying to read his book but at the rate of about a page a month...

My take on Crypto is it is a problem without a solution.

It's difficult to use, full of scams and unlikely to see made adoption.

Stable coins are the perfect examples of how the space does not really innovate it just iterates poorly.

7-seasons.com wrote: ↑Wed Jan 11, 2023 1:22 am

TokyoBoglehead wrote: ↑Wed Jan 11, 2023 12:26 am

adamu wrote: ↑Tue Jan 10, 2023 10:36 pm Tangential musings because I said everything I had to say about exchanges in the other thread.

I'm fascinated by crypto, but I still don't understand it.

Then again, I don't understand fiat currency either. That's not worth anything, but everyone treats it has having value.

David Grebner says the difference is that the government says you need to pay your taxes using fiat currency*, however the guy going around collecting aluminium cans to sell them for some change is probably not concerned about taxes, so I still don't know.

Maybe if enough people think it's valuable, it's valuable? And if enough people stop thinking that, it's not? Again, the difference seems to be the government. But in the worst case the government can fall, too.

One thing I'm sure about, not having money and having to rely on social structure would be a huge pain. I quite enjoy strangers doing my bidding because I give them the magic numbers.

*Maybe. Watch this space. I'm trying to read his book but at the rate of about a page a month...

My take on Crypto is it is a problem without a solution.

It's difficult to use, full of scams and unlikely to see made adoption.

Stable coins are the perfect examples of how the space does not really innovate it just iterates poorly.

Crypto is coming full force, a sleeping giant. Think of it more as a speculative technology investment like Tesla or Amazon 10 years ago. I know the group here is quite conservative so the safer plays might be stocks of crypto companies like Coinbase or HIVE, etc. Though, simply buying Bitcoin and maybe Ethereum on well-established exchanges like Tradestation, Interactive Brokers and perhaps leaving it there is another conservative way to play it and is what I would 'recommend' to anyone dabbling and open-minded (NFA!). Getting into self-custody, cold wallets, staking, NFTs (mostly on ethereum at this stage) is pretty deep so I wouldn't recommend it as a serious investment to people who are skeptical and cautious already. You generally need to have some technology awareness and know best practices before diving in right now.

Another angle here in case the above didn't convince... while the Reddit community generally 'hates' (hated?) NFTs, they adopted the Reddit 'Digital Collectibles' that were rebranded NFTs and started out free. Starbucks is testing out NFTs in their Odyssey program. Nike is already into it pretty heavy. There are many major brands dabbling and entering the space. It wouldn't hurt to have a Metamask (browser extension) ethereum wallet just in case the opportunity comes up for a free NFT at some point so you can at least receive an NFT or dabble in the tech. If you do create one or any wallet, write down the seed phrase on paper and don't lose it, don't share nor save it on your computer.

The tech is still early and everyone knows it is 'dangerous' territory from a technology standpoint because individual users have pressure to keep their shit in check - something like 'don't answer the door when someone knocks, don't answer your phone if you don't know who it is, don't click the link in your spam email, don't do uncertain transactions, don't save your password on your computer.'

You should claim and hold onto your ETH in your cold wallet before Kraken pulls out of Japan completely. That's a nice little stake in the game to keep an eye on the space at least.

This is the bottom of the bear, blood in the streets.