Sorta like people who bought houses in the 1960’s or early 1990’s, nearly everyone who bought bitcoin >1 year ago fancies themself an “investor.” For those who’ve never made another investment in their lives, the unexpected kiss of Lady Luck (or Lady Intervention) hubristically culminates in what economists like to call “the wealth effect,” resulting in what blackjack players like to call “doubling down.”
In the housing market, this results in HELOCs for renovations and the purchases of rental property, all of which underpins further debt-fuelled insanity in the fiat consumerist economy. Of course, since Bitcoin is the killer of Nietzschian nihilism, our new economy works nothing like that. In fact, it’s just the opposite, though that doesn’t prevent Fiaters from imposing their broken ideas onto Bitcoin for as long and as vocally as they can. As such, it’s hardly surprising that the self-ascribed Bitcoin “investors” look for returns on their returns. While some look to dice or BitBet, most look to…
Bitcoin stock exchanges!
What better way to invest in the future than by investing in BTC-denominated “securities” and “assets?” Right?!
There are, and have been, a number of places where BTC-denominated listings have appeared in the mere 5.5 years of Bitcoin’s history, none of which have managed to survive and thrive quite like Mircea Popescu’s deceptively austere implementation : MPEx.i Compared to MPEx, the murky and fly-by-night operations of GLBSE, BitFunder, BTCT, Havelock, Cryptostocks, Picostocks, and BitcoinBourse are but play exchanges populated by Zerg.
So let’s count the ways the MPEx beats the rest.
Volume:
Whereas MPEx currently trades between 20,000 – 30,000 BTC per month, Havelock is lucky to trade that much per quarterii and the others are a fraction of even that. That is, until they wither and die.iii
Hilariously, when asked about his trading volume and order book, BitcoinBourse operator and linguistic midget “dotcoin” could barely even grok the reason why he should need such high falutin’ things on his play exchange. Take note of his general ineptitude in this lulzy conversation on -assets yesterday:
jurov: dotcoin and what about publishing order book and volume?
dotcoin: login to see order book
jurov: and volume is not available even on login…
dotcoin: but what you critic this time jurov? the order book? last time was the dividends, next time is what ? should i go to your site and start searching
dotcoin: hm you needs now what jurov a order book?
dotcoin: and after
dotcoin: ?
jurov: no you need one
dotcoin: so why you not create your own stock exchange i ask myself if you can do all better
dotcoin: i mean before bitcoinbourse was not good enough for you guys,
dotcoin: than we create and redesign new
dotcoin: than you always not happy with it
kakobrekla: dotcoin a scam in a nice box is still a scam
kakobrekla: not trying to imply you have a nice box, just saying.
jurov: so dotcoin, you insist the orderbook is completely fine despite everyone else saying it is not?
jurov: okay. so why you can’t publish trades? that’s completely normal thing all exchanges do
dotcoin: not saying that, but is momently status of order book
dotcoin: but what exactly you want see, you see already how many shares from company xyz was listed and how much was left on sale!
jurov: dotcoin you ever use any stock exchange? every one of them publishes what trades were done
dotcoin: but guys you talking about things like cryptostocks do
dotcoin: the merchant have to know where the shares are gone
dotcoin: not the public
dotcoin: there are offers to buy and sell, of course, the only one not is there are not showing sold shares thats correct
davout: dotcoin: http://mpex.co/?mpsic=S.MPOE <<< on the right side of this page is also an order book
dotcoin: yes guys think like taht is under development
dotcoin: many other things in todo list, so i not give them so much priority yet as i don’t know this classifieds me as scammer
dotcoin: this not needs a month.
OMFGWTFBBQ!!!!11 Volume is the least of BB’s problems, wouldn’t you say?
So MPEx takes the volume cake with an unmatchable number and size of trades that comes in spite of MPEx offering just a small fraction of the “securities” or “assets” that the play exchanges offer. But when dotcoin is the competition, it’s not really a fair comparison, neh?
Transparency:
Whereas BitcoinBourse claims braindamage such as:
dotcoin: we hidde nothing thats is do anyone from you go inside the bourse and take a view and read all? than you see there is nothing hidden there is all transparentiv
Yikes. No monthly statements, no URLs pointing to evidence, just meaningless words.
Compare this fucktardation with MPEx, which has an order book (!), publishes volumes (!), has solved HFT,v and publishes monthly reports using a fairly revolutionary accounting methodology: MPEx-AN0-v1.
Also, MPEx PR is the tits.vi MPEx shoots straight while the other exchanges look for input from “the community” and trip over themselves to appease the teeming masses. The approach taken by the play exchanges, as with anything aimed at the lowest common denominator, always ends in tears and losses. Why? Because the masses aren’t the “investors” they imagine themselves to be, they’re children, regardless of the date on their birth certification.
MPEx just offers the best, lays it all out there, and challenges users to step up to the plate or STFU. It’s certainly not for everyone. And that’s exactly the point.
Operator:
We know that Bitcoin isn’t about the technology anymore, it’s about the people, so now we’re comparing Mircea Popescu with a full cast of shady characters. It’s barely fair to compare MP with Duncan L. Niederauer, so comparing him with dotcoin, Ukyo, burnside, etc. is like comparing a Geländewagen to a Geely.
The operators of play exchanges are not only lacking the mental equipment to keep up, but the capital equipment too, as demonstrated by the fact that they can’t afford their own time and are always “busy working hard.” Compare this with MP, who spends an inordinate amount of time in #bitcoin-assets, while keeping tabs on more than we know and starting even more new projects.vii He’s always there to have a conversation, whether you’re a reporter, the SEC, or a wannabe businessman.
No other operator of any kind, whether in fiat or in Bitcoin, is so accessible. This is both reassuring and enlightening. Imagine having daily conversations with Steve Jobs in the early 1980’s or Mayer Amscheld Rothschild in the early 1800’s. It’s sorta like that.
Other operators hide behind aliases and made-up shell corporations. Mircea Popescu blogs like a madman and hosts conferences in his backyard.
Stocks, Funds, Futures:
Ah yes, the meat and potatoes itself: that which is “invested” in.
Let’s start with an example from one of the play exchanges. So Havelock Investments, originally based in Ontario, Canada and now ostensibly based in Panama, let Canadian CAD-BTC exchange CaVirtex walk away with 4,000 BTC from their “IPO.” And they hosted NeoBee for chrisakes. Basically, they provide a platform for garbage so that they can collect trading fees.
MPEx ,on the other hand, only offers stocks, funds, and futures backed by MP himself. And dude is the richest mother in Bitcoin, worth somewhere around 1,000,000 BTC. He owns a healthy chunk of every stock offering, ensuring that he acts in the interest of shareholders, and he provides all necessary options liquidity himself. MPEx also led the only legitimate stock sale to date with SatoshiDice and has been offering futures for over two years, despite morons’ claims of FIRST and BEST!
So there you have it, strategic superiority.
There may come the day when other Bitcoin exchanges compete, but today, the rest are just for play. There’s only MPEx.
There were never any more.
___ ___ ___
- Looking to register for MPEx? You’ll need more than an e-mail address like you do on the play exchanges. For MPEx:
1. Get bitcoins
2. Set up GPG/PGP and upload the public key to bitcoin-otc.
3. Read the MPEx FAQ vehehery carefully. Several times.
4. Upload the MPEx GPG key (A57D509A) to your keychain
5. Send Mircea Popescu or MPEx an e-mail indicating “I understand that I will be required to pay3050 BTC as fees for registering this account, and I agree and promise to do so.”Yup,
35,000,000,000 satoshis to get a seat at the MPEx table. If you still want to invest in MPEx securities but want to dodge the fee and are okay taking on counterparty risk, you can use a broker, such as jurov’s CoinBr. To test the MPEx waters, I registered for CoinBr yesterday and will be sure to let you know how I fare.↩ - Havelol, as it’s affectionately known, recently published their Q1 report as a fucking Powerpoint. To boot, this report boasts of “average visitor duration” as if they’re selling fucking click ads. It shouldn’t be surprising that they were in the red for February and March. This, despite listing known scams like NeoBee and the even lulzier NeoBeeQ.↩
- GLBSE, BitFunder, and BTCT are all dead as doornails.↩
- via #bitcoin-assets.↩
- How has MPEx solved high-frequency trading, the bane of the NYSE, NASDAQ, etc.? By not allowing instantaneous cancellation of orders. Simple.↩
- MPOE-PR lit up the Bitcointalk forum like no one else. She recently retired as the forum is a hollow ghost town and beating up goons that mercilessly eventually takes a toll.↩
- S.MPIF, a managed bitcoin investment fund, was just launched 2 weeks ago. S.LIMBS, whatever it may be, looks like it isn’t far away either.↩