BBC:
The lure of making a quick buck has always attracted young people to invest in risky assets. For Generation Z, it is the volatility - and the decentralised nature - of digital assets such as cryptocurrency and NFTs which appeals. But they are unregulated, meaning there is little investor protection.
"All my friends were talking about [cryptocurrency] so one day I just decided why not just jump in and see if I can make some money," says 20-year-old Paxton See Tow.
All he needed was his phone and trading thousands of dollars' worth of assets was only a click away.
The gamification of trading is cited as a key attractant for Gen Z investors. Is that good, because it draws more people into investing, or dangerous?
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
How Gen Z is Hooked On Cryptocurrency and NFTs
|
Log In/Create an Account
| Top
| 39 comments
| Search Discussion
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
(1)
(1)
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 19 2022, @08:19PM (1 child)
The farther each generation gets from the Great Depression
the dumber they get.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 20 2022, @08:01PM
QED?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 19 2022, @08:39PM
'tis a bitch to get a direct line into the stock or financial market. it's even worse then trying to connect solar power to the grid :P
anything that allows the 99% to vote directly on the financial markets is a good thing ... and obviously feared by the 1% (which ofc have their multi acre "home" solar connected right-tidely to the grid already).
it seems obvious that anything that involves credit -aka- margin calls should be limited for freshmen. if you haven't burned out after 4 years, got your masters, no debt and some collateral and still think it's a good idea to borrow stuff ...
"robinhood(tm)" is on the right track. the next step would be to go international (anyone anywhere can buy stock anywhere-account). clubbermint bonds and especially corporate bonds (maybe mini-satoshi-fied, bringing down the minimum investment requirment. i mean "hey, why can't we minions also profit from general resource dustruction and waste, eh?")
if you go to the fresh market you don't contact a "dealer" at the entrance and give him the list of stuff you want and money, since everybody without a "badge" or "credentials" isn't allowed in (it REALLY is a communication line w/ router and stuff that links trading houses directly to that ticker board).
no, you walk in look around, check the freshness of the goods, compare prices, hear the life story of the vendor etc etc and pay.
who knows what your designated "dealer" is gonna pull in the mean time, this fish for that fish for this carrot and that salad? sure you're going to get what you put on the list for the cash or else the dealer losses his "credentials" but maybe s/he returns with the items and a big fat tuna for him/herself in the process :P
ofc this is all wishful thinkin' and we're just trying to surf the wake the big players are making ://
(Score: 5, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Thursday May 19 2022, @08:48PM (15 children)
>Is that good, because it draws more people into investing
No, because it's not investing. It's speculating on a power hungry pyramid that will eat itself the minute enough people decide to collectively pull out.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 19 2022, @08:58PM
People who are in won't pull out if they are in a big loss (well, at least most of them, as they gambled with money they couldn't loose). It collapses when the influx of new people dries up.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by mcgrew on Friday May 20 2022, @01:19AM (13 children)
It's a classic Ponzi scheme. Stocks are ownership of a physical company. Bonds are loans to physical companies. Money is backed by the might of the government (by "the government" I mean your money and your government). Bitchcoin is backed by very expensive pixie dust that has no value in the real world whatever.
NFT means "No Fucking Thing". Youth hasn't breathed lead like we geezers did, why aren't they smarter than that?
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 20 2022, @02:18AM (3 children)
No, no it isn't. A "classic" Ponzi scheme [wikipedia.org] generally involves private investors, specified rates of return based solely on influx of new investors, etc.
A few cryptocurrencies might operate sort of like a Ponzi scheme, but more are similar to pump and dump [wikipedia.org] schemes. In fact, several cryptocurrencies have been directly and deliberately operated as pump-and-dumps. It's an open question about whether some of the bigger ones (like BitCoin) are pump-and-dumps -- my understanding is that >25% of BitCoin is owned by less than 0.01% of wallets, for example. Nobody knows who some of the early big holders are... but dumping by several of the big "whales" could easily crash the currency completely.
Anyhow, let's all recognize that there are a wide variety of financial scams. Relatively few of them are "classic Ponzi schemes."
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday May 20 2022, @01:41PM (2 children)
Yes, yes, clearly the world has never seen a Ponzi scheme like BTC, one that is sold electronically, semi-anonymously, with no regard for borders or laws of any kind. It is very innovative, just not very valuable to society as a whole. We already have stacked lotteries run by the state, and at least their profits show up in places like schools and roads instead of Lambos and other overpriced luxuries from real-estate to travel.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1, Disagree) by khallow on Saturday May 21 2022, @04:24AM (1 child)
Perhaps you ought to reread the grandparent who makes a convincing case that Bitcoin is not a Ponzi scheme?
So what? Is your concept of "society as a whole" particularly valuable to anyone, including yourself?
I have a solution here. How about we ban anything I don't like? For a reasonable price, I can be persuaded to not like Bitcoin.
And government corruption, war, etc. Don't you have better things to do than compare cryptocurrencies to government-run lotteries?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 21 2022, @04:37PM
Don't you have something better to do than make bad faith arguments as you whine that people don't like your little investment scheme?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by r_a_trip on Friday May 20 2022, @09:13AM (2 children)
"Youth hasn't breathed lead like we geezers did, why aren't they smarter than that?"
Microplastics in the brain? Too much Ritalin? Endocrine disruptors?
I've noticed that our younger hoomans are very invested in non-tangibles. Be it crypto stuff. Or followers. Media platforms catering to the attention span of a goldfish.
Influencers are the thing I totally don't get. Some random person blathers on the internet and others take their bloviations as gospel. Some seem to make millions with it. To me it doesn't register as a profession. Then again, I'm too old to understand why people need others to tell them what is interesting.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by maxwell demon on Friday May 20 2022, @11:52AM (1 child)
Older businesses are also into non-tangibles. In particular so-called intellectual property.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Friday May 20 2022, @01:43PM
So-called intellectual property is another manifestation of the men with guns who enforce the laws of the land. It plays out in the courts with lawyers, but when the game is over the loser either pays, or gets forcibly locked away.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 3, Interesting) by stretch611 on Friday May 20 2022, @12:09PM (1 child)
I agree...
It is a ponzi scheme.
This computer scientist does change it somewhat and refers to it as a "self assembled ponzi scheme".
https://www.currentaffairs.org/2022/05/why-this-computer-scientist-says-all-cryptocurrency-should-die-in-a-fire/ [currentaffairs.org]
Interesting read, but a tad long IMO.
Now with 5 covid vaccine shots/boosters altering my DNA :P
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday May 20 2022, @01:57PM
Yeah, that should be summarized in 300 words or less - and it is a remarkable exploitation of human vice using the newly freed communication channel of the internet.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 4, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Friday May 20 2022, @01:38PM (3 children)
Lead doesn't just make you stupid, it also makes you psychopathic / lacking in empathy.
Boomers got theirs, everyone else can F off and die.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Friday May 20 2022, @08:29PM (2 children)
I'm the exception that proves the rule? Looking at history it seems people were a lot more psychopathic / lacking in empathy before autos were invented. Slavery, treatment of Blacks, Asians, and Natives; death penalties in all countries; have you read The Golden Book of Springfield [mcgrewbooks.com]? It was written between 1904 and 1918 and was a look ahead to Illinois in its 2018 bicentennial. Remember, cars were still toys for the rich when it was written and there wasn't lead in the air, and it claims to be a glimpse at the future utopia of 2018. In 1904, the 2020's "utopia" had shootings, knifings, murders, even a man deliberately burned alive.
I see you're young. When I was, people had a lot more empathy and the only psychopaths I even heard of were on the news, not running multinational corporations. A CEO earned 40 times the lowest paid employee, now he makes 400 times as much. NOBODY would have threatened your life for asking them to follow store policy, but that's what caused people to quit their jobs, including my daughter. People are far more evil than half a century ago.
Note that there have been no scientific studies, merely unproven theories.
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday May 20 2022, @08:47PM
There's a pretty good correlation between violent crime rates and airborne lead concentrations. You could say "coincidence" but the coincidence repeats in different countries around the world with different lead concentration time-profiles.
This presentation is... entertaining if nothing else: https://youtu.be/IV3dnLzthDA [youtu.be]
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday May 20 2022, @08:52PM
Oh, as for the cruelty of deep history, I'm more likely to attribute that to widespread poverty and the challenges of a pre-oil economy.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 4, Insightful) by istartedi on Thursday May 19 2022, @09:03PM
IMHO, there's a spectrum between investment and gambling. Real estate is mostly an investment, but you're still gambling that a tornado won't rip through town and that the insurance company won't hang you out to dry. You're speculating that the town you buy it in will continue to have a vibrant economy, that you'll be able to rent it and/or sell for a gain.
Crypto, NFT, etc. is closer to a pure gamble. There's no hard asset, no factory taking in raw materials and producing goods for profit, no rent although "staking" comes close; but the underlying proposition is that you're speculating on it continuing to have some cachet, that the next sucker will always be there when it's time to sell.
So the answer for me is "It's dangerous" although it seemed like a rhetorical question.
Appended to the end of comments you post. Max: 120 chars.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 19 2022, @10:37PM (2 children)
... for they have superpowers we can only dream of. Where older people can only see two genders, Gen Z can differentiate at least 97. Where older people can only see a pyramid scam, Gen Z sees a bright future with a retirement funded by the profits they'll make on NFTs.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Friday May 20 2022, @03:31PM
Because as we all know old people have never fallen for scams before!
(Score: 2) by Nobuddy on Friday May 20 2022, @04:28PM
Don't you have a Nigerian Prince to help, grandpa?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by mr_bad_influence on Thursday May 19 2022, @10:51PM (4 children)
Crypto currencies have no tangible assets to back them up like gold or even fiat currency. Therefore their value is based on what I call the 'greater fool theory'. The only way to avoid losing money on these investments is to find someone who is a greater fool than you that will buy them for more than you paid. Of course there is a risk with traditional investments backed by assets as well. You may lose some money but the risk is much less that you will lose it all due to the tangible assets of traditional investments.
Disclaimer - I am not a broker, just an amateur.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by number11 on Friday May 20 2022, @12:33AM (3 children)
One could argue that most fiat currency doesn't either. But the difference is, fiat currency is useful. You can go to the store and buy stuff with it. Transaction costs are nil, or if you're using a credit card, a few percent absorbed by the merchant. Crypto has a lot of transaction friction, transaction costs are high and there are delays, and most merchants won't accept payment that way. What the hell can I buy with 0.01BTC? It's turning out that it's not even super useful for money laundering, they can track your transaction if they want to badly enough. It isn't "decentralized" in any real way, it's just that the places where it is centralized don't answer to anyone but themselves. At least with fiat you can vote a government out, or haul out the guillotines.
So it's like tulip bulbs. The value is that somebody else might give you more money than you paid. Or not. At least you could use the damn tulip bulb to decorate your lot with, even if that isn't worth much money.
Some people believe UFOs are interplanetary aliens, or that you could run your internal combustion engine on water, or crypto. If Gen Z wants to put their money there, it's their choice. Eventually they'll have to come to me, because I've got a working perpetual motion machine and they don't. Just don't come whinging to the rest of us when a software bug makes your "investment" evaporate. Or that it fizzes even if everything is working perfectly.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 20 2022, @04:08AM
Fiat currency has a state behind it.
Depending upon the circumstances of the particular state, there is anything from a lot more backing the fiat currency to a fuck ton more backing the fiat currency than with cryptocurrencies.
States have tax receipts, current and future.
States have assets.
States have armies and police to enforce the usage of their currency.
Most* nations have the ability to control their money supply
*not EU common currency ones, though, nor the several small nations that have adopted the US dollar after their own currencies were devalued to zero value.
(Score: 1, Troll) by darkfeline on Friday May 20 2022, @06:00AM
The fun thing with fiat is that the government can just print a bunch of currency and devalue the currency that you possess. Or authorities can prevent you from sending or receiving money. Zero transaction costs doesn't help you when your assets are frozen.
"But I have nothing to hide!"
You had better not find yourself in the wrong place at the wrong time then, like in the vicinity of a peaceful wrongthink protest.
Join the SDF Public Access UNIX System today!
(Score: 2) by istartedi on Friday May 20 2022, @06:27AM
I think the real difference between crypto and fiat is that there are powerful entities that require I transact in fiat. Countries recognize various things as currencies, and if they don't then there's no compelling reason to deal in them. This is why the El Salvador thing was such a big deal for Bitcoin--it takes away this argument, but just a little. A quick googling reveals that in addition to BTC, USD and the local currency are still valid currencies there (although the local currency is not used) so you don't *have* to have BTC to function in their economy [elsalvadorinfo.net].
Appended to the end of comments you post. Max: 120 chars.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Friday May 20 2022, @12:06AM (6 children)
If you believe you can make a lot of money without doing any work, odds are pretty good you're either scamming somebody, or even more likely being scammed. It's really that simple. Even investing halfway intelligently involves evaluating companies' quarterly reports, following the news about all of your investments and potential investments, developing algorithms to help make AI-driven decisions, that sort of thing.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 20 2022, @12:38AM
More or less, but modern robo advisors keeping a fixed percentage of stocks and bonds doesn't require much effort for the money. Especially since they tend to use index funds.
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Friday May 20 2022, @01:20AM (3 children)
People have been taught that only chumps work for a living.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday May 20 2022, @02:03AM (2 children)
They aren't the only teachers out there. But those teachers do have some useful lessons, if you're into that. A big one is that you can save the fruits of your labor beyond today.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 20 2022, @06:25AM (1 child)
Brought to you by K. khallow, financial advisor. Call today for a free consultation on your retirement plans using the latest in Cryptocurrency! Minimal fees, guaranteed results!
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday May 20 2022, @01:06PM
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 20 2022, @02:00PM
The smart money makers have known for millennia that the real money is made as a middleman. Just a neutral facilitator to help connect parties and close deals. In this case it is the crypto exchanges. Like stock brokers (customs brokers, drug dealers, etc.), they don't really care whether the value goes up or down, just as long as transactions are made and the money passes through their hands (for a very nominal "convenience" fee, of course, entirely understandable). That's why I don't understand the crypto exchanges who close shop and run off with the money. If they can forego the short term gain and realize that if they establish a good reputation for themselves, they can practically print their own money.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 20 2022, @03:25AM (1 child)
Just brings us closer to idiocracy. These punks better hope the world is fully mechanized by the time they grow up to find out they can't do anything.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 20 2022, @04:19AM
These punks also will push any comments like this into the noise.
You are being idiots, the economy crashed in 1929 and the memory of those events matter not to
you because you don't seem to realize it is GOING TO HAPPEN AGAIN if you keep thinking STOOPID
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 20 2022, @05:39AM (1 child)
Which is my biggest red flag with crypto.
I like some of the ideas behind bitcoin, but I see the increase in value for no real world value as a massive negative.
What happened to the startrek dream of plenty, we don't need this adding of artificial scarcity to stuff just to add non existant value.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 20 2022, @08:47PM
Greed, and until we have renewable energy, or fusion, we will not be seeing pist scarcity. It is very close and could be done soon, but greed and power overrule good intentions.