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Keeping Bitcoins on the Balance Sheet

posted by martyb on Friday September 08 2017, @09:09AM   
from the the-times-they-are-a'-changin' dept.

An Anonymous Coward writes:

Overstock.com and the Internet Archive have separately discussed their decisions to hold onto cryptocurrencies rather than convert them immediately. From news.bitcoin.com:

Operating as a 501(c)(3) non-profit, the Internet Archive has accepted bitcoin donations since 2012. This week Kahle decided to explain to the public in a blog post why bitcoin remains a fixture in the nonprofit's balance sheet.

"A foundation was curious as to why we have Bitcoin on our balance sheet, and I thought I would explain it publicly," explains Kahle. "The Internet Archive explores how bitcoin and other Internet innovations can be useful in the non-profit sphere – this is part of it. We want to see how donated bitcoin can be used, not just sold off."

[...] At the beginning of August the company's CEO, Patrick Byrne revealed it is currently stashing fifty percent of its bitcoin revenue. Byrne has been [a] long-time bitcoin proponent and believes the technology behind the decentralized currency will be the future of finance. During a budget report, Byrne revealed the business used to keep 10 percent of the daily bitcoin revenue the company earned and converted the rest of the funds to USD. Now Byrne details that the corporation's board of directors has authorized a strategy to hold fifty percent of the firm's bitcoin revenue.

The original announcements:
http://blog.archive.org/2017/09/02/why-bitcoin-is-on-the-internet-archives-balance-sheet/
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/edited-transcript-ostk-earnings-conference-155549361.html (requires ECMAScript to "Read More")

Note: "HODL" appears to be a bitcoin joke, see here

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Original Submission

• Only good for moderately shitty situations Only good for moderately shitty situations (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 08 2017, @12:48PM (6 children)

  by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 08 2017, @12:48PM (#565047)

  If the shit really hits the fan, you can expect to not have internet connectivity (indeed, you'll be lucky if you have electricity). Good luck paying with bitcoins in that situation. And yes, you can print your bitcoins; but how do you prove that what you have printed are real bitcoins without access to a computer and the blockchain?

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• I used to think that way, too I used to think that way, too (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 08 2017, @01:04PM (5 children)

  by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 08 2017, @01:04PM (#565059)

  • There is no point in planning for the zombie apocalypse; if things get that bad, it virtually doesn't matter what any of your previous investment decisions have been. I mean, you might as well just put a bullet in your head right now if you're going to plan your life around such scenarios.

  • There's nothing stopping an organization from minting hard-copy bills/coins with embedded Bitcoin data; trading those things would be no different than trading dollars today—it would just be an "off-chain" transaction, and it would be possible for anyone who is worried to take those hard copies back to some central location to be checked on what little of the Bitcoin network people do manage to get up and running; with back-up generators, radio communications equipment, and a few spare computers, you could still do that kind of thing.

  Parent

  • Re:I used to think that way, too Re:I used to think that way, too (Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Friday September 08 2017, @02:46PM (3 children)

    by maxwell demon (1608) on Friday September 08 2017, @02:46PM (#565117) Journal

    You think you need a zombie apocalypse in order to lose electricity? A blown-up transformer and nobody available to fix it are more than sufficient for that scenario. If you think of a backup generator in your cellar, note that it is not sufficient that you have electricity. Every router between you and the place you want to reach needs to have electricity; especially the first one at your ISP that you connect to. If you count on mobile, that also holds for the base station.

    --
    The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.

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    • What is wrong with you? What is wrong with you? (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 08 2017, @03:58PM (2 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 08 2017, @03:58PM (#565162)

      The zombie apocalypse is the indefinite loss of electricity, etc.

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      • Re:What is wrong with you? Re:What is wrong with you? (Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Friday September 08 2017, @04:11PM (1 child)

        by maxwell demon (1608) on Friday September 08 2017, @04:11PM (#565168) Journal

        No electricity is enough for the zombie apocalypse? Really?

        Because no electricity is certainly enough for the "bitcoin apocalypse".

        --
        The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.

        Parent

        • Re:What is wrong with you? (Score: 2) by coolgopher on Saturday September 09 2017, @02:38AM

          by coolgopher (1157) on Saturday September 09 2017, @02:38AM (#565468)

          I'm pretty sure you need some zombies too.

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  • Re:I used to think that way, too (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 08 2017, @04:57PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 08 2017, @04:57PM (#565195)

    if things get that bad, it virtually doesn't matter what any of your previous investment decisions have been.

    Unless you've been investing in ammo and canned goods.

    Parent