GoldenGoose

That's because the big firms, like Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, Bear Sterns, Lehman Brothers (ad nauseam), only invest in solid investments that never put their clients or their firms at a significant risk of loss.

I enjoy the quality of your work, Hodor. And I am not a spelling/grammar Nazi, especially since typographical errors and auto(in)correct are a part of modern life; but you usually request edits from your readers. Here's one: When referring to the SBI and R3 synergy, "complimentary" role should be "complementary" role. Keep up the great work!

You should short your dog and buy it back later at a lower price.

I've never purchased crypto with a credit card, so I am unfamiliar with the convenience fees charged. I use a card for virtually everything that doesn't charge a fee, though. I've got one that gives me 2% cash back on everything, and another for 5-10% cash back on certain categories and retailers. The key is to be able to pay the balance in full every month. It's entirely conceivable that there could be circumstances where it would make sense to purchase crypto with my 2% cash back card. As a general rule, and in most situations, it wouldn't make sense to do so.

Thank you, Captain Sully!

For starters, we're all seeing it (present tense). The original, Big Dog of crypto just hit its YTD low; and we have to go back more than a year since it last traded at that price. It's by no means an aberration, since most of the other top coins are also continuing to take a beating. That being said, I'm smelling a particular stench coming from USDT. And I can envision it being a further catalyst for future blood, pummeling certain coins like a rented mule. Right or wrong, I don't touch the stuff. Furthermore, I expect XRP to weather the potential storm like the champ it is.

I'm going to go on strike and refuse to BYU or SLEL any more XRP until we stop using the term HODL.

I also don't think we're out of the woods yet with regard to potential USDT problems. Its implosion would be at least a temporary drag on the overall market and a sword of Damocles for certain coins.

You're certainly right. I'm thinking of something on a bigger scale, though; something impacting even the top 10-15 coins/tokens. Perhaps instead of calling it a cleansing, we could refer to it as The Purge. It would certainly be healthy for the long-term benefit of the crypto space; something akin to allowing the occasional Yellowstone fire to avoid the far more catastrophic one [see also California].

I'm no prophet, but I see the cleansing as something far more probable than $10,000 Litecoin.

Bitcoin investors are whistling past the graveyard, as far as I'm concerned. Not only will we fully decouple, a failure to do so may start to feel like a Weekend at Bernie's.

Hear! Hear!

Ah, yes. We would all benefit from more of that.

The intrinsic value of a $1,000 bill is one thousand dollars, so long as it is legal tender for goods and services. However, this bill is no longer in circulation; and market forces of supply and demand may put its total value at, say, $1,800. If I'm foolish enough to go spend one at Walmart, I can buy $1,000 worth of stuff. If I sell it to a private collector, I could expect to get much more money to go spend at Walmart. The total market price for something can even take it below its intrinsic value, but it's usually the sum of its intrinsic value plus whatever premium the market dictates. I consider XRP to be a bargain at the moment, and yet I still believe it will reach a new 12-month low before it surpasses its ATH. I certainly don't blame Ripple for that, though.

Unless he's got some side deal with Jed McCaleb, the most recent opportunity to buy XRP "around $.20" would have been in early December.