[throwaway392321]

Markets are not zero sum in aggregate. Every trade is zero sum-- a buyer has to be matched with a seller at a price. However, the price of an asset can move without any trades. Your perspective would seem to imply that overall economic growth of all markets could not happen without an equivalent amount of loss somewhere else. Clearly this is not the case.

[user-the-name]

Cryptocurrency trading is not the same as a regular market. None of the things that make a regular stock market not a zero-sum game do not apply to cryptocurrency markets. And cryptocurrencies are actually negative sum, due to miners and fees.

[throwaway392321]

> Cryptocurrency trading is not the same as a regular market.

Could you substantiate what you see here with a concrete difference? Particularly in terms of my argument that an asset price can move without actual trades being made. If positive news comes out about bitcoin, the price can immediately move without any trading, or at least without every bitcoin needing to realize a gain through trading. This would be an example of growth in value that is not zero sum. Stocks can do the same thing as well. This is actually very visible when a stock opens with a gap from prior closing price.

> And cryptocurrencies are actually negative sum, due to miners and fees.

I'm not sure how you reached that conclusion. Fees and miner inflation are a drag on the asset class, I agree. But stocks also have fees to trade and issue, and are subject to dilution through new issuing. The issue is whether the drag is larger or smaller than growth of the asset.

[user-the-name]

> If positive news comes out about bitcoin, the price can immediately move without any trading

I mean, it can't? The "price" is literally defined as the price of the latest trade.

The mistake you are making here is the assumption that there is a "value" in a bitcoin that can change. This is true for a stock - it represent a fraction of ownership of a company, and a company has real value. That value can go up and down for a number of reasons. The price of the stock may not be the same as its actual value for various reasons, but that value exists independently of the stock price.

This is not true for bitcoins. They do not represent anything, there is no ownership of anything but the bitcoin itself. It only has value inasmuch as it can be traded. Bitcoiners like to claim that the technology represented by bitcoin has "value", but a bitcoin itself does not represent a share of that value.

A bitcoin is a game token, that can be used to play a game where you win or lose money. The game is negative sum, because the only value you can gain is value being put in by other players, and there are cuts being taken by various parties for playing the game.

[throwaway392321]

> I mean, it can't? The "price" is literally defined as the price of the latest trade.

Check out how an order book works: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_book. I'm referring to the bid and the ask price. These often do differ substantially from the last trade price, and represent what someone is willing to pay to buy or receive to sell the asset right now. These can move without any trades actually being made. The price you are referring to is the last price.

But the broader point is that the market cap can move much faster or slower than the total traded value. It would not take exactly a 1 billion dollar buy order to move bitcoin price up 1 billion dollars in market cap, it would probably move much more than that. Same thing for stocks. So your assumption that the total cap of something represents exactly that many dollars being put in by investors is wrong, in general it will be far fewer dollars put in.

> The mistake you are making here is the assumption that there is a "value" in a bitcoin that can change.

I'm making the assumption that the value of a bitcoin is the price someone is willing to pay for it, which is supported by the evidence of what a market actually does pay for it. I tend to base my understanding of the world based on things that can actually be measured and that I can verify. You are asserting, may I add without any evidence, that its value is actually zero. I would challenge you to try to give a definition of "value" that is actually measurable, and that can lead to meaningful predictions about the world. Even if you had a perfect god's eye view of the "real value" of every asset, you'd still have to account for human behavior the irrationality of markets.

> This is not true for bitcoins. They do not represent anything, there is no ownership of anything but the bitcoin itself. It only has value inasmuch as it can be traded.

Your argument that value is only real if it represents "real" ownership would seem to imply that cash settled derivatives markets, which are some of the most liquid markets there are, also have zero value because they don't actually represent ownership of anything and are merely trading instruments. Similarly, cash itself, by your own logic, would have zero value, as it does not represent ownership in anything.

[user-the-name]

No, that is obviously not the only kind of value you can have. That is one. I am saying bitcoin has none of them.

And, again, mathematically, bitcoin trading is negative sum. This has nothing to do with what the price is. It can go up, down, or stay the same. The game is still negative sum in the end.

[throwaway392321]

> No, that is obviously not the only kind of value you can have. That is one. I am saying bitcoin has none of them.

Please elucidate me on the "kind of value" that cash or cash settled derivatives have, and that that bitcoin would not have.

> And, again, mathematically, bitcoin trading is negative sum. This has nothing to do with what the price is. It can go up, down, or stay the same. The game is still negative sum in the end.

The price is absolutely relevant. If the price were to only increase no one would ever realize a loss on an investment on bitcoin. (I don't think this has any chance of happening, I'm just illustrating why price does matter "mathematically").