Overstock.com attempting to democratize Wall Street with Bitcoin?

[think]

Overstock.com Assembles Coders to Create a Bitcoin-Like Stock Market

By Cade Metz 10.06.14 | 5:15 PM |

Overstock.com is building software, based on the bitcoin digital currency, that could allow the big-name etailer to issue corporate stock over the internet, sidestepping traditional stock exchanges such as the NASDAQ and the New York Stock Exchange.

The Salt Lake City-based company recently hired two of the developers behind CounterParty—an online project that helps individuals and businesses build all sorts of financial services atop the worldwide network of machines that drive bitcoin—and according to Overstock founder and CEO Patrick Byrne, these coders will help build “cryptosecurity” software that any company could potentially use to issue financial securities over the net. Mirroring bitcoin—known as a “crytocurrency”—these securities would be controlled by cryptographic algorithms running across computers spread across the globe, not by a central stock exchange.

Code-named “Medici,” the project aims to democratize Wall Street in much the same way bitcoin seeks to democratize currency and payments. By operating separate from traditional stock exchanges and the big corporate banks, it could eliminate certain loopholes in the system and reduce the costs associated with issuing and juggling stock.

Full article:

http://www.wired.com/2014/10/overstock-com-assembles-coders-build-bitcoin-like-stock-market?partner=skygrid

Not sure what to think of this but it is an intriguing concept.....

[SheilaT]

1. Bitcoin is still around?

I thought it totally collapsed recently.

[randome]

2. Only a few times.

What everyone seems to ignore is that there is a finite amount of Bitcoin in the universe. The few who gobble up the 'coinage' will be the winners in what can be done with it.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]Birds are territorial creatures.
The lyrics to the songbird's melodious trill go something like this:
"Stay out of my territory or I'll PECK YOUR GODDAMNED EYES OUT!"[/center][/font][hr]

[SheilaT]

4. I seem to recall that when I first read about Bitcoin

was that the very finite amount of it was supposed to be an advantage. Which reminded me of what I think I know about late 19th century economics in this country, which is that the amount of gold and perhaps silver coinage was fixed for quite a while, and as a result those who could rake in the stuff (think the industrialists and robber barons of that era) did quite well, but those at the low end of the economy, like farmers and ordinary workers, suffered.

[Cayenne]

7. There was far less inequality then than now

Money was not conjured up from nothing and then put into the pockets of the rich like what is happening now.

[SheilaT]

11. While the whole thing with banking and the like

was not around in the 19th century, the lack of actual money was, as I understand it, a problem. Plus, the railroads had a total monopoly on getting goods to market, and often charged freight rates that meant the farmers saw very little profit at all. So what money there was went into the pockets of the rich back then.

It's just that there's an awful lot more money around to go into those pockets these days.

[Cayenne]

12. Everybody had silver in their pockets

The rich had to spend their gold and silver to get anything. America thrived on the gold system.

After slavery, the creation of the Fed and establishing an income tax are among Americas biggest blunders. The Fed was explicitly created to give the rich more wealth and power and it worked. It did not make racketeering and monopolies go away and in fact made graft by the rich easier. The Fed solved nothing and made debt slaves of the masses.

[paulkienitz]

5. all that can be done with bitcoin is, in the end, to speculate

It has no inherent value. This, combined with its scarcity and hype, make it an almost perfectly engineered medium for producing speculative bubbles.

[Cayenne]

8. Paypal and Square are integrating Bitcoin

among increasingly more retailers. Bitcoin is finder more market acceptance worldwide. Latin American countries with debased currencies, namely Brazil and Argentina, find it useful. Filipinos working abroad are remitting their earnings home via Bitcoin. Despite the price drop, Bitcoin price adoption is still going up.

[paulkienitz]

9. and that's just fine if you're using it to convey value rather than to store it

Short-term uses to send money may be convenient. Longer term ownership is bubble speculation.

[paulkienitz]

3. just what we need: an even more volatile and unregulated speculative market

[LeftinOH]

6. Bitcoin = Today's Beanie Babies. n/t