So where are the so called "smart money" investments?
That is not for me to decide. As someone very involved in this space, I have made my assessments as to what projects are promising.
real investors will consider it a high risk otherwise known as "dumb" investment
I am a real investor. There is plenty of interest from large VCs in blockchain tech. They just tend to be more conservative with their funds. Anderseen is quite keen on blockchain so are many others.
but where else can the ETH go and what else can it be used for right now? Where are the lower risk "smart" or "safe" investments you speak of?
Well most people misunderstand the purpose of ETH. It is a base protocol incentive token. Basically it is the gas for the Ethereum blockchain. Investors of ETH are confident in the future usecases for the ETH blockchain. I am not going to point you in any direction for a "safe" or "smart" investment. That needs top be for you to decide objectively.
I will simply list a few projects that I think are interesting. I will not detail my actual holdings.
- Monero
- Augur (REP)
- Maker (MKR)
- Digix
- Akasha
- Cosmos
- Polkdot
- iEx.ec
Just to name a few. As some of these haven't shown any working code, they could be entirely scams.
Right and I'm aware of those projects but all are vulnerable to regulatory risk. Ethereum itself is vulnerable to regulatory risk. So that is what I mean.
Even if a project isn't a scam, and everyone building it is competent, it doesn't mean it will work out well. Tokencard for example, probably isn't a scam, and they probably are competent enough to pull it off, but will it be legal?
Anyone involved in cryptocurrency is operating in the grey. They won't even let an ETF get SEC approval.
I'm fully aware of that but it doesn't change the fact that someone with 5000 ETH isn't ever going to spend it all on gas. And when that 5000 ETH is worth a million dollars what can they do with it besides choose their ICOs?
I argue that regulation is not much of an issue. It is either allow the internet or not. Period.
Not having crypto is the least of the problems when there is no internet. Sure they could try to regulate Bitcoin but the entire point of the bitcoin protocol is to resist that very regulation. If you look at countries like Japan legalizing these cryptos, the smart places will allow their economies to thrive.
The entire point of this space is an indifference to legality. That is for consensus to decide.
The ETF is a much more complex issue than I care to detail but there are many forces acting against. I'm fairly certain one will come along in due time.
Sure, no one is spending thousands of ether on gas. That completely misses the point of a protocol incentive token. The locked ether as stake, the value of the underlying contract execution is entirely based on the value of ether. If you see ETH as simply a vehicle for ICOs I believe you are mistaken. Ether is a vital incentive structure within the protocol that will run many economies on the layer above.
Well also when 5000 ETH is work millions, you could just sell it for millions.
Care to elaborate what you mean by this?
I wouldn't go that far as that might be politically correct but not necessarily accurate. I would say the legal risks are real and the whole point in rational economic behavior would be to get the most reward with the least risk. I admit it's not as high of a risk as some people think but it's not a situation of zero risk either, so we cannot act as if laws don't matter.
Do we really want an ETF though?
I agree with this. Ethereum will be able to do much more than ICOs eventually.
And also pay millions in taxes. It is not obvious where to cash out or what the tax situation is. The IRS with Coinbase has made it very difficult to determine the tax risks. For small amounts of money it might not be much risk but if you're talking millions you will have to hire a lawyer possibly.
What is your answer to this?