Finance

Bitcoin Bet: Niche, Novelty or Revolution

/ Matthew Clemente / Leave a comment

Bitcoin Bet: Niche, Novelty or Revolution

The most recent episode of the Planet Money podcast discussed a bet between high profile venture capitalist Ben Horowitz and Reuters financial reporter Felix Salmon over the future of the virtual currency Bitcoin.  

Here is a description of the podcast: 

Ben Horowitz is a big-time venture capitalist. His firm invested in Facebook and Twitter. More recently, the firm invested some $50 million in startups related to bitcoin, the virtual currency that works like online cash. Ben thinks bitcoin is going to change the way people buy and sell stuff on the Internet.

Felix Salmon, a high-profile finance blogger at Reuters, is a prominent bitcoin skeptic.

So when Felix recently published an essay calling bitcoin a bubble that was sure to burst, Benposted a comment challenging him to a bet over the future of bitcoin.

“I said, ‘Why don’t we just bet?'” Ben told us. “And I’ve read enough of Felix’s stuff to know that would be irresistible to him.”

“He’s right about that,” Felix said. “Being challenged by Ben Horowitz is kind of a high point of my career. So I immediately said yes.”

When we heard about the challenge, we invited Felix and Ben to come on Planet Money to hash out the details of the bet. Basically, we offered to be their bookie. Fortunately for us, they accepted.

For more about Bitcoin from the SLACE Archive see:  

Bitcoin and the Law (Jan. 15, 2014)

Bitcoin: The Virtual Currency Bubble? (April 13, 2013)

 

Bitcoin and the Law

/ Matthew Clemente / 2 Comments

Bitcoin and the Law

Recently, my professor for Commercial Transactions mentioned Bitcoin, a new online currency.  It is not money according to the Uniform Commercial Code, but it increasingly used as currency throughout the United States and around the world.  The latest edition of the Lawyer to Lawyer podcast discussed the legal issues surrounding Bitcoin. 

Here is a description of the podcast: 

If you had bought $1,000 worth of Bitcoins in 2010, you would have $2.4 million dollars today. The anonymous, Internet-based currency has seen an exponential rise in value and popularity since its inception in 2009. This raises legal questions regarding the legitimacy, the legalities, and what lawyers need to know about this new currency. In this edition of Lawyer2Lawyer hosts Bob Ambrogiand J. Craig Williams invite Bitcoin experts, attorney Lowell D. Ness and journalist Kashmir Hill, to provide some answers and a foretelling of the e-currency’s future.

Ness is a partner of the nationwide law firm Perkins Coie which has extensive experience in virtual currency. The firm’s Virtual Currency Report Blog, which Lowell regularly contributes to, provides a legal outlook on the state of bitcoin and the market. Lowell’s practice focuses on high-growth emerging companies and involves venture capital financings, mergers and acquisitions, public offerings, and private placements.

Senior Online Editor of Forbes, Hill is a privacy pragmatist with an interest in the intersection of law, technology, social media, and personal information. Former editor of Above the Law, she has been following the Bitcoin story from the start, and will be releasing an e-book documenting Bitcoin’s rise later this year.

Father of High-Frequency Trading Advocates Slow Down

/ Matthew Clemente / Leave a comment

Father of High-Frequency Trading Advocates Slow Down

NPR’s Planet Money recent re-aired the story of Thomas Peterffy, a financial innovator that helped chang how (fast) stock trading occurs.  Here is a description of the story:

Thomas Peterffy’s life story includes a typing robot, a proto-iPad, and a vast fortune he amassed as one of the first guys to use computers in financial markets.

On today’s show, Peterffy tells us his story — and he explains why he’s worried about the financial world he helped create.