SBD is currently trading for around $2.
Most people are aware by now that SBD has been consistently trading above $1. Way above $1 actually. Currently you can get about $2.04 worth of STEEM if you trade 1 SBD for STEEM on the internal market. You can get about $1.97 worth of BTC if you export 1 SBD to Poloniex and exchange it.
So why is this a problem?
If a shop owner wants to sell a shirt that costs $12 USD to make, and they want to make an $8 profit, they will want to to list their shirt for $20 SBD. If $20 is a fair market price for the shirt, and SBD is trading for $2 - then why would a customer pay $20 SBD for the shirt if they could go to an exchange and get $40 USD instead? The shop owner can either hope for a customer who is willing to pay $40 for their shirt, or lower the price to $10 SBD to equal $20 USD.
Say the shop owner is successful, and they sell 100 of their shirts in a month at $10 SBD. Then let's say that by the end of the month when they go to cash out, SBD is back to $1 USD. The shop owner would now have $1,000 SBD worth $1,000 USD. This is their payment for 100 shirts, which cost them $1,200 to make. Instead of making an $800 profit off the sale of 100 shirts, this owner just lost 200 bucks (and their time).
An alternative is for the shop owner to constantly monitor the price of SBD, and change the price of their shirts based on the current market price, as well as cash out any SBD as soon as payments are made. This is a lot of work for a shop owner though, and then they are spending their time dealing with currency fluctuations instead of selling shirts.
A robust STEEM/SBD marketplace is a key to mass adoption.
The STEEM/SBD ecosystem would benefit greatly by having hundreds/thousands of shops that accept STEEM or SBD as payment.
The fact that STEEM/SBD can actually be used for something is a major key towards mass adoption of the platform and currency. Users would have something tangible that they could do with their "magic internet money", besides just sending it to an exchange and cashing it out.
SBD was intended to be a stable currency.
Shop owners will have a much easier time selling their goods and services for STEEM/SBD if one of them is a stable currency. This was one of the main reasons to have SBD in addition to STEEM.
Having a stable SBD currency allow shops to accept it as payment without having to worry about drastically fluctuating prices. Then they can focus on selling more widgets to their customers (i.e. us).
(image credit @steemitguide)
Holding SBD at $1
The free market decides the price of STEEM, but SBD is supposed to be held at 'around $1'. There are various tools in the witnesses' tool-belt to aid with this, and the whitepaper has given guidance on how to use those tools. They are limited in what they allow witnesses to do though.
What we have found is that the tool-belt allows the witnesses to do a pretty decent job at pushing the price of SBD up when the peg starts to trend below $1, but it does not provide very good mechanisms to push SBD down when the peg starts to trend above $1.
Proposed Solution
A proposed solution to deal with the problem is to allow users to "reverse convert" STEEM to SBD. This would allow the user to take "approximately one dollar worth of STEEM" (based on the 3.5 day witness price feed average), and convert it into 1 SBD.
This process would destroy the STEEM tokens, and create new SBD tokens - in the exact same way that SBD is destroyed and STEEM is created when users convert SBD->STEEM today.
How would this fix the peg?
If SBD was trading for above $2, users would be able to convert $1 worth of STEEM into 1 SBD, then sell it for $2. They would end up with an extra $1, and this will put downward pressure on the price of SBD.
This would continue until enough new SBD reaches the market to push the price back to $1 again. For as long as SBD remains above $1, users will continue to convert STEEM->SBD and push it down.
But what about the debt?
One big fear about this process is that too much SBD could be created. Users may continue converting STEEM into SBD until the level of SBD debt becomes too high.
With the current 10% debt limit that is in place, this should not be a major problem. This will likely serve as an upward bound on the amount of SBD created, although even if it does not - the blockchain's liability will be limited to 10% of the STEEM marketcap.
The way the blockchain rules are currently defined - if the SBD debt is above 10% of the STEEM marketcap, users will get "less than one dollar worth of STEEM" if they try to convert SBD back into STEEM. This would remain unchanged as part of the proposal.
What this means is that as the debt level approaches 10% of the STEEM marketcap, there will be additional risk for holding SBD, since users may not be able to get the dollar back if they try to convert back the other way.
If SBD is still trading above $1 at this point, then more users will likely sell their SBD to avoid the additional risk - putting more downward pressure on the price.
If users still want to buy/hold SBD at this point, and the price continues to trade above $1 (even after the 10% limit is reached), then they can continue to generate even more SBD, just with the added risk that they will no longer be able to convert it back to STEEM and still get $1 worth.
Added Benefits
In addition to pushing down the price of SBD, allowing users to convert SBD->STEEM would increase the demand for STEEM as well, because more users will be buying STEEM to convert and make money via conversion. This will put upward pressure on the price of STEEM if/when there is high demand for SBD.
Plus, in the process of doing this they will be destroying STEEM tokens, which will be decreasing the supply of STEEM! This is beneficial to STEEM/SP holders, as less supply means the existing tokens become worth more.
Will this work?
I have discussed with several other witnesses and community members, and everybody I have talked to seems to think that this is a good solution to the problem. At this point, this is just a proposal though. Nobody from Steemit, Inc. has commented on or endorsed the idea.
For now, I am just looking for feedback.
If the consensus seems to be that everyone thinks this is a good idea and nobody sees any major issues with it, then I will recommend that it be considered for a future hard-fork.
Thank you for reading
Thank you for taking the time to read and consider my proposal. If you have any thoughts for or against the idea, please share in the comments below!
Reminder to vote for witnesses!
The Steem witnesses are the elected leaders of the community that power the blockchain. If you don't know much about witnesses or aren't sure who to vote for, you can check out this Witness Voting Guide. If you think @timcliff is doing a great job, please consider voting for him as witness! You can vote for witnesses here: https://steemit.com/~witnesses
Interesting idea.
I'm of the view that the Steem inflation is what caused the push into SBD. People saw their account values dwindle. I know there's been a lot of reluctance of these same people to sell their SBD (there were even challenges to do this for a while).
I think this will resolve itself in time, as people being to trust Steem again to hold value.
I agree with @timcliff that at this point the action in SBD has little to do with STEEM or Steem users. It trades more or less independently on the Poloniex exchange (and others, but Poloniex is the largest) and in volumes that are far greater than what Steem users are responsible for.
What drives the SBD price is the value that is attached to it by speculators as well as overall demand in the cryptocurrency economy for stable tokens (especially given the problems that have surfaced with the market leader Tether). We've seen the same sort of sudden and large surge of trading into BitUSD (bitshares dollar token), except that in that case the peg was held much better because Bitshares has the ability to create new BitUSD tokens as needed to satisfy demand (by shorting).
a friend of mine wrote an interesting article about this:
https://steemit.com/steem/@mathsinnature/rethinking-the-steemit-monetary-system-wallet
It may have been what started us down the path, but at this point I think we have gone way past that as the reason. STEEM has been doing amazing recently, and there has been plenty of opportunity for people to dump their SBD in exchange for either STEEM or BTC/USD. I've discussed with a lot of other people, and I think there is more of a fundamental market-force at play. Traders are willing to buy/hold SBD even well past the point that they are guaranteed their "1 USD worth of STEEM" in return. There seems to be way more demand than the current circulating supply can satisfy.
Agree
I think the best strategy is for the community to just sell there SBD for STEEM, as it is basically getting STEEM at half price, since SBD is only meant to be worth $1, not $2!
Do you think this supports Steem at a higher price? Should I be buying Steem if I believe in if? I'm kicking myself for not getting more at 0.06 but if this is the new bottom at 1.50 should I buy more and power up or buy more and hold?
It's a very good question, but I'm not a trader. Personally, I think that in the long-term there is a lot of upwards potential, but I have little clue what it will be doing in the short/medium term.
Hell yes it will. Image the crypto bubble pops and people want to sell crypto for a stable asset without using banks..... this could push a lot of demand for sbd which then will push steem.
As a trader myself in SBD Tim, I just fear for the law of unintended consequences here. Any changes could make investors flee the SBD on Bittrex for example. This is already a v.volatile instrument to trade! Perhaps your plan could bring some stability to the price in the long term, but not in the short term. Interesting plan :) Upvoted.
Very good point. Short term consequences are definitely an item for concern.
I just wish the Steem price would catch up and surpass the SBD price ... that time will come though through good organic growth :)
Hope so too :) I feel that it will eventually. Likely sooner rather than later.
Looking at the daily charts I fully expect it to hit $2 before I get home from my 3 week vacation in Israel :)
This post is soooo relevant right about now... What is up with the SBD USD peg? How will it get fixed?
There is very high demand for SBD right now, most likely to it (and STEEM) getting added to a new Korean exchange recently. I agree 100% that this post is super relevant right now! IMO, the fix is what I propose here.
Absent that, witnesses can play around with their price feeds to increase SBD production, but if they do this it harms SBD->STEEM converters. It can also end up causing additional inflation in the long-term. So based on this, I do not think it is a good solution (which is why I recommended what I put above).
Assuming this doesn't get implemented, and witnesses don't artificially increase SBD production, then we basically just have to wait for supply to catch up with demand - which may take a while. In the meantime, anyone who has SBD gets an extra bonus when they go to cash out :)
True, that bonus sure is juicy lol. I honestly think that one of the factors that is exacerbating the problems with the SBD peg is the fact that most bots request SBD for their services. I think the SBD demand can be eased if all bots accepted both Steem and SBD.
The great thing about your proposal is that it will lift up the steem price. As people will buy steem to then generate sbd.
Ona nother note sbd will be required by the masses when the crypto bubble pops and this really help steem be stable when sbd is the best way to get out of cryptos without having to use fiat.
You make a great point! Something to consider. I have added you to my following. Thanks
@digestingreality
You have a new follower also!
Thank you!
Yea has to be done just like you suggested.
Btw the $2 price is great indication for steem but ubare right sbd is more valuable to the platform if the peg is stable.
Followed.
I hope it just grows and grows!
I support the idea, because it's important to preserve SBD as a pegged asset. I just have one minor point to make.
This process wouldn't destroy or burn the STEEM. It would move it from the balance of a user into the virtual supply. The virtual supply must always have enough STEEM to cover conversion of all the SBD in existence.
Even if the price of SBD declines as intended, it won't eliminate any of that STEEM. Future conversions back to STEEM will move the STEEM back into the total supply.
It's not the same as burning SBD through promoting posts, where the SBD is removed along with the appropriate amount of STEEM from the virtual supply. It's similar to conversions of SBD to STEEM, but while SBD conversions reduce volatility of supply, this proposal will introduce volatility.
It's a minor point, but an important one to consider when looking ahead. If the STEEM price declines after creating these SBD, it will increase the debt load and potentially also the liquid supply. This could hypothetically work to put further downward pressure on an already declining price.
It's still a good proposal, in my opinion. But we need to be aware of all the ramifications, so that we can respond proactively if need be.
But USD isn't an asset...
Why not find a way to burn them instead?
Thanks @bacchist! Appreciate the support of the idea, and the clarification. You are right about it converting the STEEM into 'virtual supply'.
Yes, this is the biggest concern against the proposal. One that is really only addressed in a serious way by the 10% debt limit. Pretty much any proposal that solves the high peg by increasing SBD production though (whether it be via reverse conversion or a premium price feed bias) is going to have the same effect. The main difference is that the reverse conversion process allows it to achieve the 'result' much faster.
Since you brought up the debt limit... maybe we can amend the proposal to remove the debt limit "haircut", since it will introduce a vulnerability where bad actors can single handedly drive up the debt limit. A bad actor could force a haircut, pulling the rug out from under SBD, buy them for cheap and then resell them after the market normalized.
The concern you brought up is valid, but there is also market manipulation that can be done without the limit in place. In my mind a bad actor could cause a lot more damage if they had the ability to create unlimited virtual STEEM, and then unlimited 'actual' STEEM in reverse.
The limit creates an existential/systemic vulnerability to market conditions already. I've posted about this in the past:
https://steemit.com/witness-category/@bacchist/witness-petition-do-not-abandon-the-peg
It has little benefit to offset the risk it represents. It is intended to mitigate the risk of a rising debt load that threatens to create destabilizing amounts of liquid STEEM. But in this case, the sickness isn't much worse than the cure.
You stated that your rationale for not using a positive bias to address the peg was that you wanted to preserve the "1 USD worth of STEEM" contract. Since the debt limit/haircut formally breaks that contract, you might want to consider whether that is something we can dispense of as well... or at least raise, to the point that it won't be an immediate concern as soon as SBD production halts at 5% debt load.
Moving it to even 15% or 20% will limit the vulnerability from bad actors if your proposal goes through, as well as allowing time for the throttling of SBD rewards to bring the debt load into a manageable range before the haircut.
I see your point. It is one of those things that has it's trade-offs. It just depends on which positives/negatives you weigh more heavily.
I do see the limit as different than a price feed premium, as it is coded in the blockchain - thus part of the 'contract'. The fact that it is not very well known/communicated is a different issue, but not one of violation IMO.
I am definitely open to discussion about the 'right' numbers. I suspect the ones we have today were largely arbitrary choices, and there may be better limits to have in place that would accomplish the same goal of mitigating risk without having as much of a negative side effect.
I do think though that wherever the limit is, there will be a natural tendency for the peg to get pushed down as the debt level reaches 50% of the limit (currently 5% debt) and definitely even more so when it reaches 100% of the limit (currently 10% debt).
To a large extent, regardless of where the limit is, I think the biggest risk in the whole thing is getting to 50% of that limit, and then seeing a 50% price drop in STEEM. Unfortunately wherever we place the limit, I think that risk will always be present so long as the limit is in place.
Likewise the ability of witnesses to feed any data they want as the alleged price is also coded into the blockchain. If stakeholders don't like it they can vote those witnesses out. So far we seem about evenly divided between voted witnesses using a premium (and doing so with at least some rational basis, not just feeding garbage or clearly-malicious values) and those not, so no clear stakeholder preference, but I'd still argue none of this violates the smart contract in the code.
Maybe. When one considers "existential/systemic" vulnerabilities as @bacchist claims, there is a reasonable argument that should override other tradeoffs (at least others that do not also involve such systemic risks).
That being said, one can question whether his claim is correct. I have some similar concerns.
I should also point out that if this proposal goes through, the calculation should be independent of the haircut. IE, if the debt load surpasses 10% and SBD -> STEEM conversions produce less than $1 of STEEM, it should never cost less than $1 of STEEM to create 1 SBD. That would be a catastrophe.
Agree 100%
Agree on your entire comment, but just to clarify on this one point, this is simply leverage, and works in both directions (both up and down) and, in general, the leverage ratio is quite low (1.1x at the most). In fact I would argue that in most circumstances that low of a leverage ratio is reasonable to ignore. The extremely poor liquidity pre-HF16 might have been a circumstance where it wouldn't be, but even that I'm not sure about. A situation with bad liquidity and declining demand is probably just about as bad with 1x leverage as with 1.1x.
I don't think we should be playing the role of central banker by trying to manipulate the currency to our desired target. Rather, I believe we should let the market work and it will eventually find what it determines is a fair price.
That's a valid philosophy but it isn't what SBD is.
SBD is a managed pegged asset. It is essentially managed by people who are not literally central bankers but metaphorically are in that they perform similar functions, as described in the Steem white paper (for example, setting interest rate policy). It literally isn't possible to avoid doing so because there is an interest rate parameter and a decision must be made what value it should take (potentially including 0%).
In fact, the interest rate on SBD can even be negative to uphold the peg if needed. This may help to get the peg back to 1:1 quite rapidly.
It could, in principle, but that function is not implemented in the Steem blockchain.
In the STEEM world, I agree with you 100% - but that was not the intention behind SBD. Based on what is in the whitepaper, the intention of SBD was for it to be a stable currency, and the blockchain is designed to allow 'manipulation' with the intention of 1. holding the peg, and 2. honoring the 'approximately 1 USD worth of STEEM' contract via conversions.
Surprised this isn't in roadmap suggestions unless I've missed it...
SBD well over $2 now.
I could be wrong on that but I feel like the price is pumping because people want to invest in steem but they don't want to buy a currency where the whitepaper said there is 100% inflation.
Even in our own community people still believe steem is hyperinflationnary.
Imo it was very bad to the price to not update this whitepaper, the damage has been done now...and steem will need some solid PR/marketing to reinform people on this currency.
It would be really nice to be able to push the price of steem up when SBD is pumping, to me that's logical since they are inextricably linked.
It should have been. SBD had been pegged slightly below $1 USD for so long, that it wasn't on the radar. Unfortunately the post is past 7 days old.. There are other avenues for getting changes on the dev team's radar. With the SBD peg way off again, this idea is getting more attention. We'll see if it becomes enough of a priority to justify dev work.
@shenanigator
I would tend to agree with you because that is the whole point of cryptocurrency, in my opinion. Free markets, less control without a central bank equals a more fair system and community!
Yes and that is why STEEM is the currency. SBD is a pegged asset, not a crypto currency.
@justtryme90
Makes a lot of sense! I appreciate your thoughts on this issue.
That's silly. STEEM and SBD were born from human beings that designed the system. So there is actually full manipulation from its inception. If such inception is projected to give bad outcomes, it must be corrected for the sake of the investment people has made on it. There is no escape to manipulation, since it was already manipulated by its human creators. Markets can go wrong. Good thing is that changing the protocol is sort of democratic/elitist so I have no doubt it won't do any silly changes (hopefully)
a friend of mine wrote an interesting article about this:
https://steemit.com/steem/@mathsinnature/rethinking-the-steemit-monetary-system-wallet
This article made a lot of sense. If we want a stable SBD we need mecanisms and incentives to push the price in both directions and currently there is no incentive to dump SBD. I don't know all the implication but to me this seems to be a good idea.
A negative interest rate on all SBD can help with the peg. Should not be too hard to implement in an update I hope...
This would only be a temporary measure of course when the peg is out of wack by lets say 20% or something.
There is an incentive to dump SBD but it is a slow, plodding one, as more and more SBD is created to pay rewards and none is ever destroyed (because the only mechanism for doing so, conversions, are strongly disincentivized when SBD is >1 USD). This proposal would speed up the process so the supply and peg can better track demand in a useful time period, rather than potentially over months or years.
If we are going to have a price stable currency, it should have price stability. Otherwise it's a failure.
But do we really need that? My opinion has been that it's great addition to ecosystem: people can build marketplaces. But so far we haven't seen any serious movement to that direction.
Another missing feature is privacy. People aren't going to buy and sell stuff with a currency of almost zero privacy. It's not even on a roadmap.
Right now SBD is beneficial to the ecosystem because there is so huge demand for a price stable cryptocurrency. But that might not be forever. In that case SBD might become an extra feature that's more of a nuisance than actual benefit. It just creates extra risks to the ecosystem.
But on the other hand, if we want to keep SBD, we have to find a way to create more of it to answer the market demand.
Another possibility, in addition to OP, would be to move to a Bitshares-like system. Just remove the liability from the blockchain and give it to the users.
Hey Tim ! Cody from DT here, and late to the Party , but better late than never.
Superb Post Brother and rightly paid handsomely.
Instinct last night with my first SBD payout said :
Keep the SBD, as much as I wanted more steem power, for these reasons:
Ok I'm not so smart, but sure others have the same questions. and I will search for posts answering these concerns tonight.
This post has my head spinning, so much to know, And I'm so thrilled to have a friendly face here :
(https://postimg.org/image/6bmht2omd/)
Hey Cody - glad to see you here!! I miss everyone in DT. I should drop in to say hi one of these days.
One thing to know is converting SBD to STEEM is not the only option. If you would rather have STEEM, you can trade on the internal market. This is a real-time trade at whatever the current market price is, so you don't need to wait 3.5 days. You also get a much better deal under current market conditions since SBD is currently worth more than a dollar.
If you have any more questions just let me know. I'm happy to help :)
While we can't change the fact that a certain currency/asset's value is varying from time to time, there should be a market stability of commodity being purchased by than currency. It should be well observed and properly implemented.
Great points there!
Upvoted and Resteemed
meep
The amount of reward should adjust according to how far off the dollar is from the target.
Let the witnesses decide. Add Parameters.
reward_dollar_only_price
Set this value to a value of a SBD in USD. When the marketmeetsorexceeds this value rewards should be 100% SBD and no liquid steem.
reward_steem_only_price
Set this value to a value of a SBD in USD. When the market fails to meet this value, rewards should be 100% liquid steem and no dollars.
At 1 SBD = 1 USD. Allow for 50/50 rewards. In other places not mentioned do a linear interprolation:
If the reward_dollars_only_price say 3 USD / SBD, and the price is 2 USD/ SBD; then the ratio should be 50/(3-1)*(2-1)+50% SBD = 75% SBD. That reward should be 75%/25% STEEM.Interest on SBD only makes the SBD weaker in the long term. This solution also helps the SBD dollar as well.
It is a good alternative proposal. The main concerns are that it adds a lot of complexity, which is confusing to the user, and if there is a very large demand for SBD it could take months for the production to catch up with demand.
What do you think of getting rid of SBD? Would that help the price of steem? It feels like the coin isn't trading well and if it doesn't do what it was supposed to, it may be getting in the way.
I would rather 'save' it than get rid of it, because I think that having a stable currency within the ecosystem has a lot of value. If it proves to be a drastically fluctuating currency (same as STEEM) then I don't see a lot of value in keeping it. I would need to consider it more carefully if we got to that point - as a last resort.
Do you know how Tether manages to do it?
Tether is centrally managed by a company which keeps real USD in a bank account. When you redeem your Tether they pay you from their bank account (though their legal terms do not require them to do so). If they have problems accessing their bank accounts for legal or other reasons then they won't be able to make these payments. That is what happened recently when Tether dropped to about 90 cents. It has since recovered but the incident has renewed interest in pegged coins that aren't tied to bank accounts.
Really? That is interesting. You figure it would be a simple solution, just use a bank account, but when things go south you see why more complicated measures are needed.
I am not 100% sure on this, but I believe that they actually set USD aside as collateral to back up the amount of USD that they need to be able to generate to buy back the BTC when users cash it back in.
This gets my support. Something needs to be done to get SBD under control and your suggestion rewards those who hold steem/steem power, increasing demand.
I hope other witnesses chime in and we can all come to conclusion soon about this before it gets way out of hand.
First off, your idea has merit, it was well thought out.
Whether it will work remains to be seen, but it's worth giving a try based on the current state of the markets. I bought a couple hundred Steem back when it was .11 a share, and have been amazed at the fast growth recently. I agree with @steemquestions that the SBD price has been driven by the recent resurgence of Steem. But I also agree that the SBD increase defeats the purpose the currency was created for, and creates an opportunity for a pump and dump, especially on Bittrex.
This is very clever. Let's see if people can see some downsides but if not I think we should try it.
I agree with you @timcliff. I always felt something was missing with steem dollar. I didn't understand why the demand for steem dollars was not increasing the price of steem. Your proposal seem to address this perfectly.
Thanks!
I think this is a good idea, and it provides a mechanism to burn STEEM, we already have the mechanisms to burn SBD so it makes sense to be able to go back and forth to help hold the peg in place.
I love your post and you write it very well my good friend @timcliff but I just exported some today and yep, you are right. It sure felt great to get more than I thought I would by a lot. At one time I would have agreed with you, until I sold it.
The biggest problem is how exactly is the price kept at a dollar on a trading exchange? Again, I like your post and one time thought the same way until...
Oh, I do agree that SBD trading above $1 is nice :) I'll take 2 for the price of one any day, hehe. The trade off for that though is it is making it more difficult for a marketplace/economy to form around SBD.
The price was kept very close to a dollar on trading exchanges (within 2-3%, often within 1%) for a few months up until just before the last hard fork, which also happened to be the time that Tether (another dollar-pegged cryptocurrency) started having problems. It is difficult to pinpoint the exact causes of the difficulties but it seems that SBD can keep a peg under some conditions but not others. To make the peg more reliable something needs to be improved in the mechanism (even if it does manage to recover on its own and sometimes works as-is).
Yes $2 SBD should be called Steem THOMAS JEFFERSONS the $2 bill has always been associated with brivery, gambling or prostitution! Here is my post about it! (finally the two dollar bills time to shine!)
https://steemit.com/money/@ackza/the-magic-and-history-of-the-usd2-bill-when-it-first-came-out-in-the-1800s-it-was-associated-with-bribery-gambling-and
So yeah $2 is just bad luck! (well it may seem like good luck but for money wise we need $1 SBD! )
Seriously we need to realize SBD is NOT some gimmick! SBD will be a MASSIVLY popular way to buy and sell stuff onliN! onc we get MASSIVE super security on steemit we can allow people to just use steemit and its EASIEST to use of ALL the crypto currencies!
Less technically literate peopel will end up getting tired of the long codes and passwords and will want to use STEEMIT to store crypto wealth!
remember theres only a minorot ofeople investing in crypto! so only aminorty who is AALL INwill become the billionaires we already have many bitoin mllionaire and they invest money back ino the tecnoogy if they are smart!
Congratulations @timcliff!
Your post was mentioned in my hit parade in the following categories:
Cool!
나는 이 생각이 잘못되었을지도 모른다고 생각합니다.
스팀달러가 1달러에 고정된다면 상점주인은 누구도 스팀달러를 수용하고 현물을 내어주려고 하지 않을것입니다.
이유는 간단합니다.
미국달러가 지속적으로 구매력을 상실하고 있기 때문입니다.
반면 스팀달러가 느린속도로 미국달러대비 가치가 오른다면 상점주는 적극적으로 스팀달러를 수용할 것입니다.
스팀달러의 가치를 1달러에 고정하는것은 의미가 없습니다.
스팀달러를 1달러 구매력에 고정해야만 스팀달러는 상정주가 수용합니다.
당신이 상인이라면 1달러에 고정된 스팀달러를 수용하고 그것을 저장하시겠습니까?
I think this idea may be wrong.
If the Steam Dollar is fixed at $ 1, the shopkeeper will not be willing to accept the Steam Dollar and give out the spot.
The reason is simple.
This is because the US dollar continues to lose its purchasing power.
On the other hand, if the steam dollar is worth more than the US dollar at a slow pace, the shopper will actively accommodate the steam dollar.
Fixing the value of a steam dollar to $ 1 is meaningless.
Steam dollars must be fixed at $ 1 in purchasing power to accommodate store owners.
If you are a merchant, will you accept a steady $ 1 dollar and save it?
Save long term? No. But I would hang on to it long enough to pay my suppliers and employees, something that can be very risky to do with an unpegged (or poorly-pegged) coin. Long term savings would go into an investment vehicle of some sort, not a cash-equivalent.
스팀달러는 가치가 1달러에고정된 것이 아니라 1달러의 가치가 보장된것이라고 생각합니다.
스팀달러의 가치는 1달러가 아니라 1달러 이상이라고 생각합니다.
나의 영어가 빈약하여 정확한 의미를 전달할수 없음이 안타깝습니다.
논의 기회를 주신것에 감사합니다.
I think the steam dollar is not worth a dollar, but a dollar.
I think the value of a steam dollar is more than a dollar, not a dollar.
It is a pity that my English is poor and can not convey the exact meaning.
Thank you for your opportunity to discuss.
There are some valid arguments as far as SBD being pegged to something other than the USD. I do not subscribe to that belief, although I don't have an argument against it either. Whether we agree on what to peg it to is one thing, but there is a question as to whether we believe it should be pegged to something. Whether it is USD, gold, or whatever other asset you want to peg it to - there should be something that shop owners can base their profit and loss calculations off of.
If you are of the view that it shouldn't be pegged at all - and we should just let the market decide what it is worth, that is an OK view too - but then why keep SBD at all at that point? Why not just have STEEM, and let shop owners buy/sell their goods and services based on whatever STEEM is worth?
스팀달러는 가치가 1달러에고정된 것이 아니라 1달러의 가치가 보장된것이라고 생각합니다.
스팀달러의 가치는 1달러가 아니라 1달러 이상이라고 생각합니다.
나의 영어가 빈약하여 정확한 의미를 전달할수 없음이 안타깝습니다.
논의 기회를 주신것에 감사합니다.
I think the steam dollar is not worth a dollar, but a dollar.
I think the value of a steam dollar is more than a dollar, not a dollar.
It is a pity that my English is poor and can not convey the exact meaning.
Thank you for your opportunity to discuss.
No worries. I actually understand exactly what you mean. I think you communicated your idea quite well :)
Great article and much to consider.
thank you and i could NOT have said it any better , you told the truth
Even the current SBD prize is interesting to trade (if you are into that) a stable currency is more likely to be on most people's wishlist
I had wondered why Steem wasn't convertible to SBD before.
Would this conversion process only be allowed when SBD went over $2?
At the time the blockchain was created, it was cited in the whitepaper that allowing conversions both ways added risk of abuse. I've talked it over with other witnesses though, and we don't seem to think that there is significant risk due to this, especially now that the 10% debt limit is in place.
If it was implemented, the conversions would be allowed regardless of the SBD price. Users would be unlikely to use them though if SBD was trading <= 1.
To state explicitly (which of course you know but others may not), the 10% limit was not in place in the original design/whitepaper. So the risks to STEEM holders and the ecosystem as a whole from increased SBD were much larger. It made sense to have a tighter restriction.
I am pretty new to this, but that made some sense to me as a solution, and also cleared up my mis-understanding of steem in relation to sbd.
I think you are unto something there @timcliff...upvoted!
🍒 I'm one of those people that sold STEEM for SBD, but now SBD is going down down down. Thank you for the explanation on how te prices work and I liked your proposal :D
since its listed on poloniex and its going to be pump and dump by someone sometimes. its going to be hard to be fixed
Some short term price fluctuations are OK/expected. The main things are that it doesn't deviate too far off from $1, and that it goes back to 'equilibrium' relatively quickly. The proposal helps with achieving equilibrium faster. If it ends up proving itself as a relatively stable peg, then the pump-and-dumps become less extreme. As people see the price going above $1, they are likely going to sell while it is up, so they can buy back in when it goes back to $1. The same thing is true for when it dips.
7 months after this post the price of SBD went to 15 usd. I think this is a good idea for a strong well pegged sbd
7 months later and this is still an issue. Almost 4-1 now. Guess it’s not a big deal for anyone to take action.
There are a lot of discussions about it, but it is not an easy thing to solve. Making a major change like this has lot of risk. The consequences need to be weighed carefully. I am on the side that wants to see change though :) I'd love to see them implement what I proposed here.
Thanks for the reply Tim. Do you know if using the convert feature is still detrimental when there is a premium in SBD versus Steem? Meaning you are losing money when converting versus trading in the market. If so, I may do a post to inform users as the premium of SBD to Steem is pretty drastic and the average user may not understand the consequences.
Yes, if I am understanding your question correctly - it is very bad to
convertSBD to STEEM right now. You would get around $1 USD of STEEM via conversion, whereas you can go to the internal market and get $10 worth of STEEM for every 1 SBD.Ok, thanks. Did a post earlier to inform the community. Not everyone may understand. I low balled the conversion rate in the post to account for market movement etc.
This is a simple and elegant move. I agree! It is something that probably should have happened a long time ago, but we are now seeing the need due to more speculation.
This sounds like a plausible remedy.
Not to be obtuse, but what do you think people that are holding SBD's should do now? Should one trade, or hold and see what consensus develops?
If you think this proposal is going to be enacted (which I would say is not going to be soon, but possibly 'someday') then you should trade your SBD for something else because once enacted it would almost certainly quickly devalue SBD back much closer to its intended $1.
If you don't think this proposal is going to be enacted, but you think that SBD is still going to drift down to $1 over some reasonable period of time then you should still trade it for something else because you stand to lose 50% of its current value during that process.
If you think SBD is going to stay at its current value or go higher, you should hold it or buy more, but be prepared to reevaluate that as conditions (including the price) change. In this case you are speculating. Not saying that is a bad thing, but be aware of what you are doing.
Much obliged. I appreciate your thoughts. I'm a noob so I value the insight!
I've made a tidy profit trading sbd for BTC on external markets.
I did a tiny amount just to get my first time doing the process out of the way lol.
After my first trade I saw how trading could be very addicted...thank goodness I'm very cautious. I spent a lot of time and effort earning the sbd I traded. I'm really excited about my bitpay debit card I ordered, I want to show my family cryptocurrency is for-real. If I had more funds to play with I'd be playing the markets!
Yes I agree with that. The problem I have with playing the crypto markets is finding a way to value a coin. A company with a balance sheet on the stock exchange, yes. An alt coin, not so much.
It's a good question. I am not a trader, so I don't really have good advise. If you think SBD is likely going to go higher, then I would hold and wait to sell. If you think $2 SBD is going to be as good as it gets for a while, then I would sell :)
As far as basing it off this proposal, I do not think anything will come of it for some time. Who knows though - maybe the market may react to just seeing that the community is considering such things.
Thanks for the input, Tim. It seems like holding something that is $2 that is meant to be pegged at a $1 is a fair idea to trade out of. Just like you say even the thought of making some changes may effect the value. I really appreciate the time you take to answer questions for us newer folk.
but, SBD should be at $10
As an average user, I would be very happy if someone wanted to pay me $10 each for my SBSs :)
LOL, just went above my head! Will try to read again and understand.
"reverse convert" STEEM to SBD I say:
NO
Will write a post explaining why the SBD is doing much better than the USD. They are VERY different...
I look forward to reading it. Please share a link here.
One thing though. There is a difference between SBD gaining value on the USD, and it being a drastically fluctuating currency. If it was just a matter of being 'better' than USD and was consistently about 2x as good - that would actually be OK.
The problem is that today it is 2x as much. A few weeks ago it was 6x as much. A few weeks from now it could be worth less than a USD.
If it is fluctuating so drastically, then it loses it's main value proposition of being a stable currency. If we are going to see drastic swings of that magnitude, then why not abandon SBD and just have STEEM as the one and only currency?
Great post and greater idea!
Steem on and thanks for sharing :)
Thanks!
Different thought on this
Unless the shop only accepts SBD, it does not happen IMO. If a shop accepts USD, most people will buy the shirt with USD instead of SBD. The best part of SBD is users don't have to buy SBD to use it. Most of users earn SBD by contributing the platform with their contents, so 1 SBD means just 1 SBD, not 1 USD.
In sum, SBD and USD are located in totally different economic systems.
Interestingly, SBD is actively used in KR community for tipping, buying, and donating, since we already have meaningful size of community (with retail owners surely)
I rather think high SBD price caused by speculators benefits the community, especially our contributors. Why don't we leaving it and giving more profits to the community?
I think that happens either way. If demand for SBD is transferred into demand for STEEM then the community profits anyway, both from price appreciation of STEEM and from increased rewards since they are based on the STEEM price, even when paid in SBD. I don't see a benefit in paying 1 SBD worth $2 rather than paying 2 SBD worth $1 each. Both reach much the same equilibrium in terms of SBD supply, yet the latter adds utility to the token in terms of better stability (if people don't want stability they can use STEEM or something else).
Someone (may have been you) pointed out in discussion that the current and potential demand for stable tokens is extremely large (Tether has $40 million market cap despite its obvious and demonstrated centralization risks). Even not being all that functional, SBD is capturing some of it. We can capture a lot more of it if SBD works better, and pull that demand into STEEM value as well.
We need to think about that Steem is primarily social platform and it can be better to take simpler way although not much accurate, unless something harms. I actually haven't heard any complaints about high SBD from the community members.
SBD is working well now, as a value-guaranteed community asset. It guarantees authors that earned rewards won't below specific USD-denominated values. If one wants better pegged cryptocurrency, I would recommend Smartcoins of Bitshares.
IMO @timcliff's proposal is a small change that makes an incremental improvement. It might not be the best possible approach for pegged currency, but in terms of making small improvements, I see it having a lot of merit and not much downside. It is certainly a much less major change in terms of both development effort and the nature of the platform than would be something like smartcoins.
For me, it is not a small change. It is fundamental economic model change that opens SBD creation ability to individuals (maybe call it privatizing SBD printing)
What do you think of a more modest change which would be to allow authors to choose between 100% SBD, 50/50 and 100% SP (adding the first option to the latter two which already exist)? This would provide some additional ability for the SBD supply to respond to demand, but not unlimited, which as you say is a bigger change.
I guess we'll touch the 10% "debt limit" before it could push dawn the price.
This suggestion has merit I think.
Simpler to implement I think and simpler for the layman to grasp.
There can then be a push to get people to choose the 100% SBD option any time SBD value is too high relative to the dollar.
I think that's more moderate and adjustable change. 100% SBD sounds good.
Like dan said rewards are a trojan horse to bootstrap the currency. If steem is successful the rewards earned will represent a tiny fraction of all commerce done in SBD. I expect many people to convert USD to SBD so they can spend their SBD online.
Converting USD to SBD is the similar vein as converting USD to EURO. The key is they are in different economic systems. Steemians living in U.S are like having dual citizenship, and shops too. Cryptocurrencies and fiat currencies can juxtapose and customers can choose any of them. I don't think US people will convert USD to SBD to buy good from US shops. They can use USD, no conversion fee, and efforts. While, Steemians still can buy some with SBD if they want. But in most cases I think they use earned SBD.
I think this kind of answers the question. If users have the option to buy the shirt for $20 USD or $20 SBD - then nobody is going to pay SBD for the shirt. They will just end up cashing out the SBD for USD (or whatever other currency they want to use). They may still buy the shirt or they may not, but either way the shop is not adding value to the STEEM/SBD economy if nobody is using STEEM/SBD to purchase the shirts.
Yes, tipping and donating are surely two great uses for SBD.
It can be used for buying as well, but it does become more difficult. Either there is an extra burden on the shop owner to deal with the fluctuations, or there is an extra burden on the customer to pay a higher premium. It is not that it can't work, it is just more difficult with a fluctuating currency.
The added profits are a nice short-term benefit. I am enjoying them myself as well. From the perspective of an 'average user' I probably would rather have it trading above $1. If someone wanted to pay me $100 for my SBD I would be delighted :)
Looking at it from the perspective of the long term growth of the platform though, I do see value in having a system that makes it easier for business owners to participate in a marketplace to offer goods/services to SBD holders.
Here's an interesting talking from Dan (from 57:30)
"Steam dollars as an insurance against falling below a dollar rather than a guarantee of a perfect peg. And depending on perspective you take, it's an interesting crypto-instrument"
It is a valid view. To some extent, the whitepaper also says the same: "In a market where 0% interest on debt still demands a premium, it is safe to say the market is willing to extend more credit than the debt the community is willing to take on. If this happens a SMD will be valued at more than $1.00 and there is little the community can do without charging negative interest rates."
I know we have discussed this a lot before off-chain, and I think you and I are more in agreement than disagreement.
I am curious though:
My answer is unless SBD is under $1, less burden on the community is better. The burden includes perceived complexity and potential debt crisis. I would keep the debt ratio lower to prepare another ice age. Winter is coming :)
I think your proposal is much better than feed premium, and I am actually partially agree with you. Your proposal is a good way to switch demands for SBD to demands for STEEM. What I am worrying is more complexity, higher debt ratio, and losing perks for authors (Many authors are enjoying the high price!)
I am strongly against feed premium since it harms the community members when they convert SBD. Now we have no complaints but if premium is applied, we may hear some complaints, saying "I lost $50 after conversion!".
I'm with you. I tread into these waters very carefully knowing full well that we are just one STEEM price crash away from another serious debt issue.
Understood. There are definitely trade-offs. There are valid views on both sides for sure.
Yep, agreed. I stopped my premium the moment I talked to you, and I am very glad I did. I've seen similar complaints as well. I submitted a pull request to the condenser repo too (still waiting for approval) to more clearly communicate to users the potential risks that are there with conversions. Hope this well help too.
Absolutely agree on the condenser changes. People are making foolish conversions right now and have been for weeks (bad for both the user and the system). Anything that can be done to improve that situation is welcome.
Awesome answer, as always :)
I mostly agree with you but I don't think the proposal adds significant complexity. We already have conversions in one direction, it is actually a bit more complex to explain why it can only be done in that one direction and not the other (I have been asked this multiple times).
I agree that harming community members is bad. The problem is that the high SBD value harms community members when they convert, and by not addressing it we are contributing to this harm by inaction. At least two community members converted $200 worth of SBD today alone, each is losing about $100 in the process. The faster we can reduce the high price of SBD, the faster we can stop this from happening. It has been going on for several weeks and community members have been hurt doing this almost every single day! (Thankfully it is now less than before due to education, but that isn't perfect.)
I think we can get much the same benefit without the disadvantages by shifting demand to STEEM and raising the STEEM price. This also reduces the debt concern (maybe not on net, it is hard to say).
Love money ...what ever works i'll follow :)
Wouldn't the reverse convert STEEM effect the longevity of STEEM?
Perhaps individual would be able to reverse steem vestment at 30% penalty to cover potential losses. Backup Witnesses then monitor the account.
That's my suggestion . Thanks for bringing this up though. Markets are brutal.
Technically users can 'exchange/trade' SBD for STEEM today. Allowing them to convert would just let them get the SBD under market value, which would push down the price of SBD as more users did that and sold. It would also push up the price of STEEM because more users would want to buy STEEM to convert to SBD under market value.
or use tether it apparently always equal to one dollar
If there was an easy way for non-crytpo users to get tether, then it could be a potential substitute for SBD. The problem though is that this is only available for a very small percentage of 'apt' users, and the people we are trying to onboard would not be able to benefit from it.
Technically tether is not guaranteed to "always equal to one dollar" either. It has it's own pegging mechanism, akin to SBD, although it (currently) does a better job at holding it's peg than SBD.
Tether was 90 cents not too long ago. It has its own challenges (which were part of what drove interest toward other dollar-pegged coins).
Honestly I little confused about your proposal, and need time for me to think about it. But I believe your proposal have intention to make this community keep on the track.:)
Why not having 1 SBD stabilized in 2$?... That's better than 1 SBD stabilized in 1$... I think that SBD is stable, but USD is losing its value... Now devaluing SBD would not be good for us... So, shop owner better sell in SBD rather than USD that is constantly devaluing itself...
If it actually was able to stabilize at $2, then I would not really have an issue with it. We might need to rename it :) but it would function. The problem is that it is not really stable at $2. Next week it could go up to 3, or down to 1. The week after, it could go in reverse. The instability is really more the problem, rather than the asset it is pegged to.
Why not $3?
how did you track a recruitment from me? I am just curious! Thanks for the 4 Steem! I have a list of at least 50 people who I recruited.....just sayin'
I wasn't able to track recruitment. The 4 STEEM was in payment of the 4 links you provided for my 'recruitment post' bounty :)
oh I see. thanks.
If you have to peg the the price of SBD to some thing, peg it to gold or silver so you don't have to deal with this government wanting a weeker dollar or that government wanting a stronger dollar. I would peg it at 1000 sbd/per ounce gold. Then the papers currencies can do what ever they want and you will always know what your SBD are worth.
That's a valid discussion to have, but beyond the scope of what this proposal is trying to solve.
I think that this issue will be fixed over time as investors and users begin to put more trust in STEEM holding its value.
I responded to another user who said something similar, but I think the situation is a lot larger of a 'problem' than trust in STEEM. Traders (outside of the STEEM ecosystem) have placed a value on SBD well over the $1 peg. It has shown that the current system of witness parameters is not really able to deal with a situation where there is high SBD demand - other than 'wait it out'. If fluctuations like this become normal, then there is still the problem of it not being an easily usable currency.
There is also the issue of trust in the peg. If traders expect witnesses to act aggressively to protect the peg then it becomes unprofitable to buy SBD at >$1, and SBD will have a greater tendency to stay at $1 on its own. However, if they don't, then it becomes profitable to buy SBD at >$1 (or in other circumstances sell at <$1) and we end up with a broken peg and more need for intervention. So the whole thing can become self-fulfilling in both positive and negative ways.
This, by the way, is one reason I have supported the feed premium. While we disagree on that specifically, we absolutely agree that it is an ugly, messy tool that has negative unintended consequences. However, I consider it important to be willing to protect the peg, even when it is messy to do so, precisely so we will be in the situation to have to consider using those ugly, messy tools less often. But improving the system is better still (though of course has its own challenges).
I think for the most part we are in agreement. I do feel very strongly in protecting the peg, but I also feel very strongly in not breaking the SBD->STEEM conversion 'contract' as well. Both are important responsibilities of the witnesses, and unfortunately the current situation makes us chose between the two.
There are very valid arguments to be made in favor of breaking the contract in favor of the peg, so you won't see me arguing against that. On the other side though, there is also 'real' damage done by breaking the contract in favor of the peg too. It is a very tough decision / judgement call, but personally I have chosen to favor the contract over the peg at this point in time.
I think that attests for why a change like this is needed though. If there is no good way to maintain both the peg and the contract under what we can only assume are relatively 'normal' conditions for the crypto-world, then I think it is an indication that a change is needed.
I would support this idea. It's not relevant at the moment, but it makes fine sense to me. My question now is... since the convert function has been removed from the steemit ui, how (since the value of SBD is below $1 right now) can one convert SBD to STEEM at a $1 value right now? That function still exists somewhere, right?
https://steemit.com/sbd/@timcliff/how-to-convert-sbd-into-steem-using-steemconnect
Thanks! I wound up using the steemworld.org interface.
Posted using Partiko Android