Banks/dollars retreating as backbone for international money movement.

http://www.scmp.com/business/banking-finance/article/1652715/remittance-firms-sue-westpac-banks-shun-money-transfer

Opportunity for bitcoin? Why not?

not at all.

but you have to realize that things never go up in a straight line.  markets cycle and we are at the bottom of a bear cycle for Bitcoin.  i personally think this lost Swiss gold initiative was pm's last chance to prove anything.  it's failed. 

the only Sound Money left in the world is Bitcoin. 

ya think?  oil?  who the hell needs oil?:

Commodity apocalypse! Bitcoin put ideas in their heads

That's why all the goldbugs are dumping gold and moving their muny into Bitcoin.
As is evidenced by the meteoric rise in Bitcoin prices!

...well, sort'a rise...

...Ok, Fahque, so nothing is happening, so what?@!  Last year there was!  And the year before the year before that!  What's with these artificial timeframes?  FUD!

Also with each effort, new efficiencies are found.  Many of the Saudi fields are <$5 so it can go a lot lower if economies slow.
Another unintended consequence is that the falling energy prices may slow (and mask) some inflationary effects allowing this to creep up on the wizards behind the curtains of the Central Banks.

They can get the oil out of the existing sites pretty cheaply, but there is no reason not to sell all they can with the new supplies available from technical advances.  They can be profitable when others can't.  You are right that they have lots of expenses though, lots of subsidies.  So they will pump away.

Here is some other details on some of the no-longer-profitable US sites (some well over US$130):
http://www.bloomberg.com/infographics/2014-11-19/shale-profits-at-risk.html



Lowest cost of production is in Saudi Arabia due to it being so close to the surface.
The operating cost (stripping out capital expenditure) of extracting a barrel in Saudi Arabia has been estimated to be around $1-$2, and the total cost (including capital expenditure) $4-$6 a barrel.

Even with such low costs, for the oil Saudi Arabia exports to the USA, the USA makes more on taxes levied on US citizens from that oil than Saudi Arabia makes in selling it to the USA.

Swiss gold referendum clearly shows that modern people's financial judgement has already been heavily affected by the central banks education effort

Is Bitcoin the Future?

by John Mauldin
of Mauldin Economics

While I think that Bitcoin as currently configured has limitations, the technology of the blockchain is one of the most potentially revolutionary developments of the last century. I think we evolve to Bitcoin 2.0 or 3.0, using the same blockchain technology, but with a way to make the new currency a truly stable medium of information that can be easily exchanged for goods and services.
Why not create a currency that is backed by a number of commodities, with gold perhaps as the backbone? Why even limit ourselves to commodities? Bitcoin as currently configured could be part of the basket. Anything that can be represented in a digital form and has a reasonably stable long-term value could be considered.

(..)

The Bitcoin blockchain technology allows for the most secure electronic transactions ever devised. Its adoption and acceptance seem inevitable to me. It will be used to validate everything we purchase: stocks, homes, investments, airplane tickets, etc. It will be a far cheaper and much more secure way to validate your ownership of anything, from your home to your stocks.

The blockchain will form the basis for the perfect medium of information exchange (at least as perfect as we humans can create), which in turn will be the basis for whatever electronic medium of financial exchange we evolve in the future. The market (that would be you and me) will move to whatever new medium serves our purposes best.

Satoshi, as technologically brilliant as he (or she or they) was, was limited in his understanding of economic exchange. He was trying to create electronic gold. To some degree, he was confusing technology with money. He was trying to overcome the flaws of our current monetary system (a very laudable goal, I might add) but limited himself to thinking within the box in which the current monetary system placed him.

The next generation of Bitcoin developers are going to crawl out of that box and create whole new realms of possibilities. Once you realize that money is just information, and all you need to do is to provide the most stable mechanism of the transfer of information, you turn thinking about money on its head.

http://www.advisorperspectives.com/commentaries/mauldin_120114.php

It should be Maudlin Economics. He's probably crying himself to tears over thinking he missed the boat with Bitcoin.

What box is he talking about? Satoshi knew very well about Modern Money Mechanics.