This is a story of how patience is key, and how letting someone else get revenge for you is by far easier than doing it yourself.
The setup
I live in one of those doubled up houses where they build two houses adjacent to eachother with mirrored layout, so we share a wall but are otherwise completely separate.
For years, the house next to me belonged to a nice old lady who you never really noticed or had any trouble with. When she died and the house was resold, the troubles began.
The target is someone who I will refer to as Jack Sparrow, for reasons that will become clear later. Jack owns a sizeable construction business, does some real estate on the side. He buys the house and rents it to a bunch of foreign construction workers that work for his business. I say foreign because it is relevant to the story: there are rumors Jack is doing some shady stuff to have these work for him dirt cheap, by claiming that they're national workers in their native country (and paying them according to that wage, and not the much higher minimum wage of my country). Not exactly on the up and up. Possibly unreported labour as well.
Anyways, he stuffs 4-6 of these in said house for them to live while they work here.
Now I do not have anything against foreign construction workers. But these guys living next door have two traits that are very problematic: they are extremely loud and they do not give a fuck about anyone else. We're talking non stop music and partying starting Thursday evening throughout the entire weekend, untill they leave at 5 am Monday morning to go to work. Seriously I dont know how or when they sleep, it is literally non stop. We're talking 'I'm wearing headphones but still cannot hear my own sound over their music' loud, since it would appear that they've designated the living room (adjacent to the shared wall) as the party room where the fun happens.
At first, I do the neighbourly thing and just suck it up, thinking 'its just one party, just one weekend'. After the third one in a row, I go over to ask them to turn it down, since y'know, night disturbance, its technically illegal to blast music this loud (hearable on the street and across the street by my other neighbours who have also complained).
I'm met with a halfhearthed 'so sorry, will fix'. Except nothing changes. I go over several more times, each time angrier, each time met with 'but its not loud'. If I can hear your music in my own house, over my own tv and music, I would say that it is in fact, too loud.
I contact Jack, since he is their landlord, and explain the situation, after which I'm met with an abrupt 'sorry not sorry, not my fucking problem'. Basically Jack told me to get fucked.
So I involve police, and call them every time things get out of hand. After about a dozen calls, sometimes even twice in the same night, it is clear that even regular police interference doesn't help the situation.
I should mention that I am a lawyer, so I know what the next legal steps are. I also know that other than a token paper from a judge saying 'their music is too loud' I'm not really going to get anything. Things would (like they already sometimes had) become a cat and mouse game where they would blast their music extremely loud to piss me off or to wake me up, for a few brief moments, so that by the time I could get proof or police show up, there would be no music.
I'm deadlocked with my only further option being pretty useless and a waste of time.
At this point I'm biding my time and just waiting till something changes. I'm not saying that I condone people who bludgeon their neighbour to death with a rusty pipe, but I do somewhat understand what would drive someone to that point.
The mistake
One day I'm at home and I notice quite a lot of ruckus next door, more so than usual. Suddenly, I see through my garden window that a wall is being partially torn down. You see, sometime over the years, the neighbours had built a small adjacent sidebuilding adjoining the main house. It was right on the border between us, and when the gardens were being refenced, the wall was used as a divider to save on fencing. Said wall was now in the process of having its top part ripped off by a crane.
I was not informed of any of this, which, while not technically needed, would have been the nice thing to do. I go take a walk so I can take a look at what we're doing and see that they've torn down the entire sidebuilding, the remaining wall between our gardens is the only part that has been kept intact (and even then, not the top part).
Being a lawyer, and specifically, a construction/permit lawyer, I know two things:

Shit like this is not allowed without a pre-approved permit from the city
There is no way in hell they have said permit, as I would have seen the application for it (I regularly have to check the online (public, accessible by everyone) application to see what permits are being applied for my job, and when I do I tend to look over to my own area, just so I can keep up with what is being planned in my area)

This is it. The moment I have been waiting for, the situation has changed and the time has come to exact revenge.
A quick email sent to the municipal authorities lets me do my civic duty of reporting a potential crime, the fact that someone is building or demolishing shit without a permit. Since this is a simple report, no response happens since I'm not an official victim or anything yet.
Since no further construction happens for a few days and everything was removed, I assume that was that and they would only tear down the side structure since it was starting to fall apart due to age.
Neighbours have moved all their stuff that was in said building onto their lawn and haphazardly covered it with a tarp.
The next week, more construction materials are being delivered and construction starts. I send a new email to city services, with new pictures, saying that apparently, there is more planned, and that I hope they undertake the appropriate action. Instant response less than an hour later: They'd called Jack after the first time to inform him that what he was doing required a permit, and he had ensured them that he didnt know that (BS, he's in construction, of course he knows) and that he would stop construction and request a permit. They called him again after my email, reprimanded him for not following his earlier promise and he said again he would shut it down.
I happened to be working from home that day, and had to stop myself from waving to the construction crew as they left.
Later that day I get an angry phonecall from Jack, who accuses me of reporting him and that I would be sorry, he would come after me for damages for his delays. I respectfully inform him that even if I reported him (reports are in my name, but not published and anonymised in later files) I wouldnt have done anything wrong, because from the looks of it he didnt have a permit and should have known that before he started working illegally without one.
I end the call before I start to sound too happy with things.
Jack has at this point, no idea what I have initiated with this. He is Jack Sparrow and I have just rung the bell that awakens the kraken that will destroy him, he just doesn't know it yet.
The kraken
You see, there is a good reason why most people consult an expert and or a lawyer when they want to apply for a permit. The rules involved are so convoluted and needlessly complex that navigating them as a non professional is extremely hard and time-consuming, and a single mistake can torpedo your entire case, forcing you to do it all over. I have killed entire projects (and have seen clients projects killed) by pointing out that on page 127, section 35-1-A, something was left blank that should have been answered.
I did some digging and found out that the previous owners of the houses had actually consulted eachother about the sidebuilding, and agreed on making the wall (part of) the divider between their gardens. So much so, that they shared the costs of it. And the ownership. That wall that he destroyed part of? It was also my wall. Which of course, means I'm entitled to damages, but that is not the important part.
The important part is that he needs my permission, to do anything to that wall. So when he applied for a permit a few weeks later (added bonus, rowdy neighbours stuff is still out in the open, covered by just a tarp, since they expected this to be a quick smash and replace job that would take a few weeks at most) I went to city center and looked at the application. Noticed that they were planning to do some stuff to said wall that I own 50 %.
So I filed a complaint, following proper procedure, about the permit, namely that even if granted, it could never be executed, since Jack needed permission from me in regards to the wall, and he didnt have it (nor was I intending to grant it). This should kill his permit, since permits cannot be granted if you know in advance they cannot be realized. No sense granting a permit to build a certain kind of house when you know they're never actually going to build it.
Now, Jack was a bit of a smooth talker, and as a construction entrepreneur, had his connections, and permits are a political decision here just as much as a legal one. So despite a 100% correct legal objection that should have killed his permit, it went through. He actually called me about it to gloat a little.
No worry, one can appeal a permit in my country. The only requirement is that you pay a 100 euro fee, which I gladly paid. The appeal instance is a subnational instance, and does not care one bit about Jacks political ties or the half hearted bullshit that the city officials wrote to justify granting the permit in spite of the concerns I raised.
They terminate his permit without any hesitation on the aformentioned legal grounds.
Jack sees his permit blocked untill he fixes the issue, which he can't, because I'm not really inclined to agree with his plans for our wall, you see.
At this point, going through two lenghty procedures, it has been over 7 months. The neighbours have had an unfinished construction project in their yard the entire time, forced to store their stuff elsewhere, something that was always supposed to be 'a temporary thing for a few weeks while we build' turned into something that was taking months, with no end in sight.
But wait, theres more
The above was the administrative part of the matter, him getting the permit.
Now doing construction work without a permit is also a criminal offense. And of course, my report got passed around to the appropriate instances, so now Jack was also the subject of a criminal procedure for construction offense. Not only did he risk fines and jail time, he was a construction business and used his own construction business for the work he did on the property. So his company was also on the hook, and one of the sentences that can be given in these types of crimes is to be prohibited to do construction or construction related activity as a business, either permanently or temporarily. Not only was he personally on the line, his entire business was as well.
During this debacle, Jack tried to sell the property. This didnt really go too well because of a few reasons. One, the property was inflicted with an illegal situation: the demolished sidebuilding was torn down illegally, and untill said illegal status was resolved, it would stick to the property. Which tends to kill the property value quite a bit, since nobody wants to buy something that they'll have to spend time and money on to make legal again by either rebuilding the torn down building, or getting a regularisation permit for it. Made even worse by the fact that he applied for said permit and had it denied, so he couldn't even claim that said permit would be super easy to get.
Secondly, is Jack never intended to sell the property in its current state. What he, as I now know, has done in the past is buy cheap old houses like the one next to me. He puts some of his crew in it, who can't complain about the sub par accommodation. They thrash the place because they dont care and he lets them, then when the place is done, he tears it down and sells it to a developer or develops it himself.
However due to his construction crime and the accompanying status for the property, step two was not an option. He couldn't renovate it the way it needed to be (small renovations would not be enough), because covering the crime was always a requirement in any permit he would request for the building, and because of me, he couldnt cover it.
Couldn't sell it either, because the place was trashed, and any developer looking at it would dip out when they realized there was a construction issue and a vocal neighbour who would oppose anything big that they would try to do there, lost of easier properties to develop than that one.
In conclusion
Anyway, that is where we are today. Jack is staring down the barrel of a criminal court procedure that is about to happen where he is risking his business and livelyhood. His existing projects also gather special attention from city services now, since he is now outed to them as someone who cuts corners on permits and regulations.
He cannot really sell the property unless he cuts a massive loss, since in its current state it is absolutely trashed. He cannot develop it or sell to a developer because all development plans involve the adjoining wall, which he cannot use in big ways unless he gets my permission.
The rowdy neighbours are stuck living in a smaller house than what they had, in a place they trashed but that cannot really be renovated or fixed in the major way that it needs. They have quieted down a lot, possibly because Jack blames them for his current situation (which isn't wrong, I suppose).
I have awakened the kraken and set it off on Jack Sparrow, and it utterly ruined him. And the best part is that I had do to very little to do it. All I really did was nudge the abomination that is municipal bureaucracy and point it in his direction, and they did the rest.
I could tell you that he called me to complain and even beg about letting him use the wall the way he needs it to, so that he can get on with his business and fix the issues and use them to show his good faith in court in the criminal procedure, that he was losing money and customers over this and was in danger of losing his entire business, and that I then smugly replied with 'not my fucking problem'.
But he didnt, so for now we'll just have to imagine that he did.

Video Game Counseling Meetup

[AMA] All the questions and answers from Darian's AMA on January 26th, 2021

Firstly, just want to start off by saying a big thank you to everyone who submitted great questions, but most of all, the hugest thank you in the world to u/Darian_CoC (100% the best community manager ever) for sitting down and grinding through hundreds of your questions over about 3 hours.
Due to the sheer amount of questions, putting them all here exceeds reddit's character limit, so I have put the full compilation of questions in this document here. You'll probably find a few more of the fun, personal or quirky questions are in the document, with more Clash related stuff on this post.
A load of interesting stuff was discussed, including future updates and plans for Clash in the coming year, so lots of great stuff to have a read through! We have compiled all the questions and answers into this post here for your enjoyment, and we hope you come out of this post knowing a lot more than you did previously! So without further ado, here we go:
u/non-reddituser:

Is there plans to bring in a new recruitment system or is sc still trying to better it?
Any plans to reduce cost/upgrade time? For me at least 2-3 weeks for upgrades is getting slightly excessive and going further than that. I can’t imagine many players will be very excited to grind it out. Especially casual players.
Currently, Do you think the game is balanced ? I’ve heard quite a lot of complaints saying th13 is too easy.
Any plans to add family clans features ? Like a way to add other clans to chat, white list/ black list players etc.
Has a complete remake/ sequel to clash of clans ever been considered?
Is sc more focused on bringing more tasks, events and in general things to do during the game or are they more focused on bringing new content like troops ,spells ,defences etc?
Are you able to provide any details on what the priorities are/what is being worked on for 2021
How is the cost/ sell price of magic items determined?
Is there a reason as to why all the hammers cost 120 medals ,but the hero hammer is 165 and the opposite happens for books? All the books are 925 gems, but the hero book is set at 500 gems.

Answer:

Regarding the Recruitment Tool, I'll have to repeat something I said a while back .First, the tool isn't developed by the Clash team. I don't say that to try and wipe our hands of any obligation to it, but it genuinely is something the Clash team has little control over. However, with that said, regardless of who the tool is made by we have tried communicating with the community about its features, and even its shortcomings. But because of the nature of social media, online posts, etc. much of that gets lost hours after it's been posted. One of the things we've repeatedly stated is that the Recruitment Tool suffers not from a lack of functionality but from a lack of transparency. The Recruitment Tool actually does a lot of the things behind the scenes that players feel there is a lack of control over. And because they don't see how those work, it can feel like it doesn't work like they expect it to. I'm not saying it's perfect - far from it. We know it could use some improvement, but the biggest area it could be improved on is helping people understand exactly how it works so people are a bit more confident in the searches it pulls up, or at least understand why it gets those results.
As we add more content higher up (TH14, TH15, and beyond) we keep a very close watch on how long it takes for players to start from scratch and climb to max. We try to keep the ranges relatively similar so I would say it's a fair bet we'll adjust the upgrade times and costs in the future. In fact, that is a regular facet of the game that can be expected every so often. I can't say if it'll be once a year, or once every new TH level, but refactoring and rebalancing the costs and time are a regular part of that strategy.
The game will never be 100% perfectly balanced. It's just impossible. There are simply too many moving parts, too much randomness, and too many variables to consider. We try to balance the game the best we can, based on player data as well as feedback from the community. But adding more content will always shift the balance in one direction or another. Sometimes it may skew towards offense, and sometimes more towards defence. When we see the game shifting like that, we start looking at how we can balance the game to bring it back more towards the centre. With that said, we try to balance the game more towards being offense-friendly. Now, before you get out your pitchforks and protest we're making it too easy, what I mean by this is that we try to make the game as rewarding as possible while still keeping it challenging. If defence was always OP, then the win rates would plummet. If you're unable to win, this is incredibly frustrating as a player and would cause players to leave the game. That's not a good thing. Like any other asymmetrical multiplayer game, you almost always tend to win more often than you lose. We try to maintain a degree of balance slightly leaning towards offense.
A Clan Alliance/Family feature has been on our wish list for quite a few years. We simply haven't sat down to truly discuss what we want that feature to be. When we work on a new update, we have to prioritize what new features we're implementing and any additional content must thematically feel appropriate or can be fit in resource-wise (meaning time). Creating a Clan alliance feature should be more than just being able to cross chat and donate troops. That alone isn't worth reprogramming the multiplayer functionality of the game. An alliance system has to be meaningful in order to be something the players enjoy. But what that is, we still have yet to decide.
No. Why create a sequel when we can just keep adding new content to the current game without creating a brand new one? What would the goal of a sequel be? As long as Clash of Clans is live, creating a sequel would cannibalize players from one game to the other. That is not a viable way of game development. Additionally, let's say you've been playing Clash for 8 years now. Now let's say we release Clash of Clans 2. If all this game is is just a prettier version of Clash, you'll be less likely to invest the same amount of time as you did the first one. So you quit Clash 2 but the likelihood of you going back to Clash 1 will be reduced. Also, let's say not all of your friends are willing to play the new one. So now that your friends aren't playing, you're more likely to quit because of split loyalties between the games.The best thing we can do is keep improving Clash so you're not forced to choose between which ones you want to play,
I'd say it's all of the above, depending on the needs of the game. Content will always be the primary driver for Clash of Clans. It's where we see spikes in players returning, players being more active, etc. But in between content releases, it's good to give players more activities to do.
Lots and lots of new content for 2021. Lots. And it is badass.
I had an answer for this and I cannot for the life of me remember what it is. Unfortunately our Live Ops guy has left for the evening so I can't cross check with him. I'll try to ask him tomorrow and I'll post a reply here.
One big reason with the cost discrepancy is due to the resources you spend to upgrade those units. The cost to upgrade a Hero uses Dark Elixir which is a much more premium resource to farm/earn compared to Gold or Elixir. It's far easier to earn Gold and Elixir for upgrading Buildings/Troops. So the cost for the Book of Heroes is to help offset that. Whereas, because it's easier to earn Gold & Elixir, the other Books are more expensive. With the Hammers, the Hammer of Heroes is more expensive because you don't need to farm the DE for it.

u/ClashDotNinja:

Are you able to share any details on ideas/concepts that were designed and/or tested within the team that were then scrapped?

Answer: The Elixir Monster was a troop concept we prototyped during the development of TH12. The Elixir Monster was a troop that gained strength and size as it destroyed things. Similar to the Lumberjack, it would drop a Rage Spell after it was killed. In the end, the mechanic was really cool but way too complex for the average player. Additionally, because the unit required to make the kill attack in order to earn it's level up, with so many other troops attacking it actually rarely made a kill so it didn't morph? Mutate? Evolve? as fast as we thought it would. So it's a troop we might save for a rainy day and tweak it a bit to see if we can get it to balance correctly.
u/Drin_CoC:

Is the maximum Experience level, which currently is level 500, gonna be increased any time soon?
If there'll be more than 100 buildings after TH14 update, how will % be calculated? What about bases that have the 6th builder compared to the bases that don't?

Answer:

We might address it in the future, but I wouldn't expect any changes to it in the next couple updates. Apart from vanity purposes it doesn't really do much else so it's not a major priority for us.
We won't hit the 100 building limit just yet so we still have some wiggle room left to go before we start needing to worry about it. But it is something we are worried about for when we finally do hit that limit. We haven't found a solution to how we want to address it, but it is something that comes up every time we start working on new content.

u/LordPeter212:

What is the status of World’s 2021? The entire competitive community has been eagerly waiting for news about this. We need time to plan and prepare, and if it’s not happening we deserve to know.
Are there any plans to include any in game e-sports tournaments other than ESL?

Answer:

We are still working on the Worlds stuff and we're inching closer to announcing the 2021 season. We've made a few changes so we're still putting the final polish on those details. But we will announce the 2021 Worlds when we're ready.
There are tons of community-run events around the globe. We simply can't add them all in-game.

u/LadyB_clash:

Will we ever get a rewind button for replays? 😯 not sure if it’s possible but it would be a small but incredible QoL improvement for many. 😁

Answer: The challenge with this is that replays are not stored as videos. So you're not actually watching an actual "replay" of the match. The game stores your screen taps that you performed when you played your game. So when you watch a replay, you are actually watching a live version of the game where the AI is simply reproducing the same screen taps. Because the pathing algorithm and AI functions the exact same way, the system can recreate the same conclusion of the game every time.
So because you're watching the AI play the game using your screen taps, it can only go forward.
u/Soft-Decision5935:

Hi Darian! I’ve started 3 mini accounts and I’ve made one big observation: the beginning is by far the worst, slowest section of the game. The rest of the game is fun and it’s a great grind, but those opening 3-or-so days would be very unappealing to newer players who don’t know much about the rest of the game yet. Even for me, I absolutely hate those first few days. While I understand CoC is a game meant for people to grind out, I think something needs to be done to attract newer players. Have you considered fixing this/ is there a reason you haven’t yet?

Answer: This is actually a topic of discussion we're looking at; how to make the lower TH's more engaging and less grindy to make the progression to higher levels more enticing. So we totally understand where you're coming from. It's something we hope we can address in an update this year.
u/OverSizedHamster:

Hi Darian! Would you consider Clash of Clans a good representation of mobile gaming? Has its impact matched up to other notable titles on PC and console? Is it Smash Ultimate worthy?

Answer: Every so often, a game will become a cultural icon of the platform it's released on. For consoles that would be the Mario franchise. For MMORPG's, that would be World of Warcraft. For mobile, that's Clash of Clans. What I mean by cultural icon, is that it's a game that has lasted far longer than most others due to the sheer number of people that play it and the popular success it has had because of it.
Clash has been out for almost 9 years now. On any game platform that is almost unheard of apart from those other games that are cultural icons themselves.
I'm not sure what you mean by "good representation". But I will say this: The Clash community is possibly one of the best gaming communities. Period. It's one of the least toxic, most supportive, and fun communities I've ever had the privilege of working with.
u/301023459:

Would it be possible to have custom CC's for friendly challenges implemented into the game? To further explain what I mean, lets say I have my normal raid army set up with the cc troops I would usually take. However I want to practice new armies in friendly challenges but every time I do that, I have to dump old troops and request for new troops but those in my clan who have the troops I need for my friendly challenge army aren't always online. So a feature where I could customize my own cc troops for a friendly army is what I'm getting at.

Answer:

The Friendly Challenge is an interesting facet of the game that was introduced much later in the game's development history. So the functionality of it is wholly based on how the rest of the game functions with regards to troop donations, troop deployment, etc. Creating a unique set of functions for this feature is something the team sees as a priority at the moment. However, that priority could change when we start to look at what QoL changes we want to implement in future updates. Many of the changes implemented into the FC/FW features were based on QoL requests from the community so I wouldn't say it's a ruled out idea. Just not something on the production schedule at the moment.

u/purk8:

When are we getting BH10. Lot of people who are more competitive on B-base, but aren’t playing much because it’s the same old thing every season. We’re all feeling kinda forgotten about ☹️

Answer: It's rather interesting that whenever we released new BH content, there was general disdain that we were allocating development resources to it. But now there is a lot of clamouring for when the next BH level will be. :-) We don't have any solid plans for BH10 yet, but we have discussed it on occasion. We're reluctant to simply just do a new level as we're still trying to decide where we want to take the Builder Base feature. We don't want to keep adding features that are already available to the Main Village; otherwise why not just keep developing the Main Village?
u/El3veN_:

You said you had a meeting planned about the API, do we have any news regarding the API, your vision on it, whats your plans for it, etc?

Answer: I am not a programmer so I would hate to misrepresent something I know little about. You'll have to forgive my lack of correct vocabulary. There has been some API discussion recently to make certain data more accessible, though what those data are I can't say simply because I didn't understand how that process works. But I can say there has been some movement in the API discussion on the team.
u/Hellrazor:

Has an increase to the 30s scout time in legend league been considered along with viewable building radiuses? This was brought up partly last year in one of the TH hour videos where Eino admitted that as new TH levels were released the allotted 30s planning time becomes more & more restrictive the more there is to consider when planning an attack. IMO increasing the time to 45s / 1min in legend league would combat this whilst also separating it from lower leagues.
Are there any plans to restructure the Legend League system i.e rewards / ladder / ranks? The gems rewarded to the top 20 players in the top 3 clans is long outdated & legend trophies don’t have much use besides a visual standpoint. The day to day ladder system could also be taken further - something akin to a weekly system for example whereby your standings at the end of the week determine your placement for the next whilst still maintaining a monthly season would be less stale & more meaningful imo. Additionally ranks / badges could also be included within legend league to further develop the ranking system & possibly tie in to a rewards system somehow.
How does the Eagle Artilleries target prioritisation work? According to the wiki: The Eagle Artillery targets according to a "heat map" or "hitpoint map". In other words, it targets the area with the largest density of hitpoints. However this doesn’t seem to apply most noticeably during a queen charge / walk. 5 healers for example have a greater combined HP than a maxed queen yet 9/10 the eagle will target the queen so I suspect there’s more going on here. Whilst targeting the queen over your healers is far more favourable for the attacker it can be incredibly frustrating when the opposite occurs. As far as I can tell the logic currently appears to operate under RNG although I hope & suspect I’m wrong. Perhaps someone from the dev team could elaborate on this?

Answer:

While it had been discussed, at this time the team feels there's no need for it.
While the LL system could certainly use some new polishing and some shiny chrome, there hasn't been anything internally proposed that has made us say, "YES! That's what it needs!"
There is no RNG in how the AI targets units or paths towards a target. Every target is calculated based on the rules programmed into the algorithm. For the Eagle Artillery, yes population density does factor in. In your particular example, it could be that the Archer Queen had taken damage, where the collection of Healers now collectively had more HP resulting in a more desirable target before the AQ was fully healed again. I would need to see a specific replay of any instance before making a definitive call on what you're seeing.

u/non-reddituser:

In an interview with galadon around 11 months ago you said “ Part of it is as we see a lot of activity of a lot of players returning a lot of them are coming back to their old clans” In response to why sc hasn’t added a clan name change. Has this changed, Is there a still a high amount of players returning? If not is sc planning or at least considering adding it?
In the same interview with galadon he pitched you an separate section in the shop were you buy obstacles with legend league trophies. At the end of your answer you said” but, I think it’s an idea that does have some merit and all I can do is to present it to the team” did you present to the team and is there possibility we could see this any time soon?
As my final question I’d like to as you if you could explain the choice of sc censoring the whole clans chat when a kids account join?

Answer:

Clan name changes are still a ruled out idea for now, for the same reason. Additionally, changing your player name is one thing. That's personal to you. Changing a Clan name is something that affects the entire Clan. While sure, many Clans would be ok with the name change but what happens when members don't like the name that it's changed to? If that original Clan name had sentimental value, and someone changes it, that would feel really crappy for those who liked the original Clan name. So rather than try to come up with rules and edge cases for it, and introduce possibly more unnecessary complexity, it's simpler to prohibit for now.
Nothing has come out of that discussion apart from the idea being presented.
The rules for this only applies to new underage accounts created in the US. The reason for this is for compliance with new online regulations that are required for certain kinds of games. We have no control over those regulations.

u/thisisathrowawayCoC:

Does the barrel shaped building where you boost super troops have a name? If not, then what did the dev team call it?
Do you guys plan on adding more achievements?
Will there be more single player campaign levels as part of the next update or th14?
There has been an insane amount of rumours and ideas as to water based troops or gameplay. Is the dev team even considering something among those lines?

Answer:

It's called the Super Sauna. The image of the modern sauna is a Finnish invention, and since we're based out of Finland, it seemed like a nice cultural touch to the game.
Yes!
We really liked the Winter Challenge map and plan on doing more things like that in the future. However, we'd like players to remember that Clash is a multiplayer game and designed around that idea. Adding more single player content, while fun, minimizes that multiplayer aspect so it's not a primary focus of ours.
Water based troops? First time I've heard this rumour. Considering the map is based on land, a water troop would be a bit like...a fish out of water? In other words, I wouldn't listen to rumours.

u/HarrBathtub:

What was the “big thing” that was meant to be released in the winter?

Answer: We have a super cool feature we're steadily working on. We're not ready to share what that is just yet, but we're hoping we can reveal and release it this year.
u/Quna_chan:

Can we expect a goblin map maker where community can make goblin maps and clash team can check them and add it to the game.

Answer: This sounds like a good idea, but moderating all the entries that would come in would require it to be a full time job in itself. Checking to make sure the map isn't broken, or doesn't have inappropriate content, or doesn't cause any problems. It's not a matter of just pulling it up on the screen and say "ok there are no middle fingers hidden in the images so it's good to go." It would require playtesting, feedback, etc.
u/Pero_Plays:

Would you consider going to a 24-month instead of a proposed 18-month cycle of new TH levels to sync with World Championships better?
Could we get a double deployment bar on phones?

Answer:

24 months of no new TH content is simply too long. We're really happy with the pace we've been releasing new TH levels. One of the things we have to look at when spacing out the content is how long before maxed players start to get bored and stop playing. New content is always the biggest driver of player activity, and the longer you draw out not having new content results in players becoming more likely to leave the game. The World Championship is an exciting and cool facet of Clash, but it's not the main one and only a very small number of players will ever compete in the Championships. That small percentage of players cannot dictate the pace of content progress.
We tried looking at this but the UI became so small that it was super inconvenient to use, even with a stylus.

u/feareddakota:

Hey Darian, I’m not sure if this question was asked before but do you think it would pose a significant challenge for your team considering what a new a Town Hall would be due to the weaponization of Town Halls 12 and 13?

Answer: Coming up with new and unique content will always be the challenge as we create new features. It came up when we were working on TH13, and is in discussion as we work towards TH14. And it will likely come up again as we work on TH15 and beyond. Making sure something is cool and unique is always a fun challenge, but we shouldn't make something JUST because it's unique. It has to also be fun and exciting.
u/LowScrow_Tom:

Will we ever have a troop, or Super Troop, with the capability of switching from Ground to Air? (I think Ice Golem/ Ice Hound could've utilized this feature.)
Without the ability to add new buildings due to percent damages, could you have a "Gear Up" feature at TH14 which would combine all Builder Huts and /or Barracks to 1 main building, which must be upgraded FIRST before being able to purchase new TH14 Defences?. (Multiple problems solved)

Answer:

This is something that has been considered, like making a "Fallen Angel" Healer who is a ground troop but heals air units. This is just an idea and not something being worked on, before everyone starts saying it's confirmed. Changing a unit from air to ground or vice versa is actually pretty complicated because the pathing for ground units is different than air units as is the logic algorithm. So it's not just a matter of allowing it to swap places. But I wouldn't be surprised if we introduce a Super Troop that does do this.
We've contemplated the building fusion idea in the past and we're not convinced that is a good solution.

u/Alpii69:

Hello Darian! Is there any Chance we can get second abilities for Heroes? You can either choose the first or the second for a attack? For example the Barbarian King gets stationary and is immune to all damage for 5 seconds. Queens shoots faster and her shots pierce through buildings for x amount of second. The Royal Champion deflects damage for x amount of seconds. Warden heals troops over time

Answer: We had considered this idea and while it's cool, it doesn't offer quite the flexibility and variability players are looking for in a feature like this. We would want a feature like this to feel like players are able to customize their experiences. A second ability doesn't really do that as players would just choose a favourite one, then set and forget. We think there is a better way to offer that kind of customization. Additionally, balancing new abilities would be super challenging compared to new troops or new spells.
u/Immabeloverof15june:

Any plans on player made maps as single player map?
Any plans on mega base type mode?
What are big features which aside from new troops, buildings, townhall levels?
What are your plans on bringing more social features to the game?

Answer:

Player made maps are never a good idea, though they sound neat on paper. We'd need some kind of moderation process to remove inappropriate submissions, and given there'd be thousands upon thousands of entries, it would require full time moderation.
We see this request a lot. Again, on paper it sounds really cool. But what would the overall goal be? What would the benefits be to the Clan? There are a ton of logistics you'd have to look at. Like who would be the caretaker of such a mega base? The leader? What if the leader left or stopped playing? Co-leaders? What if they disagree with how the mega base should be laid out? Would Elders and Members have access to editing the mega base?
We've got something pretty big planned this year (fingers crossed we can finish it in time). We'll announce it when it's ready. And it's a doozy.
It entirely depends on what social features players want (features that aren't Global Chat or similar function).

u/sportsguy3: Could you give us some examples of new charactetroops/heroes/ideas that were very close to making it into the game but eventually didn't make the cut?
Answer: When we work on new TH content, we try to prototype new troop ideas. When we were working on TH12, we had several troops we had tested out before we finally settled on the Yeti. One of the troop ideas was a Goblin Glider. It was basically Goblins that flew in on little gliders and dropped down to attack resource storages and collectors. If I remember correctly, the Goblin Glider eventually inspired the Builder Base Hog Glider unit since we liked the glider function. But the Goblin Glider felt a bit TOO spammy.
u/NikplaysgamesYT:

Do you guys have plans regarding banning accounts? I see so many times players are perma banned for “account sharing” or “account stealing” when nothing like that ever happened. Even someone in my clan was perma banned, and I see posts on Reddit all the time about this. Do you have plans to change the process of being banned or the criteria to avoid these situations?
What is your opinion regarding queen walks after indirectly nerfing them so hard? This year, you guys added headhunters and super minions, both of which destroy queen walks if your not careful. Did you guys think they were OP before this update, and do you think they’re still OP now?
Do you believe that the game has done a good job balancing progression? For townhall 10, IMO you guys did a perfect job, I finished my hero’s, walls, and defences at almost the same time (got screwed up since at that time there was the event where everything was half off. But for th11, I am currently almost max, just working on my last lab upgrades and walls, but I’ve been full on dark elixir for the past 3 months. Do you think progression overall is super balanced and any plans to change it?

Answer:

In the near-4 years I've been at Supercell, I've had hundreds of requests from players to investigate their account ban. Out of those hundreds, I can count on a single hand how many of them were incorrectly banned due to agent error. A single hand. Time and time again such threads rarely ever reveal any kind of loopholes or weaknesses in the support recovery process and more often than not highlight how players treat their account security by engaging in behaviour that violates our Terms of Service policies. Almost every single one of those players underestimate just how accurately we can investigate an account issue. Many of them start off with a friend who let another friend do their War attacks, but most of the banned accounts have shown very suspicious activity of account sharing, buying, etc.How do these accounts get phished? It's simply because most people don't realize just how manipulative scammers/phishers are. Also most people fail to realize exactly just how much identifiable information they put out for the public to be able to see.That's the thing about scammers/phishers. The good ones rarely make their intentions obvious until it's too late. There's a reason why scamming is a multi-billion dollar industry. Good scammers are charismatic, manipulative, and convincing. They are also relying on the fact you have no idea just how useful the information you gave them really is, especially when you think the information is banal or mundanely useless.The fact they leave you blaming a lax in security instead of blaming yourself shows A) just how manipulative they are and B) how willing you are to deflect blame in order to admit to falling for a scam.Admittedly, that second one is a tough pill to swallow. No one likes admitting they made a mistake, and that's especially so when you have to face severe consequences for those actions. But as I said before, we can tell the difference between someone's compromised account vs. someone who fell victim to a scam or gave/bought/sold their account. Usually if the account is compromised, Support is fairly quick at restoring access to those accounts. But because there's no reason to voice any complaints about it, you don't read about those thousands of success stories. What we do hear about on the forums are those examples where support was unable to restore the account because they can see suspicious or fraudulent activity on the account.
I still use Queen Walk at TH13 so you're asking the wrong person. I find the strategy still viable and very strong.
I do think we've done an overall good job of maintaining balance. It's not perfect, nor will it ever be perfect. This is especially true as we add more content in the future. There is no such thing as a perfectly balanced multiplayePVP game. All we can do is try to balance it to the best of our ability when we release a new troop or keep an eye on the data and balance it as we see the data coming in.

u/GroddTH12:

Do you intend to improve the time to update buildings and troop level TH11, TH12 and TH13?
Is there a possibility to create a new hero in a new update?

Answer:

Eventually, most likely.
We don't want to do a new Hero with each new TH level. The earliest we will likely add a new Hero would be TH15, but that's not a guarantee.

u/clashic94:

Clan War Leagues and Clan Games are monthly events that last a week. Are there any plans for introducing another monthly event that lasts a few days in between CWL and Clan Games? (Townhall Tournaments, etc.)
As the army camp size increases and the possibility for more troops in battle at any given time increases, will we be seeing troops with higher and higher housing space to avoid overcomplexity?
Will we be able to use two Siege Machines at the same time in the future? More than two Super Troops?

Answer:

Yes. Although what that is we're not ready to reveal yet.
It's unlikely we'll adjust the housing space for older troops like Barbs, however, how much housing space a troop takes up is actually an essential part of the design process as we design a new troop.
Two Siege Machines would be a bit weird since you only have a single Clan Castle. Being able to deploy two and divide up the CC troops between them would genuinely be way OP. As far as allowing more than 2 Super Troops at a time, I mean, we just started allowing 2 recently! We're keeping an eye on their usage to see if allowing 3 or more would be something positive for the game.

u/confipete:

Is it true that Supercell is going to remove builder base by June?
Why don't war donations account for donation count?
Why is builder base's attacking AI is different from Home village's?
Do you consider the ideas we post in this sub while adding new features to the game?

Answer:

Wait..what? Remove Builder Base? Where the heck do you guys find this stuff? We're not removing it.
Part of it is because you can remove and edit War donations, at least in the War Leagues. So it would be easy to abuse to edit/remove cc troops and keep redonating just to get your count up.
The AI isn't different, it uses the same logic engine as the main village. However, a big factor in what causes some issues is the Guard Post. The wandering units cause havoc with the pathing AI because the attacking units have to constantly recalculate their position and the targets it's tracking.
Absolutely.

u/EyalReddits:

Will we ever get a new gamemode like the builder base?
Why are super troops taking up so much space? This makes them almost unusable

Answer:

I'm sure there'll be new game features we'll introduce in the future. It won't be like Builder Base, but will be something completely new. In fact we're working on something that I think will be pretty enjoyable. No release dates yet, as it's a fairly complex system. But we're excited to announce it when it's ready.
The housing space for Super Troops is to balance out how much stronger they are than regular troops.

u/superman37891:

Can we donate super troops with gem donations, even if we don’t have them unlocked?
Can we have separate clans for home village and builder base (so I don’t get kicked out of my top clan for not having a good builder base)?
Add a clan search filter for CWL league (Champs 1, Champs 3, Master 2, etc.)
Can we cap the level of the CC troops donated to lower town halls / CC levels? (Ex: A level 9 loon donated to a TH3 caps at level 2)? I feel this will make it easier to balance lower THs and make it more fair for those who can’t get CCs

Answer:

No. Being able to donate them without spending the upgrade cost kinda defeats the purpose of spending the upgrade cost.
No. Programming the logistics behind this, having separate chat UI's, Clan logs, match logs, war logs, etc. would be an absolute data nightmare.
As a reflex response, my guess would be that it would lead to just those Clans at the top tiers being bombarded with invitation requests while lower clans would remain unfilled. And because they remain unfilled, it would make it harder for them to climb to those ranks, thus perpetuating a bit of a cycle.
No. The levels they are donated at is intentional.

u/Luke_theGreat:

Hey Darian. Thanks for doing this. Right now, every month we have cwl in the first week and clan games towards the end. I personally feel like this is getting tedious. Are there any plans to mix this up more? Thanks. Luke

Answer: We planned out the calendar of events for a very specific reason and the timing is intentional. Having them set the same time allows players to more efficiently plan out how they upgrade and how they spend resources. Mixing up the schedule would make it more difficult for players to do so.
u/One-Decision-6110:

Hello there, Darian, thanks for taking the time to answer my question if you do,one thing I'm recently annoyed about is botters, it seems like they are everywhere, is it possible if you could give me a percentage of how many players out of total players are botters?also, i use the same army, time and time again, I'm worried my account will get banned one day due to SuperCell suspecting me to bot, are there any other measures you take into account when banning botters?

Answer: We never publicly reveal numbers. With regards to bots, it's a constant game of cat and mouse. We improve our systems to detect them and they improve the botting software to avoid detection. So we then improve the system again to detect them and then they improve the botting software to avoid detection. You can see how this goes on. It's one of the reasons why we do mass bans of botters instead of just individual cases. If we banned players who bot on an individual basis, it allows the bot software creators to analyse what it was that allowed them to be detected and make changes even faster. So by banning in mass groups, it slows down their development a bit.
To answer your question about using the same attack, that's not how the detection system works so as long as you're not using a bot program we don't care how often you attack with the same army.
u/mystic_coc: Hi Darian, what do you think about a new game mode in clash. It can be solo or multi (like clan base or something). You could create multiples worlds with the clash universe like a goblin village etc were we can attack the king of goblin
Answer: I'm curious, but you don't really give any kind of idea what kind of feature you're suggesting. It's like saying "have you thought of a new multiplayer game?" Yes I have, but without knowing what kind of game you want, it's kind of an impossible question to answer.
If you've made it down here, well done! I hope everyone here has learnt something new, and after reading the sheer amount of answers I'm sure you can all thank Darian for the extraordinary effort he put in (he isn't being payed for this either, he's just that amazing).
If you don't see your question on the reddit post or the document it was most likely to avoid duplicates
Happy Clashing!

Bloomberg Opinion: GameStop Is Rage Against the Financial Machine

I know, everyone is tired of hearing about Gamestop, but this was something I came across that I thought was actually quite well written and pretty spot on with most of the anger driven rhetoric I've seen on Reddit.
I've copy/pasted because I know most of y'all don't have Bloomberg subscriptions.

Traders putting on the short squeeze aren’t motivated by greed. They’re engaged in an anger-driven uprising against the establishment.
Anger Is an Energy
The saga of GameStop Corp. continues. By the end of another frenetic day of trading Tuesday, the stock had just topped its high from Monday. Between those peaks, it staged a fall of more than 50% on Monday afternoon. Colleagues have followed these extraordinary developments as they happened. I will try for now simply to process the single most important question: Is this just a weird technical situation, of the kind that comes along every few years, that can otherwise be safely ignored? Or does it tell us something important about market conditions as a whole?
GameStop's share price surged back to set a new high Purely qualitatively, based on what I have witnessed, I think it does matter. The signal it sends is disquieting, if not surprising. It also introduces us to a new variant on an ancient market phenomenon.
The cliche is that market capitalism works on the balance between greed and fear. The standard defense is as follows: If the greed to make money by beating the competition is matched by a fear of failure through making too many mistakes or cutting corners, then capitalism works. Nothing else yet discovered gives people such an incentive to work and create growth. Speculative bubbles happen when greed becomes excessive, or when fear diminishes too much. Easy money and easier trading with derivatives oil these emotions and allow them to run riot. The financial crisis of 2008 happened in large part because years of policy had convinced investors that there would be a bailout if they failed; they lost their fear, and greed took over.
This feeds into the debate over whether we have a speculative bubble at present. Markets are pervaded by gloom and worry, so there is no lack of fear — even if confidence that interest rates will never rise is growing excessive. Meanwhile, there is little in the way of greed. Cryptocurrency has generated excitement, as has Tesla Inc., but in the main the frenzy over a historic opportunity to get rich, of the kind that was everywhere in 1999, is lacking. This is a different, worried world. The last two decades have stripped it of its positivity. The mood is nothing like the great bubbles of the past.
Instead of greed, this latest bout of speculation, and especially the extraordinary excitement at GameStop, has a different emotional driver: anger. The people investing today are driven by righteous anger, about generational injustice, about what they see as the corruption and unfairness of the way banks were bailed out in 2008 without having to pay legal penalties later, and about lacerating poverty and inequality. This makes it unlike any of the speculative rallies and crashes that have preceded it.
On Monday, I argued that it was misplaced to take pleasure at the pain for the short-sellers who had attacked GameStop stock, and then been subjected to a “short squeeze” for the ages by traders coordinating on Reddit. I received a bumper crop of feedback. Here are some representative samples (leaving out many with unprintable expletives):

“You kind of miss the point of what is going on with GameStop. How much did Melvin pay you to write this garbage? shill. Literally trying to protect an industry trying to fleece jobs from low income workers. Sleep well chump.”
“Watching entitled institutional shorts whine on TV and OP EDs that millennials equipped with margin accounts & zero fees are collaborating on Reddit to target them is my new favorite sport. Looks perfectly healthy from where I'm sitting, which is on bull side :) plus 1 for the little guys.”
“Normal isn't putting the retail trader down for being independent while organized hedge funds force you to take their way or suffer in fear. Normal is the American dream and being able to make your own way. This isn't a casino. This is a riot.”

One respondent warned that the people squeezing the shorts aren’t “a herd of impressionable youngsters with Robinhood accounts. No. They are an experienced & ruthless army of insomniacs followed by a silent legion of rapidly learning new traders. This is a new paradigm that won’t go away.”
Another told me I was a “dumb boomer” amid a screed of unprintable epithets. (Point of information: I’m just too young to be a boomer. I’m in Generation X, but it’s the intergenerational antagonism that’s noteworthy.) Another said that the short squeeze was just a way for millennials to recoup the money they had been forced to pay to bankers during the TARP rescue 12 years ago, and to put coronavirus relief checks to work:

“In other words, poor people have too much money and are now controlling the narrative. Damn those $1200 stimulus checks and $600 unemployment supplements. Too much liquidity, let's get these folks back to living paycheck to paycheck.”
“I know. Democratisation of the market is so damned inconvenient for those of us with money.”
“nobody cares about your hedge fund cronies!”
“Bloomberg defending the suits. Not surprised. They’re just mad the rubes are in on the joke now. Might this force the Fed’s hand? Too many regular people in on the game.”

This is all fascinating. In the space of 12 years, the role of the short-seller has turned on its head. Back in 2008, it was the shorts who upset the status quo, revealed what was rotten in the state of Wall Street, and brought down the big shots. They were even the heroes of a big movie. It was the Wall Streeters who attacked them.
Alienation has deepened since then. Short-selling hedge funds are now seen as part of a corrupt establishment, as is the media. The motives of anyone defending the shorts, or anyone wearing a suit, must be suspect. And there is a deep generational divide; those unable to own their own home and forced to rely on defined contribution pensions have a stunningly unfair deal compared to those a generation older, living in mortgage-free homes with guaranteed pensions. That percolates into anger, and a determination to right the scales by making money at the expense of corrupt short-sellers.
We lack precedents for an angry bubble, so predictions are even harder than usual. But there are enough similarities with past incidents to raise serious cause for concern.
First, the little guys have had their success so far with the aid of margin accounts, and by using derivatives. We know what happens when these things are used to excess; even the Dutch tulipmania relied on margin debt and derivatives. Little guys (and everyone else) deserve safer tools with which to build wealth.
Second, “democratization of finance” isn’t new, and in itself is nothing that anyone can object to. The problem is that investment and financial planning are difficult, and require time. Regulate these things, and you no longer have true democratization. Leave people free to take chances, and you get disasters like the bursting of the dot-com bubble in 2000. That also followed plenty of hype about the success of the “little guy,” and the first great explosion of online discount trading succeeded in sucking an army of new retail investors into the bubble’s final climax. Unregulated “democratization” led to the little guy bearing the brunt of the losses.
“Democratizing” finance also leaves newly enfranchised financial citizens prey to spivs and frauds. I started my career covering the disastrous repercussions of one of Margaret Thatcher’s last reforms in the U.K. — giving people the right to leave their defined-benefit pensions, offered by employers, and take on defined-contribution “personal pensions.” Unscrupulous salesmen persuaded miners, firefighters and police officers to abandon copper-bottomed index-linked pensions for plans that came burdened with excessive charges. It was a repellent spectacle, and the bill for compensation was in the billions.
These points doubtless make me appear to be a complacent shill for the financial industry, talking down to the rubes. For the record, I’m still angry about the way workers were ripped off in Britain more than three decades ago, and about the way the little guy ended up bearing the brunt for the financial implosions of 2000 and 2008. But it looks horribly to me as though the same thing is going to happen again — and I don’t think the answer to today’s many ills is to empower poor people to bankrupt themselves with margin accounts and derivatives.
Anger, even more than greed, has the capacity to make us throw caution to the winds. Many of us have a lot to be angry about. If this carries on, and spreads beyond targets like a video-game retailer, I don’t want to see the consequences when history’s first angry bubble bursts.

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-01-27/gamestop-short-squeeze-is-rage-against-the-financial-machine
Anyway, I'm sure everyone's tired of hearing about Gamestop, but hopefully this is a decent departure from the memes, hype, and completely unfounded bullshit that's been surrounding that conversation so far.

Detailed DD post [re-post after r/pennystocks removed it]

Why Robinhood Limited Gamestop Trades (Reject the Simple Narrative)

On January 28th Robinhood disabled all transactions except for position-closing (selling) for a small set of stocks including Gamestop (GME). This was a new and exciting development in the ongoing saga of how a subreddit called Wallstreetbets (WSB) memed their way into contributing to a short squeeze and profiting from it (or at least the early adopters are likely to profit from it). Freezing stock purchases also generated significant outrage, quickly turning into a narrative of how Big Wallstreet will cheat to avoid losing money to the average Joe. This narrative is simple, appealing, and probably wrong, and the following is an attempt to explain why.
I'm not going to go over the full history here. Others have already done that with plenty of background information. If you want to read the full saga (not necessary to understand the rest of this post, but it is interesting) then check out these links:
The obligatory Vox explainer. A background piece with an interesting explanation of how WSB could profit from this without many of them losing a bunch of money if they can coordinate effectively. A Wallstreetbets thread on GME if you've never visited the subreddit and want to immerse yourself in the full experience of crass GME memes and takes by people who have fully embraced the early 2000's non-PC habit of using intellectual disabilities and sexual orientation as insults.
Anyway, check out those links if you want, or don't, how we got to where we are isn't all that important for explaining why Robinhood shut down certain trades on January 28th.
Disclaimer: I am not an expert on any of this. There's a good chance I've made mistakes in the following explanation. I'm just a guy who wasn't satisfied by the simple narrative and stayed up 4 hours past his bedtime on Thursday night and spent most of his free time since trying to better understand this stuff and writing it up to share what I've learned. If you see anything that you know to be wrong please comment with correct information!
What differentiates this post: There have already been a few other good posts (see links below) on why Robinhood shutting down transactions was not some corrupt conspiracy. But this post is a post for masochists who want to know what's going on in more detail and who want to dig into the technical background and data. If that's you, read on!
Links to other good posts: https://www.reddit.com/neoliberal/comments/l7bo3the_game_stop_situation_is_not_a_conspiracy_an/ https://www.reddit.com/neoliberal/comments/l7bdcv/what_actually_happened_today_hint_there_probably/ https://www.reddit.com/neoliberal/comments/l81tif/why_did_robinhood_stop_allowing_their_customers/ https://www.reddit.com/badeconomics/comments/l7gi70/financial_econ_101_or_link_this_in_bad_reddit/

How a Stock Market Transaction Works

To really understand why the popular narrative about Robinhood is likely to be wrong, we need to better understand how a stock market transaction works. When you buy a stock, you fork over your money and receive in return shares of a stock. The company that provides the user interface or the human that you call up to arrange this transaction is called a broker. That's what Robinhood is. You tell your broker you want to buy X shares of stock Y, you give them the money and they arrange for those shares to be purchased and documented as being owned by you.
But if you're going through Robinhood, and the person that is selling you the shares goes through TD Ameritrade (another broker), Robinhood and TD Ameritrade don't actually talk to each other to complete the transaction. A number of intermediaries may be involved and this can be crazy complicated. Here is a brief explanation of some of the key players:
Broker: The broker interacts with traders. Brokers show traders what the current prices are, takes orders, and handles the traders’ money.
Clearing BrokeEntity/House: These entities handle the logistics of the trade. When a broker interacts with a trader they are basically a conduit for alerting the broader market that someone wants to make a trade of X stock at Y price. The clearing entity is in charge of organizing and documenting things, basically making sure that each side of the transaction transmits the appropriate funds and documenting everything as to who now owns what. Often brokers and clearing entities are combined. Robinhood was originally just a broker (they refer to that as being an "introducing broker") but has since expanded to also do clearing.
Market Maker: A market maker is an entity that has an inventory of certain shares and sells and buys those shares. The purpose of a market maker is to add liquidity. Instead of trying to connect one trader who wants to buy a stock with another trader who wants to sell that stock, brokers can just go to a market maker who they know is holding a stock. The market maker might sell a stock, depleting some of its supply, and then the next instant buy more of that stock to replenish its supply. It's basically a vehicle for faster transactions, and it makes its money by skimming a bit off the bid-ask spread. In other words, it might list a stock for sale at $100, and also list that it's willing to purchase a stock for $99.95. The 5 cent spread on each stock traded goes to the market maker. The reason spreads remain small is people would rather go through the market maker that skims the least off the top. Yay competition!
Exchange: This is like the NASDAQ. The NASDAQ acts as a kind of system enabling the exchange of information and making trades more efficient. This one is confusing to me, but it sounds like an exchange like the NASDAQ brings together market makers and I assume offers them some kind of service and features that makes trading easier. However, it also sounds like market makers don't necessarily have to go through an exchange and can operate without an exchange.
Before we get to the last piece I'll talk about here, keep in mind that all of the above becomes horribly mangled and complicated in reality, because from what I can tell just about any of these entities above can all be under one roof, or subsidiaries of other companies, or any number of different arrangements. The stock market is complicated! This should be your first warning when people try to push simple narratives. Extremely complicated stuff often doesn't fit within a simple story where there are heroes and villains and everyone is out to get the little guy.
The NSCC: NSCC stands for National Securities Clearing Corporation. It is a subsidiary of the DTCC, which stands for the Depository Trust and Clearing Organization. The DTCC is a private company. Each day billions and billions of trades happen. Instead of swapping equities back and forth and all over the place for every single transaction, the NSCC tracks all of these trades, sums them up and at the end of the day says "Company X, you owe company Y $1 billion, company Y, you owe Company X this many shares of each of these securities." The NSCC also handles these transactions, so the money being exchanged by these companies flows through the NSCC. And it does that for every company trading on the stock market. They all go through the NSCC, and the NSCC minimizes the amount of times money and equities have to change hands. There is one private company in the US that tracks and manages all of the trading information to make sure everyone gets paid, everyone gets their shares, and everything happens at the right price. I'm sure the details are complex but I assume brokers that are also clearing entities would be told by the NSCC how much they owe the market makers they exchanged with each day, and vice-versa.
It kind of blew my mind that there's essentially just one main company out there that serves as the central hub of all stock transactions and makes sure the markets work. As you can imagine, resting the entire stock market on one company means that company is going to be heavily regulated to be sure that it can never fail and bring the whole market down with it. We'll get into what regulations are at play soon, but the NSCC is likely the key component in the Robinhood trading freeze.

Claims of Corruption

Okay so we're going to take a brief detour into the reason people are outraged that Robinhood shut down trading. As broken out in this Twitter thread there once was a trader named Gabe Plotkin, he worked at a company called SAC Capital but they got fined for insider trading (not sure how this is relevant to the story other than to get your mind to make the association Plotkin = shady) and he left to start his own company. His new company was called Melvin Capital.
Plotkin's new company did a bunch of shorting, including on Gamestop. His shorts blew up this week with all the Wallstreetbets stuff, putting his firm in bankruptcy danger. But then Melvin got a $3 billion investment from SAC founder Steve Cohen and a Citadel hedge fund manager named Ken Griffin (the tweet thread says bailed out, apparently insinuating that these guys bought a stake in Plotkin's struggling company just to personally help him out, but make of that what you will). Citadel is a market maker. Robinhood uses Citadel as one of its market makers, and Citadel pays Robinhood fees for the trades Robinhood brings them. So Citadel pays Robinhood, Citadel recently bought Melvin capital, which had (and might still have?) a large short position on GME. Therefore the theory is that Citadel stands to lose a lot of money if the short squeeze continues, and since Robinhood gets fees from Citadel there's a big conflict of interest there, the implication being that Robinhood might have restricted purchases of GME in order to drive the price down and prevent Citadel from losing a lot of money via its recent purchase of Melvin.
I didn't fact check any of the above, I'm just presenting the information as I understand it for your knowledge. Make of it what you will, but that's the reason for the outrage. I assume many of the people outraged about it don't even know those details and just think that Robinhood is a big investing company so is probably just trying to save Wallstreet a bunch of money by shutting down trading and stamping out WSB's big short squeeze.
Also, I want to make it clear that this post isn't saying we should completely dismiss the possibility of corruption. It should be fully investigated to make sure nothing shady is happening behind the scenes. The point of this post is that this theory seems a little half-baked, and that there’s a much better theory available.

NSCC Collateral

Back to the NSCC and why it's the key component of all of this. The fate of the US financial market basically rests on its shoulders. So how do we make sure it never goes under? Lots of regulation. The NSCC is required by law to collect a bunch of collateral from the companies it facilitates trades for. That way if the market were to collapse and take down a few of the big market makers or brokers, any outstanding transactions don't completely bring down the NSCC with it, they have some collateral to offset those losses. (Side note: I believe the NSCC also has a means of getting a direct government money infusion in the event of a market collapse so that it can stay afloat and keep processing trades. I don't know the details of this, just wanted to mention it so people rest easier knowing that the sole private company keeping the market afloat isn't only relying on collateral).
You might wonder how much risk there really is for the NSCC. Don't these transactions happen instantaneously through the magic of computers and the internet? Sort of, but not really. While trades execute immediately, they don't actually settle for another two days. This is known as T+2 (In the days of physical stock certificates and paper money it used to take 5 days, or T+5, but computers and internet have sped up the process.). If you buy a stock, you don't officially become the owner until two days later once the NSCC settles the transaction.
Many brokers show the money in your account immediately after a sale, but you may have noticed or heard about delays in making multiple trades, such as not being able to sell a stock, use the proceeds to buy another, and then sell that one. Brokers often allow you to make a trade using unsettled funds for stocks, but they don't let you stack up a bunch of transactions, they require you to wait for settlement to actually occur so that everything is official and so you do a bunch of stuff with money that isn’t really yours yet.
Because these large payments between entities flow through the NSCC it creates a lot of risk for the NSCC. If there were to be a market crash or a sudden bankruptcy of a large trading firm, the NSCC would be exposed to the risk of a collapsed firm missing its payments for trades that have been executed but just not settled yet due to that two day period. I don't know the exact details of how this works, but essentially it sounds like the NSCC would be on the hook for those payments and still have to complete the transaction and pay the firm that the money was supposed to go to. That's why the government requires that companies post collateral each day with the NSCC based on factors like amount of money owed, volatility, and shifts in market price.
After the financial crisis a lot of scrutiny came upon the financial system and Dodd-Frank was passed, which created more oversight and regulation for the financial industry. As part of that, the NSCC was designated as one of eight Systemically Important Financial Market Utilities (SIMFUs) and was required to work under the oversight of the Federal Reserve and the SEC to establish requirements to ensure that it couldn't collapse, such as requiring collateral. The SIMFU designation was something I had no idea existed, so I just wanted to mention that and link to the wikipedia page on it in case anyone else was interested.

Calculating Collateral

The latest rules that the NSCC has created and SEC has approved (under procedure XV here) set forth certain measures to use in calculating how much collateral has to be posted by each firm settling trades with the NSCC. As far as I can tell and based on the original Twitter thread I found this information in (see the end of the post for the credit and link) the collateral is a portion of the outstanding money owed by a firm at the end of the day. For example, if after summing everything up the NSCC determines that Robinhood owes $1 billion to other firms and will receive $0.5 billion from other firms, the collateral will be a portion of the net $0.5 billion they owe. Here's a brief summary of the estimates and steps that go into finding the required collateral, more details on each of these will follow:
1.) Take the highest of two different measures of value-at-risk. Value-at-risk is a measure of how much money you could lose in a certain time period. According to the NSCC proposed rules to the SEC this usually comprises the largest part of the collateral. PDF download of proposed rules is here. 2.) If a single position or stock makes up more than 30 percent of the entire balance owed, the collateral must be a percentage of that balance based on certain historical data, with a minimum of 10% of the size of that position. 3.) A percentage of the difference between the long and short positions in the balance plus the lower balance of the long and short positions multiplied by an even smaller percentage. 4.) The mark-to-market value, which is basically the difference between the initial value of the shares when the trades were executed and any change in market value since then. So if on the first day Robinhood owed $500 billion to the NSCC to be paid out to other companies, but the next day (T+1) the market value of those shares increased by $10 billion my understanding is that Robinhood would have to add $10 billion to their collateral. 5.) Any additional collateral the NSCC demands based on volatility of certain positions. I’m just speculating on this but this seems to be an increase the NSCC can apply if it assesses that there’s widespread exposure to volatility. In other words, the previous four collateral calculations are based on risk exposure from a single firm, but NSCC also would want to look at risk from all of the firms that owe money to the NSCC. Don’t take that as gospel though, the source documents are hard to follow.
The total required value of the collateral is the max of item #1 through #3, plus #4 and #5. So #1 through #3 aren't additive, you just take the worst of them. And there are more than this too, but these are the main five we'll go over now because that's enough complexity and these seem to be the big factors. The others have to do with things like previously unpaid balances, and the ones I have listed here seem to be the biggest factors in calculating required collateral.
To make this less vague I want to give an idea of how these numbers might change as share volatility increases. We'll start with value-at-risk. The value-at-risk essentially looks at the historical volatility and estimates how much you're at risk of losing in a single period. For the purposes of what we're looking at the period is one day. The idea is you normalize the data from a certain time period of daily changes in portfolio price, and then using a normal distribution you see what the 99th percent confidence interval of maximum loss would be. Say Robinhood has a balance owed with the NSCC of $500 billion, they might come up with a number like $50 million, which would mean in a single day they could be around 99% confident that their balance owed wouldn't end up increasing or decreasing by more than $50 million.
But those are fake numbers, so let's estimate some real ones. There are two measures in their rules they use for estimating this. One measure is an evenly weighted volatility function over a period of at least 253 days. That means they look back over the last 253 days or longer and the change in price each day is equally weighted when estimating the mean and standard deviation. The other measure is called an exponentially weighted moving average (EMWA), where they look back a certain number of days but each subsequent day into the past is weighted a little bit less, so that more recent days receive the most weight in your volatility estimate.
Now I want to be clear before I start describing the process that my statistics knowledge is weak, so be aware that I’m following explanations I found online for how to do these things. If anyone notices an error in what I’m doing or in my terminology please correct me. If your stats knowledge is also weak just be aware that this is a case of the blind leading the blind, so don’t assume I know what I’m doing!
My strategy for the value-at-risk was to estimate the value-at-risk of a single share of GME and use that as the basis for estimating the value-at-risk to Robinhood and across the stock market. To estimate these values I downloaded the last 5 years of GME data and ran numbers on the share price at daily close. First I calculated the daily return and applied the natural log to each return. From what I’ve read this is common in the finance world and has some benefits, and it’s generally assumed that the resulting returns are normally distributed. From there for the equivalently weighed method I took the standard deviation on a rolling basis over the past 253 days. According to the NSCC submittal to the SEC, they use a 99% confidence interval to estimate the largest amount that the share price could drop or rise in a single day, based on the data in the historical sample. Or in other words they’re trying to estimate a single-day drop or increase in value that only has a 1% chance of being exceeded.
Once you have the standard deviation you use the assumed normal distribution to find the value-at-risk. The Z score represents the number of standard deviations to the left and right of the mean that results in your confidence interval. As shown in the image below, for a 99% confidence interval the Z score is 1.96. For 99% the Z score is 2.576.
Normal Distribution Showing Z Scores for 95% Confidence Interval
Computing the value-at-risk for the EMWA is a little more complicated. Instead of describing it here follow this link if you want an explanation. But at the end of the day you’re still computing the standard deviation and multiplying it by the Z score, you just compute your standard deviation so that each previous day is weighted as X% of the day after it. I assumed 95% as the decay factor based on the linked article. So today is weighted at 5%, the previous day is 5%*0.95 = 4.75%, the day before that would be 4.51%, and so on.
Below is a plot of results showing the value-at-risk as a percent of the GME share price each day and the GME share price. As you can see, the EMWA generally sticks close to the equivalently weighted method, but fluctuates around it. That fluctuation is because the EMWA is going to be weighing recent price movements a lot higher. So we can see that it makes sense to use the worst case of the EMWA and equivalently weighted value-at-risk, since the EMWA captures recent highs and lows in volatility while the equivalently weighted measures your longer term volatility.
GME Value at Risk as Percent of Share Price Since 2018
You can also see from the chart that what’s happened recently with GME is pretty crazy. The EMWA value-at-risk is close to 80% of the share price! That means if the share price were $100, the 99% confidence interval means it could drop or increase as much as $80 in one day. Previously the EMWA measure had peaked closer to 30% in the last few years, so we’re in pretty uncharted territory for this stock. Below is the same chart but focused on after October 2020 so we can see the recent movement better. As you can see, the equivalently weighted value-at-risk is at about 30%.
GME Value at Risk as Percent of Share Price Since October 2020
That just tells us the value-at-risk for one share. To estimate value at risk for the whole stock market I took the percent value-at-risk times the share price times the volume traded. You can see the result in the image below. I had to show the vertical axes in log-scale because the recent change is just massive. Assuming my method isn’t completely wrong, the stock market as a whole had a value-at-risk peaking at $23 billion on January 27th in just GME stock. That’s some pretty huge volatility.
Dollar Value at Risk for Single and All Shares of GME Since 2018
Here's the same chart but figured on October 2020 onward.
Dollar Value at Risk for Single and All Shares of GME Since October 2020
Robinhood’s value-at-risk is going to be less than that. Their value-at-risk from GME is going to be based on how many shares their users bought and the net Robinhood owed money on each day. So the dollar total for them is going to be quite a bit less than $23 billion. This is difficult to estimate, since from what I can tell brokers don’t really publish their daily volume in each stock. As a back-of-the-envelope, very very rough guess, I’ll start with just roughly assuming 1% of the trades of GME were through Robinhood, and 75% of that was purchases of GME and 25% was selling GME. Doing the math on that would mean that on January 27th Robinhood would be estimated to have $115 million in value-at-risk from just GME alone.
As a second method of estimating I’ll look at what data we do have from Robinhood. In June Robinhood said they had 4.3 million daily average revenue trades (DARTs). That doesn’t really tell us a lot though, because it looks to me like that’s just trades and doesn’t indicate how many shares were traded. That means it’s time to make more arbitrary assumptions! First I’ll assume that average remained the same during the recent craze. I’ll just guess that since Robinhood is billed as for the little guy that the average is 5 shares per trade. And I’ll also assume that in recent days at the height of the craziness that GME accounted for 10% of the trades on Robinhood, and 75% of those were buys. Reasonable? I have no idea, but hopefully. On January 27th the single-share value-at-risk for GME was $250. And total GME shares traded was 93 million. Based on the assumptions, I’m coming up with 2.15 million trades of GME from Robinhood, and a total of $268 million at risk for Robinhood.
So with those two guess-timates it looks like on the worst day, January 27th, the value-at-risk for Robinhood for GME alone could have ranged from somewhere around $100 million to maybe as high as $300 million. And that’s just for GME. The NSCC requires Robinhood to account for value-at-risk of its entire portfolio, all stock purchases net of sales. So the value-at-risk is likely to be even higher than what I’m showing here.
As a final sanity check on this, the NSCC had about $10 billion in its clearing funds as of September 30th, 2020 and about $15 billion as of June 30, 2020. According to our chart, in September and June of 2020 the total value of GME at risk across the entire stock market was about $10 million dollars, or about 0.1 percent of the clearing funds. According to this article, on January 28th the NSCC clearing fund value jumped from $26 billion to $33.5 billion. I’m estimating that GME itself might have accounted for $10 or $20 billion of that. Based on that I’m guessing my estimate of GME’s contribution is probably on the high side. There are other volatile stocks out there besides GME, so for it to be making up over half of the clearing funds seems a bit extreme. That said, we’re at least somewhat in the ballpark, since the clearing fund went from $10-$15 billion in summer and fall to about $25-$30 billion now, so it does seem that GME and other volatile stocks are pushing up the clearing fund by quite a bit.
Bringing that back to our list, what I’ve estimated is that the NSCC might be requiring in the ballpark of $100 to $300 million from Robinhood as collateral for item #1. The rest of the list items I’m not going as in-depth on. For item #2, we have to estimate what the collateral would be if GME was more than 30% of Robinhood’s outstanding portfolio at the end of the day. Let’s say they hit exactly 30%, what would that look like? Let’s use our previous ballpark estimate of 4.35 million trades per day at 5 shares per trade. We’ll also assume GME is around the average price for a stock so we don’t have to weight for stock price. And finally we’ll say GME is at about $300 in share price. Doing that I come up with 6.5 million shares of GME purchased by Robinhood on net, with 10% of that value being $196 million.
I’m going to skip over item #3, I don’t have a good way to estimate that and they don’t define the percentages. We'll just hope items #1 and #2 are larger, which seems like a reasonable assumption.
Where we’re at so far is that we need to take the max of items #1-3. Item #1 was $100 to $300 million, item #2 was $196 million. So we’re still in that $100 to $300 million range.
Item #4 is the mark-to-market adjustment. If we were to stick with our item #2 estimate of 6.5 million shares traded in a day, and pick $100 as how much the stock price jumped in a day (not too far off what it’s been doing recently), then we’d be looking at adding on an additional $650 million in collateral. That’s pretty massive, but also we’re basing that number on the item #2 estimate which assumed that 30% of Robinhood’s trading was GME, which may not be accurate. So the mark-to-market estimate could be a lot lower than that.
Finally, item #5 encompasses several add-ons that NSCC seems to be allowed to demand, which I’m assuming are based on overall risk from all of the entities that owe them money. The rules document I linked previously allows them to require a “special charge” in the event of volatility or liquidity issues, and they can also add something called a market liquidity adjustment which again seems based on volatility and risk.
So where we’re at after all of this is potentially somewhere between $100 million and $950 million in collateral, plus whatever extra the NSCC can demand based on item #5. Likely somewhere toward the middle or higher end of that range, or more. Again, I want to make it clear that I have no idea what I’m talking about and am just trying to get a ballpark estimate. I may be making mistakes. Overall I’m just trying to give an idea of what factors are in play and hopefully give an idea of how much the recent volatility can affect the required collateral.
But honestly this rough estimate doesn’t seem too far off. According to Robinhood their collateral requirement increased 10-fold due to the recent weeks’ events, which they describe in this short (and much too late to stem the outrage) article summarizing why they halted trading on some stocks. And according to this article Robinhood had to draw on up to $1.5 billion in credit to be able to get trading going again. So we’re definitely talking about a huge amount of collateral, and that makes it sound like what I’ve estimated here isn’t that far off all things considered. One important thing to note is that NSCC only handles regular trades from my understanding. There’s another clearing firm called Options Clearing Corporation (OCC) that's used for options. Robinhood likely had additional collateral commitments at OCC for options purchases in addition to what NSCC was requiring on regular GME share purchases. The OCC collateral might be large as well, and it’s possible I could be overestimating the NSCC collateral requirement and that the OCC collateral was more significant.
I did all of my value-at-risk calculations and plotting in this google sheet, feel free to check it out. If you see any errors please let me know.

Where That Leaves Us

Robinhood had to put up a ton of cash as collateral. Just a huge amount. And they weren’t the only ones that had to pause trading due to collateral issues. E-trade, Webull, and several others also restricted trading. And the estimates I’ve provided here, if accurate, serve to quantify to some extent just how large the collateral required is. The alternate theories implying corruption or foul play seem unsupported and implausible when you actually dig in and see what happened with volatility and collateral requirements last week. Again, this should probably all be investigated to make sure there wasn’t any favoritism or alternative motives in the trading halt and increased collateral requirements, but based on all this information it seems that what happened was an unusual but completely legal and ethical situation.
I started looking into this knowing nothing at all about what actually happens when you purchase a stock and now I feel like I have an okay grasp on it. If you read this far I hope it helped you as well.
As a final thought, it worries me how quickly people will jump to assuming malice and corruption in every new turn of events. If the news can be interpreted in a way that makes their perceived enemies look bad people will fully adopt that interpretation without question. This is dangerous and creates outrage and conflict for no reason, so I ask everyone reading this to be an influence in the other direction. Try to avoid taking a strong opinion until you’ve made an effort to better understand all the factors at play and be skeptical when everyone else is jumping to conclusions.

TL;DR

Ha, just kidding! You don't get one of these, this is a complicated issue and trying to reduce it to a simple narrative has caused the country to turn against each other looking for a culprit. Simple narratives based on a shallow understanding of complex issues are bad and are reducing social trust, strive to understand how the world works, it's a fascinating place!

Additional Sources

A lot of credit goes to this Twitter thread, it was the first source I found that explained that there was more going on and provided enough detail to explain why. I basically built on this and expanded it with more background and information. If you're on Twitter go give this person a like and a follow for being a voice of reason and digging into the details.
Just about every concept or entity I discussed in this post has a useful page on Investopedia that you can look at for more information or to verify what I said here. I've probably scanned through about 100 Investopedia pages to try to get a better understanding of these things so I'm not going to flood this post with links, but if you want more information just search for a term on there.

Not just another HITI / HITIF post... Serious DD incl. valuation analysis

Misconceptions regarding Dogecoin

NOTE THIS ARTICLE IS SLIGHTLY DATED. I MADE A NEW UPDATED POST - VERSION 1.1 OF THIS SAME ARTICLE. THE INFORMATION IS BASICALLY THE SAME - JUST MORE CURRENT link here: https://www.reddit.com/dogecoin/comments/lfhomy/misconceptions_regarding_dogecoin_revised_version/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
Misconceptions regarding Dogecoin. This information below is important. I ask that you please take the time to read this entire post before making judgment or commenting. My discord group of over 100 people have grouped together the majority of the most asked questioned and misunderstandings regarding Dogecoin, into the following 22 key points. Please read them below.
1) What is Dogecoin? Dogecoin (/ˈdoʊdʒkɔɪn/ DOHJ-koyn, code: DOGE, symbol: Ð) is a cryptocurrency invented by software engineers Billy Markus and Jackson Palmer, who decided to create a payment system that is instant, fun, and free from traditional banking fees. Dogecoin features the face of the Shiba Inu dog from the popular "Doge" meme as its logo and namesake. It was introduced on December 6, 2013, and quickly developed its own online community reaching a market capitalization of US $5,382,875,000 on January 28, 2021. [Wikipedia, 20210203]
2) Why Dogecoin? For the Lolz. Well, not quite. Initially as a purely meme-driven alternative to the likes of Bitcoin and Litecoin, Dogecoin in-fact boasts very low transaction fees and fast transaction times, very little network congestion, and most importantly, is designed to be used as a daily means of exchange, like your morning cup of coffee. Also, it is really fun, and who doesn't like the Dog ?!
1/2) What Is Dogecoin? And why Dogecoin? Back a few years ago, some crazy people banded together in support of a cryptocurrency known as Dogecoin. Similar to other cryptocurrencies, Dogecoin, the people's crypto, finds itself with the support of hundreds if not thousands of individuals pushing for this currency to succeed. But what is that?

Unless you have been absent from every social bubble, you may have heard of Bitcoin. For the purpose of this explanation, you will find that Bitcoin is not exactly an easy thing to equate to Dogecoin, but lets think about the criteria of a Cryptocurrency. Bitcoin did not find its foothold overnight. In fact, it took several years. A lot of people fought tooth and nail for their belief in the coin. Crypto, in a nutshell, is a decentralized form of currency that finds its value in a combination of individual asset involvement, ease or difficulty in security of an exchange, creating a method of reliable, secure, trustworthy exchange, and other reasons. Think of it like this: to exchange goods and services without currency, one must barter. I can barter a service (a haircut, for example) towards someone who needs a haircut, and in exchange they can barter a good or service to me. Currency then becomes an "IOU" (I Owe yoU) so that, if somebody needs me to cut their hair, they can give me an IOU for a good or service they control. When enough people begin adopting this, a centralized currency eventually takes hold. Crypto seeks to take this a step further and, insteal of relying on building up a centalization in terms of valuable metals or debt, it is built up solely on the exchange of goods and services. Dogecoin, compared to other cryptocurrencies, finds itself in a strange position where the origins did NOT see it soaring to the moon in any situation. Funny how things can change in time. Dogecoin has pros and cons to it. Comparing it to other cryptos, it does not face a supply cap like Bitcoin does. It is not a directly equated asset, such as how Bitcoin can be attributed as a digital gold asset. Mining dogecoin is also much simpler (comparitively) and does not face difficulty spikes, a source of Bitcoin slow-down. In essence, in 50 years, Dogecoin will still be around, still be mined, still be traded. Bitcoin will cease to be created, hoarded, and become the digital currency of the affluent.

Step 3) Places to buy dogecoin places where you can spend Dogecoin?
Refer to dogecoin posts by the moderators
4) Cryptocurrencies vs stocks. The main differences between them. When comparing crypto to stocks, the main thing to keep in mind is that cryptocurrencies have few if any regulations applied to them. It is still the "wild west" of trading. You can be scammed, skimmed, pumped-dumped, as so forth, much more often and more easily than with stocks. Terminology is similar to exact between the two, but both require a certain mindset. Crypto is almost always a long-haul game, where stocks can be short play or long haul.
5) Dogecoin vs Bitcoin - their competitive advantages and disadvantages. Many cryptocurrencies have a higher degree of scarcity in comparison with FIAT (e.g. the US Dollar). For example Bitcoin / BTC has a strictly limited supply. And even though Dogecoin is not strictly limited, it is still a lot more scare in terms of supply than the US dollar. This simply means that if more people want to hold BTC or Doge versus the limited supply of the respective coin, the value of the cryptocurrency increases.
6) Is Dogecoin a meme or should it be taken seriously? We have all witnessed the power of a meme, the depths it can reach in society, especially in recent years. We have seen it many times before with video games, consoles, Oreos, or as of late even toilet paper... A meme has inherent value in the form of “widespread information”. A meme can spread an idea across diverse communities, and even entire countries literally overnight. This can bring about lasting effects on culture and society. If correctly taken advantage of, Doge can become the dominant meme currency of the internet, and amass real-world value just by being a popular, recognisable meme itself. This is where the saying “Dogecoin is the people’s coin” comes from.
7) Mining Dogecoin and the history of Dogecoin). How a new currency entered the market.
mining is the process of creating new cryptocurrency by solving a computational puzzle. mining is necessary to maintain the ledger of transactions upon which cryptocurrency is based. Miners have become very sophisticated over the last several years using complex machinery to speed up mining operations. Approximately 600,000 dogecoins are produced per hour and 5,256,000,000 per year,
8) Circulation of currencies. The importance of buying, selling, and holding - and the differences between them. To briefly explain this, a lot of people have been saying “buy and hold” or “I’m never selling!” - which in itself is great start. But there remains a lot of misinformation around the topic, for example that simply "buying and holding Doge" will drive up the price indefinitely. Unfortunately, that is just not true. Buying, holding, and selling are all intricately connected with each other. ALL of those three states are essential for a (digital) currency to flourish. Holding does neither hurt or raise the value of the asset, but rather it helps to establish a baseline, which is also called "setting a floor". Those who have diligently kept on holding their coins, have allowed Dogecoin to stabilize at roughly 0.03 USD cents for the past few days. Remember, this remains a huge gain from where Dogecoin has been just weeks ago. The reason the price is not changing much from this baseline right now is because few are buying and few are selling their Dogecoin, specifically due to topics which will be covered in other sections here. However, an active circulation of a currency is critical to establishing it as an effective means of exchanging goods and setting it up for long term growth. The best way to increase the overall value of the currency in the long run is by eventually by exchanging your coins for goods, services, or just by tipping and trading with other Dogecoin holders. The value of any means of exchange is fundamentally driven by supply and demand. If two parties agree that X amount of asset A is roughly worth the same as Y amount of asset B, you effectively have established a market.
9) Establishing a floor or a baseline. Due to other current issues, such as "RH" and other platforms artificially delaying FIAT-to-Crypto exchanges, these trends may appear strange at first sight, but those who continue holding onto their Doge are affecting or rather creating the floor. The floor is essentially the lowest value Dogecoin will drop to at current market conditions. The floor is currently 0.03 USD cents. Which is up from 0.008 USD cents just a few months ago.
10) Inflation and deflation Infinite supply / no cap vs cap in regarding to cryptocurrency

 Inflation and deflation are common economic terms used to explain the change in the inherent value of a currency. This means that that 1 US Dollar today does not have the same value or “worth” as it did, for example, in 1950. Inflation is a situation of rising prices in the economy. A more exact definition of inflation is a sustained increase in the general price level in an economy. Deflation on the other hand occurs when the inflation rate falls below 0%, that is a negative inflation rate. While inflation reduces the value of a currency over time, a sudden deflation of a currency increases its relative value. This would allow more goods and services to be bought than before with the same amount of currency. Deflation can be a factor in leading to a recession and also result in a deflationary spiral.

10a) What does all this mean with regards to cryptocurrency, specifically Bitcoin versus Dogecoin?

 Well - Bitcoin is stagnant or deflationary over time, while Dogecoin is inflationary overtime. This is due to the way they are architected and mined, and how new coins are added into their respective markets - covered in other section. What gets misunderstood is which one is “better” or rather "the lesser evil". Since Dogecoin has an “infinite supply”, how can it maintain value?

10b) You may have read things like: "You're stupid if you buy Dogecoin. It has no value. It has unlimited supply. It's just a stupid meme." Let's look at the US dollar (or essentially any major FIAT currency of your choice). FIAT currency is created out of thin air. It is backed by large sums of debt, and in the normal course of the economy it is inflating endlessly. But FIAT currency does have value. It's a value assigned to it by governments and people, a commonly accepted means for exchange. Again, FIAT does not have a limited supply. In fact, the supply of the US dollar is a lot more inflationary than Doge would ever be. Please think about that for a moment and make up your own mind.
10c) Yes, Dogecoin has a supply growth of about 5 billion coins (that's about 4-5% right now) per year, but why is that a problem, practically speaking? The growth is there to keep transaction fees to a minimum and allow a small, but healthy inflationary tendency, rather than the opposite.
10d) Dogecoin doesn't need a supply limit like Bitcoin, because in the long run it will be much easier to exchange Dogecoin for goods and services, than with other crypto currencies or regular currencies for that matter.

If Bitcoin wants to become a real global currency with buying power, not just a speculation tool to exchange it for a few thousand debt based USD, when it hits a new record high every few months or years, its supply will have to grow inevitably. We have to see the bigger picture! Dogecoin may well climb to one US dollar, but why stop and sell there? Instead, we could build a new, fair, balanced monetary ecosystem based on Dogecoin, not to make a quick profit, but to change the whole world. Our current money is backed by signatures on debt contracts, not on real values. But it works, because we believe in it, even if it will be our downfall if it continues like this. Dogecoin is different. Dogecoin has a set amount of coins entering the market by the minute. There are plenty of spreadsheets out there showcasing exactly how much many Dogecoin will be in circulation at any given moment of time. People get confused because they think inflation is a bad thing, when in fact it is actually beneficial in small quantities and beneficial to the longevity of a currency. Dogecoin doesn't need a supply limit like Bitcoin, because in the long run it will be much easier to exchange Dogecoin for goods and services, than with other crypto currencies or regular currencies for that matter. If Bitcoin wants to become a real global currency with buying power, not just a speculation tool to exchange it for a few thousand debt based USD when it hits a new record high every few months or years, it's supply will have to grow inevitably.

11) Financial aspects of Dogecoin. Who will profit from it? What will happen if Dogecoin has exponential growth? A zero-sum game. Explaining that you only realize a loss or profit at then time of sell.

 To clear things up - cryptocurrency is essentially what economist call a Zero Sum Game. A zero-sum game is a mathematical representation of a situation in which each participant's gain or loss of utility is exactly balanced by the losses or gains of the utility of the other participants. What this means is that across a group of people who engage in selling and buying Dogecoin, if one person gains another person loses. For example if you bought at 0.08 and sold at 0.03 someone made a profit of 0.05 cents per Dogecoin while you lost 0.05 cents per Dogecoin. The important thing to understand is that in these situations the only way you truly lose or gain anything is when you sell. You don’t realize your gains or losses until you complete that transaction. What this means is that if Dogecoin does increase exponentially the people who have been holding since the price has been low will gain astronomical returns on their investment, while others who joined late will not.

12) Stability vs Volatility This describes basically how stable something is over a set period of time. Volatility is how much prices change over time. Stabilization of Dogecoin is important for the overall health, however, cryptocurrencies are known to and will likely remain very volatile for the foreseeable future.
13) Pump and dump vs long term growth. "Pump and dump" is a form of securities fraud that involves artificially inflating the price of an owned stock through false and misleading positive statements, in order to sell the cheaply purchased stock at a higher price. Pump and dumps are consider illegal. While a subset of people are trying to pump and dump Dogecoin the legitimate community is focused its long term growth and stability which is achieved through the rest of the topics addressed here
14) Difference between cold storage, internet wallets and Robinhood
Coldstorage - in the cryptocurrency world cold storage refers to physical objects/devices that contain your cryptocurrency.
Wallets are an electronic program of service that stores your cryptocurrency
Robhinhood- as of right now robinhood does not actually give you cryptocurrency when purchased through them. From Robhinhood’s cryptocurrency page: “We don’t currently provide you with access to your wallet or your wallet address. You own the cryptocurrency assets in your account, and you can buy or sell them at any time. We’re evaluating features to allow you to safely transfer coins to and from Robinhood, and we’ll update you when these features are available.” Robhinhood will be addressed in another section.
15) Elon Musk - Is he important for Dogecoin? The impact of celebrities and big business supporting Dogecoin Big business allowing Dogecoin to be supported as means of exchanging goods, and people like Elon musk supporting and backing this cryptocurrency are important to proving its value and legitimacy.
16) Is getting Dogecoin to increase to the equivalent of one US dollar possible? Can and will it really happen? What will change if it does happen? Yes, despite not having a fixed or capped supply, the value of the currency can rise based on its relative value against other currencies in the market. You can find examples of this in the FOREX market where currency pairs are traded, like Euro against US dollar, or US Dollar against Japanese Yen. As the value of Dogecoin rises, more and more businesses will recognise its potential and importance, and subsequently begin to accept it in exchange for goods and services. This will also help to grow the developer community around Dogecoin. In summary, Dogecoin has a way to go and can be improved from its current state, but the potential for greatness is there already today. NEEDS MORE INFORMATION
T
18) Is Dogecoin a product of the Wallstreet Bets movement? What differentiates dogecoin from GME/AMC? Just like some other investment opportunities (Nokia, Blackberry), DOGE was brought into the spotlight amidst the whole GME situation during the previous week. Unlike those stock, however, Doge is not another short squeeze, it is not a stock. It is a cryptocurrency / asset that many people think has potential, despite its Meme origins. Many who feel that they were late for embarking on the GME hype or the Bitcoin train in 2013 respectively, are now looking towards Doge, one of the early alternatives to the original cryptocurrency, Bitcoin. Doge got a lot of interest recently, for example with the Elon Musk tweeting the same week.
19) The situation with Robinhood - Changes in terms and conditions. Disclaimer, it is important to read through Robhinhoods entire terms and conditions to fully under what happened. The information below is just a summary and is not Robhinhoods terms and conditions but an explanation of what happened and why it happened Robhinhood has received high profile backlash in the media recently for their involvement with GME/Wallstreetbets. A lot of the cryptocurrency and Dogecoin community were outraged when they found out that about one week ago Robhinhood stopped allowed instant transfers for their cryptocurrency. Unfortunately, while we may not agree with what happened there they do have a reason for this. Over the past week the sheer amount of people trying to buy cryptocurrency skyrocketed at one instant. When robinhood allowed for instant transfers what they were really doing is essentially “loaning” you money to make trades or purchase cryptocurrency before the funds actually hit Robhinhoods business account. This caused a huge liquidity issue and Robhinhood could not meet the demand. That is why you had to wait 5 business days for your funds to be approved. This is standard practice across multiple brokerage firms before Robhinhood pioneered the instant transfer option. Whether we like it or not, Robhinhood is a power house in their industry and not going away. Robhinhood is one of the most mainstream ways to purchase and sell cryptocurrency and if everyone pulled their money out of Robhinhood the entire cryptocurrency market would collapse which I believe we can all agree no one wants to happen.
20) Feb 4th - Feb 8th Well unfortunately we wanted to get this post out before Robhinhood’s clearance of funds. Went through, but now that they did, you can see what happened. The price immediately skyrocketed. This happened due to the topics we covered above. Now what’s going to happen is the people who are pumping and dumping know that this is coming and will be immediately prepared to sell. This will cause huge volatility with dramatic swings up and down. Nobody knows exactly what’s going to happen this week, but we do know it’s going to be crazy. That is where the diamonds holders come into play. We need to set a new floor after this swing to show the rest of the world that dogecoin is legitimate and can weather extreme volatility.
Thank you for reading this post in its entirety. It took a large amount of collective effort of people in my discord. I appreciate them to no end. We have over 100 people in that discord and we are here to stay. We are interested in explaining Dogecoin, reducing the scare factor and backing up Dogecoin through economic, social, financial, mathematical theory, etc. Per Dogecoin rules I cannot give out this discord, but if you are interested message me. It goes into greater detail on every one of these topics, with resources, links, articles etc. thank you and above all else remember that at the end of the day this is a meme cryptocurrency from 2013. But the people have spoken, and this is now official the people’s currency as well. Dogecoin🚀🪐🚀

online gaming regulations us video

The first online casino and poker rooms were introduced in the US in 2013 when New Jersey, Delaware, and Nevada passed state laws for online gaming. As for online sports betting, this was illegal The regulations, which had largely been submitted in consultations and to the European Commission, set out how online gambling may be conducted in the Netherlands once the vertical is legalised later this year.. Earlier versions of the regulations already banned gambling businesses from using individual athletes in advertising in an effort to protect young people, as it said these athletes MGC Regs Part 6: Authority of the State Gaming Commission . MGC Regs Part 7: Accounting Records . MGC Regs Part 8: Technical Standards for Gaming Devices and On-Line Slot Systems. MGC Regs Part 9: Racebooks and Sports Pools. MGC Regs Part 15: Fantasy Contests . New Adopted Regulations (PDF format) Proposed Regulations - Public Notice Online Gaming Regulators, Licensing Bodies and Gaming Auditors Around the World Global licencing bodies, regulators and auditors help to give you a secure online gambling experience. Regulations vary from territory to territory and state to state, for example in the Australian Capital Territory online gaming businesses are charged high taxes and fees but the profits from the Australian gambling market offset those expenses.Each state or territory has its own regulations as well as having to abide by the country’s regulations. The AGA’s Responsible Gaming Regulations & Statutes publication is a collection of the statutes and regulations addressing responsible gaming in the 28 states, plus the District of Columbia, that have commercial casinos or sports betting regulations as of August 31, 2019. The acts and regulations listed below provide information for a range of specific matters in relation to gambling regulation and the gaming industry. The regulations complement the Gambling Regulation Act and provide further detail to give effect to the intentions of the Act. Gambling Regulation Act 2003; Casino Control Act 1991 In addition to being fun, playing video games can reduce stress, lighten depression, increase vision, improve the ability to multi-task and improve decision-making skills i.Online gaming is also linked to obesity, increasing depression, poor grades, addictive behavior and increased aggressive or violent behavior ii.. Confronted with seemingly conflicting research findings, parents need to take Legislation and Regulations A number of laws and regulations have been drawn up to create the regulatory framework that covers the activities licensed by the Malta Gaming Authority (MGA). In this section you can find the English and Maltese versions of all the laws and regulations related to gaming. Whilst the Authority makes every effort […] United States Online Gambling Federal Laws. the laws that apply to the online gaming industry. Wire Act of 1961. The first thing you may notice is the date on this law. Yes, it was passed regulations on this type of gambling and the legal system can at times be rather

online gaming regulations us top

The Worlds Largest Online Gaming Company - David Baazov ...

Hey guys and gals, It's SinzXMC and welcome to my 6th OGFM video. In this video, Some friends and I are having the weirdest/hilarious conversation with a pla... David Baazov, CEO and President of Amaya, spearheaded the company’s $4.9 billion takeover of the Rational Group, a company that owns the world’s largest onli... Following the live post-election discussion held in November, we’re getting our experts back together right after the US inauguration to reflect on what the ... #amoongussOnline Gaming and Today's Kids #LetsTalk Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube. Sub to kaden or ur an idiot https://m.youtube.com/channel/UCqzDGKtN9dw7YlVrsWnz-rAToday I play liberty county with kaden Fumblebottom from the kaden Fumblebo... http://www.thisweekingambling.com - We interview the Executive Vice President of MGM Resorts, Alan Feldman, about online gambling regulation withing the Un... Set your gaming channel up for success with these tools and techniques. Disclaimer: Different game publishers have different rules around how their games can be used and/or potentially monetized on YouTube. Make sure you understand the terms and conditions for any game footage that you plan on uploading. To complete this course: First, sign in, then finish the lessons at your own pace and pass ... Hello, I'm Camodo Gaming. Look for let's plays, first Impressions, and other random things about video-games to be added to the channel!Follow me on Twitter:... http://calvinayre.com/ - Becky Liggero is with Consultant Mario Galea, as he talks about his work with the Division of Gaming Enforcement on standardizing th...

Legislation & Regulations - Malta Gaming Authority

online gaming regulations us

online gaming regulations us - win

Weekend GME Thread + Homework for all: Let's stop using brokerages that halted trading

Important information

Let's make a list of the Brokers that restricted the purchasing of specific tickers

Horrible Brokers - Restricted purchasing of certain tickets and lied/gloated about it

Bad Brokers - Restricted purchasing of certain tickers

Neutral Brokers - Restricted trading, publicly naming their intermediary

Good Brokers - Did not restrict trading

Note regarding the clearing houses

US Players, would you hypothetically pay a small monthly fee to play online poker on a domain registered in the US and regulated by your state's gaming commission?

I unleashed the monster of bureaucracy upon my neighbour and watched it destroy him

Video Game Counseling Meetup

[AMA] All the questions and answers from Darian's AMA on January 26th, 2021

Bloomberg Opinion: GameStop Is Rage Against the Financial Machine

Detailed DD post [re-post after r/pennystocks removed it]

Why Robinhood Limited Gamestop Trades (Reject the Simple Narrative)

How a Stock Market Transaction Works

Claims of Corruption

NSCC Collateral

Calculating Collateral

Where That Leaves Us

TL;DR

Additional Sources

Not just another HITI / HITIF post... Serious DD incl. valuation analysis

Misconceptions regarding Dogecoin

online gaming regulations us video

online gaming regulations us top

The Worlds Largest Online Gaming Company - David Baazov ...