The demand for shorts has outstripped demand for BitUSD thus far.... so right now BitUSD is cheap relative to USD. Few players are performing the arb. role at this point in time... I think it will take a while for things to get there.
Can you teach us to play that role? More players would take the role if we understood the markets but right now it's too complex for most people.
I think the best idea is to just buy BitUSD and wait out the storm.
When the BitUSD price of BTSX is high... sell BTSX to buy BitUSD... for a while the price was .05 BitUSD per BTSX... when the price falls to .04 BitUSD per BTSX, sell your BitUSD back to the market at the peg price. You will make the gain from selling BTSX at .05 and buying it back at .04....
The challenge here is that you have to separate out your investment in BTSX from your arb profits. If BTSX doubles to $0.10, you can still make money from your arb assuming you can sell your BitUSD for BTSX at 0.10. You missed the capital gains must you made arb. gains. Arb gains should be less risky than BTSX and can be made in any market condition (up/down/sideways). If you want to bet on BTSX to the max, then you may not make as much from arm.
My personal recommendation is that your BTSX holdings are more likely to go up if you help maintain the peg and add liquidity... so everyone should use at least 10% of their holdings to add liquidity. The combined strategy will likely cause your BTSX holdings to grow faster than if no one provided liquidity.
Perhaps we should incorporate a robotic trading assistant into the wallet.
Most of the market operations are algorithmic and do not require much thinking beyond what the end goal is. People know what they want to do, they just don't know which buttons to push to get there.
ie. The user could select an investment goal (BTSX bull/bear, arb, hedge, etc. or perhaps simpler choices like 'I think BTSX is going up', 'I think BTSX is going down', 'High risk', 'Low risk', 'Provide liquidity'. etc.) and the assistant (wizard!) could take them through step by step. Alternatively, user can designate assets have the assistant execute. The assistant should have access to live price feeds and be aware of user balances/portfolio holdings.
There are robotic asset management services out there that do this sort of thing, and they are gaining in popularity.
Implementing a robotic trading assistant would be a huge value-added service that would make it easier for non-investors to participate and not get frustrated/hosed, ie. make the initial investing/trading experience positive and most importantly quick and easy.
This is an opportunity for Bitshares to leapfrog the industry, like skipping landlines and going straight to mobile.