Topic: [2022-01-27] Bill might give Yellen unilateral power to ban BTC and crypto (Read 507 times)

@o_e_l_e_o. It appears you are not considering human predisposition for wanting shiny things hehehe. The forked project will be stealing all the ideas of the original and will also incentivize their users by issuing a token and make them something similar to being shareholders of a company. What will the people choose, the original with no token or the fork with a token? If some people have not noticed this in all their years in the cryptospace then they might have not been very observant.

Do you reckon that there will be a community of people who will be interested in bank settlements if Ripple did not issue XRP?

In any case, on this topic. Putin, Xi and Kim Jong Un hehehe.

@o_e_l_e_o. It appears you are not considering human predisposition for wanting shiny things hehehe.

The forked project will be stealing all the ideas of the original and will also incentivize their users by issuing a token and make them something similar to being shareholders of a company.

What will the people choose, the original with no token or the fork with a token?

The original project has to protect themselves by issuing a token.

I'm sure it will, but the actual requirement for these blockchains to have their own coins or tokens which can be bought or sold is almost always zero. I remember having this argument with someone back in 2017 about some altcoin whose big vision was to put medical records on a blockchain. If any health system wanted to do that, you can guarantee they will use their own in-house developed blockchain which they have control over, and not some scam nonsense launched by a random individual who has pre-mined half the supply themselves.

The strongest opposition to government regulation of cryptocurrencies is everyone using bitcoin in a decentralized and peer to peer way, not throwing their money away on scam coins and rug pulls.

FED problems could slow the move..
https://occupythefed.substack.com/p/fed-scandal-bigger-than-watergate

You keep saying the same thing over and over, but does the average American even know who to call and the possibility of doing something like that?

I believe that the vast majority consider it a waste of time, and you confirm that this is the case when you say something like this

Well, all the more reason to start calling your representatives and telling them to amend or vote against the provisions in this bill.

The world will have and use many blockchains, it will not only be bitcoin.

While technically not an outright ban on bitcoin, it would be very close.

That's nothing new, though. So does the last bill we discussed which could be used to make it illegal for nodes not to collect KYC and tax information for every transaction they process, which is clearly impossible. Thankfully, however, there are plenty of peer-to-peer trading options and plenty of countries which aren't the US and don't have such stupid laws. They could de-facto ban centralized exchanges from operating in the US with this law, but they can't stop you holding your own coins in your own wallet, trading peer to peer, or spending your money with any business or service (in this country or overseas) which accepts bitcoin directly.

The problem is the vast majority of these achieve nothing. Almost every single ICO from the ICO craze has failed to live up to expectations and simply resulted in the owners taking money from the newbies who bought these scam coins. DeFi is more centralized than bitcoin, running centralized coins on centralized chains via centralized services, and is an easier target than bitcoin for government regulations. Most anonymous altcoins are nothing of the sort. Far easier for the government to shut down some tiny altcoin with a handful of nodes which is only traded on one or two exchanges than it is for it to shut down bitcoin.

It isn't. You an read my thread from a few days ago here: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/2022-01-26-europol-report-on-cryptocurrencies-5383745. The Chainalysis report from last year, and the Europol report from just a few weeks ago both reached the same conclusion, that terrorists, drug cartels, and criminals in general, all still prefer using fiat, and proportionally fiat is used far more than cryptocurrency in illegal activities.

Well, if Biden leave this decision with butthurt Janet Yellen, we will all suffer as a result of that. We know what happened when she was doing a speech and when the "Bitcoin Guy" held up a "Buy Bitcoin" sign behind her. She did not take kindly to that, so she will take some kind of revenge on Bitcoin for that embarrassment.

This is why we should be open to ICO, IDO, IWO for democratic funding. Defi for trading without KYC. Anonymous altcoins for privacy and many other new developments that are being created. I know there will be scams, however, there are real projects that will make it very difficult for the government to take everything down because they are decentralized enough and there are many of them.

We cannot be certain if bitcoin is being used for terrorist funding or if it is being used by drug cartels

Are there terrorist organizations that pose a serious threat to the US today? I think I am well informed about it, and I cannot remember the last time I read the news related to terrorism. The drug trade is a different story altogether, but the fact is that drug dealers still prefer good old greenbacks, which you can set on fire when you're cold (Escobar reportedly burned $2 million to keep his family warm). The US government may try to put Bitcoin in the story, but Bitcoin has little or no effect in all of this.

@Lucius. However, Janet Yellen and the Biden administration might take it further and combine the 2 biggest campaigns, the war on drugs and the war on terrorism, with the war on the cryptospace because bitcoin and other cryptocoins are being used by drug cartels and terrorists. It will leave every cryptocoin user’s head shaking hehehe.

This is why we should be open to ICO, IDO, IWO for democratic funding. Defi for trading without KYC. Anonymous altcoins for privacy and many other new developments that are being created. I know there will be scams, however, there are real projects that will make it very difficult for the government to take everything down because they are decentralized enough and there are many of them.

Is the war against the cryptospace next? It is very clear that every law that will be signed for this campaign are laws that will also decrease more of our freedom and increase their control.

I would argue this bill has the potential to de-facto ban bitcoin.

Is the war against the cryptospace next? It is very clear that every law that will be signed for this campaign are laws that will also decrease more of our freedom and increase their control.

Communism always finds an enemy even where there is none - I know this well because I lived in such a political system where people went to prison for 2-3 years because they sang a forbidden song. China will therefore always continue to hunt ghosts and fight Bitcoin, not because they continue to write nonsense that has nothing to do with common sense, but because Bitcoin is a danger to them that needs to be removed.

No, this bill doesn't ban bitcoin. What it does do is give the government the power to unilaterally freeze transactions or close accounts of any centralized exchange, service, or other entity, without any warning, public notice, due process, legal challenges, etc. Essentially, if you are holding your coins on a centralized exchange or service, then your access to those coins could be removed by the government at any time and there is nothing you can do about it. It's terrible for the whole premise of financial sovereignty, which is the whole point of bitcoin in the first place. But then again, so too is leaving your bitcoin on a centralized exchange in the first place.

Yes, we should be calling our representatives about this, but chances are that will change nothing because they all work in their own self interests and not for the people they claim to represent. Best thing you can do is make sure you are holding all your own keys and all your own coins.

This seems pretty anti-constitutional.The government cannot just steal your wealth without any reason.

I don't really think that this America Competes Act will pass,because some parts seems very anti-constitutional.This document will have to be changed almost completely.

No, this bill doesn't ban bitcoin. What it does do is give the government the power to unilaterally freeze transactions or close accounts of any centralized exchange, service, or other entity, without any warning, public notice, due process, legal challenges, etc. Essentially, if you are holding your coins on a centralized exchange or service, then your access to those coins could be removed by the government at any time and there is nothing you can do about it. It's terrible for the whole premise of financial sovereignty, which is the whole point of bitcoin in the first place. But then again, so too is leaving your bitcoin on a centralized exchange in the first place.

A state controlled newspaper - the Economic Daily - published a piece about how China needs to ban bitcoin yet again just a few weeks ago: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-12-25/china-must-close-loopholes-in-crypto-mining-ban-economic-daily

Further bans won't necessarily be about bitcoin itself, but rather the CCP trying to "show their strength" or to be seen to be standing up against this Western plot to overthrow currencies or some other such nonsense.

I don't know what else they could have ban without it already being banned?

There is no chance China are done "banning" bitcoin. There will be another news story this year about another Chinese ban whenever it suits the CCP to spread such FUD.

Is this really to ban bitcoin?

and ended in 2021 with a ban on crypto mining.

Those familiar with the crypto industry will understand that China’s crypto ban is not entirely a surprise. The country has maintained a hostile relationship with its crypto industry since 2013, when it rolled out its first set of crypto restrictions. China’s hostile stance regarding crypto dates back to Dec. 5, 2013, when the People’s Bank of China (PBoC), the Ministry of Industry and Information and other financial watchdogs jointly issued a notice prohibiting banks from handling transactions related to bitcoin.

In an attempt to buoy a weakening yuan and block money from flowing out of China illegally, the country’s central bank began to investigate the activities of crypto exchanges in January 2017. The investigation focused on exchanges’ approach to forex management and anti-money laundering.

While China’s crypto community was still processing this new reality, regulators issued another directive forcing crypto exchanges to shut down voluntarily by Sept. 15.

In April 2019, China’s National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) labeled bitcoin mining an “undesirable” industry in its preliminary list of sectors that should be encouraged, restricted or phased out by local governments. Bitcoin mining, which is a computer-intensive process of validating bitcoin transactions to earn newly minted bitcoin in reward, fell under the catalog of industries the agency considered to be highly polluting.

For the better part of 2020, the Chinese government tightened its grip on crypto exchange activities within its borders amid an ongoing campaign to crack down on money laundering and fraud. In August, the PBoC revealed its intention to block over 100 foreign websites offering crypto exchange services.

The Chinese crypto industry’s problems in 2021 began in May when the State Council doubled down on past crypto policies by calling for the restriction of crypto mining and trading. Before this, the provincial authorities of Inner Mongolia, Xinjiang and Sichuan provinces, which were all major bitcoin mining hubs, had begun to introduce policies that stifled the operations of bitcoin miners.

Under the skin, all politicians are more or less the same, striving to have as much power as possible that will give them absolute control over the people. The problem for Western so-called democracies is that such measures do not fit into the democratic societies they promote as fundamental human values. For this reason, the US cannot do what China has done, as Russia or India are trying to do, but use such moves to examine public reactions in order to determine how far they can go without compromising their political positions.

The problem for all of us is the fact that the US holds a large (too big) part of the crypto in the sense that there are the biggest of the biggest players (Coinbase, Grayscale, MicroStrategy), with the fact that they have more than 35% hash power and that the US still has a huge impact on the rest of the world. One such decision would only encourage other countries to try something similar, or they would even be forced to do so.

It sounds quite fascist to me.

This is not surprising, however, since socialism and fascism are first cousins. It would give Yelen quasi-dictatorial powers. I hope this is not the case in the end because giving such arbitrary power can end very badly.

It sounds quite fascist to me.

This is not surprising, however, since socialism and fascism are first cousins. It would give Yelen quasi-dictatorial powers. I hope this is not the case in the end because giving such arbitrary power can end very badly.

Secondly, it would “Eliminate all public notice and comment requirements.” Moreover, it would “Eliminate the 120-day limitation for measures imposed without regulation.”

...

It empowers the Secretary to prohibit any (or indeed all) cryptocurrency transactions (or any other kind of transaction) without any process, rulemaking, or limitation on the duration of the prohibition.