January 31st could be very significant. If we look at what one credible source, Bloomberg, has said about the new rules in China:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-12-18/btc-china-says-it-can-t-accept-new-deposits-for-bitcoin-trading.html"Chinese central bank officials told third-party payment service providers to stop offering clearing services to online Bitcoin exchanges, China Business News reported yesterday. The newspaper is affiliated with the Shanghai government,
Companies currently offering services must end them by the Chinese New Year, a weeklong holiday that begins on Jan. 31, the newspaper cited Zhou Jinhuang, deputy director of payment clearance at the People’s Bank of China, as saying at a meeting with more than 10 third-party payment service providers."Third party payment service providers started by immediately halting deposits to the exchanges. So now the question is,
what happens on January 31st to withdrawls? Quoting the same article:
“The PBOC statement on Dec. 5 was somewhat vague and there is more clarity now,” Zennon Kapron, managing director of financial consultancy Kapronasia, said in an interview yesterday in Shanghai. “The way it’s reading now is that after the Chinese New Year, you won’t be able to get your money off the platforms.” Think about that. As of January 31st, you will no longer be able to withdraw money from Chinese BTC exchanges. Let that sink in for a second.
When Mt.Gox began having issues with withdrawals, other exchanges simply popped up and filled the void. This cannot happen in China, since these rules apply to all Chinese exchanges, and there are already restrictions on the flow of money in and out of China. Sure, BTCChina and other exchanges have found some workarounds, including using vouchers
http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1tnf8e/btcchina_adds_a_fundingwithdrawal_option_btcc/ , but that still involves using Chinese Banks, many of which are controlled by the Chinese Government.
Unless the Government changes their stance, there are a few possible outcomes to all of this, I believe:
1.) This is already built into the price, and those in China who wanted to sell have already, and nothing will happen on January 31st.
2.) The weak hands in China were the ones who sold leading to the recent drop in price. The strategic investors are holding until the price rebounds (already under way), and are going to dump in the weeks before the deadline. China is out.
3.) The weak hands in China were the ones who sold leading to the recent drop in price. The strategic investors will continue to hold, and will move underground to trade Bitcoin.
I'd love to hear anyone's thoughts, especially those who are in China and can confirm what the sentiment is like now and what people are thinking. Perhaps there are other scenarios that may play out that I haven't considered. I personally think that scenario #2 is the most likely, or at least perhaps a combination of #2 and #3. Even if #3 were to play out, there would still be drastically less people in China willing to go through all the hassle of dealing with vouchers and other potentially shady ways of dealing with bitcoin. Regardless of which of the 3 scenarios that play out (or another scenario that I have not considered), this will be a "blip" on the radar in the life of Bitcoin. There is a bright future for crypto and 2014 will be the year that we really see BTC gain momentum. If we play our cards right, there could be an amazing buying opportunity at the end of January
My 2
BTC anyway
It's about 3rd party payment services in the source you quoted. They all have already stopped, much earlier than the proposed deadline 31 Jan. No 3rd party services are used in deposit and withdrawal now.