CEO of a top Bitcoin exchange warns: crackdown on cryptocurrencies may be coming • Hacker News Board

Re: CEO of a top Bitcoin exchange warns: crackdown on cryptocurrencies may be coming

#211

Post by knorker » Mon, Apr 12, 2021, 8:39 PM UTC

petertodd wrote: post #23

liquidise wrote: post #4

> U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and other officials have warned about the use of cryptocurrencies for illicit transactions. Wait until you hear about cash. More seriously (and hopefully less reductionist) i feel nations who embrace cryptocurrencies early will see mixed results as the landscape matures. I am more confident that nations which turn their back on it, or shut it out completely, will see a loss of o…

> Wait until you hear about cash. I'm always bothered by this arguement because most of the same people in government who want to see a crackdown on Bitcoin also seem to want cash to be eliminated. I've been asked to do consulting on one of these digital cash replacement projects. The requirements included all the stuff you'd expect, like strict ID requirements for every account, and the ability to freeze funds at wi…

It's a ridiculous comparison, though.

E.g. try to regularly move billions in cash and see how long it'll take before you're busted for not reporting that you're doing that.

A billion bucks weighs a fucktonne.

I'm pro cash, anti cryptocurrency, because the comparison is absolutely ridiculous there's no contradiction.

Re: CEO of a top Bitcoin exchange warns: crackdown on cryptocurrencies may be coming

#212

Post by jandrese » Mon, Apr 12, 2021, 8:40 PM UTC

r00fus wrote: post #136

liquidise wrote: post #4

> U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and other officials have warned about the use of cryptocurrencies for illicit transactions. Wait until you hear about cash. More seriously (and hopefully less reductionist) i feel nations who embrace cryptocurrencies early will see mixed results as the landscape matures. I am more confident that nations which turn their back on it, or shut it out completely, will see a loss of o…

USG knows how to deal with cash - you can't take any decent amount over the border or even on trains without being questioned. Bitcoin main use (regardless of what it was designed for) is for laundering money. Also it's not a currency, but an asset - as it is designed to appreciate due to how mining works.

Large amounts of cash, and not even all that large ($10k) have been considered evidence of crime and confiscated by the cops in the US. The laws that enable this have been slowly dying off, but it still happens. No other evidence of a crime is necessary nor do the people need to be convicted of anything, the cops just take the money because it might be used to commit a crime.

http://gm1-miwebvarnish.newscyclecloud.com/opinion/20201218/...

Re: CEO of a top Bitcoin exchange warns: crackdown on cryptocurrencies may be coming

#213

Post by thebean11 » Mon, Apr 12, 2021, 8:40 PM UTC

winslett wrote: post #46

Instead of killing it by banning it, I suspect they could kill it by buying it. If the Fed wanted to "invest" in Bitcoin, it would kill it by soaking up liquidity and creating a liquidity-squeeze. Because the amount in circulation is fixed, it wouldn't have to buy all of the Bitcoin -- just enough to kill any utility. This is a downside of an asset with a fixed quantity. Once the community discovered the liquidity-sq…

You're claiming that an entity buying up a ton of Bitcoin would crash the price? Do you have any references? I'm not familiar with that economic phenomenon.

Also like others have said, the price is divisible to many decimal places, and with consensus could be updated to be further subdivided.

Re: CEO of a top Bitcoin exchange warns: crackdown on cryptocurrencies may be coming

#214

Post by csomar » Mon, Apr 12, 2021, 8:40 PM UTC

liquidise wrote: post #4

> U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and other officials have warned about the use of cryptocurrencies for illicit transactions. Wait until you hear about cash. More seriously (and hopefully less reductionist) i feel nations who embrace cryptocurrencies early will see mixed results as the landscape matures. I am more confident that nations which turn their back on it, or shut it out completely, will see a loss of o…

> I am more confident that nations which turn their back on it, or shut it out completely, will see a loss of otherwise valuable businesses and mindshare.

This is a very under-appreciated point. US persons (citizens and companies) assume the US banking system for granted. Many countries (even some developed ones) do not have a developed banking sector and by consequence it is harder/expensive to make transactions, access to capital is limited and access to markets can be restricted which limits opportunity.

Crypto-currencies requires significant expertise, much more than the current banking system. Countries who will attract these companies and knowledge will have lots of sway in the international economy in the future.

Re: CEO of a top Bitcoin exchange warns: crackdown on cryptocurrencies may be coming

#215

Post by thinkmassive » Mon, Apr 12, 2021, 8:42 PM UTC

puranjay wrote: post #132

justapassenger wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

DeFi main value proposition isn’t tech (that’s cool) but avoiding regulations. Blockchain has lots of potentially interesting use cases like NFT, but crypto currency is still not one of them. And by not cracking down on scams in cryptocurrency will only make any future adoption harder.

DeFi's main value proposition is the automation of money. NFTs main value proposition is fractional ownership and assertion of ownership rights in a transparent manner. Imagine owning 1% of a Drake song - and getting paid 1% of the royalties every time it plays on Spotify. Or creating a yield earning strategy that automatically moves money around based on fixed paramters without ever interacting with a banker or fund…

Scott Galloway has an interesting take on this, predicting it's only a matter of time before some prestigious institutions and brands jump on the bandwagon:

https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/04/unified-monetary-the...

Re: CEO of a top Bitcoin exchange warns: crackdown on cryptocurrencies may be coming

#216

Post by leppr » Mon, Apr 12, 2021, 8:42 PM UTC

kelnos wrote: post #109

liquidise wrote: post #4

> U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and other officials have warned about the use of cryptocurrencies for illicit transactions. Wait until you hear about cash. More seriously (and hopefully less reductionist) i feel nations who embrace cryptocurrencies early will see mixed results as the landscape matures. I am more confident that nations which turn their back on it, or shut it out completely, will see a loss of o…

> Whatever your stance on cryptocurrencies are, what is of little dispute is the business opportunities they have created. Binance and Coinbase are large, successful companies. Poloniex was sold for ~400M. I find this argument a little weird, because I think we can all agree that bubbles and fad tech isn't really great for society as a whole. If you believe cryptocurrencies aren't a fad and actually provide useful be…

Cryptocurrency/web3 is at its core just technology. Fundamentally, the technology is still not that far advanced from the early Bitcoin days, but the little that is currently implemented successfully allows for ponzis and gambling. Cryptocurrencies currently trade for over $2 trillion, most of that value may indeed be a net negative for society, but that doesn't say anything about the core technology in itself. If cryptocurrency didn't exist, people would be trading tulip bulbs or pumping stocks like TSLA to $700B (oh wait...).

This may be a relatively lawless environment, but as for its current atmosphere, blame the world's central banks, not the crypto builders who are mostly as disgusted by the current situation as sidelined observers.

Decentralized networks have the potential to resolve many of the issues we techies love to complain about. Only a tiny percentage of that $2 trillion is allocated to teams actually working on solving these issues (Binance and Coinbase definitely aren't a part of it), so please try to reserve your judgment when you see developments coming out of crypto. Most of it is under-developed, over-hyped, and just an extension of the tech-bubble ponzi, but some of it will actually change the world. In the same way Tesla is actually positive to society overall and we shouldn't shun their cars just because the company's stock is a meme used in zero-sum-game gambling.

Re: CEO of a top Bitcoin exchange warns: crackdown on cryptocurrencies may be coming

#217

Post by peytn » Mon, Apr 12, 2021, 8:42 PM UTC

bko wrote: post #204

arcticbull wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gold is shiny pebbles people are willing to pay money for. Crypto is spreadsheet cells people are willing to pay money for. Well, some amount of money -- mostly Tether though, which is likely in turn backed by the same crypto lol. It's really an open question just how much new real money is flowing into crypto. It's all pretty clear in the settlement Tether signed [1]. Particular note are #17, #20, #36, #43-46 [1] ht…

I don't know what the point of your comment is. There is a need to have a medium of exchange for trade. Barter has its limitations. For all of history, people have created new forms of money for exchange. The primary characteristics you would need is scarcity, clear ownership, transferability and fungibility. Gold serves this purpose, and Bitcoin even more so. The fact that gold is a shiny pebble is not adding anythi…

If you owned all the gold, people would still want to buy gold. If you owned all the Bitcoin, nobody would want to buy Bitcoin. The only value stored is the network of people pumping it, and the only question is how long it’ll take them to move on to the next thing.

Re: CEO of a top Bitcoin exchange warns: crackdown on cryptocurrencies may be coming

#218

Post by Barrin92 » Mon, Apr 12, 2021, 8:43 PM UTC

puranjay wrote: post #67

justapassenger wrote: post #62

Crackdown on current state of crypto can only help it in the long run, if you actually really believe it. Right now it’s market mostly dedicated to get rich quick schemes. While it works great if you’re on top of the pyramid, it’s only hurting crypto case for the future.

DeFi has a legitimate use case and NFTs have an astonishing number of use cases. Smart Contracts are an incredible, incredible innovation. We are at the tip of the iceberg and nothing has been more disappointing than seeing the traditional tech world's dismissal of crypto as "get rich schemes". The tech world is surprisingly as complacent now as the legacy dinosaurs it first helped destroy in the 1990s and 2000s.

>NFTs have an astonishing number of use cases

NFTs are the equivalent of trading cards or video game lootboxes. They enable a form of conspicuous consumption whereby you conjure up value by slapping a digital signature on something and creating artificial scarcity.

From the perspective of the state none of these instruments improve supply chains, enhance military or state capacity, increase productivity or growth. NFTs basically enable the uber wealthy to sell original versions of their artworks or whatever, they have no impact on real world innovation or mass commodity production.

Re: CEO of a top Bitcoin exchange warns: crackdown on cryptocurrencies may be coming

#219

Post by paulgb » Mon, Apr 12, 2021, 8:43 PM UTC

devmunchies wrote: post #102

xxxxxxx12 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They dont want competition Which is another way of saying they want absolute control, which in this case is the absurd charade where "inflation" measures that they claim represent life on the ground exclude the essentials like education, healthcare, and housing.

I liked the take from the Mayor of Miami (from a podcast about cryptocurrency): "they [governments] will have to borrow money like everybody else borrows money, they can't just print their own money. They have to borrow money at an interest rate. And if governments don't behave fiscally then they are going to have to borrow at worse and worse rates. They can't just invent their own interest rates and currency, which…

> We in the city of miami, we're forced to balance our budget

This is true, but not without some moral hazard. Miami can keep building on land that will be swamp within the lifetime of the building because federal taxpayers and inflation are there to bail them out.

https://e360.yale.edu/features/as-miami-keeps-building-risin...

Re: CEO of a top Bitcoin exchange warns: crackdown on cryptocurrencies may be coming

#220

Post by wayoutthere » Mon, Apr 12, 2021, 8:43 PM UTC

loceng wrote: post #188

wayoutthere wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the fed did a cryptocurrency, it would be backed by the full might of the US Government — and all the things that the government can do if it decides to print more money. This also includes military and police powers. Which brings me to the other point: currencies are governed at both ends; at issuance and at use. If you use a crypto that’s not approved, the government can simply arrest you for using one of its co…

I can see value in democratic nations agreeing to use a single global blockchain they've created, without an MLM-Ponzi structure redistributing wealth simply because of adoption/use (consensus by agreement, not through greed/financial gain).

Totally would never happen; it would require too many people to give up too much power. See also Brexit (the UK never fully integrated into the EU over this exact currency control issue).