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Turkey bans use of cryptocurrencies for payments

reuters.com

221–230 of 302 posts

Re: Turkey bans use of cryptocurrencies for payments

#222
post #2

For context: Turkey has been facing an several year long financial crisis with the Turkish Lira plummeting in value. Erdoğan has done nothing good to solve the crisis and is just firing the central bank administrator one after the other. The central bank has brought so much lira with its foreign currency reserve to try to maintain the price that it is almost running dry of any foreign currency, making the future look…

Bitcoin doesn't depreciate the lira. Bitcoin is just meant to protect people when Erdogan depreciates the lira all by himself.

Re: Turkey bans use of cryptocurrencies for payments

#223

Whatever naysayers may think, it looks like the "BTC as a store of value" case is pretty strong if even dictatorial govts are feeling the need to act against it (and Turkey isn't the first, see Venezuela and their various attempts at taking BTC down). "BTC, timeless store of value, as acknowledged by many dictators around the world" (tm)

this is quite incorrect.

In Venezuela they haven't banned cryptos, they banned mining, especially if it's done on state funded electricity (for obvious reasons)/and because other cryptos compete with the state backed crypto, the Petro.

Dictators love cryptos, especially bitcoins.

If they didn't, criminals wouldn't use them.

Re: Turkey bans use of cryptocurrencies for payments

#225

Whatever naysayers may think, it looks like the "BTC as a store of value" case is pretty strong if even dictatorial govts are feeling the need to act against it (and Turkey isn't the first, see Venezuela and their various attempts at taking BTC down). "BTC, timeless store of value, as acknowledged by many dictators around the world" (tm)

this is quite incorrect. In Venezuela they haven't banned cryptos, they banned mining, especially if it's done on state funded electricity (for obvious reasons)/and because other cryptos compete with the state backed crypto, the Petro. Dictators love cryptos, especially bitcoins. If they didn't, criminals wouldn't use them.

A currency linked to the price of oil would be a good idea for reducing volatility. That doesn't appear what the Petro is, though.

Re: Turkey bans use of cryptocurrencies for payments

#226
post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Banning something has proven to never work in history. By definition there are lots of banned things in every legal system, and I'd argue many of them for very good reasons. What's usually ineffective is banning something without providing a viable alternative.

What are some examples of banned items that have good reasons to be banned, in your opinion? (excluding explosives)

smoking in public places.

alcohol sold to minors.

unlicensed doctors.

guns.

hard drugs.

tanks as private vehicles.

old polluting cars.

the list is endless.

Re: Turkey bans use of cryptocurrencies for payments

#227
Please can we regulate the carbon use of cryptocurrencies. This is getting out of control and governments are too slow. Bitcoin mining consumes more energy than the entire country of Argentina uses now. I do not want to hate on Bitcoin but climate change is getting out of control and there is little time left to reverse course. Last year with a global pandemic CO2 still rose by near record amounts. Bitcoin mining does have something to do with this. There is a connection. Please be open to the idea that we need to regulate the energy that Proof of Work mining cryptocurrencies use. I don't want to stop crypto. I just want us to use types that require less energy to mine. The planet is running out of time and this is FACT offsetting lots of progress on reducing emissions. https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/gr.html Please don't downvote because you love crypto. I do too. I just want us to do better at preventing CO2 emissions from rising because of its mining.

Re: Turkey bans use of cryptocurrencies for payments

#228
post #7
post #2

For context: Turkey has been facing an several year long financial crisis with the Turkish Lira plummeting in value. Erdoğan has done nothing good to solve the crisis and is just firing the central bank administrator one after the other. The central bank has brought so much lira with its foreign currency reserve to try to maintain the price that it is almost running dry of any foreign currency, making the future look…

Basically one of the exact reasons why Crypto should exist.

That's a bizarre statement.

Corruption is causing the devaluation of the currency in this case. The devaluation is already a method for hurting the ones responsible.

I'd think that the ones that are corrupt would be able to store their currency in crypto, while the rest of the citizens are not.

Crypto doesn't help anything. It could help some who know how to use it ( and will not forget their password)

Re: Turkey bans use of cryptocurrencies for payments

#229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this is quite incorrect. In Venezuela they haven't banned cryptos, they banned mining, especially if it's done on state funded electricity (for obvious reasons)/and because other cryptos compete with the state backed crypto, the Petro. Dictators love cryptos, especially bitcoins. If they didn't, criminals wouldn't use them.

A currency linked to the price of oil would be a good idea for reducing volatility. That doesn't appear what the Petro is, though.

that's what they advertise the Petro as

> A total of 100 million Petros will be sold, with an initial value set at $60, based on the price of a barrel of Venezuelan crude in mid-January.

Unfortunately we know that its purpose is raise cash because they can't repay their huge national debt.

Which is why every dictator loves cryptos if they can control them as they control state currencies.

The narrative can be shifted to we are all in this together, we live and die together.

If they'd allow bitcoins for the general population (they love them only for themselves) some would become richer, but the country as a whole would not benefit a bit from it.

And failing at that is something no politician can survive.

Re: Turkey bans use of cryptocurrencies for payments

#230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your transaction isn't settled instantly. The actual money that flows between institutions behind the scenes is way slower than bitcoin. ... and yet the world turns; and credit cards amount to $3tn of payments in the U.S annually. As it turns out, businesses do not actually care about instant settlement of payment transactions that much, what's important is instant authorization .

Bitcoin alone has done more than that per year since since 2018. And there are literally thousands of other projects. Credit cards are small by comparison. https://mobile.twitter.com/yassineARK/status/134613927863667...

That's absolutely an apples to hand grenades comparison.

First of all, global credit card volumes are much larger than Bitcoin volumes. Asia Pacific has been a bigger credit card market than the U.S. for some time - for example.

Secondly, credit cards payments are overwhelmingly payments for services or goods; effectively none of Bitcoin's total volume is in that category.

In fact, virtually all of Bitcoin volume is gross settlement and relates to speculative trading activity.

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