Live data from Hacker News

EU to make Bitcoin traceable, ban anonymous crypto wallets

euronews.com

101–110 of 267 posts

Re: EU to make Bitcoin traceable, ban anonymous crypto wallets

#101

Everybody who ever thought that crypto currencies will not come under this scrutiny was highly delusional. All other governments will follow soon.

Governments can either get onboard, and come up with a reasonable, practical regulatory environment, or alternatively they will be left behind and Crypto will evolve to circumvent their wishes. It is a shame but the USA may end up leapfrogging the EU in the same way they have done with other innovations, like Social Media, Self Driving Cars, and other cutting edge tech. It turns out regulating entire sectors of the e…

Cutting edge? The only special thing about Bitcoin is the blockchain which only matters when there is a shortage of trust. Bitcoin may force government to be more responsible because it can be used to circumvent capital controls or price controls. Any advantage other than trust that a public blockchain has can be replicated through a private blockchain. It's just software after all.

Considering the monetary philosophy behind Bitcoin it is basically motivated by gold which is something we abandoned as a currency because we know it doesn't work and doesn't make sense. It's akin to having shares in the global economy. If you own 1% of the economy in 1930 then you will also own 1% of the economy in 2021. You're just a deadweight leeching off the economy. Since your share is fixed but the economy growing you are getting richer at the expense of other people. More and more people start investing "into money" and then quit working. You get a bust or recession or depression when people consider money a superior investment over actual work. Thus the economies' size is limited by the quantity of shares. If you issue new shares people will immediately start working for them even if it is at the cost of diluting them. You can clearly see it happening with the block reward. Bitcoin miners work like crazy, consuming an absurd amount of energy. The same applies to gold.

Re: EU to make Bitcoin traceable, ban anonymous crypto wallets

#102
post #91
post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Looks like a ton of bureaucracy with little or no output. I agree, might be the same thing as a war against the drugs lmfao.

The War on Drugs was a matter of method and intensity; the aim was to completely and swiftly eradicate drug abuse rather than move societal incentives. This could go either way, as far as I know both are possible

wasn't it to discredit political rivals and minorities? like, there really wasn't ever a strong argument against weed (that relied on that stated aim), especially in a post-prohibition America.

Re: EU to make Bitcoin traceable, ban anonymous crypto wallets

#103
post #34

Pure wapor. How will they ban anonymous wallets?

Typically, by preventing regulated institutions to accept deposits from and withdrawals to addresses that do not match a wallet that has been associated with an identified entity. That would be unfortunate.

Re: EU to make Bitcoin traceable, ban anonymous crypto wallets

#104
post #43
post #34

Pure wapor. How will they ban anonymous wallets?

It's the same thing as if EU jumped to ban our classic, leather, pocket wallets. Pure bullshit, except if this is marketing?

What about the EU banning ivory wallets?

Re: EU to make Bitcoin traceable, ban anonymous crypto wallets

#106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but who uses bitcoin for something different than transfering illegal funds and speculation? A lot of people. You just have to NOT live in a country that uses a currency that could be considered a global reserve to find us.

could you elaborate? I'm ignorant. From my perspective it seems like the value of bitcoin changes too much, having risen sharply in value recently, to spend as currency, but I'm also assuming that there are other more stable options. What kind of things do you buy, and how often? What sort of things do you do considering that the value might sky-rocket or dive overnight?

> I'm ignorant. From my perspective it seems like the value of bitcoin changes too much,

The value of Bitcoin fluctuates UP and DOWN too much *when compared to the US Dollar*.

But compared say, to the Mexican Peso or say (more extremely) Venezuelan Peso, it has gone steadily up. So for us who don't live in a place with a sufficiently stable central bank and a trustful government, Cryptocurrencies are one avenue to safeguard the value of our income.

Re: EU to make Bitcoin traceable, ban anonymous crypto wallets

#107
post #38

In other news, the government has declared by decree that nobody is allowed to memorize seed phrases anymore. Also, multiplying prime numbers is now illegal. edit: Downvotes are funny because we are almost certainly going to see laws passed in the next few years that are functionally equivalent to the rules stated above.

To build on this; Is code equivalent to speech? Is Bitcoin free speech?

Probably not, and no.

Re: EU to make Bitcoin traceable, ban anonymous crypto wallets

#108
post #30

The EU isn't doing anything to bitcoin. They have no ability to regulate bitcoin. They can make it traceable when it is held on kycd exchanges In their jurisdiction. That is a big difference

They can't regulate bitcoin but they sure can discourage investors from putting in billions into Bitcoin. Considering that the growth story is based around those future investors it would be pretty bad news for Bitcoin if that flow of investors suddenly stopped.

Re: EU to make Bitcoin traceable, ban anonymous crypto wallets

#109
post #7

I understand anti-EU sentiment, but who uses bitcoin for something different than transfering illegal funds and speculation? I understand Ethereum and other smart contract cryptocurcies, but time when people believed Bitcoin is going to become currency are long gone

Bitcoin miners use Bitcoin to pay their bills.

Re: EU to make Bitcoin traceable, ban anonymous crypto wallets

#110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

could you elaborate? I'm ignorant. From my perspective it seems like the value of bitcoin changes too much, having risen sharply in value recently, to spend as currency, but I'm also assuming that there are other more stable options. What kind of things do you buy, and how often? What sort of things do you do considering that the value might sky-rocket or dive overnight?

> I'm ignorant. From my perspective it seems like the value of bitcoin changes too much, The value of Bitcoin fluctuates UP and DOWN too much *when compared to the US Dollar*. But compared say, to the Mexican Peso or say (more extremely) Venezuelan Peso, it has gone steadily up. So for us who don't live in a place with a sufficiently stable central bank and a trustful government, Cryptocurrencies are one avenue to sa…

You know, this is one of those things that would go away with the snap of a finger if the leaders cared about their country. Okay it's harder than that because the IMF is completely backwards but let's assume that the Venezuelan government was willing to listen and the IMF actually understood economics. It wouldn't take a year to fix the problem. Shortages may last longer because the real world is slow.
Post reply on HN