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China's Central Bank Bans ICOs

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Re: China's Central Bank Bans ICOs

#301

Post by mrep »

crypt1d wrote: post #82

A lot of people seem to suggest that some kind of regulation, or even outright ban, of ICOs is necessary. Apparently in order to prevent people from loosing their money on risky investments? I don't really understand why it is appropriate for someone else to tell me how to spend my hard earned money? Isn't that what freedom of choice is about? Even if I'm being manipulated into a scam, it is still MY choice. Let peop…

Because lots of them look like outright scams and are fueling a bubble which is bad for everyone because they cause negative externalities [1] such as systematic risk [2].

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Externality#Negative

[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Systemic_risk

Re: China's Central Bank Bans ICOs

#302

Post by vasilipupkin »

uberrr wrote: post #298
vasilipupkin wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

most ICOs are done by startups that haven't built their businesses yet - that's why they are raising money. Many of them seem like legitimate businesses that could fail but also could succeed.

So you can't name a single legitimate business that's doing an ico?

filecoin. storj. factom, ripple, omega one. golem, iconomi there are tons of them.

Re: China's Central Bank Bans ICOs

#303

Post by numbchuckskills »

empath75 wrote: post #293
rothbardrand wrote: post #147

Why don't rich people need protection? Here's the answer: this is their protection. It reduces their competition. Seriously, these securities rules keep people like me from investing in AirBnB and Uber (two that I caught very early and wanted into)... but we can all go to Vegas and lose $100k in a single weekend. But putting $10k into Uber's seed round is somehow a crime I need to be protected from? Truth of the matt…

Name one ICO that is a legitimate business.

https://kin.kik.com/

Re: China's Central Bank Bans ICOs

#304

Post by CryptoPunk »

Nursie wrote: post #207
CryptoPunk wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People support all sorts of things that reduce rights. Doesn't make it okay.. >>Perhaps it's just not a good idea to have such a thing? Or perhaps the seller side of the equation, where you can't run an ICO without being registered and regulated, is needed. I don't believe we should be limiting other people's right to privacy and to exchange digital tokens (not guns or tanks) under any circumstance. I think accepting…

Whereas I think that not regulating this space is a great recipe for scams, crashes and monetary instability.

Cryptocurrency is something people choose to go into knowing it's resistant to regulation by design. If they want to avoid the risks associated with fewer regulations, they can remain in the traditional financial market. But yes we've reached an empasse. We fundamentally don't relate on the issue of a third party essentially dictating to an individual what risks they may subject themselves to.

Re: China's Central Bank Bans ICOs

#305

Post by dingo_bat »

davidgerard wrote: post #217
rothbardrand wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. 2013 was a lot of clones of bitcoin with a few parameters changed. Nowadays ICOs I'm seeing involve a lot of very hard work. The risk is that the teams may way under-estimate how much work it is (And I think that's what's going to cause them to fail) but they are a lot more ambitious than you are characterizing.

This doesn't appear to be an accurate description of the ICO market as it exists. The hardest work in ICOs is the marketing. At the back end, they literally put in the fine print that the thing you just bought is worthless. https://davidgerard.co.uk/blockchain/icos-magic-beans-and-bu... Look up the EOS fine print. They took down the PDF, but I kept a spare: https://davidgerard.co.uk/blockchain/references/EOS%20Token%…

It's literally saying "Give us your money and we will give you nothing in return"! WTF?!

Re: China's Central Bank Bans ICOs

#306

Post by gritzko »

vasilipupkin wrote: post #302
uberrr wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you can't name a single legitimate business that's doing an ico?

filecoin. storj. factom, ripple, omega one. golem, iconomi there are tons of them.

Filecoin? Consider Bit Torrent seeding/bandwidth. It is too cheap to count for at least 10 years. Even tit-for-tat is no longer necessary since LEDBAT was rolled out (circa 2010).

The stuff they are going to count "on the blockchain" is too cheap to count! Well, and blockchain transactions are kind of expensive and slow. See the problem?

Re: China's Central Bank Bans ICOs

#307

Post by CryptoPunk »

mcguire wrote: post #269
CryptoPunk wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have a regulation against fraud already. New proposed regulations are about banning unvetted token sales, to preempt possible scams, which is limiting people's contracting rights when there is no evidence of a crime - only a possibility of a scam based on a generalisation.

Problem: stock booms result in massive fraud and a great deal of economic damage. Solution: regulate the stock market. Problem: cannot sell things we want to sell. Solution: Derivatives. Problem: CDOs cause massive economic damage. Solution: don't do that. Problem: cannot sell what we want to. Solution: Etherium. ...

>Problem: stock booms result in massive fraud and a great deal of economic damage.

>Solution: regulate the stock market.

If people want to trade the price of a digital token into bubble territory, that's really their business. No one else is forced to buy up that token. Which governing authority will know it's a bubble anyway? It's not like it's possible to know if something is overvalued. If it were, one could reliably short every bubble and make a profit, and in fact do so so much and at such scale that their market shorting prevents bubbles from ever forming (since a short adds pressure on the sell-side).

Re: China's Central Bank Bans ICOs

#308

Post by vasilipupkin »

gritzko wrote: post #306
vasilipupkin wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

filecoin. storj. factom, ripple, omega one. golem, iconomi there are tons of them.

Filecoin? Consider Bit Torrent seeding/bandwidth. It is too cheap to count for at least 10 years. Even tit-for-tat is no longer necessary since LEDBAT was rolled out (circa 2010). The stuff they are going to count "on the blockchain" is too cheap to count! Well, and blockchain transactions are kind of expensive and slow. See the problem?

the question was to name legitimate businesses doing ICOs. filecoin is certainly legitimate. You are talking about how their tech might fail and how their business might not work. that's great, and you could very well be correct, but that's not what we are discussing here

Re: China's Central Bank Bans ICOs

#309

Post by CryptoPunk »

xorcist wrote: post #273
CryptoPunk wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But banning them from participating in an entire class of financial transactions is not just protecting them from scams. There are token sales that are not scams. It's prohibiting them from entering into legitimate investments that simply don't have government approval (e.g. a securities sale that doesn't ask them for their ID, and thus doesn't meet securities regulations).

> There are token sales that are not scams. This whole discussion would be much easier with an example. I have spent quite a lot of time debating cryptocurrencies with people and explaining why they could be useful. But with ICOs I find myself on the other side of the fence. I have yet to find a white paper that isn't either useless or impossible. > and thus doesn't meet securities regulations In this context "doesn'…

BAT and FunFair are neither impossible nor useless.

>I'm not sure that's a good idea.

But if someone thinks it's a good idea, we should forcibly deny them the right to invest their own money in it? I simply don't understand the justification for such a strong-arming intrusion.

>It is impossible to be serious in a space dominated by liars as they will outcompete you every time.

Reputation is a very real and powerful thing in the marketplace. In the long run scammers and other unscrupulous types cannot compete against honest providers who deliver. And by the way, I'm fine with going after confirmed scammers. I'm not okay with centralizing/banning an industry to preemptively prevent scams.

Re: China's Central Bank Bans ICOs

#310

Post by Nursie »

CryptoPunk wrote: post #304
Nursie wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whereas I think that not regulating this space is a great recipe for scams, crashes and monetary instability.

Cryptocurrency is something people choose to go into knowing it's resistant to regulation by design. If they want to avoid the risks associated with fewer regulations, they can remain in the traditional financial market. But yes we've reached an empasse. We fundamentally don't relate on the issue of a third party essentially dictating to an individual what risks they may subject themselves to.

I think we'll begin to find out how regulation-resistant it is over the next few years...

And no, we don't relate on that, and we disagree that the effect is limited to the individual (see "the Great Depression, causes of") or that the individual should have to bear all risk of their actions at all times. Fundamentally I suspect we disagree on what sort of society we want to live in.

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