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India seeks to block most cryptocurrencies in new bill, government says

reuters.com

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Re: India seeks to block most cryptocurrencies in new bill, government says

#61

Post by xwdv »

lordnacho wrote: post #52
cletus wrote: post #51

Crypto is increasingly looking like a Ponzi scheme to me. I know this is going to be an unpopular opinion on HN but it's no less true. The fact is that blockchain solves a problem for almost nobody. The primary use seems to be to avoid real or threatened government intervention. These uses are largely illegal, by definition (eg bypassing capital controls in China). Now you can argue the morality of such laws but that…

Unpopular? What you've written is a summary of the orthodoxy on HN.

When people say it’s an “unpopular opinion” it’s really a dog whistle for supporters to come out and agree.

Re: India seeks to block most cryptocurrencies in new bill, government says

#62

Post by mise_en_place »

ashwagary wrote: post #47
ngokevin wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How are you supposed to turn the coins into FIAT where it's actually usable? At that point, you cannot move your money around however you like, you can only move the tokens around on the blockchain.

Gift cards and p2p exchange for fiat using a dex or another service. As long as there is money to be made, the Indian crypto black market will thrive and grow.

Who exactly will be making money? Bitcoin is already extremely illiquid, regulation like this will make it even more illiquid. What a ludicrous take.

Re: India seeks to block most cryptocurrencies in new bill, government says

#63

Post by instagraham »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #9
instagraham wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not as easy to participate in the informal economy as it used to be. Everything from one's bank to one's mobile number and govt id are linked. If you want to deposit funds in an exchange, you'll need some form of KYC--barring which your bank debit/credit card is linked anyway. The banks, even before the ban (which has yet to come), were keeping track of customers making payments to exchanges. In some cases, they…

Would turning cash into crypto outside of the banking system not be considered money laundering?

Depends on what they classify it as. The preview of the bill said "private coins" would be prohibited. On what grounds, they did not say.

There was a call to treat NFTs as securities. If something like that is done, then any illicit trade of securities would be considered illegal, if not money laundering.

Re: India seeks to block most cryptocurrencies in new bill, government says

#64

Post by idiotsecant »

betwixthewires wrote: post #5

Well, they can try, but even with centralized exchanges, a VPN will do. And then there are decentralized protocols. Once you have some of your money in cryptocurrency there's no real way for anyone to stop you from moving your money around however you like. The only points that can be controlled are interfaces with banks.

If they make owning crypto a crime it becomes just a matter of showing that you used it then they put you in a concrete box for a while.

Re: India seeks to block most cryptocurrencies in new bill, government says

#65

Post by ganeshkrishnan »

dboreham wrote: post #35
m00dy wrote: post #11

You can seek to block cryptocurrencies but you can't block decentralised protocols. P.S: I'm someone important at LongShort.Finance

> someone important Everyone here is important.

no uh. not me

Re: India seeks to block most cryptocurrencies in new bill, government says

#66

Post by TekMol »

LegitShady wrote: post #60
TekMol wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Owning a token means you can perform certain actions on a distributed system. No social contract needed. You own the token by owning a secret key which gives you the power to move it. It's like owning a key to a door. It gives you the power to lock and unlock the door. No social contract needed. You can not own a domain. You can only pay a registrar to have them talk to a registry. You then are at the mercy of both.…

its not a door. It's a number on a blockchain. It has no inherent value and no inherent function. It's just a number on a blockchain. Everything else is tulipmania.

If digital assets have no value, then you are probably fine with having your hn handle, your bank account and your phone number deleted?

The value of digital property is widely accepted for decades now.

What crypto adds is that you can hold the key to your property yourself. So others can not move or delete it against your will.

Re: India seeks to block most cryptocurrencies in new bill, government says

#67

Post by TrinaryWorksToo »

cletus wrote: post #51

Crypto is increasingly looking like a Ponzi scheme to me. I know this is going to be an unpopular opinion on HN but it's no less true. The fact is that blockchain solves a problem for almost nobody. The primary use seems to be to avoid real or threatened government intervention. These uses are largely illegal, by definition (eg bypassing capital controls in China). Now you can argue the morality of such laws but that…

How is fiat money not a ponzi scheme?

Re: India seeks to block most cryptocurrencies in new bill, government says

#68

Post by vmception »

shubhank19 wrote: post #16

The article seems a little misguided. The news was "private cryptos", not all cryptos.

but the layer 1 cryptos are all moving towards private

even bitcoin’s taproot amendment that just got passed and implemented does this to a limited extent

Re: India seeks to block most cryptocurrencies in new bill, government says

#69

Post by EugeneOZ »

xtracto wrote: post #42
jazzyjackson wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

not just banks, but everywhere you can spend it in country. fine you can move money between virtual accounts and buy NFTs all day, but government can control whether local business are allowed to accept your crypto as payment, so you’ll need to liquidate crypto into local currency - which kind of sucks to do if the banks aren’t there to help.

This hasnt been a problem forvseveral years. There are different options: - buy international prepaid cards for legal dervices (bitrefill) - use p2p local crypto exchanges: localcrypto, localmonero (in some countries this can be 100% anonymous by using the "withdraw from atm with 1 time code" bank services) - Exchange to alternate "tokens" that are legal (anyone remembers Linden dollars to BTC market around 2010?) -…

Every option looks risky, people will not use it widely.
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