Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

“You’d have to shut down the Internet” to ban Bitcoin, says SEC’s Hester Peirce
Cryptoslate.com ^ | APRIL 10, 2021 AT 2:27 PM | Liam Frost

Posted on 04/10/2021 8:35:52 PM PDT by E. Pluribus Unum

Any of the government’s efforts to ban Bitcoin would be “foolish,” said Hester Peirce (aka “Crypto Mom”), a very Bitcoin-friendly commissioner at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), during a MarketWatch virtual conference earlier this week.

“I think we were past that point very early on because you’d have to shut down the Internet,” Peirce said, adding, “I don’t see how you could ban it. You could certainly make the effort. It would be very hard to stop people from [trading Bitcoin]. So I think it would be a foolish thing for the government to try to do that.”

The statement came on the heels of Ray Dalio, a billionaire investor and founder of Bridgewater Associates, arguing that there’s “a good probability” that governments around the world would ban Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.

“Every country treasures its monopoly on controlling the supply and demand. They don’t want other monies to be operating or competing, because things can get out of control. They outlawed gold, that’s why also outlawing Bitcoin is a good probability.”

However, according to Peirce, the main issue for authorities—at least when it comes to cryptocurrencies—is to find an approach to regulation that would be productive and non-restrictive at the same time. She noted:

“We’ve seen other countries take, I would say, a more productive approach. We really need to turn that around. And I’m optimistic, with a new chairman coming in with a deep knowledge of these markets, that is something we could do together—build a good regulatory framework.”

At the same time, Peirce also pointed out that she doesn’t know when—or if—a Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) will finally be approved in the U.S. Recently, we’ve seen a new wave of major investment companies, such as Fidelity Investments, SkyBridge Capital, and VanEck, filing their applications for Bitcoin ETFs with the SEC.

The regulator, however, never approved a single filing of this kind so far.


TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: bitcoin; blockchain; btc; cryptocurrency; elonmusk; hesterpeirce; raydalio; sec; tesla
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-4041-6061 next last
To: ctdonath2
Cash may be fiat currency, but it's usable when the grid is down.

If the shtf it will have value only if someone accepts it as having value. All so called assets share that.

41 posted on 04/11/2021 6:14:02 AM PDT by ASA Vet (The first two boxes failed. Only one remains.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 22 | View Replies]

To: ASA Vet

At least there’s an “it” to debate the value of.


42 posted on 04/11/2021 6:28:04 AM PDT by ctdonath2 (The claim of consensus is the first refuge of scoundrels.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 41 | View Replies]

To: ASA Vet

Corollary:
Firearms will always have value as long as there are viable projectiles for them.
Bullets will always have value as long as there are firearms.


43 posted on 04/11/2021 6:51:53 AM PDT by themidnightskulker (And then the thread dies... peacefully, in it's sleep....)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 41 | View Replies]

To: themidnightskulker
Ammunition will be either the new barter currency or the means to "obtain" needed supplies.

While I have enough for quite some time, I think we have a rough ride ahead.

44 posted on 04/11/2021 7:07:25 AM PDT by ASA Vet (The first two boxes failed. Only one remains.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 43 | View Replies]

To: palmer

Find the mines. Shut them down. It wouldn’t be hard. They use too much power.

Without miners, the whole system falls.

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-56215787


45 posted on 04/11/2021 7:14:29 AM PDT by Pikachu_Dad ("the media are selling you a line of soap)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 35 | View Replies]

To: Pikachu_Dad
Same as finding the indoor pot growers using too much power with the grow lights. It works sometimes. Sometimes they can stay hidden.
46 posted on 04/11/2021 7:26:39 AM PDT by palmer (Democracy Dies Six Ways from Sunday)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 45 | View Replies]

To: ctdonath2
Cash may be fiat currency, but it’s usable when the grid is down.

You may have not heard of Starlink.

47 posted on 04/11/2021 7:28:28 AM PDT by corkoman
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 22 | View Replies]

To: chuckles

It already is taxed the same way your stock market account is taxed.

You don’t owe any tax until you sell it, just like you don’t owe tax on a stock until you sell it.

If you held it less than a year, the profit/los is ordinary income.

If you hold it more than a year it is taxed as capital gains.


48 posted on 04/11/2021 8:20:49 AM PDT by E. Pluribus Unum (Anti-racism looks suspiciously like racism.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 28 | View Replies]

To: Truthoverpower
I have a question for you bitcoin aficionados Who backs your currency up?

The only thing that backs the US dollar since Nixon abandoned the gold standard is the full faith and credit of the US feral government, and they are printing money like there is no tomorrow and handing it out to people who didn't earn it.

I checked the price of a Maytag washing machine we purchased last year for $500.

Today it is $750.

We are headed for Weimar Republic/Venezuela territory, Skippy.

49 posted on 04/11/2021 8:24:15 AM PDT by E. Pluribus Unum (Anti-racism looks suspiciously like racism.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 26 | View Replies]

To: ctdonath2
Cash may be fiat currency, but it’s usable when the grid is down.

If the grid is down, the supply chain evaporates and store shelves are empty within days.

It won't matter how much cash you have squirreled away in your mattress, there won't be anything to buy with it.

At that point the only thing that will matter is how much of a supply of storable food you have and how many guns and how much ammunition you have to defend it and barter with.

50 posted on 04/11/2021 8:28:19 AM PDT by E. Pluribus Unum (Anti-racism looks suspiciously like racism.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 22 | View Replies]

To: Truthoverpower

Your wallet comes with a nonsensical pass phrase.. several words long. If you lose your device you can rebuild your wallet on another device. Can take some time for the system to reconstruct your transactions, but it works. Had to do it once when I got a new android phone.


51 posted on 04/11/2021 8:28:39 AM PDT by Tallguy
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 26 | View Replies]

To: ctdonath2

If the Internet goes down, the supply chain evaporates and store shelves are empty in a matter of days if not hours.

No matter how much cash you have, there won’t be anything to buy with it.


52 posted on 04/11/2021 8:29:48 AM PDT by E. Pluribus Unum (Anti-racism looks suspiciously like racism.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 40 | View Replies]

To: E. Pluribus Unum

One day the “Technology Trap” will shut, just a matter of when.


53 posted on 04/11/2021 8:30:34 AM PDT by dfwgator (Endut! Hoch Hech!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 52 | View Replies]

To: E. Pluribus Unum

Nice question. Without the internet the world economy crashes into smoking ruin. There has never been a faster and more thorough transformation of the way business and commerce are accomplished than what has happened in the past 20 years with the internet.


54 posted on 04/11/2021 8:35:42 AM PDT by Rebelbase
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 18 | View Replies]

To: All

The value of Bitcoin is that no government controls it, meaning no government can print it into oblvion.

The amount of Bitcoin that can be minted is capped at 21,000,000. It is physically impossible to mint more.

18,000,000 have already been minted, so the most it can be inflated by by is 16.7% and that will take years to mine it.

The US dollar is backed by nothing other than the full faith and credit of the US feral government, and the US feral government is now run by psychopaths who are printing money like there is no tomorrow.

We bought a washing machine at Lowe’s last yearfor $500. The exact same washer is now $750.

You do the math.


55 posted on 04/11/2021 8:47:35 AM PDT by E. Pluribus Unum (Anti-racism looks suspiciously like racism.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: E. Pluribus Unum

*


56 posted on 04/11/2021 9:41:10 AM PDT by E. Pluribus Unum (Anti-racism looks suspiciously like racism.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 55 | View Replies]

To: E. Pluribus Unum

Bridgewater Associates, arguing that there’s “a good probability” that governments around the world would ban Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.

Every country treasures its monopoly on controlling the supply and demand.

cryptocurrencies would be like going off the gold standard and it’s China’s wish to do so.


57 posted on 04/11/2021 10:05:26 AM PDT by Vaduz (women and children to be impacIQ of chimpsted the most.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Vaduz

I’m sure they’ll try.

Good luck with that.


58 posted on 04/11/2021 10:09:45 AM PDT by E. Pluribus Unum (Anti-racism looks suspiciously like racism.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 57 | View Replies]

To: E. Pluribus Unum

Many countries don’t want anything to do with it’s to easy for it to fail it’s like having the one world dollar a fools paradise.


59 posted on 04/11/2021 10:37:12 AM PDT by Vaduz (women and children to be impacIQ of chimpsted the most.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 58 | View Replies]

To: E. Pluribus Unum
..."It already is taxed the same way your stock market account is taxed."

Can you not buy an sell outside your stock Account? How did the Silk Road operate if it's reported in your stock account? Can you sell it privately to Elon Musk? I thought that was the whole purpose of Bitcoin was to keep it on the hush hush.

You have to know there is a whole underground system for handling Bitcoin. You just choose to show at least some of the transactions to the gubmint. Sorta like saying I know how many guns you have through the government forms. But I don't know how many you got from dad or your neighbor. That's the whole reason Biden keeps harping on "background checks", because he knows I can buy a gun from a friend and it will be listed in a guys name 3 sales ago. If I have 15 Bitcoins and buy a Tesla with a couple of them, which 2 coins did I use? the ones I paid $15000 for or the ones I paid $500 for. How do they determine the tax I owe? Does Tesla even report that I paid in Bitcoin or gold coins? It's simple for the people that buy Bitcoin for investment in an account, but for everybody else, they will be buying and selling from their internet account all the way down to buying Starbucks coffee. Cutting out the middleman is supposed to be the whole idea of secrecy. A great many just buy a Bitcoin and watch it grow or recede in their Schwab account and when they exchange it for cash, they owe tax. But places of business are now taking Bitcoin straight from your account. I don't doubt before it's over Iran will be able to just pay N.Korea in Bitcoin for their own warhead and nobody will be the wiser. How are people paying for dope, guns and even murder without it showing on their stock account? Believe me, there are billionaires out there that nobody knows about because they started early in Bitcoin. If I had the Bitcoins, don't you think I could buy a 737 and paint "Trump" of the side and fly it around without the government even knowing I bought it?

Some day the government will decide that too many "little people" have too many Bitcoins and they will ban them because they can't tax them. Right now, Bezos, Soros, John Kerry, Oprah, and the elites that eat Pizza in DC can have as many as they want, but when they see a mechanic in Kansas gets a few, they will be taxed to keep them from buying a yacht in secret. The first phrase I ever heard when Bitcoin came into the main stream was "money laundering".

60 posted on 04/11/2021 8:27:29 PM PDT by chuckles
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 48 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-4041-6061 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson