Bitcoin Forum

https://talkimg.com/images/2024/12/25/DLHrP.png
https://x.com/BTC_Archive/status/1871893702098256367

Russia has been struggling to trade with its allies for the past few years due to US sanctions. Currently, there is a fear that US sanctions against several more Russian companies will further harm it. The restrictions on foreign banks to receive the price of export products and the impact of the sole dominance of the US dollar. They have already started using Bitcoin for commercial transactions and experts believe that this is a breakthrough step for Russia. Bitcoin transactions will increase further as an alternative to the dollar in the world.

Bitcoin is currently becoming one of the most important financial strategy for the two most powerful countries in the world.

News Source: https://www.reuters.com/markets/currencies/russia-is-using-bitcoin-foreign-trade-finance-minister-says-2024-12-25/

This is fantastic news for the community, as it proves that Bitcoin can achieve what fiat currencies cannot. It eliminates sanctions because Bitcoin isn’t controlled by any country, especially those that aren’t allies of Russia. This is truly what we call real financial freedom. Seeing Russia take this step will undoubtedly create a ripple effect in the crypto world, sparking new conversations and possibilities.

And we are talking of Billions of dollars here, which would certain increase its demand.

US and UK investigate $20 billion worth of Tether entering sanctioned Russian exchange: Bloomberg (https://www.theblock.co/post/285408/us-and-uk-investigate-20-billion-worth-of-tether-entering-sanctioned-russian-exchange-bloomberg)

Well bravo. Raises a few questions I think.

Will Putin's btc team signup on bitcointalk?
Will this mean that btc as a whole will get tagged as 'backed by russia'?
The Trump-Russia link that's been speculated - does this prove it or is this just some variant causality at work?
What about countries that don't want btc? I know some of them still mark all kinds of crypto as illegal
Does that mean oil will now be tagged to BTC like 0.0004 BTC to the Barrel to generate more revenue as the coin goes up?

Not sure how I should react, but with this news we can expect some blockchain analysis to mark or blacklist addresses associated with Russia. So, if Russia accept Bitcoin in order to use it for foreign trade, I don't think it's gonna work fine since it can be traced.

The next question is, if Russia want to trade with their allies e.g. Brazil, China, India, South Africa etc, why they didn't choose to use BRICS currency instead?

But, the good thing is there are two big countries are trying to use Bitcoin, if China join this party, it will be really big news.

The US new president Donald Trump has threatened to impose 100% tariffs on imports from BRICS countries if they start creating and trading separate currencies as per their resolutions. Among the economically powerful countries, the remaining 7 countries, except for Russia and China, are mostly underdeveloped or developing and cannot afford to face the US threat.

https://edition.cnn.com/2024/11/30/politics/trump-brics-currency-tariff/index.html

They know that Bitcoin blockchain operates borderless, globally and Bitcoin transactions can not be censored. If they use Bitcoin blockchain, they are well against sanctions from the USA.

Before Russia, North Korea did many hacks, and money launderings with Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies to have money and avoid sanctions. Russia don't need to be smart to know it and apply it, as they can easily learn it from North Korea, one of their most friendliest countries and allies.

The two most powerful countries in the world, what are they?

You only mentioned Russia. They are most powerful country in the world, really?

Today is 25 December, 34 years since the resignation of Gorbachev, but unfortunately Putin did not help Russia to grow from this milestone, but he destroyed Russia with his dream.

For some reason, the success and recognition \ use of bitcoin at the country level seems like "Satoshi's blessing" for bitcoin at the level of ordinary users. The interest of entire countries in bitcoin as a way to bypass sanctions and make cross-border payments between countries means only one thing: if bitcoin is used at such a high level, then at a lower level (ordinary citizens) bitcoin will not be allowed to be used. This will inevitably lead to bans and criminal prosecution for using bitcoin by ordinary citizens. The use of bitcoin in foreign trade will undoubtedly lead to an increase in cost, but also, in the long term, will lead to a decrease in the "freedom" of bitcoin as a means of p2p payments. In a country in which, for centuries, there is a "good old" tradition of 1st taking everything from private property, and then "evenly" distributing it among the top bosses, one can hardly expect a different fate for bitcoin. Outside this country, the use of bitcoin in foreign trade will be a positive factor, but inside it will be negative.

I too don't know how to react to this. In fact my first reaction is to deny that this is true. They re strong members of BRICS and one time some months ago, I saw the BRICS currency which they say would rival the dollar. Why change to Bitcoin now? This will have no effect on the dollar. And those countries that they would trade with what's their policy on bitcoin. Well, I don't trust journalists they may have taken the words out of context.

If I'm reading correctly it seems like their partner countries are cautious because they don't want to get hit by US sanctions if they process Russia-related transactions. If this is true, I guess they believe that using Bitcoin will obfuscate some of their transactions (we're talking about Russian business btw, at least according to the article) and allow them to convert it to fiat or other currency more easily compared to using BRICS fiat money.

Many nations are fearful that they will be treated badly when Trump returns to the White House and even with future Presidents of the USA. BRICS sounds promising but its potentiality to succeed is unknown or even vague and some nations don't want to hope too high with BRICS' currency and de-dollarization. Two biggest examples are India and Saudi Arabia, they are like two-faced in policies but if they smell that BRICS won't succeed, they will quickly turn over to US. dollar again.

It's easier and more beneficial for them to turn back to US. dollar, no harm with them by leaving this ambitious project that has unknow chance of success.

Smart move from a businessman in action.
That's why we are talking about BTC being used in such a way in the first place  ;D

Depending on your perspective, I wouldn't call it a huge win for all. This just proves that sanctions can now effectively be circumvented and there are little repercussions for countries or entities to be engaging in crimes against humanity. I think this is a good time to rethink how we can better approach the global issues since sanctions are obviously not as helpful as it seems.

I'm not condoning censorship, but I find it difficult to imagine that it is a positive news since the whole idea about Bitcoin being censorship-free hasn't really been the top priority of most people.

I am not sure if this news is true! But if it is true, then it's a big news! Oil rich countries like Russia using Bitcoin for foreign trade, is a huge thing. The benefits are enormous and many countries are going to be benefitted out of it. Most importantly, it will further devalue USD by allowing the countries to ditch the usual USD route and trade freely without the fear of any sanctions from US. It's lovely to hear!

The world needs balance and Bitcoin can surely bring in that balance by not allowing one big country to dominate others. The balance of financial power is needed in today's world. Is that one big country did not invite Ukraine to join NATO, the Russia-Ukraine war did not happen!

In the news you provided, Trump asked BRICS not only not to create a new currency but also not to support any other currency to replace USD. That means BRICS members using bitcoin to avoid sanctions or reduce their dependence on the USD will not avoid sanctions from the United States either.
Not to mention, Russia is the only country that accepts bitcoin, while China has even completely banned bitcoin in the country. So that really begs the big question?

Many people are excited about this news and believe that this will help bitcoin become more popular but I am not so sure about that. To me, the US is still a superpower and they can do more than we think, and countries like Russia using bitcoin to confront them is not a good thing.

I don't think Putin's team will sign up on Bitcointalk because they don't need it. If they create an exchange or something similar, they might create an ANN thread but I highly doubt that, we don't live in 2016 anymore.

Russia will never back Bitcoin as a whole because Bitcoin is global and decentralized. Most Bitcoin pools are American and Chinese pools and if Russia tries to be dominant in Bitcoin, then keep in mind that other countries will fight for domination

No, the US Dollar is still the dominant currency and Bitcoin's value is calculated in USD.

The US can also easily track Bitcoin transactions and threaten countries with 100% tariffs, so this can't be the deal in this situation but they do it anyway, why? Wouldn't Monero be a better choice?

Monero is the best option, but if Russia accept it, this will not good for the public perception because people always think Monero = criminal, so public would think Russia = criminal. Maybe Russia will use DEX or other tools to hide their Bitcoin origin.

It's good decision for Russia, they can improve their privacy using Bitcoin and the US can't just implement any rules like they want because they also use Bitcoin.

They made this announcement some time ago and now did they make the transaction or what? I mean what they have bought and from whom is that clear or hidden? I know there is no need for them to publicize such deals and make their addresses public to everyone but I am still wondering if they even made any deals with BTC yet or what just a news?

Speaking of the finance minister, he said we will be using the BTC we mined to make deals and on the other hand they are restricting regions in Russia to mine BTC! Maybe to regulate mining in specific zones alone but is'nt this hurt the meaning of mining BTC like they will mine for their own benefit but some dude in a restricted zone can't mine it! Although this is a good deal because the adoption of BTC is all investors and traders want.

Trump has been talking too much and I doubt if he has the power to do all. He had threatened Mexico, Canada, Ukraine, Panama, Greenland, etc. He went as far as threatening Republicans in the Congress not to support Biden's proposal. His failure to force these Republicans to turn down the bill shows that he is overestimating his powers. America might be the most powerful country in the world but they cannot fight the entire world economically. If the world comes together to fight against the overbearing pride of Trump, I don't think the US will survive.

There is nothing like the BRICS  currency. What was introduced was BRICS Pay. It is a decentralized cross-border system that allows member countries to settle trade payments with local currencies.

As enemy is not to be underestimated, I must admit that Russia has pretty good economists and a decent finance system. They bounce back over and over again quite well after sanctions. It's unfortunate that they've turned to Bitcoin to counter Western sanctions, but it's not surprising. That's the downside of freedom and decentralization: all sorts of entities can use Bitcoin for all sorts of purposes. However, as they're using BTC mined in Russia for such trade, I suppose it might be possible to set up restrictions targeting BTC originating from mining pools in Russia.

To be fair to them, that's just how politics is. Being two-faced is probably a basic skill nowadays. At the end of the day what matters the most is whether you get something out of a deal or not. Trying to be less reliant on USD is hard when you can't align your goal with other countries. Worse case scenario BRICS will probably end up as another market deal for most countries instead of a force to get out of US hands. I think they'll try to use crypto sooner or later so it's no surprise that Russia is the first one to allow their national businesses to do that. CMIIW.

I guess the west has to take the war somewhere else. It's probably just fair to exempt currencies from sanctions and the like. They want to take down Russia, they do it in ways that won't affect the innocent people who have nothing to do with what they're quarreling about.

Let those who want wars fight each other like real men. Why do they have to drag into their foolishness the millions of people who just want to live their lives peacefully? If they want to kill each other, let them kill each other. Why should everybody's access to potato, clean water, corn, milk, steak, be affected?

Thanks to Bitcoin, this is partly solved.

First lets get something clear, the article says "Russian companies have begun using bitcoin" which is not exactly the same as "Russia is using bitcoin for foreign trades". It is not at the government level, it is still at the "people's level" which is what Bitcoin was made to do.
Think of it this way, we are all using bitcoin and we are all from different countries but nobody can say your country or mine are using bitcoin for foreign trade just because we are using bitcoin!

Other than that, I don't see Russian government using bitcoin because they already have an alternative payment system in place to SWIFT which they have been pushing and in their other trades with a country like China or India they are using their own fiat currencies.

When it comes to politics, it’s tough to figure out which side is entirely true. For example, the US sanctioned Russia for the reasons you mentioned, but is the US really that clean? I believe they’ve also been accused of crimes against humanity. A quick Google search for “US crimes against humanity” will give you plenty of examples.

But this is all a matter of perspective, and I won’t dive too deep into that. My main point is to focus on what Bitcoin has achieved, it’s a form of money that brings freedom. It can be used globally, even in countries where it’s banned, because users always find ways to bypass those restrictions. That’s the real takeaway here.

I didn't say US is clean, and whataboutism shouldn't be encouraged because it greatly diminishes the gravity of the situation. The narrative that is being parroted would just be that Bitcoin is facilitating transactions that are undesirable. This is probably not what the community needs.

It has always been possible for Bitcoin to facilitate transactions without restrictions. OFAC compliant blocks, which fortunately didn't take off is why countries like Russia are able to circumvent sanctions.

Sounds like truth and the fuzz is being created about the situation to get the attention to it.
Before the officials talk about the adoption and such - it's just a wind blowing, echoing from the truth of some companies making something with Bitcoin.

Forum community have experience with a very long lasting campaign from Best Change, and it's a company from Russia. Policy in Russia can be changed very quickly because that nation is centralized in power and adminstration by a single person, Putin, but Best Change in many years shown that in Russia, people can use Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies through their service.

Expect it to be legal tender in Russia is too far.

https://newhedge.io/terminal/bitcoin/legality-map

Why would Russia as a country be interested in having a profile on BTT? Additionally, this forum is banned in Russia, so anyone coming from that country must use a VPN or Tor. Which leads us to the conclusion that they are real hypocrites, allegedly using BTC for trading - and at the same time banning crypto forums.


I would not be surprised if in the future we have BTC that will be tagged as the one with the Putler label and the one with the Mr.Donald label.


Mr. Donald is a businessman whose first priority is profit - and if that means he has to make a deal with the devil himself, he will do it without hesitation. Besides, is it even news that Russia is using BTC today? They have been doing it for at least 10 years since they started with the realization of the creation of the Russian world.

I didn't  know that Russia ban access to Bitcoin forum. They hate the USA but does it make them banning all websites from the USA?

The forum is USA-based, and it makes me thinking about this policy action from Russia but I think it is really too serious if they do that. The forum does nothing harmful to the Russia, so in my thinking no reasons for Putin to restrict Russian access to Bitcointalk forum.

Hi Bravo!

Here we are, how can we assist you?

Are you interested in knowing about our current policies for Bitcoin adoption around our local communities? Honestly, we are working secretly you are the first to ask this question so we thought why not create a historic moment to answer such direct questions  8) 8)

I can remember vividly during 2019 and 2021, were so many countries is against bitcoin development and technology, some dislike bitcoin due to they feel that the essence of bitcoin introduction is for money laundering, I think that it's same Russian government that ban or restricted bitcoin in her country...but right now they want to trade with bitcoin..I have already predicted that before 2040 if some of us will be alive before them, bitcoin will be accepted as a legal tender

Because if United States of America accepts embrace Bitcoin and Russia also embrace Bitcoin, that will triggers other countries who restricted her citizen's not to trade with bitcoin will definitely allow their citizens to trade with bitcoin,  I will say why Russian agreed to trade with bitcoin is that they have seen the important of Bitcoin and that's why they all agree to trade with bitcoin.

It's obvious that this information will skyrocket the price of bitcoin, because if effect take place by Russians the demands of bitcoin will be triple higher than the supply, so that's what I want us to understand....I know that one day top countries like Russia will embrace cryptocurrency BTC because its a decentralized currency and its not been controlled or influenced by the government.

I think it’s the same because these companies play a big role in shaping the economy of their county. The government benefits from them through taxes, so if these companies are unable to trade, they can’t generate revenue. This would ultimately result in them paying little to no taxes, which would also hurt the government’s income. It’s all interconnected IMO.

It says that Russian companies have started accepting it as currency, but if you read a little after that, it is seemingly endorsed by the prime minister of Finance:

That's more "government level" than "people's". Another reason to be bullish on 2025. However, I do acknowledge that it conflicts with their plan on promoting BRICS.

HITLER USING BITCOIN FOR FOREIGN TRADE!
Economic minister says that "special relocation projects" can now be fully funded.

...
...


Folks, it's fine to be enthusiastic about Bitcoin adoption, but not all news is necessarily good news. Right now Russia is sending thousands of its young people to die every day, and committing daily atrocities on Ukraine. I suspect the news is going to get worse and worse for them as the war drags on. This is not something we want associated with Bitcoin.

There are ways to remove traces (i.e. paying exorbitant fees to a certain miner), especially if you own big mining facilities (https://cointelegraph.com/news/russian-government-subsidies-crypto-mining-facility-in-siberia).

Spoiler alert:

There was never and there will never be a BRICs basket currency. It's vaporware.

They intended to use BTC from the get-go, they just don't want to announce it formally (yet).

Why? Because the price could easily skyrocket to 7 digit figures in a single day.

Maybe they'll announce it in 2025, but at the latest I expect it to happen by 2030.

It will be really big news when China invades Taiwan in 2027 (https://www.forbes.com/sites/tylerroush/2024/03/20/china-will-be-ready-to-invade-taiwan-by-2027-us-admiral-says/).

It doesn't. That was the plan from the get-go.

That's why they started mining BTC a while back.

It's alternative to BRICS. Using that for foreign trade encourages everyone else to do the same, and abandon BRICS. Why would that be in the plan from the get-go?

WEF wants BTC to help the dedollarization process and Net Zero (https://www.instagram.com/worldeconomicforum/reel/C35FfRytPtJ/).

WEF endorses the "multi-polar" BRICs alliance (https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2019/01/a-multipolar-world-brings-back-the-national-champions/).

There are even projections that China/India will leave US behind by 2030 (https://www.weforum.org/stories/2019/01/india-will-overtake-the-us-economy-by-2030/).

They won't abandon BRICs, just USD as a global reserve currency.

I read the news a few hours ago and I wouldn't be surprised if Russia would actually do it. Bitcoin is the best option/alternative for anyone, not only for Russia nationally, but also individually. We don't need to use dollars or any fiat to pay for goods or services from other people from different countries, of course bitcoin can be an alternative if both of them agree on the means of payment. Bitcoin is effective and an alternative solution that can be considered, so we can imagine how valuable bitcoin will be in the future.

We'll probably know and realize that bitcoin will eventually get a better use case as a currency, but when a country like Russia takes advantage of it, then I guess it's because they're forced to due to limited other options. Bitcoin is considered safer than others, but I can only think of the positive side.

Currently, Bitcoin has been a joke alternative to the USD because it can appreciate well in a matter of time. There is no restriction in using Bitcoin, even though the US tries to sanction Russian companies that are using Bitcoin for trades. Bitcoin was created to make transactions much easier for everyone and it's what we are seeing. The could try to sanction companies from trading with others but with Bitcoin, the sanction can be waved. With all the sanctions against Russia, the country has been doing well, which has been a big surprise to others that thought Russia will not be able to meet up with her mere functions.

I would say that Russia and most other countries now understand the importance of Bitcoin for trading of goods or for export and import goods. It's useless to create BRICS or use it when you know whom you're going to fight, and it's a great strategy to use Bitcoin at current times when even US president supports it and considers it a great currency.

BRICs and BTC aren't mutually exclusive, I don't know what made you think that:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/digital-assets/2024/10/23/russia-launches-brics-mining-infrastructure-project/

There is no conflict here. Bitcoin is still too small and too volatile to be used as the replacement for the Dollar (SWIFT, etc.). The replacement that BRICS will introduce should have stability and provide control to member governments for it to be a viable option.

BRICS is also not just a payment system, it is far more than that... It can even be called a bloc...

Does Russia care about public perception? Putin does whatever he wants with whoever he wants. I don't think that DEX will be enough for such a big country because liquidity on DEX is very low compared to centralized exchanges but they won't be able to use cexs because cexs are regulated.
I think that Putin can ignore public perception and push Monero into active usage, he will explain it by calling Monero the only tool that will be able to bypass US restrictions. I believe that Russia will secretly be using Monero.

Russia wants to use Bitcoin against USD but it's funny because in the end, Bitcoin's value is calculated in USD. Bitcoin is best in terms of reserves because no one will be able to ban or steal their Bitcoin reserves.

What Russia did was a very right decision by making a regulation that they will make international payments with bitcoin, of course this is a reflection of the future. In addition, as we all know, Western countries are indeed aggressively imposing sanctions and even making it difficult for Russia to trade with major partners such as China or Turkey. On the other hand, many local banks refuse to transact with Russian companies to avoid supervision from Western regulators, especially the US.

So the steps taken by Russia are the right steps to fight the US. Russia chose Bitcoin as a means of transaction in international trade because they know that no one in the world can regulate Bitcoin. My hope is that with the policies currently being implemented by Russia, other countries will follow suit and abandon the dollar and use bitcoin.

This is a bold decision for Russia to make commercial transactions through Bitcoin. This can certainly be an example for the world to reduce pressure on the dollar. As a result of this decision, financial banks in the world that depend on the dollar may think of alternatives, although there may be many complications in its implementation. The idea of ​​an alternative to the dollar has now begun, so I am optimistic that new ideas may be created in its implementation in the future.

The United States tries to maintain its dominance over every country in the world with the dollar and they have succeeded in this system. If Russia can keep the alternative to the dollar, Bitcoin, running on a larger scale, it will have a positive impact on its country's economy and the entire world economy may undergo radical changes.

Russia will make more progress in the future of Bitcoin payments.

https://talkimg.com/images/2024/12/28/D85rI.png

https://x.com/BTC_Archive/status/1873007052756533336

This happened a few years ago, and I don't think it had anything to do with the fact that the forum is somehow US-based, or maybe even the fact that cryptocurrencies are discussed here. If I remember correctly, that ban came from some Russian ministry that has nothing to do with finance or anything similar.

However, those who are corrupt and behave like dictators do not need an excuse to forbid something, they simply do it.

---

Nothing matters as long as the price of BTC goes up, not even all the suffering and destruction happening in 21st century Europe. I have a similar opinion as you, but most people on this forum are completely fascinated with any news coming out of Russia or China and don't care that the average citizen of those countries will not benefit from what their governments are doing with BTC.

What even more fascinating is that some people are only sensitive to certain news. Like if it is Russians using bitcoin we suddenly see certain number of "worried" users and we even see the word "Hitler" be in that topic but for example when Donald the convicted felon who is the president of a regime that just carried out a terrorist attack this morning against civilians in Yemen talks about bitcoin we don't see the same level of worrying or even terms like "Hitler" be used about him ;D

It's never been surprised for me to hear that. It's not only Russia, but all of parties who get economic sanctions may be also using as well i.e North Korean. I remember when Putin outlaw Bitcoin a few years ago, and he's changing his mind now.

It seems to me they can use Bitcoin to avoid the sanction, but there are no much free spaces available for them. I wonder what's Putin's motive to tell public if his country used bitcoin.

I agree with most things you've said, but keep in mind BTC will be a lot less volatile when it reaches 7 digits.

A common China/Russia announcement in behalf of BRICs could push it up there...

And yes, BRICs is a bloc (like EU/USSR), not a currency. What they want is an independent currency that nobody will be able to control (https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/markets/cryptocurrency/nobody-can-ban-bitcoin-vladimir-putins-comment-that-fulfilled-bitcoins-1-lakh-dream/articleshow/115999371.cms?from=mdr).

So no, they won't create a new currency from scratch, because nothing can beat BTC.

It's not funny, because currently (2024) USD is still the global reserve currency.

Will that still be the case in 2027-2030? I strongly doubt it.

As soon as China invades Taiwan and TSMC is destroyed (https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/trump-nominee-favors-destroying-tsmc-fabs-if-china-invades-taiwan-strategy-would-deprive-china-of-a-key-motivation-to-attack-but-devastate-world-economy) (Apple/nVidia/AMD/Intel can kiss their supply chain goodbye!), the USD will be hyperinflated to oblivion. Tech stocks (NASDAQ) will melt overnight like a hot knife passing through butter.

Mark my words: Russia will ask for BTC payments to sell you wheat/oil/gas. What will EU do then? Will they freeze/starve to death?

That's not entirely correct though. They want to create a new payment system that the US regime can not control, censor, sanction and turn into a weapon against everyone. They do want control.

In fact one of the reasons why development of BRICS currency is slow and we barely saw BRICS-Pay recently, is because each member wants to push their own fiat, specifically China and Russia. In that sense there is no difference between them and US. Like China that wants to push Yuan and replace US and in a couple of years they turn Yuan into a weapon against others just like US did with the dollar!

From our perspective, sure. But from the perspective of governments, not at all. They all hate bitcoin because they cannot control it, they can not print more of it, they can not censor its transactions, etc. So they will definitely create a new currency or maybe more of a new payment system from scratch so that they can control it!

Quite the contrary!

When China wants to trade goods with Russia, they want a currency that cannot be inflated by printing more of it (that's why they won't accept rubles and vice versa).

They want BTC for government usage/international trade (i.e. China selling microchips to Russia and Russia selling wheat/oil/gas to China).

Using fiat for international trade is already problematic (https://www.hindustantimes.com/business/russia-has-billions-indian-rupees-that-it-can-t-use-says-foreign-minister-lavrov-101683548573886.html).

They do NOT want BTC to give it to citizens, which brings me to my next point...

Yes, they will create CBDC (digital ruble) for citizen usage inside Russia!

This will be a currency with way too many restrictions and it will NOT be accepted worldwide.

No CBDC (not even the digital dollar/euro) will have global acceptance/recognition.

Why? Because CBDC is meant to be restrictive (unlike BTC).

I hope that clears up the confusion.

TL;DR: BTC for governments, CBDC for the plebs.

Ever since their sanctions happened, they seem to have been creative to get around this and when I read about their support for crypto coming from our Soviet friends ...I knew this was a bypass of the system and it works in their favour if you ask me and hope this won't negatively affect the markets bullish tread at the moment when the dots are connected by everyone else.

Putin has an imperialistic ambitions, he want to make Russia great again, like it was in USSR but that's not possible, they lost and the west became strong. He can't accept this fact mentally, there is a constant battle in his mind. That's his problem. Russia has the potential to be a very rich country with high quality of life because they have so many resources but instead, all of these resources are wasted on military that brings only death and destruction.
If there is any powerful nation in BRICS, that's definitely China but I don't think China wants a bad relationship with the US.

Long story short, the USA is too powerful. The empire might fall but not soon. The USA is very smart in this game.

What if the West will share the highest percentage of Bitcoin hashrate and set censorship on transactions? What is Russia going to do about that? Also, what's the point of Bitcoin payments if the west will sanction every country that will make transaction in Bitcoin? Keep in mind that Bitcoin Blockchain analysis is only advancing.

Sounds like... NATO. ;)

Remember those 2 trillion $$$ down the drain (https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/12/09/world/middleeast/afghanistan-war-cost.html)? ::)

They could improve the US infrastructure and US citizens' lives, but no, the war was more important...

Or maybe not:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OuOcnGAv4oo

The network is decentralized. Saying that a single entity ("the collective West") will control 90% of the hashrate is a pipe dream. ;D

Even in that case, even if Russia controlled only 10% of the hashrate, there would still be 10% chance to include their transaction in the blockchain.

Also, don't forget that Russia has vast amounts of natural gas to feed ASICs.

The West on the other hand doesn't like gas, they prefer renewable energy, which doesn't offer 24/7/365 reliability.

Guess who's more likely to have the vast majority of the hashrate in the end? ;)

There are ways to hide traces, especially if you own miners.

This is what I understand as well. These nations want to de-dollarize themselves, I get it. But, they definitely want their fiat currency to take its place. If one of the BRICS countries had to impose the new fiat currency standard, it would probably be China, and I'm thinking they'll use everything in their disposal to accomplish it, and they won't just give up to bitcoin.

This does make some sense, but on the other hand, the overwhelming advantage of the fiat currency is to be able to rob the wealth of other countries. If you're limited to only your own country, the gains are significantly reduced.

They don't want that. Fiat as a global reserve currency is a historical anomaly. Gold had that role for thousands of years.

We're going back to the Gold Standard, only with a digital twist this time around. History will repeat itself.

Countries with big BTC reserves will claim that their CBDC is more "valuable" vs others. You've heard this here first.

Also, China is not like USA.

USA imposed the dollar not just by force/military violence, but also via entertainment/cultural warfare (Hollywood movies describing the "American dream" and even cartoons depicting greenbacks (https://victor-minca-fine-art.myshopify.com/cdn/shop/products/couting_store_ed42c082-2dae-4240-ab52-8a02f0da0857.jpg?v=1451587383) -> they try to brainwash impressionable little kids and they're pretty good at it judging by this forum)! ;)

China has nothing like that culturally (and besides that, most people don't speak Chinese), so you can forget the yuan conquering the world.

They don't need to rob anything when they have valuable resources to trade.

Russia has wheat/oil/gas.

China has electronics and in-house microchips (https://asiatimes.com/2024/04/china-to-make-5nm-chips-with-saqp-process/) (not as advanced as TSMC's so far, but you can imagine what will happen after Taiwan's invasion -> they just want to reverse-engineer ASML's EUV machines).

Imagine if the collective West sanctions/bans Made in China electronics... imagine an nVidia GPU skyrocketing from $500 to $10000 in a single day due to scarcity! :o

People will remember the 2013/2017/2021 GPU mining craze as something insignificant compared to what's coming next. ;D

I definitely expect the West to shoot themselves in the foot once again -> hyperinflation kicking in -> no more fiat/cash -> welcome CBDC.

I wonder how this ends.

Could it lead to Europe or The United States obliging all local Miners to block Transactions coming from the known Russian Addresses?  Or will they let Bitcoin be, which I really doubt?

This could in turn cause Russia to strongly invest in Mining so that they do not rely on foreign Miners.  But what if, in turn, Europe considers a Bitcoin ban due to avoidance of sanctions?

Remember.  We have never had such history except when we heard of North Korea using Bitcoin for multiple criminal use cases.  So this could bring a lot of new questions, potential solutions and question marks above Bitcoin to the table.

I believe it will cause a little bit of turmoil around Bitcoin now that this is official.  We all know how keen on Governments are about sanctions and they never play around with them.  Therefore, this is probably going to develop in an interesting way for us.

That would have been true if China and Russia haven't been trading using Yuan over the past couple of years.

That is one approach but you are forgetting that CBDC can also be flexible. There can be a fixed "swap" rate for different CBDCs which can be agreed upon between different nations. Then they can easily trade with each using their own CBDC.

That's not specific to Russia. With my edits in your comment, all your statements are still true! :D

After all the $12 trillion US regime wasted on wars for 20+ years, all which they lost is coming back to bite them in the behind...

love hearing this directly from Putin if they are truly into having an account here and surely , will add flavor for the bitcointalk community lol.
if the US are also  relying in Bitcoin then they will be tagged as well?
even if not , still OIL and BTC will surely soon be together .

This could very well work for them, they used to be quite anti-bitcoin, I remember times when they caused problems with users as well, so the fact that they started to like it more and more because of sanctions shows another benefit of bitcoin, to certain nations.

I believe we could make a good return from this if we could see Russia use bitcoin too much, that would require them or whoever they make a deal with to get a lot of bitcoin, in billions, which could make it so that bitcoin could grow in price thanks to this. I do not know if they started already, maybe this big increase had something to do with Russia, or maybe it was just Trump, or maybe it was pure bull run after halving that we always have.

Those are all very possible reasons and I believe that we are going to end up with some good changes, it is going to end up with something that will take some time, so we need to consider how things could change, we are going to end up with something profiting for us, and that's all that matters.

Bitcoin can be used without any restrictions or censorship - this only proves that.

With Russia in the line to allow this, I am sure other countries will follow suit and the USA might be willing to lead the revolution. If that happens almost every country out there will be allowing bitcoin and it will become mainstream.

However when Russia invaded Ukraine, a lot of problems happened with credit cards and international students were using bitcoin through Tinkoff Bank to pay their expenses from money sent from their homeland.

It seems bitcoin is actually solving a lot of problems like this.

Maybe you should come out of your cave and look at the world around you? This nonsense that the EU will freeze without Russian gas and oil is total nonsense - because the EU has already found alternative sources that cover its needs, and the little that still flows through the pipes will be stopped in a few days - at least as far as transport through Ukraine is concerned.

The EU is not dependent on anything coming from Russia, neither will people freeze nor die of hunger - stop writing nonsense and embarrassing yourself...

Read, learn something ->

Deutsche Welle is the German press.
Russia's ‘shadow fleet’: how it was created and why it is still invulnerable
https://www.dw.com/ru/tenevoj-flot-rf-kak-on-byl-sozdan-i-pocemu-poka-neuazvim/a-71108648

This article is in Russian, but you can find primary sources in English and see how sanctions work in practice.
No one will be cold, there is no need to confuse war and trade, wars start and end, but trade is eternal.

_____
In Russia, cryptocurrencies are very often used in business, although this is prohibited by law. At the largest wholesale bases in Russia, cryptocurrencies are much more popular than cash.
Who believes that sanctions work, let him come to Moscow. He will see there the latest models of expensive cars, the latest medical equipment in private clinics and everything else. Everything has become more expensive, but rich people don't care.

Maybe you should learn that as soon as EU abandoned cheap Russian gas and started importing expensive American LNG, prices/inflation started soaring... and people cry all the time (even on this forum!) that their wages are not enough to keep up with expenses.

Have fun getting poorer... and don't be angry when someone tells you the cold harsh truth, internet stranger.

This is a very good new for bitcoin community and this is a practical example for people to see when we talk about the freedom bitcoin gives. This is a situation whereby people can have a good understanding of bitcoin and the good quality it has over fiat. Russia accepting bitcoin foreign trade is a good awareness for the adoption of bitcoin and because of this people will show interest to know bitcoin more.

I remember that this year, Russia started using cryptocurrency as an international payment in their country https://www.aa.com.tr/en/world/russia-to-begin-using-cryptocurrencies-in-international-trade/3315551 and it was successful news all over the world actually.

And now 4 days ago they will use bitcoin as foreign trades in which I think this is very good news for all of us crypto communities around the world in this era.

My previous statement and this, your edited statement, are both true but the difference is that The United States Of America is an empire in present time.

By the way, Imperialism is very expensive, that's why the USA is in so much debt. They have NATO, fund many projects and politicians in many countries all over the world and so on. I believe that the USA made a mistake when they prioritized Hollywood and influence over masses instead of science and engineering. China prioritized science and they are developing rapidly. In the world, people don't want to study like before because if you study hard, get PhD and so on, a retard Youtuber or TikToker will earn more than you while they'll have all the fun and attention, while you'll have to work depressed.
I believe that there is still time to fix this.

They just use what they have to avoid things they want to keep avoiding.
Before the situation they've got - I don't think they would go on such steps regarding BTC and crypto.
But dire times require it.

You are telling a story that Putler and his like-minded people have been telling for years - and yet no one in the EU has frozen or died of hunger because there is no trade with Russia. Besides, what is the inflation rate in the EU compared to Russia - and what are the interest rates?

It is true that people are fleeing from your beloved Russia because the annual inflation rate is around 10% and interest rates are around 30%, and people are being sent to the front to be cannon fodder. People in the EU live quite well, if it weren't so, millions of people wouldn't want to come and live here.

For your information, I am much richer than I was 5 years ago and I lack nothing.

You sound like the stereotypical Current Thing NPC:

https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/002/328/011/419

Zero critical thought, always jumping on the bandwagon. I think Bitcoiners should do better than that.

Speaking of Russian foreign trades and energy, Trump recently threatened Europeans that if they don't buy the super expensive US oil and gas he'll tariff the hell out of them. That reminded me of the famous saying that "It may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be America's friend is fatal."

Europe now has two choices, either continue buying super expensive energy and continue deindustrializing or refuse making a stupid move and face tariffs and continue deindustrializing in another way (as they lose markets).
Looks like their third option is either to buy Russian energy (using Ruble by the way not bitcoin) or hope that their terrorist proxies in West Asia can provide them with ultra cheap energy (like 10 bucks a barrel for Syrian oil). Neither of which are working yet... Oh and Qatar just threatened to cut their gas off too...

Not gonna lie but Crypto especially the bitcoin is borderless as long there is electricity and the internet you can deploy the node and start do the transaction and no one can banned you unles you deposited into third party.
That is why there is always a news about north korea crypto hack I believe country that banned using swift is using crypto as their payment method.

LOL, I want to do a similar graphic that depicts Bitcoiners caring about absolutely nothing else on the planet except... Bitcoin going up in price.

As I implied in another thread, the Bitcoin universe could be made to do absolutely anything as long as the price went up. If Trump announced tomorrow that the US was going to seize the bitcoin code base and the miners and basically own the bitcoin network for now on, the only thing people would care about is if it made the price BTC go up, which it would, so all of the supposed libertarians would have sold out everything the pretended to believe in for a 20% price bump in their holdings.

Putin's Russia is a brutal, murderous regime that has slaughtered countless innocents for absolutely no reason but plunder. Putin himself came to power by murdering women and children of his own country. He clearly has designs on subjugating the rest of Europe under the totalitarian rule he enjoys in his own country--a totalitarian state where things like Bitcoin are laughable.

But you guys don't care about any of this because Putin might make the price of Bitcoin go up a little.

So basically you are willing to trade all of your political freedoms and the lives of millions for... Bitcoin going up in price a little bit.

Y'all are cheap dates. :)

Russia isn’t likely to do that because their transaction volumes are massive, making it easy to track. I think they’re still using exchanges, but probably those with less oversight, so they can convert Bitcoin to fiat more easily.

There are plenty of exchanges worldwide with high trading volumes, and US sanctions only apply to certain regions. Since exchanges operate globally, it’s tough for the US to fully enforce sanctions on Russia's use of Bitcoin. It’s a challenge to control something as decentralized and widespread as cryptocurrency.

Source?

If hating Putin made the price of Bitcoin go up then you would hate Putin.

That's not a source and don't try to deflect like a weasel.

Give me a source that backs up your outrageous claims.

The new president of the United States is accepting Bitcoin, while Russia has been kept away from the conventional banking system. That is, everyone needs Bitcoin. Considering the current situation in Russia, if they can transact in Bitcoin, they will benefit even more. If Russia starts transacting in Bitcoin, they will definitely be more interested in reserving Bitcoin. Because the more Bitcoin's acceptability increases, the more it will be bullish.

Powerful countries will try their best to reserve Bitcoin as a weapon of financial warfare. Russia is a powerful country, they must have taken the decision after analyzing it. Bitcoin can be one of the means of business transactions instead of the dollar. In that case, everyone will welcome such a decision by Russia.

I think since Donald Trump won the US election, the price of Bitcoin has increased significantly and the acceptance of Bitcoin is also increasing day by day. Currently Russia is also preparing to use Bitcoin. Today, Hong Kong is preparing to include Bitcoin in their national reserve. 2024 is a very positive year. This year, the price of Bitcoin touched $100,000, and the Bitcoin halving also took place.

https://www.talkimg.com/images/2024/12/30/DqGmN.jpeg
https://x.com/BitcoinNewsCom/status/1873769131016855598?t=yIw28WmDWyKmMu5txfpdAQ&s=19

I think it's fair to say that you missed the point of what I was trying to say. I suspect, however, that it's a point you wouldn't want to acknowledge no matter what I did to clarify, so I think we'll just leave it at that for now.

That's all what they can do for now when the US' sanctions are too tough and pressing their economy badly. But I think there's a point in the past that they don't even believe about Bitcoin and even banned it.

I think with the new administration of US coming, these sanctions will be minimized if not removed at all. Trump and Putin are known to each other so as Xi, so this will change the game later on.

But for the meantime, there's still less than a month until Trump assumes office so, I hope that Russia will continue to stand with their use of Bitcoin since there are also a lot of forum members from there.

If sanctions are lifted and Russia is allowed to return to normal financial relations with the rest of the world then... they will have absolutely no reason to use Bitcoin and they will just return to using the systems they used before.

Bitcoin's original purpose--and it's only unique technological value--is evading governments. If you don't need to evade your government, then you don't need Bitcoin or blockchain in general (or rather, it becomes a "nice to have" versus a "must have").

Thank you for the acknowledgement, sir.

Merry Christmas! :)

They're already here ;)
 

I'm sure that haters like Elizabeth Warren will use this opportunity


IMO Democrats were trying to blow this out of proportion to sway votes, but obviously failed.
Who cares? They can have fun staying poor, or as Saylor says go down with the ship.


No idea. Let's wait for the strategic reserve first.
As far as Russia goes, the sanctions don't work at all and it's not because of bitcoin. I'll give you some examples:
-in the first year of war France was selling gun sights to Russia
-BMW was recently found selling new cars to Russia. Over 100 luxury models were exported.
-There's this so called Russian shadow fleet operating in the Baltic Sea that was targeted only because it cut an underwater cable.

LOL, you still don't get it, and you keep digging your hole deeper and deeper.

I agree with what you've said.

And that's where it is going if ever Trump removes or lightens the sanctions against Russia. But I think that he'll stay on the ground by saying they're still friends but the sanction remains.

With that, the sanction continues and Russia will continue to add more demand in the usage of Bitcoin.

Yes, Trump is very open to Bitcoin and hopefully he will come up with friendly policies so that Bitcoin can thrive. But Russia's use of bitcoin for international trade transactions is a temporary solution to avoid sanctions, they have no intention of abandoning the traditional banking system. This could also change in the future if sanctions are lifted or the Brics currency system is finalized.

Regarding using bitcoin as a reserve, we need to realize that everything is just an idea of ​​a few parliamentarians of some governments. There have been no concrete plans from the US, Russia, EU or most recently Hong Kong on this idea. We should not rush to confirm anything or have high expectations, only to be painfully disappointed if everything turns out to be just rumors.

For me things with Russia have no limits, the Russians know how to evade any type of prohibition, they believed that by banning visa cards, swift and whatever they want they believed they were going to make their economy decline , sometimes countries that think they have Control of the World are Going to stand out by going over their intelligence, of course they use Bitcoin ,  of course they make those who sell oil change to rubles to Continue maintaining their currency , and of Course they will continue Using btc today, tomorrow and always, as long as everyone is clear, this country together with its people will not stay in the apparatus.

Of course all parties involved in the government must turn to the idea of ​​finding other sources in the context of adequate funding as a top priority for the government, but of course it needs to be discussed further even though it is very likely that it could happen and a lot of costs must be poured out for the program to run well. From all the considerations that exist, the movement of the BTC price will always be the main discussion later.

Not with the rest of the world, with only a handful of countries in the Western bloc. Otherwise Russia has normal financial relations with the rest of the world already, they just no longer use the dollar.

Welcome to the New World Order by the way ;)

I wouldn't be so optimistic about this. Russia using BTC for payments might lead to Bitcoin being hit by a new package of US sanctions.
I know that the Trump administration claims to be pro-Bitcoin, but the entire Republican party isn't totally pro-Bitcoin, so most of the pro-crypto policies by Trump probably won't get accepted by the US Congress and Senate.
Rumors about Russia using Bitcoin have been circulating around the crypto world in the last few years, but this didn't lead to major bull runs.
Tether might be facing some troubles, if the USA decides to shut it down, because many Russians are using USDT.

National interests always come first, even if the Trump administration supports bitcoin, but if Russia uses it to circumvent US sanctions or uses it to replace the USD for the purpose of de-dollarization. The US government will not hesitate to find ways to negatively impact bitcoin and will have a negative impact on the entire market. So I'm not optimistic about this either.



The Trump administration's support for bitcoin and cryptocurrencies is a positive sign, but people forget that Trump does not have complete power to decide everything, it is Congress that decides whether policies are passed or not.


If Russia weren't sanctioned, would they be more open to bitcoin and cryptocurrencies? Cryptocurrency may be a temporary solution for them.

That's what I think too.
It's just a way to get things through the restrictions imposed on them.

They maybe will stop using it so much (after all we don't know how much they are using Bitcoin in trades), but after all at some point they will already have much of the cryptos incorporated into their state one way or another.

You can only experience such decision from leaders that are well educated, which is what Russian president just approved for investors to be using BTC in their foreign trade because depending on dollar on the time in  the foreign trade make some countries look so small to the country that owns the currency. I have confidence on this Russian president that he will do things that will make the government to recover their losses because for him to allow his minister to announce BTC for foreign trade, show that they have started making some decentralized investment that will speeding their economy to grow faster through crypto.

Even though they are not going to stay long in this BTC foreign trade for long in the country, but it will open the eyes of their citizens to know important of crypto which it will be difficult for their people to quit totally from crypto trading.

Both countries, I feel that it is impossible to have good relations anymore, especially because Russia also wants to lead the world and Putin always criticizes the dollar and even wants there to be no more US dollars for international transactions. For Russia, the best bilateral currency for transactions is bitcoin because no one can ban bitcoin. So what Russia is doing now will one day be followed by other countries in the hope of breaking the dominance of the US dollar and creating a new world order.

Yes, that's right. Bitcoin is unique and of course no one can control bitcoin because bitcoin is freedom. Even now, instead of governments wanting to control bitcoin, they are making bitcoin a strategic reserve and some countries are currently considering their own bitcoin reserves.