Bitcoin Forum

http://panampost.com/belen-marty/2014/07/23/top-down-digital-currency-coming-to-ecuador-with-competition-banned/

I hope some Ecuadorean member can give more informations because this sounds too crazy to be true :)

It sounds crazy in a nightmarish sort of way, and yes, it is true. Just another way for the ruling elite to keep their citizens from every making any money. They will prop up their Central Banks digital currency, which will most certainly be a centralized solution and hacked many times. Then, a couple years from now when all of their elite class has a firm position on bitcoin, they will "allow" their citizens to finally start using bitcoin. We've seen this pattern at every bank and in every stock market ever. The poor are always encouraged to continue being poor.

Well this certainly sets a precedent.  A central bank issuing it's very own digital currency and simultaneously denying it's citizen's from using alternative blockchains.  lmao.

"The Bitcoin Community of Ecuador sent a statement of concern to the Assembly. They want representatives to take into consideration the proposed legislation’s threat to the privacy of Ecuadorians and to their freedom to use decentralized cryptocurrencies, such as bitcoin and litecoin."

i dont think that their crappy coin will win over BTC and LTC  :D

So they are launching their own altcoin now? Any more details about it? Will it have a blockchain? Or will it be like Canada's failed MintChip experiment? Seems interesting although it's sad that they're abusing their power to stamp out decentralized rivals such as Bitcoin.

I'm from Ecuador.

The government is not creating its own alt coin.

This so-called "digital currency" is a digital representation of the U.S Dollar (our national currency since 2000).
There's a project to handle the US dollar from the cell phone, via SMS.

This has some of the benefits of crypto-currencies, but it is absolutely centralized and it is the dollar, not another currency.
Anyone will be able to go to a bank an claim a dollar bill in exchange for one virtual currency.

The text of the law states that only the U.S. dollar can be used in Ecuador. But it's not very clear how that will be enforced.
So I'm still waiting for more information to know whether or not Bitcoin and other crypto currencies will be prohibited in practice.

Thanks, now it makes more sense

That makes more sense. I did not know Ecuador used USD as official currency. Maybe USA should adapt Ecudorian currency in turn? :-)

I just wanna know if it will be GPU mine able :p

Some socialists they are.


Haha. So they do this by banning a peoples' currency whilst giving all the power back to the banks? What a joke.

Now on coindesk :

http://www.coindesk.com/ecuador-bans-bitcoin-legislative-vote/

So how much different this USD centralized virtual currency will be from credit cards ???

So thats the first and only country which banned btc. It will be interesting to see what will happen there.

their own digial currency is doomed anyway.

That's going to be absolutely funny to watch, they won't be able to enforce it, Bitcoin was made open source precisely because of stuff like this, this thing is going to get completely destroyed by hackers :D

I thought Iceland was the first country to actually attempt to ban BTC....?

Any government that creates it's own cryptocurrency is only making it easier to move currency into bitcoin. This will backfire for them. /popcorn

Hopefully they "steal" the insecure centralized currency, but also hack the identities of those who own it, then pay them back. Of course it still might trigger a bank run, so they'll need to convert it all into physical USD and BTC before that happens.

okay, you are right  :)

they should also ban the internet by the way...would be usefull if they want to ban btc

yeah, makes sense. viva la ecuador!

Except the digital currency to be created is not a crypto-currency. It's somewhat similar to a digital bank account handled by the cellphone.

But the currency is still the US dollar.

I wonder if this has anything to do with the fact that Julian Assange of wikileaks fame is currently holed up the Equadorian Embassy in London.

There is only one thing that really matters here:  is this new form of USD "cash" going to be irreversible or reversible?

If reversible then is is just another form of debit card, nothing to see here.

If irreversible, now that would be fantastic!  Is would then be very easy to convert larger sums of USD to/from BTC and by banning the BTC they almost guarantee public interest in and higher prices for BTC.  It will be a thing o beauty to see a huge black market in this developed and thrive.