Unlike in the western world, PBOC doesn't have the disclosure obligation. The recent event is a notification to the banks, to stop and close the trading account used by 15 named exchanges to receive deposite and send withdraw.

The notification was never meant to go to main stream media. In smaller cases too paltry for media interes, I expect, sometimes the bank account holder may simply gets confused why his account is closed, and finds no one can answer. A kind official may explain that "you know what I mean", implying there are higher orders. I'll divert the topic a minute for "you know what I mean": it is a famous quote. In a recent press conference, foreign medias are told they are forbidden to ask about Zhou Yong Kang. A journalist however asked, putting his/her news agency at risk. The spokesman said he doesn't know, and "you know what I mean" i.e. you know you are forbidden to talk about it and you know I am too.

This is to give an idea that notifications is not for the public, although PBOC may be aware that it will be on the news anyway. Notifications are not treated as secret neither, only 'internal information'. The notification was issued, according to Caixin, "around mid of March", so it has been a while. Remember that there were speculation why the supposely-fake news of China ban held down the market for longer than it should? Various speculation were there and I don't buy any of them †- seems it is because that some players in the market knows the 'notification',  people who know more than I do. I've been acepted and deleted out of some seasoned investor's QQ group for a few rounds, and no one answers me why, otherwise I might have known more info before this hard crash - did I speak in English about China too much?
† https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=524820.msg5848910#msg5848910

Caixin said they confirmed the 'notification'.‡ Du Jun (co-founder of Huobi) said that 80% of the chance the news being untrue.  Caixin is a reputable financial media in China. I'll believe Caixin's report for now. In the report it mis-quotes that China makes up 60% of the BTC trade world wide, while I guess the reality is less than 40%, 15 to 25% is a reasonable guess. But Caixin's ignorance of China's trade volume doesn't mean they'd risk misreporting PBOC.
‡ http://finance.caixin.com/2014-03-27/100657253.html

So what's the impact? Price was 520USD this Chinese morning. I am surprised the price only went down by this far. In comparison, 18th Dec PBOC news press made a 35% drop and this ban is harsher than that. Perhaps the people are waiting for a formal press release from PBOC, perhaps they ain't scared enough. After 18th Dec the Chinese bag holders are all long term investors, motivated by the dream of prosperity and wealth, but any long term investors dreaming of wealth are not long term investors, i.e. they look at the reward (of their effort, belief and sacrifices), not value (of their wise choice). I expect them to dump more; too much emotion are attached to BTC investments here. There is going to be a huge transfer of digital wealth from the east to the west. Read my other post about investor sentiments:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=510829.msg5639435 (a continued inspection of China )

Chinese people have little believe that the government does anything in their interest. If, after the saga, Bitcoin rises again, Chinese players will feel that the government robbed them away the chance to be rich, once again! This is a perfect backdrop for P2P trading network, or "blackmarket" as our government would like to call it. It is a very good opportunity to develop p2p trading software that links online and offline world. PBOC did not ban Bitcoin trades, only bans Bank's involvement, 'cos banning the trade requires other government sector to work with PBOC. With bank involvement removed, this is a good opportunity to test whether Bitcoin really can replace Banks on payment processing, deposite, transfer, settlement and foreign-exchange. (It cannot replace Bank for lending, because Bitcoin is a hard limited currency, not suitable for usury, but that need is secondary.)


On a interesting side note, Bitfinex, an exchange based in Hong Kong, is not on the ban list. Does that mean PBOC have no jurisdiction over Hong Kong? Can someone knowledgable verify this? If so, we should be seeing massive move to Hong Kong soon.

Mind you the Exchange-Run (like Bank-Run) will reveal the insolvency of some Chinese exchanges, which may trigger another crash, depending on the size of the debtor.

P. S.

I'll quote myself when one of my background homework revealed to be true:

Caixin says they inquired and PBOC stafff confirmed the news:
http://finance.caixin.com/2014-03-27/100657253.html

The panic sell is going to go on, I believe many still have doubt in their little mind. Whoever didn't panic sell is going to be big losers, because they eventually will (as said, few are value-based investors).

Thank you. I certainly feel encouraged, and thus made another more-in-detail post:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=540358.new

For these bloody cheap coins nobody seems to care about the 'bloody' part and they only have 'cheap' in their eyes. But there is no better way to save Chinese players: if the USD trade doesn't buy from CNY sellers like crazy, it would be even worse off for CNY players. I know there is no way to prevent the majority selling off after a few days of doubt. Even worse, with the ban on depositing to exchanges, arbitrageurs will not be able to fill in, getting the coins off Chinese hands - this will cause a sharp price difference between USD and CNY, and the bloody coins will be lost even cheaper. So the best senario is for all the Chinese to sell off now instead of a few days later (since they willl do so anyway, now is better) and let arbitraguers ship the coins to USD buyers.

Of course $$$ price is so beauitful (520) now, or how do you guys usurp the bloody Chinese coins? Arbitrageurs are shiping the coins nights and days to keep USD price down. Just keep buying, if you drop the ball the ball is dropped forever. There will be more Chinese coins to dump. I just don't feel right that the ban only caused 15% drop in price.

When I say 'bloody Chinese coins' I mean it. Quote myself:

Indeed it is a buying opportunity. Unfortunately if all coins change hands, that justifies China government's fear of Bitcoin as a western ideology and thus is a road-block of the next 5 year's bitcoin development in the world - that is, if this government managed to exist for another 5 years.

I explained this view many times. Even the weathered players on the market are opportunists, vary on degree. Going to fall hard for days, not a splash-fall-and-back-soon. Price difference between China and Bitsamp is only 4.23% - last Government ban caused a 20% difference.

P.S. I reserved 200,000CNY for this predictable fiasco - at the time the price reach 4000, I think a Chinese ban flash-crash would reach 3300CNY so I placed bid there. It was triggered in the precursor cash (a few d ays ago when Bank of China romoured to ban), now with the real crash I wasn't prepared. Pity, because now I expect it fall below 2500CNY.

In that case, yes, BTC should be affected, but that train of thought is weakly linked IMHO. It is a supposition though.



I am speaking English as a second language. I thought peak only means the upward peak, the 'buttom peak' is perhaps called a dip?

I will join your case when you start one. I will offer all necessary information and offer transaction details to you, and my personal identity if needed - to add credibility to the complaint, provide that I know who you are as well. I hope other forum member does the same. Just state what you need me / others to do.

If they file for bankrupcy, we need a way to know it before it goes effective, to buy some time for action. Is such thing usually announced on some governmental website? We should monitor that site.

But the best option is to act now. There are no more reason to wait for myrical. I am speculating that Amir and Patrick are now too disconnected with reality to act, and they lack the nerves of steel Mark Karpeles possesses, but share the same hubris, not caring mundane reputation - so they chose not to act so far - thus we should.

You made your point really clear with picture. Here I challange it: You ascribe the 3rd March peak to BtcChina's announcing LTC. If my theory that LTC speculators are more twitchy is correct, then any sudden rise of bitcoin is going to emplify in LTC. So the LTC peak can be reasoned by the BTC peak. And why BTC peak? I don't think it is due to BtcChina announcing LTC at all. -- Unless you have another graph more detailed showing LTC peaked first - in that case I'll rethink - but I am a bad TA and doesn't know how to operate bitcoinwisdom.


I said "BtcChina just opened LTC/BTC market in this week, that doesn't normally happen in the weaknes of LTC."

I did not say "BtcChina just opened LTC/CNY market in this week, that doesn't normally happen in the weaknes of LTC."

I did not say "BtcChina just opened LTC market in this week, that doesn't normally happen in the weaknes of LTC."

I am correct to the detail:  "LTC/BTC", not "BTC/LTC". Nevertheless, LTC/BTC was paltry, so I removed the sentance after post - not that anything was incorrect.

Suppose people believe Karpeles has been runing fractional reserve, these people would think MtGox actually have caused inflation, because some of the coins Mark doesn't have are being circulated in the system. Such people should expect price boost after inflaction removed.

One possibility is: people are slowly undersanding what MtGox fiasco means. I don't think so, but I am short of sound reasons.


I learned things inbitcoin world happens faster than you can prepare. I would still think 2014 is a good year.

The value of a LTC fell from 19th's 0.032BTC to today's 0.0275BTC. So let's say people lose faith in LTC RELATIVE TO BTC. That means wealth is being transfered from LTC to BTC or from LTC to fiat, and NOT evincing BTC-to-fiat transfer. I should see BTC price be boosted instead!

In fact, I think LTC simply amplifies the volatility of Bitcoin. Bitcoin investors are weathered, LTC investors are twitchy, thus whenever BTC falls you should see LTC falls even harder. When Bitcoin price drops to unexpected low and you didn't reserve cash to catch the bottom, simply convert you bitcoins to LTC, and conver them back later.

That still doesn't explain why the recnet downward trend happens in late March, not early March.

Do you think the majority takes a full month to chow the MtGox fiasco and decided to quit now? This timing makes little sense to me.

You said miners caused it. If after MtGox everybody are holding or buyers/sellers reaches an equilibirum, and miners are causing disturbance, then the support should be the cost of power, because miners who are holding tends to refuse to recognize the lose. According to seriouscoin's recent post: "Buying a mining gear at current exchange rate, you will have very little chance to BREAK EVEN". So I doubt miners are asserting downward pressure. Besides, this "miners did it" execuse can be used any time to reason a fall, it is just too convenient to be true.


Why the correciton doesn't dub with the MtGox fall, late Feb and early March? It should, IMHO. I consider that if a correction has to happen, it tends to do so at the bad news, and MtGox is a very bad one.

22th March (today), People's Bank of China announces that they did not announce a ban on Bitcoin, disprooving previous rumor, but, notice this: price did not rebounce following this announcement. If you ask me, I'd say market sentiment plays a more important role.

Thanks! I'll combine with the other suggestion "liquidity" for naming.


I said in the first post "'the other 400 are retained for other purposes." Buziss' reply assumed the other purpose being long term holding. For the real long term investment I have a seperate wallet already. The "'the other 400 are retained for other purposes" expands to  "the other 400 are retained on the trading account for other trading techniques that are not classifiied as day-trading, more specific, for the purpose of lending to other day-traders for their margin trades." So Buziss misread me in the first place. Nonetheless I learned the lesson: I'll not give chance to this kind of miscommunication again.

But consider we are in the newbie forum, I'll not marginalize the exchange risk one is exposed to. Read my other post: "a continued inspection of China"

1. You can file it to London police like me and some others did. I believe repeated filing calls attention.
The procedure is here:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=414764.msg5539367#msg5539367

When asked about the lose in Pound Sterling, scine 100% of my lose are asset (not cash), I filled in my total lose converted to Pound Sterling in market price.

The police has obligation to protect people's asset, be it cash or other valuable asset that has a price tag on it (bitcoin). I watched the latest youtube video of the deceased Autumn Redtke, a U.S. entrepreneur, who says virtual goods, including armor and weapons you obtained in computer games, are lawfully recognized as such asset - perhaps in U.S.. So bitcoin is 10 times more valid and more liquid than that. We are doing nothing illegal and we lost asset to other illegal practise, the common sense is that police has no reason to turn us down.

2. Consult a laywer (especially U.K. laywer or a country with a law system inherited from U.K.) or anyone knowledgeable about possible next-actions (and share with others here).

3. Visit other governmental websites, obtain the how-to knowlege of how this cases are commonly dealt. e.g House of Company and publish your learning.

4. Not accepting the lose and moan over it unless you learned how the system works. Be pro-active.

5. If we have to accept the lose, make sure the relative names are properly tainted in public so that less people fall  again. e.g. if an adult  is a fraud, addressing him so is not slandering but a social service.

That's my understanding.

A huge percentage of bitcoin trading nowadays are carried by bots, and 90% of them operates day trading (open closing position within a day), using various techniques like scalping, ga, mta etc. You need a stronger reason than "you gonna lose all" to convince all bots to quite the network. For your information I am posting in order to name a risck-control co-routine to manage reserve fund in the bot.

The lesson I learned is 1. to not ask in newbie section even for naming question, because a newbie context is assumed here. Newbie is a word to describe original posters, not to describe posters' questions. 2. use the word "high-frequency-trading" in the future, to replace 'day trading'. The word 'day trading' I picked up from wikipedia (I'm EFL speaker) to describe shorter-than-a-day position, not awaring it was colored so badly.

If you've written algrithm trade bot like I did, you know day trading (closing position within a day, often by a bot, not "a human sitting in front of computer the whole day and sleep badly" - I explained in the OP) needs a lot of money and takes the risk of exchange failure, because you can scalp about. 0.1% profit each hand (in a few seconds of window). I asked in newbie section because I think wording question is too naïve for bot authors who perhaps had been trading before bitcoin was born. Nonetheless I ended up using the word 'commitment'.

I have been transparent about my progress. I had hoped others reveal their progress too, and assumed the silence as there be no real progress (reasonable). Talking about transparency and cooperation, in fact, I find it is difficult to get trusted to report case for other customers altogether. My first attempt was to file it in Poland (physically, not online): 5 people are contacted and I failed to get any one on my boat in time. So this time when I file it in London (ActionFraud) I instead decided that it is better for everybody to file for themselves.

Did you file a case in ActionFraud mentioned above? I think filing it on everyone's own  filing on the same website has the additional benifit of calling attention, since they implied they have a big pool of reports and they can only procees a few of the fraud report (hustlers should be happy to read this information: the police are busy working on something else).

I have not yet given up on legal action. I am afraid I am not the best person to start: as I explained before, I never lived in the first world, there are too many things totally new to me, and I am rather far away (China). But I am ready to jump on other's boat: I would like to share cost with others if someone can start the process, find an agent to talk about the issue, figure out to do list and proceed on actions.

I am not a law man. It is of my common sense that law has more means to do justice than taking away 2 pounds to the crown.

Hi. Looking for a word to address the money reserved for day trading. This is about 100BTC when the whole amount left on the exchange account is about 500BTC, 'cos the other 400 are retained for other purposes. when I say day trading I mean it in finance sense, that is the position opened with this money is closed within a day.

A lazy way is to call it "pool-for-day-trading" or 'fund-reserved-for-scalping'. But there is perhaps a professional name?

Or please just tell me a general word for 'fund reserved for a certain trading purpose'.

is US dollars. ("Focus on what the majority uses instead.")

Seriously, as a desktop OS, 1.5% desktop computer users uses Ubuntu. A bitcoin would worth 20,000USD if only 12 million people (0.25% of world) uses it - bitcoin is far less popular than Ubuntu.