Bitcoin and the State

[cryptme]

Hi everybody,
Bitcoin has some marketcap, but if it gains traction it will compete with the all-powerful state with it's fiat currency?
If countries (usa, canada,) and group of countries (EU) ban the usage of BTC, what will be the effect in price?
Thanks!

[yayayo]

Of course Bitcoin is a threat for fiat currencies, because it is a much better form of money. It is also probable that governments will try to destroy it, because it bereaves them from their power that stems from the fiat system. The question is, if governments will outright ban Bitcoin, or try to go a different route. Currently there are multiple initiatives to establish central bank-controlled altcoins as competitors of Bitcoin to suck off the potential user base. However these will likely fail.

A ban of Bitcoin is only partially enforceable, because full enforcement would require governments to control the decentralized network which is extremely difficult to accomplish. What they can relatively easily prevent is the conversion of Bitcoin to fiat currency. But in a native Bitcoin economy with direct BTC payments without intermediary fiat conversion this will not have a strong negative impact for Bitcoin.

In my opinion, the attempt to ban Bitcoin in the way described (fiat conversion), will lead to a significant drop in fiat price for sure. But I think the effect will be short-lived. In fact a ban might make Bitcoin appear even more attractive and trade could move and prosper in black/gray markets. It could even lead to accelerated capital flight away from fiat currencies.

ya.ya.yo!

[rapazev]

Hi everybody,
Bitcoin has some marketcap, but if it gains traction it will compete with the all-powerful state with it's fiat currency?
If countries (usa, canada,) and group of countries (EU) ban the usage of BTC, what will be the effect in price?
Thanks!

probably none... the users right dont care about the state. So, if the countries decide to adopt bitcoin we will see a big pump, if dont.. well, it will stay as it is today.

[franky1]

this has been answered many times.
summary
countries have laws (minimum wage, tax, court fines, licences, mortgages, debt) that keep fiat LEGALLY binding to have usefulness in a country.

you can happily work from home in america working for a european company who pays you in euros which you then spend on european retailers websites. but you still end up having to convert some euros to dollars to pay taxes. which in short means that they still get their taxes.
EG america does not care about its residents using the euro because of the LAWS that keep dollars in default usage in america.
even if everyone in america started trading euros, those euros need to be converted to dollars to pay taxes, court fines and licences.
so most countries do not care because they will still receive fiat tax, even if people are personally using something else.

but lets say they did try..
governments prohibiting alcohol last century didnt stop the moonshine and private drinking clubs business
governments prohibiting drugs hasnt stopped anything
governments prohibiting guns in schools hasnt stopped anything.

they can try, but i dont presume they want to stop bitcoin out of feat of fiat value dropping*.. but even if they did prohibit it. people will still use bitcoin. and the price (just like moonshine, guns and drugs) will just go up the more its prohibited, due to peoples perceptions of how much supply is being restricted.

*because due to government debt, governments love fiat losing value because they can pay off fixed debt amounts faster. its why they went for a inflationary model in the first place. (research Zimbabwe dropping from 147% GDP debt to 75% GDP debt in one year2008-2009 thanks to the drop in "value" of their currency to make debt repayments easier)

[mobnepal]

As bitcoin can't be banned completely by any government or states in sense that they can't stop people from transacting bitcoin from one user to another but they can banned the bitcoin exchanging services as well as in some extend limit the withdraw amount that can be withdrawn using bitcoin debit cards from the ATM. However i don't think they are thinking about banning bitcoin rather than they are trying to capitalize on bitcoin price manipulation.

[jak3]

op's statement clearly says one thing that is bitcoin will loose a huge price and fall suddently but there are two things which will never stop one is compition between opponents and developing yourself more and more because many is always a social animal and it have always a demand which is increased by time

[Kprawn]

Once Bitcoin is banned, it would attract a lot more attention from Anti-government groups. A ban just makes it the forbidden fruit, and you

know how this draw people in... Example : Smoking & Drinking & Sex for under age kids. Most kids just smoke, because it's the forbidden

fruit, not just because it is addictive. Bitcoin will go under ground and people would trade person to person, or they will collect it, cross

the border into a country where it is not banned, and spend like crazy. { Bitcoin Holiday }   

[thejaytiesto]

Governments can't ban bitcoin, an example of government trying to ban bitcoin is Russia. Russian government has been trying to ban bitcoin for ages and trying to make people scared of using bitcoin, but if you look at the localbitcoins marketcap from the rubble to btc volume you will see that the btc volume to rubble has indeed increased in the last years, this proves scaremongering from the government doesn't work.

[Velkro]

Hi everybody,
Bitcoin has some marketcap, but if it gains traction it will compete with the all-powerful state with it's fiat currency?
If countries (usa, canada,) and group of countries (EU) ban the usage of BTC, what will be the effect in price?
Thanks!

Price will be affected, but there are like 230 other countries without usa, canada and couple EU countries.
Bitcoin can't be banned, because even if banned people in these countries can still use it.

[vero]

from the beginning of bitcoin out to the public the government has banned bitcoin by giving a warning a very dangerous that the investment in  bitcoin could suffer losses and also media reports bad news all related to bitcoin but bitcoin it grew rapidly even in the countries that prohibit bitcoin in hard way.

[1Referee]

We should be happy with how Bitcoin is right now. If Bitcoin grows too large, then governments will more and more (which they already do) see Bitcoin as a threat to every aspect of their economy. That's when governments will come up with all kinds of ridiculous policies in an attempt to push Bitcoin back to it's smaller form, or perhaps (in their mind) for ever. If countries will put up a ban, then it will definitely affect the price, but people will continue to use it no matter what.

[posternat]

I posted somewhere else here on the forum a while back that BoA did something in a small area of their customer base that they now deny.  They forced verification on what they called "sin" purchases in 24 hour period that were above a set amount.  So, in other words, if you bought too much beer in a 24 hour period, you got declined and had to hit a link in an email to authorize further purchases. 
Same can be the case with bitcoin

[dc1a0]

Hi everybody,
Bitcoin has some marketcap, but if it gains traction it will compete with the all-powerful state with it's fiat currency?
If countries (usa, canada,) and group of countries (EU) ban the usage of BTC, what will be the effect in price?
Thanks!

They can TRY to ban the usage of BTC, but as has been mentioned before it will work as well as efforts like prohibition, the war on drugs, and the attempted ban on e-cigarettes did. There are just too many people that like me have realized that the state is just organized crime with enough force to call itself legitimate. The state can go fuck itself as far as I personally am concerned.

[MingLee]

Hi everybody,
Bitcoin has some marketcap, but if it gains traction it will compete with the all-powerful state with it's fiat currency?
If countries (usa, canada,) and group of countries (EU) ban the usage of BTC, what will be the effect in price?
Thanks!

It would (and already does compete to an extent) compete with fiat currencies in a pretty big manner, and if groups of countries started to ban it chances are the value would go down due to people exiting the currency, however there would likely still be some sort of underground economies in the countries still using Bitcoin, in one way or another.

[Leonard2016]

Hi everybody,
Bitcoin has some marketcap, but if it gains traction it will compete with the all-powerful state with it's fiat currency?
If countries (usa, canada,) and group of countries (EU) ban the usage of BTC, what will be the effect in price?
Thanks!

even if they start banning bitcoin we are going to still be using it and nobody can stop us. and the price can even go higher because it is the forbidden fruit effect on bitcoin.
besides let us ban it the rest of the world will enjoy bitcoin more.

[prabowo96]

a country will never use bitcoin...
maybe a country can create their own coin to have control on people

[iv4n]

a country will never use bitcoin...
maybe a country can create their own coin to have control on people

I have similar opinion, there is higher possibility that countries will create their own coin then chances for some country to adopt it. But that is for strong countries, small ones will need to adopt bitcoin or to follow some bigger country.
On other hand when I see what New York did, and situation in states, Japan is very open toward bitcoin also, how many stores Brazil have that accept bitcoin? That tells me that there is a chance for btc to be adopted in all world one day.

[Yakamoto]

Hi everybody,
Bitcoin has some marketcap, but if it gains traction it will compete with the all-powerful state with it's fiat currency?
If countries (usa, canada,) and group of countries (EU) ban the usage of BTC, what will be the effect in price?
Thanks!

They can ban it, the value can go down, and regardless of what they want to come out of this they would likely still end up not really achieving their desired result and would likely just end up creating an underground economy. Nothing like this ever works out how they want it to.

[Skarner21]

a country will never use bitcoin...
maybe a country can create their own coin to have control on people

I have similar opinion, there is higher possibility that countries will create their own coin then chances for some country to adopt it. But that is for strong countries, small ones will need to adopt bitcoin or to follow some bigger country.
On other hand when I see what New York did, and situation in states, Japan is very open toward bitcoin also, how many stores Brazil have that accept bitcoin? That tells me that there is a chance for btc to be adopted in all world one day.

I heard that 150 stores in brazil has accepting bitcoin as payment.. but its not the case that there is a country that can make a coin for bitcoin to use locally we have already traditional coin we are using so its impossible.

[shinratensei_]

Hi everybody,
Bitcoin has some marketcap, but if it gains traction it will compete with the all-powerful state with it's fiat currency?
If countries (usa, canada,) and group of countries (EU) ban the usage of BTC, what will be the effect in price?
Thanks!

But that's just your imagine and i think not a real fact. that is just useless decission for the state caused by everyone will always trying all of the way for using bitcoin because they're already feel convenient with it, and just the people brain can controlling the body and not for the state.