Over-the-counter market for cryptocurrency grows after authorities close exchanges. Chinese investors are still trading bitcoin and buying initial coin offerings, suggesting authorities in Beijing are struggling to clamp down on cryptocurrencies just weeks after announcing that public exchanges would be shut down. Observers feared the closure of Chinese exchanges would lead to a sharp drop in demand for bitcoin, given China has been a key source of demand. Instead, more of the buying and selling of cryptocurrencies has gravitated towards the private over-the-counter market. Bitcoin, the best known cryptocurrency, has set a series of records in recent weeks. At the same time, the renminbi share of OTC bitcoin trading has risen from about 5 per cent at the beginning of September, before exchanges were shut, to about 20 per cent a month later, according to data cited in a report by the National Committee of Experts on Internet Financial Security, a government-backed research group.
This is showing us and the government of China of how Bitcoin can really be unstoppable and the only way to stop it is to ban the whole of the internet and ordering people not to use any of their gadgets in connecting to the web. Now, that's a tall order and even the Chinese government knows that in our modern setting they could not do it anymore. Total control of the way people think and decide is not anymore existing in this century where instant communication is the in thing and people are already empowered by information available anywhere. This can be one of the many reasons why the government is now contemplating of opening up Bitcoin trading again since they are actually losing an opportunity to impose tax on transactions.
Now, am thinking: In this kind of scenario if ever the government would push with their long-help plan of having its own version of cryptocurrency the coin can just be another boring coin lacking the excitement and interest which Bitcoin has generated...they might learn the fact that nobody can ever copy the success of Bitcoin not even a state-sponsored, promoted and controlled cryptocurrency.
Honestly speaking, it is all about that opportunity to make more money and so far it is Bitcoin that is giving that kind of hope for many people to invest and then share of the profits later. This is one of the basic human traits and if you control that people would realize that you are not on their side. The China government should be listening more to the people who are into Bitcoin and not just concentrate on their own outdated ideas and opinions.