Talks of soft crypto regulations

[Flyingjack123]

Recent statement by a British MP Matt Hancock  wherein says we need liberal regulations for bitcoin.
He said  
"The underlying technology is so powerful … Just because the dot-com bubble crashed in 2001, we didn’t discredit the internet as a technology"
" No country can stop this revolution. We can only choose whether it happens on our shores or happens to us from elsewhere"
Though we all know crypto is here to stay and bitcoin will surely rebound.
I was wondering if these soft regulations will keep the crypto decentralised.
His interview can be accessed in the link below.

https://news.bitcoin.com/british-mp-calls-for-liberal-crypto-regulation-no-country-can-stop-this-revolution/

[Oshosondy]

Altcoins are not bitcoin, according to the title of the article, it is talking about cryptocurrencies, not only bitcoin. Bitcoin is different and should be treated seperate. What should be regulated are ICOs, IEOs, IDOs, DeFi, NFTs, Metaverse cryptocurrencies and other new scam projects that will eventually be invented by a centralized organizations that will call it decentralized but leading to another means scammers will earn more money from victims and the projects are centralized.

[franky1]

anyone wanting the original source of hancocks words, without having to go website to website to website trying to find it.. here it is:
its a podcast interview done on the 6th of may:
https://omny.fm/shows/the-city-view-city-ams-daily-podcast/tech-weekly-matt-hancock-on-crypto-ambitions-and-u

he surprisingly knows alot about crypto, far more than i seen any other politician show detail of.
he also talks about how some of the draconian regulations of fiat should not apply to crypto, such as how the fiat regulations force MSB(money service businesses) to go through a scholars economic exam to pass a test of compliance to regulations and finance,  things also like how fiat regulations only allow businesses/institutions of huge wealth be licenced. where by he said this stifling limitation should not be put on crypto business

[edgycorner]

Hancock's idea of 'liberal' cryptocurrency regulation is very one-sided. It could end up hurting investors more than helping the industry.  Regulation should be in place to protect investors, but he wants to prioritize the industry instead. Isn't this what happened during the dot cum bubble? Companies had too much freedom  
He's contradicting himself, with no clear vision and understanding. Expected from a politician tho. You know it's a dumb politician if his lips are moving.

[hatshepsut93]

That depends on how you look at it. Bitcoin itself is totally decentralized, but its market is mostly split between a few large exchanges, which creates certain risks. These risks don't threaten existence of Bitcoin, but they can cause certain problems. So ideally everyone would use Bitcoin in a way that is harder to regulate, to avoid government controlling certain aspects of Bitcoin.

[PX-Z]

I was wondering if these soft regulations will keep the crypto decentralised.

Impossible, no government authorities will let it happen. How can they monitor and regulate things if its decentralized.
Every regulation have this kind of pattern. Soft regulations might be a thing but it wont last soon as more incidents happen in crypto and will take to full regulations to avoid laundering as they claimed.

[Fundamentals Of]

We don't need to have soft regulations in order for cryptocurrency projects to cease from being decentralized. They are already decentralized right from the very beginning. Majority of the several thousands of cryptocurrency projects have never been decentralized. Decentralization as far as these projects are concerned is just a bait, a mere word that would help them sell their coins. They're just using it because it's the current hype.

[DapanasFruit]

I am excited to hear a politician talking that way about Bitcoin and cryptocurrency in general. The man has some good understanding of this fledging industry and how it can be a good opportunity for his country too. I am looking forward how this so-called "soft regulation" will really be materializing and how it would affect the crypto industry. As for me, there is really no stopping for many big and important countries to do some regulations on Bitcoin and other digital assets...this is not anymore a question of IF but of WHEN and HOW.

[Reid]

Hancock has been a vocal crypto advocate. He said at the London Crypto Club in April: “If we get the regulation right crypto will not only accelerate growth but make financial systems more transparent and reduce crime. We must understand and harness the potential of new technologies, not fear and avoid their disruptive power.”

I love this part of the article. He is right about it. What's more? It's not just transparency and reducing crime like corruption and money laundering, they are also lifting a weight for investors making too deep research about every cryptocurrency they will invest at. That's the hardest part of all and time consuming for every small or big investor. We want to avoid being scammed so regulation will help a lot especially for new projects that are based in their jurisdiction. They don't need to worry about Bitcoin, it's the altcoins that is being abused.

[avikz]

Regulation is inevitable! We can't stop it in any way and slowly all countries will adopt cryptocurrency. I am happy that a powerful economy like UK is recognizing the fact as a pioneer. But they also need to understand that all cryptocurrency is not same. All fund raising platforms are not same. The regulation has to be flexible in order to be favorable which can cover the wide array of the crypto market. Let's hope somethinf good will come out of this.

[FanEagle]

I would say that soft regulations are still regulations and I think we should be staying away from that for sure. I am not saying that we can't do that at all, all I am saying is that we should be careful about it. Regulations means that there will be some governmental control, which means that there will be plenty of people who will try to squeeze in some more stuff in there and it may look to be a bad thing eventually when we are done.

If done correctly, just like the article says, dotcom bubble caused a crash, but the biggest companies in the world are in the tech world nowadays, if you could do that then you could do anything you want in the future.

[Jo_Liu]

I think it necessary to have regulations! However, the regulations must not try to steal any thunder from the main body, which are Bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies themselves. Proper regulations help us to abide by rules, so we can avoid some unnecessary risk in advance. But too much regulation will definately cut the vitality of both players and market.  Therefore, proper softing regulations will definately help.

[Despairo]

I think it necessary to have regulations! However, the regulations must not try to steal any thunder from the main body, which are Bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies themselves. Proper regulations help us to abide by rules, so we can avoid some unnecessary risk in advance. But too much regulation will definately cut the vitality of both players and market.  Therefore, proper softing regulations will definately help.

There's no soft regulations, if the government start to regulate Bitcoin then you need to expect in the near future there will be a more regulations comes up and then it's no more soft regulations. The example is Binance where they let anyone to withdraw without KYC for 2BTC/day, but after SEC force them to implemented KYC on all customers, after that they're ask anyone KYC even you're not doing anything.

Bitcoin shouldn't and never need to be regulated, it's only need to be not banned and everyone have a freedom to buy or not.

[franky1]

over burdensome regulations
setting a high tier where a business needs to set aside some value of, as a claim/pot of funds to show they are able to handle large business.. before they even started running a business
by this i mean suggesting that businesses need to set aside £500k just to even start offering any amount of exchange service, even if the latter customer volume is just £1k a day, as that becomes a wall that stops certain businesses starting up.

requiring regular audits of 40+hours a time at £150 an hour puts extra costs on a service. . an easier thing would be just to email a regulator the addresses of hot/cold wallet reserves. and job done. 5 minute proof.

having to put business employees through some examination they have to pass to become "compliance officers" where this is not a free thing to train/send then to the exam. where businesses cannot even operate without a compliance officer in the building at all time(meaning multiple people on shifts of a 24/7 business)

requiring a business to grab information it does not need.
EG instead of KYC everyone. have a business that offers 3 portals of access. users that have under £1k balance use portal A that has no KYC. nor does it want to know the taint/source of funds as its not large enough to be worthy of money laundering investigations..  if they breach the threshold, then they need to upgrade to portal B or stop using the service portal A. and so on. wher portal B asks for basic KYC and portal C asks for extended KYC
the same could apply to custodial wallets. no KYC for monthly min wage income amount, requiring upgrading to higher level wallet if they want to receive/spend more per month

basically no need to KYC everyone upfront even if they are only trading sub £1k. no need to KYC-extended(require proof of income and business status/work status/proof of source of funding) for people under £20k, and so on

coinbase could have kept its coinbase vs coinbase pro separate to enable this idea so that the small holders had less friction about opening an account.
but instead coinbase has now a headache for customers trying to sign up even if they only want to trade small amounts.

[ChrisPop]

I'm quite impressed that a Conservative member of the parliament has liberal views on cryptocurrencies. This is how things should be governed all around the world.

There are times when Conservatism is good and times when Liberalism should be applied. That is why we need our political leaders to have both views in perspective.

[Desmong]

We don't need such regulation to control the entire market because it may affect the growth of the entire cryptocurrency market. And more over Bitcoin does not need any regulation but I think altcoins need proper regulation to reduce the rate of rug pulls that had been happening in the market. There are different scammers in the crypto market that are creating new projects and scamming investors running away with the funds.

[franky1]

We don't need such regulation to control the entire market because it may affect the growth of the entire cryptocurrency market. And more over Bitcoin does not need any regulation but I think altcoins need proper regulation to reduce the rate of rug pulls that had been happening in the market. There are different scammers in the crypto market that are creating new projects and scamming investors running away with the funds.

its not about regulating bitcoin on the network or node level..(EG demand devs make back doors or give government analysts github pull/commit privileges)

its about the business gateways back and forth to and from fiat. and real world stuff like mining farm electricity quotas

matt hancock thinks there needs to be some control of the entry and exits of fiat because fiat is the jurisdiction of government. as is electric
however unlike some nations that want institutional sized businesses to pay institutional sized amounts for licences, fines, compliance and auditing. he wants a simmered down version that even small businesses can handle

im sure this will stretch to centralised projects offering ICO of stable coins where they would need to be highly regulated to ensure auditing of their pegged reserves.

im sure this will stretch to mining operations not stealing more then a fair share of excess power from power companies. but instead of over stretching to just ban mining i see him just telling power companies not to give away too much to any single business operating a farm.. which can actually help decentralise mining by having lots of mini farms instead of single massive farms

[AakZaki]

some regulations that appear will certainly benefit the government, one of which is the application of taxes for cryptocurrencies. Decentralized Bitcoin cannot be fully regulated by anyone, the government can only regulate its users. Soft rules are just the initial rules that will later develop with some new rules. Nowadays even KYC for large exchanges is mandatory. If you don't apply, access will be banned.
The government is free to make any regulations, as long as it doesn't make it difficult for the people.

[Retiicle]

I think it necessary to have regulations! However, the regulations must not try to steal any thunder from the main body, which are Bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies themselves. Proper regulations help us to abide by rules, so we can avoid some unnecessary risk in advance. But too much regulation will definately cut the vitality of both players and market.  Therefore, proper softing regulations will definately help.

I totally agree with your opinion. This will also ensure that cryptocurrencies are not misused for any illegal purposes.

[RealMalatesta]

Though we all know crypto is here to stay and bitcoin will surely rebound.
I was wondering if these soft regulations will keep the crypto decentralised.

Liberal laws will not get you going with crypto. Sure the regulations would be "soft" but that would be still a risk. What we need here is not hard or soft regulations, we need understanding that crypto is a currency and should be taxed based on that. So, let’s take UK for example since that is the topic, they use Pounds as a currency right? Sterling, pound, quid, whatever you want to call it.

If one person buys euro or dollars, and then that goes up against pound, then they made a profit, right? How is that profit taxed? That is exactly how crypto should be taxed, because that is exactly what a crypto is, not like a stock, but like a foreign fiat currency.