The Authorities Are Not Smart Enough to Do This

[Davidvictorson]

The two strategies, in my estimation, for dealing with Bitcoin are to fix fiat currency and, second, to promote an approach of ignoring Bitcoin rather than attacking it. In the first strategy, all the authorities need to do is to address the issues facing traditional fiat currencies. I bet if they can do this successfully, individuals will be less motivated to seek alternatives like investing in Bitcoin. I say this with utmost certainty because, in my country Nigeria, one of the major reasons why we are ranked among the top 10 countries in the world with the highest rate of crypto adoption is because of the instability of our national currency, high inflation rate, poor and deteriorating economic conditions, and lack of transparency in the financial systems leading to distrust in traditional financial institutions. If they can fix these shortcomings in traditional financial systems, Bitcoin will be less appealing to us. I know this is not exclusive to my country only.

In the second approach, by simply ignoring Bitcoin or avoiding direct confrontation through over-regulation or restriction of its use, Bitcoin would just remain in a corner and not emerge as a significant threat to the financial systems. For instance, the authorities in my country, through the Central Bank, placed a ban on Bitcoin transactions and ordered the banks to freeze the accounts of individuals transacting business with Bitcoin. Did this stop Bitcoin adoption and increase? No way.

But I doubt that the authorities are smart enough to do this. Please leave a comment.

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[Zaguru12]

But I doubt that the authorities are smart enough to do this. Please leave a comment.

I bet you they are definitely smart enough to think this, in fact I will say smarter but one prevents them from doing it which is greed. Do you think the government aren’t aware of the inflation problem associated with fiat currency and the problem to solve it? They do but they use this inflation to either weaken people’s business growth and to boost there’s through other means.

Another advantage bitcoin has over fiat is the freedom and privacy that comes with. This one is the most powerful thing the government or say politicians do not want its citizens to have. A free man is seen as a threat to their ambitions and with the privacy bitcoin overs they wouldn’t be Able to place surveillance on the citizens which is something they can not afford to lose

[Jawhead999]

It's not that the authorities aren't smart, but they're just don't want to completely fight it.

If Nigeria is known as one of country which has a really high Bitcoin adoption, it means many of Nigerians aren't really protect their privacy. The authorities can just caught or threat their citizens, however this will give a bad effect to them and it's not that important to seize someone who don't have a lot coins.

[Odohu]

The two strategies, in my estimation, for dealing with Bitcoin are to fix fiat currency and, second, to promote an approach of ignoring Bitcoin rather than attacking it. In the first strategy, all the authorities need to do is to address the issues facing traditional fiat currencies. I bet if they can do this successfully, individuals will be less motivated to seek alternatives like investing in Bitcoin. I say this with utmost certainty because, in my country Nigeria, one of the major reasons why we are ranked among the top 10 countries in the world with the highest rate of crypto adoption is because of the instability of our national currency, high inflation rate, poor and deteriorating economic conditions, and lack of transparency in the financial systems leading to distrust in traditional financial institutions. If they can fix these shortcomings in traditional financial systems, Bitcoin will be less appealing to us. I know this is not exclusive to my country only.

Unfortunately,  what you are suggesting is akin to the authorities handing over their power, their authorities and the very thing that enable them decide "who gets what, when and how". Imagine government allowing Bitcoin to flourish,  lifting all restrictions and limitations placed on it and allowing citizens to decide what they prefer. Do you think many will not choose Bitcoin? Do you think that their is much the authorities can do stop inflation? If there was anything to be done to stop it, some countries would have done it and inflation will not be happening across all currency. As long as they have the power to print unlimited supply of fiat currency, inflation is bound to become a recurring decimal.

The authorities thrive by the control they have over the financial system and anything that threatens that power will be resisted or at least forced to conform to their terms and conditions.

In the second approach, by simply ignoring Bitcoin or avoiding direct confrontation through over-regulation or restriction of its use, Bitcoin would just remain in a corner and not emerge as a significant threat to the financial systems. For instance, the authorities in my country, through the Central Bank, placed a ban on Bitcoin transactions and ordered the banks to freeze the accounts of individuals transacting business with Bitcoin. Did this stop Bitcoin adoption and increase? No way.

But I doubt that the authorities are smart enough to do this. Please leave a comment.

Ignoring Bitcoin is like ignoring someone who comes to take your land, resources and even your wife. How can you ignore something that you cannot ignore? There was a time my country threatened to ban Binance because they complained that the money people have in Binance was bigger than what they have in their bank accounts. People were practically saving their funds in Bitcoin and USDT rather than in the banks and this was affecting the banks in terms of lending power.

Bitcoin cannot be ignored even if they try.

[tranthidung]

The two strategies, in my estimation, for dealing with Bitcoin are to fix fiat currency and, second, to promote an approach of ignoring Bitcoin rather than attacking it. In the first strategy, all the authorities need to do is to address the issues facing traditional fiat currencies. I bet if they can do this successfully, individuals will be less motivated to seek alternatives like investing in Bitcoin

They will fail as they have already failed many centuries. It relates not only to economics but also politics and politicians prioritize their career than benefits of citizens and they have power to use central banks for it. It's naturally for politicians to use such power to print more money as temporary nurture for economy but in a long term, it is harmful. Their national fiat currencies will lose purchasing powers but politicians usually don't think longer than 4 years or 8 years.

In the second approach, by simply ignoring Bitcoin or avoiding direct confrontation through over-regulation or restriction of its use, Bitcoin would just remain in a corner and not emerge as a significant threat to the financial systems.

They can create more laws, regulations and barriers to prevent Bitcoin adoption growing more. They are more seriously to control centralized exchanges, Peer-to-Peer marketplaces and they also are trying to create a kind of competitive currency (CBDCs - Central Banks Digital Currencies) to get money flow of citizens into their controlled flow.

They will somewhat succeed with the efforts with power they have but I have rights to make my decision from many choices and I believe technology will be developed more. Governments will always go behind their citizens in technology developments.

[tabas]

That's their only way to stop people from using Bitcoin and that's through banning Bitcoin itself on their countries and giving sanctions to the citizens that will be found to be dealing with it. But that's the reality that they can't stop Bitcoin no matter how hard they try it, they can see the broken system on their financial system especially on your country where there's a massive and quick adoption rate that increases over time. Eventually, like what we're seeing for some countries that they have been vocal about Bitcoin and starts to give some hint that they're about to adopt it, maybe that will also happen there in no time.

[Woodie]

As much as we might want to blame the authorities for the poor performing economy and dwindling currency when it comes to the first strategy, I think as citizens in a privileged position that have access to all this information thanks to the internet and newspapers etc have a duty to explain some of the factors affecting a country as these are things beyond their control such as oil prices on the global  market are going up which always affects everything as when it comes to costing transport will be factored in and this in turn pushes price up and demand too pulls price!

Tbh, the real problem in all this is politicians make promises they know they cannot keep and have to say it anyway to get into office and we can not blame them because citizens never want to hear the truth, it's almost as good as trying to get a girl and you sell all these lies to her for you to win her heart , otherwise the truth would make it easy for everyone  

Btw, people are smart enough to know how to get their crypto with or without strict regulation and we have seen this happen over the years...best approach is let the element of choice exist to avoid unnecessary waste of tax payers money of taking people to court when the money can be redirected towards more pressing issues.

[hg_away]

Those who buy Bitcoin seek profits and consider it as an investment rather than peer-to-peer money or a currency in which it is necessary to have support for privacy. Therefore, you will find that many have no problem providing identity verification data, even to parties far removed from regulatory regulations, in exchange for obtaining some profits and some services. Decentralization bans users because they are from a specific country or against a specific policy, so regulating cryptocurrencies will not be difficult.

[Lucius]

The two strategies, in my estimation, for dealing with Bitcoin are to fix fiat currency and, second, to promote an approach of ignoring Bitcoin rather than attacking it. In the first strategy, all the authorities need to do is to address the issues facing traditional fiat currencies. I bet if they can do this successfully, individuals will be less motivated to seek alternatives like investing in Bitcoin.

Do you think it is even possible to fix fiat currencies in the way you imagine? If the criterion you are talking about is only a bad/weak national currency, then how do you explain all those who invest in Bitcoin in countries like the US or the EU - unless their currencies are also bad like your national currency?

The problem of your country is not actually what the majority thinks, it is the corrupt and incompetent politicians who create an atmosphere of financial instability and a bad economic environment. This leads people to look for some kind of alternative, but not in the sense that you are trying to fix the financial or political system, but that you are trying to make a financial profit for yourself by investing in Bitcoin.

In the second approach, by simply ignoring Bitcoin or avoiding direct confrontation through over-regulation or restriction of its use, Bitcoin would just remain in a corner and not emerge as a significant threat to the financial systems.
~snip~

I don't see that Bitcoin is a threat to the financial system anywhere in the world, especially not as a decentralized currency considering that most people use it exclusively as an investment to make a profit, so I wonder where the danger is for fiat and any central bank? The biggest danger for bankers and their servants (politicians) are the so-called stablecoins. If most of the powerful countries of the world were to unite in causing serious damage to Bitcoin, all they would have to do is ban all CEX and declare all transactions illegal.

While noting stablecoins are trying to fix those issues and could drive added innovation in payments, they "pose serious risks," Lagarde said. "Using stablecoins as a store of value could trigger a large shift of bank deposits to stablecoins, which may have an impact on banks' operations and the transmission of monetary policy," the ECB head added.

[GeorgeJohn]

In any way that really affected adoption of bitcoin such information came and secondly it makes people devalue bitcoin, in nigeria most of the people are very supportive in something that concerns centralization than decentralization and they have been making use of centralization system of currency before now and anything that concerns decentralization is like foreign thing that they are not aware of it, so I believe that bitcoin adoption happens base on the environment you find yourself and the kind of policy that been innate in the geographical environment. People have known bitcoin and theirs nothing you can do that will make someone who knows bitcoin very well to try to avoid bitcoin or ignore, even though the country lift a sanctions about adoption of bitcoin their is some people who will embrace bitcoin with another system of manipulation.

[Aanuoluwatofunmi]

The two strategies, in my estimation, for dealing with Bitcoin are to fix fiat currency and, second, to promote an approach of ignoring Bitcoin rather than attacking it. In the first strategy, all the authorities need to do is to address the issues facing traditional fiat currencies. I bet if they can do this successfully, individuals will be less motivated to seek alternatives like investing in Bitcoin. I say this with utmost certainty because, in my country Nigeria, one of the major reasons why we are ranked among the top 10 countries in the world with the highest rate of crypto adoption is because of the instability of our national currency, high inflation rate, poor and deteriorating economic conditions, and lack of transparency in the financial systems leading to distrust in traditional financial institutions. If they can fix these shortcomings in traditional financial systems, Bitcoin will be less appealing to us. I know this is not exclusive to my country only.

In the second approach, by simply ignoring Bitcoin or avoiding direct confrontation through over-regulation or restriction of its use, Bitcoin would just remain in a corner and not emerge as a significant threat to the financial systems. For instance, the authorities in my country, through the Central Bank, placed a ban on Bitcoin transactions and ordered the banks to freeze the accounts of individuals transacting business with Bitcoin. Did this stop Bitcoin adoption and increase? No way.

But I doubt that the authorities are smart enough to do this. Please leave a comment.

I agreed with your two approaches and deeply understand the reason why you have suggested for them, however, we should not forget some conditions also that surrounded all these together, the government has their own, the people has their own, some part of the government may actually support the use of bitcoin but couldn't come boldly to say that, secondly are the people as well, many were fast interested in bitcoin adoption while some were not and others remain indecisive about it, yet the government or it's people can't stop whatever achievement bitcoin has brought down to our table regardless of their regulations on it.

[KiaKia]

If not a matter of if, sorry I am not wishing bad for the country but since the beginning of time, this country have only enjoy improvement just once, that was when a general called Muritala took over presidency,  nothing in the history of Nigeria comes close to what this man achieved in a short period of time in power, my advice is all Nigerians should not hope and wait for some magical change to happen, fixing the country is now 100 times more harder than 20 years ago.

Since I was into crypto I have never use any centralised bank to make any payment that's related to crypto, even while the news of ban was circulating I was not worried a bit, and another thing is I don't keep money in the bank, assuming they block my bank account right now it does nothing to me, my assets are locked away in a offline cold storage anyway.

All hope is not lost for Nigeria but not until all mind becomes one there is never going to be a real change, when the poor ones start saying no to the people in power that's when things will start to take a turn, right now money still buy some people, in fact a lot of people, this is what is dragging down all sense of justice and growth in the country.

[Spaceman1000$]

The two strategies, in my estimation, for dealing with Bitcoin are to fix fiat currency and, second, to promote an approach of ignoring Bitcoin rather than attacking it. In the first strategy, all the authorities need to do is to address the issues facing traditional fiat currencies. I bet if they can do this successfully, individuals will be less motivated to seek alternatives like investing in Bitcoin. I say this with utmost certainty because, in my country Nigeria, one of the major reasons why we are ranked among the top 10 countries in the world with the highest rate of crypto adoption is because of the instability of our national currency, high inflation rate, poor and deteriorating economic conditions, and lack of transparency in the financial systems leading to distrust in traditional financial institutions. If they can fix these shortcomings in traditional financial systems, Bitcoin will be less appealing to us. I know this is not exclusive to my country only.

The first policy you're trying to talk about cannot fully have it implementation or effect because fiat does not yield interest.
But Bitcoin yield interest with time. So even if you put the economic infrastructure in place, in a bid to stabilize the country's currency, it won't still affect the adoption of bitcoin in Nigeria. For every economy in the world inflation is bound to take place, the level of impact can either be determined by the effect your government tries to put in place to control it. So whether there is inflation or not, it doesn't negate the fact that fiat has its own deficiencies which in the other hand gives Bitcoin its own advantage.

[uneng]

I think you are right. That is what they should do if they wanted Bitcoin to get less recognization by the local population, although they aren't smart enough to do that. Of course there isn't a complete fix for fiat currencies, since they operate in an inflationary model, where money is constantly printed to keep the economy under control, but in extreme cases like the one we see in Nigeria, I think it's pretty possible to make the situation much better through an economical reform or plan introduced by the government and central bank, supported and elaborated by specialists.

It has already happened in many third world countries and worked nicely, including my country, Brazil, where inflation was also out of control by the 90's decade, and got significantly better since then through the 'Plano Real' economical remodeling introduced in 1993-1994.

In every cases, I don't think you should feel so bad about it, because at least it's an opportunity for Bitcoin to shine and get more acceptance in your local community. Since it's being enough to supply the demands of your countrymen, that should be Ok!

[kryptqnick]

I'm not sure what the op means by fixing fiat, to be honest. I can see the info about Nigeria, but these issues aren't universal.
Some countries have major issues with fiat, like hyperinflation or just high inflation. But there are many examples of fiat currencies that have been doing quite well for a long time (if 0-5% of annual inflation is considered 'well' because that's the aim of many fiat currencies). Moreover, some would say that the problem of fiat is that it can be printed and destroyed at a whim of authorities. Others might add that the key issue of fiat is that it is no longer backed up by truly valuable assets. So, according to different people, fixing fiat would mean very different things.
As for ignoring Bitcoin, I think it's already pretty common, as active opposition to Bitcoin is an approach undertaken by a minority of countries. But some cannot allow themselves to ignore Bitcoin because they see it as a direct threat to their control over their population (as is the case in China).

[Hewlet]

The issue regarding the option of using either Bitcoin or fiat currency has never been a serious issue that the authorities would even bother to look for ways to diminish one using any of the approaches you just outlined. Although the authorities don't want to publicly accept the adoption of Bitcoin, I feel that both Bitcoin and fiat currency should be allowed to exist and serve their purposes. They both have advantages and disadvantages and could still be used together in society to solve their peculiar purpose.

[mindrust]

Bitcoin doesn't care either way. The authorities might ban bitcoin completely and btc will still find a way to survive. Not on a corporate level however p2p transactions can't be banned completely.  I don't agree with your other points where you think bitcoin is the solution to your country's problems. Yes printing FIAT out of thin air is a big problem but switching to bitcoin won't solve the problems automatically. People should change first. Unless people stop being greedy and stupid, bitcoin can't help countries. Building a better education system is a great start.

[Amphenomenon]

The two strategies, in my estimation, for dealing with Bitcoin are to fix fiat currency and, second, to promote an approach of ignoring Bitcoin rather than attacking it.

The fait currency can never be fixed, I don't think any currency can ever be entirely fixed and if this is done, bitcoin won't be highly affected by this but those trading currency pairs and the government and economist knows why this isn't feasible
The government can never ignore Bitcoin and even if they choose to attack it Bitcoin will continue to grow, while they  ignoring it will make its adoption faster, just like how it was when it was created in 2009, I believe they never thought it adoption rate would have grown this fast.
In as much that government are against Bitcoin is only from the fact that they want to control it because its bigger than them. Most government officials will never want to see bitcoin fall because they are also investing in bitcoin (nobody will ever turn down a sure means of making more money legitimately) and since some of them are in the position to cause FUD, they will do just that in order to make the market favour them more

[Kelward]

In the second approach, by simply ignoring Bitcoin or avoiding direct confrontation through over-regulation or restriction of its use, Bitcoin would just remain in a corner and not emerge as a significant threat to the financial systems. For instance, the authorities in my country, through the Central Bank, placed a ban on Bitcoin transactions and ordered the banks to freeze the accounts of individuals transacting business with Bitcoin. Did this stop Bitcoin adoption and increase? No way.

But I doubt that the authorities are smart enough to do this. Please leave a comment.

I really don't see how government ignoring bitcoin, in over regulating it or restricting its usage will keep it in a corner, so it won't be a threat to the financial  system. Are you saying that if everything that you mentioned are not in place then bitcoin will not have relevance in the country? Bitcoin is an alternative to fiat, and it's a matter of choice for an individual to adopt it, it is decentralized while fiat is centralized. People who seek privacy in their transactions, and wants a decentralized currency for it, will go for bitcoin, not because of it's government restrictions, but because it's an, asset that serves their purpose. Maybe I don't understand your topic well, because I don't see how the authorities not being smart enough to keep bitcoin in a corner will restrict it's adoption.

[stompix]

I say this with utmost certainty because, in my country Nigeria, one of the major reasons why we are ranked among the top 10 countries in the world with the highest rate of crypto adoption .

hmmm

with 47 percent of the population owning or using digital currencies.

Let me call this bs, elephant shit, dinosaur shit!
You're telling me 110 millions people are holding and using crypto with about 3-4 million tx on the most used chains each day worldwide, and despite that they rank 10? Common! There are 40 million addresses with a balance worth more than 1$ on the whole Bitcoin chain and we're talking about 110 millions crypto users in one country?

For instance, the authorities in my country, through the Central Bank, placed a ban on Bitcoin transactions  and ordered the banks to freeze the accounts of individuals transacting business with Bitcoin. Did this stop Bitcoin adoption and increase? No way.

They don't care to enforce this!

Imagine NK would have the same problem with crypto, a few thousands shot live on the 8pm news, their bodies paraded though the streets with loudspeakers announcing the enemies of the nations and then for month every single citizen called to the police station to tell if he owns or not coins, do you think you would still deal with cryptos? No you won't!

It's just about their willing to do so, if they would want to it's pretty simple to make an account on Binance, trade with all users that posts sell or buy orders then simply arrest them based on their payment details and after 48 hours of waterboarding they will cough up every single of their clients. Then pick those guys up and start again with the waterboarding, see how simple that is? Besides, when you think that authorities can;t get you, remember Tor was developed by a government agency, SHA-2 was developed by the NSA, do you really think everyone there is just some old fart in their 90's who doesn't know how to use a smartphone?  Ross, Silkroad, Alphabay, even CM would have something to say about hard hard it's to track somebody!

As for fixing fiat, why do you need to fix it?
You say 47% of the country is owning and using crypto, so with half of the economy running on Bitcoin you should be the world leading economic growth pylon, right? Oh, wait!