Bitcoin Cryptocurrency: China Declares Crypto Businesses Illegal
Bitcoin Cryptocurrency: Today’s London session has not been too friendly with Bitcoin as the flagship cryptocurrency is currently trading below the $42,000 trading mark, just after the price traded at $45,000 yesterday.
This new bearish move is a result of an announcement from China’s central banking, the People’s Bank of China (PBoC), declaring cryptocurrency-related businesses illegal.
Today, China strengthened its anti-crypto stance and as a result, the gains Bitcoin made in the last two days have been completely erased. The People’s Bank of China (PBOC) stated that Bitcoin, Ether and stablecoin Tether (USDT) do not qualify as legal tender and cannot be used in the country’s currency market.
The announcement stated, “Virtual currencies such as Bitcoin, Ether, and Tether have the main characteristics of being issued by non-monetary authorities, using encryption technology and distributed accounts or similar technologies, and exist in digital form. They are not legal and should not and cannot be used as currency in the market.”
10 Chinese state authorities, including the PBoC, the Cyberspace Administration of China and the Ministry of Public Security, have established a “coordination mechanism” to prevent financial players from participating in any cryptocurrency transactions. According to the announcement, the authorities and institutions involved in this crackdown have completed significant improvements to cryptocurrency monitoring platforms to identify illegal cryptocurrency transactions efficiently.
The announcement further stated, “Virtual currency-related business activities are illegal financial activities. Carrying out legal currency and virtual currency exchange business, exchange business between virtual currencies, buying and selling virtual currencies as a central counterparty, providing information intermediary and pricing services for virtual currency transactions, token issuance financing, virtual currency derivatives transactions and other virtual currency-related Business activities suspected of illegal sale of tokens and tickets, unauthorized public issuance of securities, illegal operation of futures business, illegal fund-raising and other illegal financial activities are strictly prohibited and resolutely banned in accordance with the law.”
The announcement also mentioned that the use of cryptocurrencies has been criminalized and there shall be sanctions against the perpetrators. It stated, “Those who carry out related illegal financial activities that constitute a crime shall be investigated for criminal responsibility in accordance with the law.”
According to China journalist, Colin Wu, the latest central bank statement is quite detailed and mentions Tether (USDT) as illegal for the first time. Tether, the largest stablecoin per market value, is widely used to fund crypto purchases and as collateral in decentralized finance.
Bitcoin is trading at $41,422, down over 4% for the day, as of the time of this writing.