Crypto was a huge mistake. It should have been rigorously regulated right out of the gate to the point of being unusable for anyone. I have yet to see a use case that doesn’t amount to buying drugs or defrauding rubes.
Most arguments for cryptocurrency are just as weak as this one.
Crypto allows my family members to bypass arbitrary restrictions set by one such kleptocrat right now so the benefit is very much more than marginal.
By sending your family money, as crypto or US dollars, you have to assume some percentage of that money is going to end up in the kleptocrat's pocket. If the funds are eventually settled through official exchanges in the country, its very likely that the government gets a cut of the exchange transactions. If its being settled by unofficial exchanges like street exchange vendors, those individuals probably pay some bribe or tax to operate that eventually makes its way back to the kleptocrat. Additionally you are offering the kleptocrat increased liquidity by operating with crypto. Assume the kleptocrat is the largest buyer of cryptocurrencies in their country.
All three of those countries have restrictions/regulations on converting crypto currencies into local currencies - doesn't crypto just move the the problem to converting it to local currency?
1. You want to convert the "hard" currency into the local currency
2. You want to convert the local currency back to the hard currency
3. You want to send hard currency back
Often there are official rates set by the central bank in these countries, and then there are black market rates. Banks etc will convert hard currency to local currency only using the official rates, which tends to be a lot lower than the black market rate, so you get shafted by that in the first instance. Then, when you want to convert the local currency back, banks won't sell it to you because the government does not let them sell hard currency to the general population. Finally, sending hard currency abroad is usually de facto (and sometimes also de jure) banned so your money can't leave the country once it's in. And as a last resort if you say screw you I will withdraw e.g. USD notes and take a flight, banks will refuse to give cash hard currency.
Obviously crypto lets you sidestep all that as nothing can prevent you from sending USDT from your wallet.
While it is useful for this case, it is not 'legit', in that its purpose is to by-pass (break even) laws of the country with the capital controls. In that sense, money laundering is also a legit use-case.
Russian here. My forgotten Bitcoin stash saved my ass multiple times by providing a way to transfer money to a friend abroad who then paid for my western expenses (hosting, VPNs etc.) using his Visa / MC cards.
Also, a lot of programmers who emigrated from Russia to countries such as Georgia in 2022 were using USDT as a way to receive their salaries.
Also there are plenty of blackmarket goods that are heavily restricted and legally punished without good cause, and I do not believe just because something is "illegal" that it is automatically bad.
Payment processors essentially get to dictate what is and is not allowed to be financially viable which is a very powerful form of control over culture.
In theory, but it doesn’t in practice. Most crypto transfers never make it to the blockchain, they happen entirely in SQL databases of exchanges.
Also, Tether has complete control over USDT and can block or reverse any payment or freeze any account it wants. No bank or payment processor in the world has such centralized control over the traditional financial system.
If anything, crypto is more centralized by comparison. Both in terms of payment processors as well as wealth distribution.
In practice neither exchanges or Tether have made any attempts at refusing to allow payments to legal businesses as far as I'm aware. So in practice it does.
Crypto is just speed running the 19th century and making us re learn all the reasons why we made the pre crypto regulations.
Because the CEO of one could read a false news article about your site and prohibit you from transacting with them anymore. Your existence is at the whims of a few people.
Bitcoin generally appreciated, where fiat had inflation.
While the transaction costs/speed have eliminated this, there was a few years of my life that I both sent money to friends and used a Bitcoin debit card.
One must ask whether the Bitcoin valuation has raised 1000% because the fiat has inflated as much, or is it mostly driven by speculation. For reference point, the buying power of fiat currency has not changed dramatically during the same period.
Fraud generally has good returns for the fraudsters.
the only way to get "fleeced" like a "rube" is to sell or never buy.
- paying/receiving bribes
- bypassing international sanctions to finance wars
There's a lot of uses for cryptocurrency and only a very small fraction are good for individuals.
Crypto has many different useful applications. One of the main ones: limited supply (I am aware not all crypto has a cap).
Hey now. There's also trading child pornography.
Society has been struggling for decades to overcome prohibition via political channels, and watching as multiple generations have been damaged by its impact on local economies, civil liberties, and the boon to criminal cartels.
Then, a mathematical solution arises which unambiguously undermines this regime, and somehow that's a bad thing?!
You're proposing that it's a technological solution to a societal problem. These only last as long as a particular regulatory body / regime allows them to.
Mining. It has long been infeasible for anyone without prior capital and investment. Ban that - you can easily get a lead through the electricity bill - viola.
Private key custody. Even technologically-inclined individuals mess it up from time to time. Hence the proliferation of centralised services to keep the keys ("wallets") for you. Block the exchange. QED.
There is substantially more to it than that but I will let you chew that over just to point out how blatantly incorrect your prior is.
Your moral equivocation is utterly irrelevant.
Did you know in some countries, a good loan for someone with perfect credit is 20% apr? Do you know in some countries police can confiscate all the money you have and never give it back? Have you ever heard of civil asset forfeiture? Did you know in some countries, just protesting can have your accounts frozen? Did you know in some countries, sending money can take over 3 days with no knowledge of what is happening to your money during that time? Did you know that Debit and Wire transfer often cost well over $20 to perform?
This list could go on for days. Only fools would speak about crypto so confidently without doing a minimal investigation into its utility.
Only fools would speak about a technological solution without understating the reality, that technology still leans on society, power structures, and ability to enforce laws.
Civil disobedience works as a means to shift the rules, the balance of power; you can't maintain it perpetually. P2P eventually shifted the attention of the recording industry to online distribution. People jumped to Netflix and iTunes, because they became more convenient, while providing good value for the money.
Challenging media empires was child's play compared to challenging the world's financial system. Bitcoin has successfully illustrated a new and better way. Presidents have been killed for less. Civil rights activists have been killed for less.
Bitcoin and the crypto economy is now inevitable, just as gasoline vehicles became inevitable, and a nuclear armed world became inevitable. The world is changing, please do not let your self-identity interfere with the reality of this.
When a new and revolutionary invention becomes part of the human mental strata, you cannot take it back. This has never been done before since the knowledge of building a campfire or sharpening rocks. It doesn't matter how powerful, stable, beneficial, or otherwise the old system was. It has been super-ceded by something that outcompetes it.
That's reality. I hope that you and others like you realize it and have a prosperous life.