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And that's a fair point. But the problem is Crypto is an investment playground by people from rich countries and legitimate uses of it in countries like say Ven

And that's a fair point. But the problem is Crypto is an investment playground by people from rich countries and legitimate uses of it in countries like say Venezuela is an extremely small part of total transactions.

devoutsalsa 4y ago
The US dollar is used for shady stuff all over the world, but we’re not trying to ban it.
- cooljacob204 4y ago
  Yes but it's used by far for more legitimate stuff. I would argue crypto outside of investing is not. Also I don't want to ban crypto. I want to crack down on these exchanges which encouraged everyone to gamble on crypto and lost a ton of people money.
  - aww_dang 4y ago
    The market is cracking down on these exchanges by bankrupting them. I'd prefer a privately run auditing and voluntary accreditation model.
- danans 4y ago
  > The US dollar is used for shady stuff all over the world, but we’re not trying to ban it. That is because it is overwhelmingly used for standard non-shady stuff, like trading legal goods and services. Crypto can't make a similar claim.
  - throwup 4y ago
    https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3942181 https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3942181 > For example, illegal transactions, scams and gambling together make up less than 3% of volume.
    - sokoloff 4y ago
      What constitutes a "scam" in the that paper? That paper treats all USDT (Tether) transactions as "not scam". I think that remains to be proven and I don't think it's anywhere near certain.
      - hellotomyrars 4y ago
        Tether is arguably itself a scam based on their incredibly creative account and likely outright lies about the backing of Tether.
        aww_dang 4y ago
        Turtles all the way down. The US central bank backs the US dollar with "The full faith and credit of the US government" https://www.federalreserve.gov/faqs/currency_12770.htm https://www.federalreserve.gov/faqs/currency_12770.htm
        hellotomyrars 4y ago
        Sure, totally. But I trust the faith and credit of the US government a lot more than the faith and credit of Tether.
    - danans 4y ago
      You excluded the first part of that paragraph: > We show that the vast majority of Bitcoin transactions between real entities are for trading and speculative purposes. Starting from 2015, 75% of the real bitcoin volume has been linked to exchanges or exchange-like entities such as on-line wallets, OTC desks, and large institutional traders. So 75% of the transactions are just speculative trading, not transactions for goods or services, which is what is being discussed. Taking the paper's numbers at face value, as a percentage of non-speculative transactions, illicit transactions are 12%, which is quite high. There are also papers which quantify the amount of illegal activity as high as 46% [1] in 2018. Illicit activity is still probably the most durable use non-investment use-case for Bitcoin, and realistically will be the most enduring use case going forward. 1. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3102645 https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3102645
  - aww_dang 4y ago
    Use of the US dollar is compulsory. Thankfully, cryptocurrencies cannot make the same claim. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gresham%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gresham%27s_law
  - TacticalCoder 4y ago
    3% to 5% of the world's GDP is linked to criminal activities [1]. Cryptocurrencies are a drop in the bucket here. It doesn't even register. [1] And it's highly likely the CIA is still, in 2022, deeply tied in drug trafficking and drug money laundering.
pera 4y ago
I'm from Argentina but live in the UK: in 2020 my mom needed an urgent oncological treatment and the only method I had to transfer the money was using a cryptocurrency. I really don't like to talk about this stuff but when people here in HN keep making arguments like "oh who needs this stuff, I can send money to my friends with the Monzo app" it really makes me feel like my problems as someone from the third world don't matter at all
- runarberg 4y ago
  I think most people here agree that it is unnecessarily hard and expensive to transfer money between countries. However cryptocurrency is a technological solution to a regulatory problem. This issue could be solved tomorrow by legislation if governments would cooperate and work to do so. All the efforts pushing cryptocurrency for this particular niche would be better served pushing for international standards for cheap and simple instant money transfers.
  - ls15 4y ago
    > All the efforts pushing cryptocurrency for this particular niche would be better served pushing for international standards for cheap and simple instant money transfers. That seems impossible given today's geopolitics. Crypto remittance at least works.
    - runarberg 4y ago
      Maybe that is true of transferring money between USA and Russia, or between USA and the EU, or the USA and any other country outside of Canada and Mexico, but there is no reason that the UK and Argentina don’t have a bilateral agreement in place that would make transferring money between the two countries quick, cheap, and easy.
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
      - Sargos 4y ago
mr_woozy 4y ago

devoutsalsa 4y ago

The US dollar is used for shady stuff all over the world, but we’re not trying to ban it.

cooljacob204 4y ago
Yes but it's used by far for more legitimate stuff. I would argue crypto outside of investing is not. Also I don't want to ban crypto. I want to crack down on these exchanges which encouraged everyone to gamble on crypto and lost a ton of people money.
- aww_dang 4y ago
  The market is cracking down on these exchanges by bankrupting them. I'd prefer a privately run auditing and voluntary accreditation model.
danans 4y ago
> The US dollar is used for shady stuff all over the world, but we’re not trying to ban it. That is because it is overwhelmingly used for standard non-shady stuff, like trading legal goods and services. Crypto can't make a similar claim.
- throwup 4y ago
  https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3942181 https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3942181 > For example, illegal transactions, scams and gambling together make up less than 3% of volume.
  - sokoloff 4y ago
    What constitutes a "scam" in the that paper? That paper treats all USDT (Tether) transactions as "not scam". I think that remains to be proven and I don't think it's anywhere near certain.
    - hellotomyrars 4y ago
      Tether is arguably itself a scam based on their incredibly creative account and likely outright lies about the backing of Tether.
      - aww_dang 4y ago
        Turtles all the way down. The US central bank backs the US dollar with "The full faith and credit of the US government" https://www.federalreserve.gov/faqs/currency_12770.htm https://www.federalreserve.gov/faqs/currency_12770.htm
        hellotomyrars 4y ago
        Sure, totally. But I trust the faith and credit of the US government a lot more than the faith and credit of Tether.
  - danans 4y ago
    You excluded the first part of that paragraph: > We show that the vast majority of Bitcoin transactions between real entities are for trading and speculative purposes. Starting from 2015, 75% of the real bitcoin volume has been linked to exchanges or exchange-like entities such as on-line wallets, OTC desks, and large institutional traders. So 75% of the transactions are just speculative trading, not transactions for goods or services, which is what is being discussed. Taking the paper's numbers at face value, as a percentage of non-speculative transactions, illicit transactions are 12%, which is quite high. There are also papers which quantify the amount of illegal activity as high as 46% [1] in 2018. Illicit activity is still probably the most durable use non-investment use-case for Bitcoin, and realistically will be the most enduring use case going forward. 1. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3102645 https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3102645
- aww_dang 4y ago
  Use of the US dollar is compulsory. Thankfully, cryptocurrencies cannot make the same claim. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gresham%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gresham%27s_law
- TacticalCoder 4y ago
  3% to 5% of the world's GDP is linked to criminal activities [1]. Cryptocurrencies are a drop in the bucket here. It doesn't even register. [1] And it's highly likely the CIA is still, in 2022, deeply tied in drug trafficking and drug money laundering.

pera 4y ago

I'm from Argentina but live in the UK: in 2020 my mom needed an urgent oncological treatment and the only method I had to transfer the money was using a cryptocurrency. I really don't like to talk about this stuff but when people here in HN keep making arguments like "oh who needs this stuff, I can send money to my friends with the Monzo app" it really makes me feel like my problems as someone from the third world don't matter at all

runarberg 4y ago
I think most people here agree that it is unnecessarily hard and expensive to transfer money between countries. However cryptocurrency is a technological solution to a regulatory problem. This issue could be solved tomorrow by legislation if governments would cooperate and work to do so. All the efforts pushing cryptocurrency for this particular niche would be better served pushing for international standards for cheap and simple instant money transfers.
- ls15 4y ago
  > All the efforts pushing cryptocurrency for this particular niche would be better served pushing for international standards for cheap and simple instant money transfers. That seems impossible given today's geopolitics. Crypto remittance at least works.
  - runarberg 4y ago
    Maybe that is true of transferring money between USA and Russia, or between USA and the EU, or the USA and any other country outside of Canada and Mexico, but there is no reason that the UK and Argentina don’t have a bilateral agreement in place that would make transferring money between the two countries quick, cheap, and easy.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - Sargos 4y ago

mr_woozy 4y ago