Would you welcome regulation of the crypto space?

Pintman Paddy Losty · 18-04-2018 8:03pm #1

More and more I'm starting to think government intervention is needed to protect people from the major scams occurring in the whole crypto scene.

The latest example

Josiah Wilmoth in ICO NewsNews

‘Over and Out’: $50 Million Savedroid ICO Makes

The founders of cryptocurrency startup Savedroid appear to have exit-scammed investors following the conclusion of its initial coin offering (ICO).

On Wednesday, the website for the German company unexpectedly went offline and has since been replaced by a single image — the “Aannd It’s Gone” meme, which first originated on South Park.

And in case investors still did not get the message, Yassin Hankir, the project’s founder and CEO, published a Twitter post that showed him in an airport and later on a beach, holding a beer.

“Thanks guys! Over and out…#savedroidICO,” he wrote.

Purportedly, the company was building a savings app that would use artificial intelligence to help users automatically invest in curated portfolios of cryptocurrencies and related derivatives. Savedroid also said that it would produce a cryptocurrency-funded credit card, a claim that has proven to be quite common among ICOs that later turn out to be scams.

These stories are becoming a daily occurrence. It really damages the image of cryptocurrencies.

Would you be in favour of greater government regulation to prevent this kind of thing occurring.

scam-savedroid-founders-actually-announce-fu-you-exit-scam-via-social-media-the-ico-journal.jpg

Slideways · 18-04-2018 9:01pm

As my papa always said “A fool and his money is easily parted”

garrettod · 18-04-2018 9:40pm

Would you welcome regulation of the crypto space?

Yes, it's become more than clear at this stage that the industry and it's various participants cannot be relied upon to regulate themselves properly. Dodgy ICOs, Claims of Staff in Exchanges acting for their own benefit ahead of customers etc. Fraud and Greed will destroy cryptos, if things don't change !

grindle · 18-04-2018 9:43pm

Light-handed regulation wouldn't make much of a difference but when has our government regulated something with a light hand and gotten it right? If it's not done well/done properly it's better they don't do it at all as they'll only fück something up.

Pintman Paddy Losty · 18-04-2018 9:47pm

grindle wrote: »

Light-handed regulation wouldn't make much of a difference but when has our government regulated something with a light hand and gotten it right? If it's not done well/done properly it's better they don't do it at all as they'll only fück something up.

I wouldn't advocate light touch regulation either. I'd be advocating each national government have their own strict laws in relation to crypto. Similar regulations as you have with normally equities or bonds.

grindle · 18-04-2018 9:52pm

Pintman Paddy Losty wrote: »

I wouldn't advocate light touch regulation either. I'd be advocating each national government have their own strict laws in relation to crypto. Similar regulations as you have with normally equities or bonds.

Depends how strict the laws were. Imagine Bitcoin got released today and instead of allowing the crypto-anarchists to have their cute internet money for a few years they regulate strictly and immediately, how would they regulate Bitcoin? Anti-authoritarian anon dev releases software aiming to supplant traditional money and some people decide it's worth exchanging money for - what do they regulate beyond taxing of profits?

JohnnyFlash · 18-04-2018 10:24pm

There's a right 'bang' of libertarian woo off large parts of the crypto community. Suggesting that Government is tyranny, and advocating the use of crypto as a way of implementing Austrian School economic theory. I've read that Satoshi's early posts mention this sort of thing - a move away from centralised authority towards a truly free anarcho-Capitalist model. There's a book on the topic: The Politics of Bitcoin: Software As Right-Wing Extremism. And we've all read the posts on reddit about the FIAT scam, and the liberation of being your own bank.

And it's certainly the wild wild west out there at the moment. It's anarchy alright. Scams, complete lack of regulation, printing of magic money (Tether) to manipulate the Bitcoin market; insider trading, money laundering, John McAfee. Every huckster and con-man is getting involved. It's a damning indictment of libertarianism as a theory. Complete pie-in-the-sky stuff, rather like Marxism (the political theories of the oddball and the madman). However in one vital respect, Satoshi's vision has failed; it's not decentralised. Those who mined at the start took none of the risk, and most of the reward. Mining these days in hugely centralised, with those who already have unduly influencing the market.

Finally, the environmental impact of Bitcoin mining just cannot continue to be ignored. It's vile, and a damning indictment of the deeply flawed theories and ideologies that came up with this madness.

This puts it into perspective.

sabat · 19-04-2018 1:11am

It's already regulated - it's not even a huge leap to suggest that the law is being broken right here in this forum.

http://www.irishstatutebook.ie/eli/2007/act/19/section/65/enacted/en/html

smacl · 19-04-2018 7:40am

Simple answer, no. Who do we protect through regulation and why? If your talking about the punter who borrows money, blows it on crypto, and lands themselves in debt as a result, the guilty party if we're apportioning blame is the lender. The same punter would just as likely blow the money on something else that would lose all of its questionable value over a short space of time. If we're against gambling entirely, then close down the Paddy Powers and stop the national lottery. If the money hasn't been borrowed, on what grounds do we dictate what a person can or can't spend their money on?

There's a right 'bang' of libertarian woo off large parts of the crypto community.

There might well be, and there's a bit of a bang of some of yourself and Paddy's posts too, so do you think we should regulate them?

grindle · 19-04-2018 9:03am

JohnnyFlash wrote: »

Satoshi's vision has failed; it's not decentralised. Those who mined at the start took none of the risk, and most of the reward. Mining these days in hugely centralised, with those who already have unduly influencing the market.

There are flaws with Bitcoin's decentralisation model yet in other posts I've seen you imply that alts are scammier than Bitcoin - most recently GRS in the Alt thread where you can't grasp the difference between mined currencies and ICOs for service tokens. Some are trying to provide a fix to Bitcoin's model. The concept of Open Source Software seems to cause a bit of confusion to you (as well as most BTC maximalists) - it's there to be improved upon. Alts are supposed to exist so differing models get tested.
Bitcoin's devs are choosing a certain path and sticking with it, we don't have to agree with them or value their decision and Bitcoin by association.

As for Austrian economics or Marxism - absolutism rarely provides the perfect answer. Settling for the broken, quite openly gamed system we have now has to be one of the most redundant, flaccid depression-inducing and frankly insulting forms of absolutism, the "Dada knows best" argument from authority - rekindles great memories of our nation's leader telling the economically literate to kill themselves when they wouldn't drink his poison.
Yeah, that's done great for us - your kids will be paying off the debts of the Celtic Tiger for decades. Add another crash or two and the precedent set by those bailouts - if they're very lucky their own kids and grandkids might get hamstrung too!
That's a great system, definitely "works" just fine.

sabat wrote: »

It's already regulated - it's not even a huge leap to suggest that the law is being broken right here in this forum.

http://www.irishstatutebook.ie/eli/2007/act/19/section/65/enacted/en/html

Are you talking about BitConnect or Dascoin or Onecoin?
If so, good point and boards should be wary of MLM pyramid schemes considering how trigger-happy they tend to be on subjects which could get them in hot water by association.

If you're talking about every crypto - by that logic every commodity or asset which appreciates in value due to demand is a pyramid scheme? Narrow your scope at the very least.
Everybody buying into any crypto should be well aware of the possibility of their holdings providing them with a healthy loss, maybe all the way to zero. There's nobody beyond scammers guaranteeing riches. You're guaranteed space in a ledger and nothing more, what price you're willing to pay for the privilege is up to you. Caveat emptor.

Bubble? Yes, at numerous points in the past and into the future but there's such a small amount of money in it that it's impossible to tell where the top of the parabola is.
Ponzi or pyramid? No. There are some recommending to hedge bets and place a small portion of your overall wealth into it as the potential reward is much greater than the potential to be lost, but that's not a ponzi or a pyramid scheme or any kind of facilitation thereof. It's merely a hedged bet for deflation and financial sovereignty vs inflation and loss of control.

Dohnjoe · 19-04-2018 4:30pm

grindle wrote: »

Settling for the broken, quite openly gamed system we have now has to be one of the most redundant, flaccid depression-inducing and frankly insulting forms of absolutism, the "Dada knows best" argument from authority - rekindles great memories of our nation's leader telling the economically literate to kill themselves when they wouldn't drink his poison.
Yeah, that's done great for us - your kids will be paying off the debts of the Celtic Tiger for decades. Add another crash or two and the precedent set by those bailouts - if they're very lucky their own kids and grandkids might get hamstrung too!
That's a great system, definitely "works" just fine.

Agree with other parts of the post but this is definitely into populist realms here. A third of the debt has been repaid and it's unlikely anyone's kids will be repaying it for decades. It took the US 2 and a half years to pull out of the worst systemic crisis in 80 years. And that was a lot of bad controls, regulation and tools - most of which has now been significantly overhauled

Blockchain, DL tech, smart contracts, etc are great but they are going to complement the current system, not replace it.

I'm not claiming the current system is perfect, far from it, but it's functional, resilient, is constantly being changed/tweaked and fundamentally it works - and so far no one has demonstrated a workable and functional better working alternative

Nermal · 19-04-2018 9:27pm

The whole point of Bitcoin is to bypass financial regulation, so bring it on. If increasing regulation is actually effective, Bitcoin has failed. If Bitcoin succeeds, the regs are pointless.

Would you welcome regulation of the crypto space?

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