When I first learned about crypto currency on HN back in 2012 I was excited. It sounded like a fun technical project that could do good in the world. I bought some along the way, followed projects. Along the way it changed. Yesterday I saw a spam post on Reddit about joining a "pump and dump group", which I had to research. It's groups of people who coordinate a buy of a specific currency, spread false news about this currency to create a mania, drive up the price, sell it at a profit. Not only is this probably illegal, it's immoral. Maybe this is how people who were in the internet in 1992 felt in 2000?
"In an official announcement, South Korean government reaffirms there will be NO TRADING BAN"<p><a href="https://twitter.com/iamjosephyoung/status/951428854085689344" rel="nofollow">https://twitter.com/iamjosephyoung/status/951428854085689344</a>
Multiple tweets stating this is all FUD. Can someone contradict or corroborate this claim? Lots of<p>"I talked to my contact in South Korea who works for a major exchange, don't fall into the FUD. The ban is ONLY applicable to exchanges that are not following the previous KYC regulations."
Crazy how fast the markets moved on this news. The price crashed and bounced halfway back before I even found the article, and I was actively searching for the source of the panic.<p>But, perhaps that's because in the grand scheme, SK is small news and other traders who got there first knew full well that it'd rebound.
Right after the S.Korean Justice Ministry announced this, the Finance Ministry is like WTF? we were planning on taxing them. We can tax them if you get rid of it.<p>So far this plan doesn't have the full government support so it might not actually happen.
It's a tough task to let the air of a balloon slowly.<p>On one hand SK probably has to do something because so many people are jumping on and eventually will likely get burned. On the other, they just removed a bunch of "money" from the hands of their citizenry by tanking the markets. Which in and of itself may be world wide good deed as it could dampen dangerous rampant speculation but it does make less "rich" people.<p>My guess is the decline continues into spring but picks back up come summer and into next year (although at a slower rate which isn't a bad thing). BTC isn't going anywhere any time soon and although the whole thing is overheated right now I believe more gains are likely in store in coming years. Shaking the weak hands out stabilizes a market and a stable market is what is missing at the moment.
So I'm assuming SK doesn't want their citizens' money 1) exposed to the risk of a bubble 2) for which SK society will blame them 3) flowing through Chinese and Russian miners to 4) pad North Korean state finances?
This is a money grab isn't it the South Korean goverment sees a lot of money moving about in crypto currency and they want to 'tax' it because why not?<p>The entire article sounded like excuses to me for why they need to be 'monitored' and of course if they are monitoring the might as well tax it right?<p>Baning it is no going to solve much so it sound more like a threat to me to make the exchanges more cooperative.
<i>Bitcoin sank on Monday after website CoinMarketCap removed prices from South Korean exchanges, because coins were trading at a premium of about 30 percent in Asia’s fourth largest economy. That created confusion and triggered a broad selloff among investors.</i><p>So counterparty risks is still something which is misunderstood in the cryptocurrency space?<p>With action pending against South Korea exchanges, higher prices were warranted.
Are other states planning to follow the example of Korea? I would have expected that governments would not take it lightly that some entity is challenging the states monopoly to control the flow of value by means of emitting currency.<p>(sorry, now i am more informed, China is imposing similar bans; also South Korea wants more synchronisation with Japan and China on these issues: <a href="https://cryptovest.com/news/south-korea-pushing-deeper-collaboration-with-japan-china-for-joint-cryptocurrency-regulations/" rel="nofollow">https://cryptovest.com/news/south-korea-pushing-deeper-colla...</a> )
Seems like the original post might just be fud: <a href="http://m.ytn.co.kr/news_view.php?s_mcd=0101&key=201801111615246051&pos" rel="nofollow">http://m.ytn.co.kr/news_view.php?s_mcd=0101&key=201801111615...</a><p>Using Google Translate:
"Cheong Wa Dae said the Justice Minister Park Sang-ki's remarks that the virtual currency exchange will be closed is not coordinated by the government.<p>A Cheong Wa Dae official said in a telephone conversation with YTN that Park's remarks are the position of the Ministry of Justice and that other ministries have various positions.<p>In addition, the Ministry of Justice approached from the dimension of elimination of speculation, but the Financial Services Commission explained that the Ministry of Science, Technology and MIC is interested in nurturing core technologies of virtual money to prevent similar reception.<p>He added that virtual currency-related policies will determine the best time for policies to be effective while looking at market conditions. "<p>and edit: this post isn't a month old