It'd be extremely difficult for a democracy to ban and seize crypto assets, but they wouldn't need to. The treasury department and FBI could simply declare that ALL transactions between crypto and regular currencies are now presumed to be money laudering unless proven otherwise. Basically ending cryptocurrencies as a meaningful asset class.
They'd be slaughtered in the courts, unless the FBI is allowed to go around making such dictations outside of a political process, and to be fair I don't not consider the US as a sort of half-assed police state as it is, so who knows.
I think you're seriously underestimating how draconian US money laundering/proceeds of crime/asset forfeiture regulations already are. And yeah, federal agencies do have a lot of scope to set and change regulations outside the legislative process. Although if there was real political will behind it, congress could pass legislation also
There'd be legal challenges, many successful, but if essentially *anything* purchased with crypto is liable to seizure and you have to go to court to get it back, the risk and expense just isn't worth it for most people. Not to mention that financial institutions would stop touching anything even vaguely associated with crypto to avoid the hassle and liability. Just look at how hard it already is for adult content providers to process payments, and they're not even breaking the law.
I think this observation is critical: "Although if there was real political will behind it, congress could pass legislation also." A Biden or any other administration could push regulation in one direction or another, but any severe movement would require new Congressional legislation. For the immediate future, I don't see that happening on crypto/ML.
It'd be extremely difficult for a democracy to ban and seize crypto assets, but they wouldn't need to. The treasury department and FBI could simply declare that ALL transactions between crypto and regular currencies are now presumed to be money laudering unless proven otherwise. Basically ending
It'd be extremely difficult for a democracy to ban and seize crypto assets, but they wouldn't need to. The treasury department and FBI could simply declare that ALL transactions between crypto and regular currencies are now presumed to be money laudering unless proven otherwise. Basically ending cryptocurrencies as a meaningful asset class.
They'd be slaughtered in the courts, unless the FBI is allowed to go around making such dictations outside of a political process, and to be fair I don't not consider the US as a sort of half-assed police state as it is, so who knows.
I think you're seriously underestimating how draconian US money laundering/proceeds of crime/asset forfeiture regulations already are. And yeah, federal agencies do have a lot of scope to set and change regulations outside the legislative process. Although if there was real political will behind it, congress could pass legislation also
There'd be legal challenges, many successful, but if essentially *anything* purchased with crypto is liable to seizure and you have to go to court to get it back, the risk and expense just isn't worth it for most people. Not to mention that financial institutions would stop touching anything even vaguely associated with crypto to avoid the hassle and liability. Just look at how hard it already is for adult content providers to process payments, and they're not even breaking the law.
I think this observation is critical: "Although if there was real political will behind it, congress could pass legislation also." A Biden or any other administration could push regulation in one direction or another, but any severe movement would require new Congressional legislation. For the immediate future, I don't see that happening on crypto/ML.
Yeah, I tend to agree that such a sweeping declaration would be legally difficult, although if it happened in some kind of emergency setting, maybe.
It'd be extremely difficult for a democracy to ban and seize crypto assets, but they wouldn't need to. The treasury department and FBI could simply declare that ALL transactions between crypto and regular currencies are now presumed to be money laudering unless proven otherwise. Basically ending