As Bitcoin adoption is increasing day by day, with El Salvador legalising it recently, many would therefore assume that the world’s flagship cryptocurrency may finally be accepted as legal tender in various parts of the globe. However, this is not the case with all nations, as had been proved by the words of a Dutch official who had argued that the Netherlands must do all it can to effectively ban the holding, trading and mining of BTC as the digital asset fails to adequately satisfy the 3 basic functions of money.
The official also argued that cryptocurrencies in general are dangerous not just because of the extremely high volatility, but because criminals usually consider them to be quite handy for carrying out illegal and illicit activities.
‘We must ban BTC’
Pieter Hasekamp had been the one to make the argument that it would be better for everyone if BTC would be banned. He had highlighted this through an essay which had more or less the same title. In the essay, Pieter provides a comprehensive list of various reasons as to why the Netherlands’ government must put an end to Bitcoin as soon as possible, chief among which being the idea that cryptocurrencies do not possess any kind of intrinsic value as well as the notion that BTC is only really valuable due to the fact that numerous people have deemed it to be, which had also been done without seeking any kind of approval from governmental or regulatory bodies.
Furthermore, Hasekamp had referred to one of the more common narratives when it comes to anti-cryptocurrency sentiment, and that is the argument that cryptocurrencies are not able to act as a means of payment, a store of value, or any kind of unit of account. These 3 functions, the official added, are the 3 basic functions of money and since cryptocurrencies do not satisfy these, a ban must be put into effect. Pieter had also listed other reasons such the potential for scams and fraud, security issues, high volatility, and so on.
Lagging behind
Pieter believes that his country is falling behind others when it comes to stopping cryptocurrencies in the past. He acknowledged that Dutch regulators and authorities have tried to increase efforts for supervision and regulation before, however these initiatives were often met with little to no success.
He lastly pointed out that the country’s Central Planning Bureau highlighted the various risks associated with cryptocurrency trading back in 2018, however it had been decided that sterner regulations were not required at the time.