France Wants Bitcoin Regulation To Counter Russia, Binance CEO Reacts

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The conflict between Ukraine and Russia appears to become an ideal pretext to accelerate the pacing of regulation of Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies.

After ECB President Christine Lagarde, it is now Bruno Le Maire, French Minister of Finance, who insists on the urgency of putting in place regulatory oversight on crypto assets. He reacted to a question by the Financial Times on Thursday.

NATO and EU sanctions

Russia’s ability, and even willingness, to use Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies to circumvent economic sanctions from NATO and EU members appears at least exaggerated, if not even fantasized, claim Bitcoin supporters.

Le sentiment de Bruno Lemaire quand il va appeler le CEO de #bitcoin pour lui demander de déconnecter la russie pic.twitter.com/4HkZ8FoxY5

— randomwizard.i2p_NOT/KYC’D (@no_snitchcoin) March 3, 2022

However, this seems a “good” opportunity for some big money managers to push the tight supervision of cryptos ever further. This is particularly the case of the Minister of Finance of France, Bruno Le Maire.

After narrowly failing to create a serious diplomatic incident by openly speaking of “economic war” against the Russians, Mr Le Maire now wants to attack the crypto market.

He stated:

We are taking measures, in particular on cryptocurrencies and crypto-assets, which must not be used to circumvent the financial sanctions decided by the 27 EU countries.

Diamonds and gold

However, Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao, speaking to the BBC earlier this week, pushed back against this idea, stating:

If people want to avoid sanctions there’s always multiple methods. You can do it using cash, using diamonds, using gold. I don’t think crypto is anything special.

And made sure to mention that Binance follows all the sanction rules.

Fact:
Banks (most of them I hope) follow sanction rules.
Crypto exchanges (at least Binance) follow sanction rules.

Media:
Crypto exchanges don’t sanction Russia normal people.
Crypto exchanges don’t follow sanction rules.

🤷‍♂️

— CZ 🔶 Binance (@cz_binance) March 3, 2022

To be followed up we’re sure.

AhmedZaggoudi / Depositphotos.com