An Early Crypto Visionary Voices Concerns Over Potential Chinese Ban
In the realm of cryptocurrency, China’s regulatory actions are looming larger and could potentially culminate in an outright prohibition on holding digital assets, asserts Bobby Lee, a pioneering figure in China’s Bitcoin landscape.
Lee’s insights are rooted in personal experience, having navigated the fallout from Beijing’s directives firsthand. He divested from BTC China, the country’s inaugural Bitcoin exchange, following a crackdown in 2017, despite its former status as the globe’s second-largest exchange.
China’s current offensive against cryptocurrencies encompasses targeted measures against miners, coupled with restrictions on crypto-related banking services and trading. These actions have catalyzed a substantial downturn in Bitcoin’s value, halving its mid-April peak of nearly $65,000.
Speculating on future developments, Lee suggests that an outright ban on cryptocurrencies remains a plausible scenario, offering odds of 50-50. His commentary, delivered from his WeWork office in downtown Shanghai, underscores the potential severity of such measures, although specifics on enforcement remain nebulous.
Recently returning to China after a sojourn in the U.S. and authoring a book titled “The Promise of Bitcoin,” Lee now directs his energies towards Ballet Global Inc., a venture specializing in hardware wallets for cryptocurrencies. Despite the regulatory headwinds, Lee remains bullish on Bitcoin’s trajectory, forecasting a year-end valuation of $250,000 and projecting a $1 million valuation by 2025, albeit coy about his personal holdings.
Reflecting on China’s crackdown on miners, Lee attributes the government’s stance to concerns about financial stability, underscoring the broader regulatory climate favoring centralized oversight.
As for the potential for further regulatory actions, Lee suggests the government retains ample levers to exert control, including the possibility of expelling crypto-related businesses from China’s shores.
Lee cautions miners to evaluate the depreciating value of their capital equipment amidst shifting regulatory sands, highlighting North America as a burgeoning destination for mining operations.
Regarding Bitcoin’s dependence on the mainland Chinese market, Lee anticipates diminishing significance in the face of regulatory headwinds, emphasizing Bitcoin’s resilience to geopolitical constraints.
Dismissing speculations linking China’s digital yuan to the crypto crackdown, Lee contends that the state-backed digital currency poses no existential threat to Bitcoin’s status quo, given its distinct regulatory purview.
Offering personal projections for Bitcoin’s trajectory, Lee foresees a resurgence in the latter half of the year, with a potential peak surpassing $250,000. However, he anticipates a subsequent bear market cycle in the following year, with Bitcoin’s value plummeting from its all-time high.
Looking ahead, Lee envisions a cyclical pattern of Bitcoin’s ascent, foreseeing eventual valuations exceeding a million dollars, with the next peak potentially materializing in 2024 or 2025.
Surveying the evolving landscape of China’s crypto industry, Lee identifies decentralized finance (DeFi) and non-fungible tokens (NFTs) as burgeoning trends, albeit cautioning against excessive hype, predicting their eventual tapering off post-bull market fervor.