The news out of China over the last week brought quite a shock to cryptocurrency markets.
Bitcoin fell roughly 40% from peak to trough over the last few weeks as the news flow from China seemed to go from bad to worse.
The altcoin market took the news even harder as many altcoins were off 30%+ in a single day.
Just recently, however, we have seen a bit of a recovery in the Bitcoin and cryptocurrency markets as the news flow has changed from "terrible", to "not quite as terrible as we first thought".
Even with the news flow out of China and a couple smaller countries being overwhelmingly negative, Bitcoin/cryptocurrency prices can still go much much higher.
That was the sentiment echoed by Stelian Balta, the Founder and Managing Partner of HyperChain Capital.
Specifically, he had this to say:
"If we look at Bitcoin or Ethereum from a technology perspective, the bad news is not entirely relevant."
Not entirely relevant?
Really?
What does he mean by that?
"If you haven't noticed, miners (including Chinese miners) will continue to mine and developers will continue to create great code and projects."
"Digital assets are a global phenomenon and the ecosystem is in its early days."
That's great but what does this mean that they don't really need China to thrive?
Balta went on to say that they can be just fine strictly from a supply and demand perspective.
"I am very optimistic regarding the global digital assets markets. Digital assets can be considered commodities trading on supply and demand."
"There is a fixed supply of each of one them and demand is only increasing."
Sounds almost like digital gold, perhaps?
"Yes China is an important market and the recent news of exchanges shutting down and ICO funding being banned certainly has a short term negative effect on the prices. However, digital assets are a global phenomenon. Huge Internet businesses like Facebook or Google are banned in China and are doing pretty well."
This last part is especially interesting...
Facebook and Google are 2 of the largest companies on the planet right now and neither is allowed to operate in China.
If they can operate effectively and reach such lofty levels without the Red State, I would agree with Balta that cryptocurrency can as well.
Also...
His "digital asset" reference seems to align pretty well with the United State's definition, as that is the official designation they have given cryptocurrency currently.
Digital gold indeed, the people's currency.
Stay informed my friends.
Sources:
https://cointelegraph.com/news/bitcoin-will-be-dominated-by-western-nations-china-will-be-vassal-nation-again
https://www.forbes.com/sites/panosmourdoukoutas/2017/09/16/can-bitcoin-prices-reach-5000-again-without-china/
Image Sources:
http://mashable.com/2017/09/12/china-bitcoin-ban-exchanges/#uFvDWMa_caqJ
https://coinjournal.net/down-38-bitcoin-stumbles-amid-regulatory-uncertainties-in-china/
https://futureoflife.org/2016/12/30/2016-actually-year-hope/
Follow me: @jrcornel