US Congressman Says There’s Absolutely “No Capacity To Kill Bitcoin”
Will this change the future of Facebook’s Libra coin?
Earlier on Tuesday, Facebook’s Libra coin project invited hostile criticism and speculation from the US Congress as David Marcus, a Facebook Executive continued to defend the proposal to lawmakers.
Members of the Senate’s banking committee raised serious questions on Facebook’s privacy and security plans for Libra and likened the idea to a toddler playing with machines. Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio said Facebook is breathtakingly arrogant in attempting to launch a digital financial service after the Cambridge Analytica scandal, and cannot be trusted with people’s bank accounts and money. She stated that Facebook has burned the house down on more than one instance, thus inferring that the complete idea of Libra coin is dangerous and detrimental to the Financial system.
While the US Congress grilled Facebook on Libra coin, another US Congressman, Patrick McHenry of North Carolina said that there’s absolutely “no capacity to kill Bitcoin,” speaking to CNBC’s Squawk Box. When asked about his thoughts on whether central banks and regulators would allow Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies to emerge, he answered that there is no way to stop Bitcoin. “I think there’s no capacity to kill Bitcoin. Even the Chinese with their Firewall and their extreme intervention on their society cannot kill Bitcoin. So, distributed ledger, full and open, in the essence of Bitcoin, as a first mover in the space, the developer of this technology… […] My point here is, you can’t kill Bitcoin,” the congressman answered.
He expressed his opinion on Altcoins and Tokens, likening them to new iterations trying to mimic Bitcoin and said that they are not fully distributed or open. They are just different mechanisms to kill Bitcoin. He likened Facebook’s Libra to one such project trying to mimic Bitcoin and said that on looking closely, we find monumental differences.
While he agreed that regulators will influence Bitcoin’s mass adoption, he spoke about the growth trajectory of Bitcoin, its price action from being practically free to trading at nearly $10000.
This comes as a positive development in the space but the price hasn’t recovered from Tuesday’s plummeting of over 8%. It is now trading at $9830, down from $12300, seven days ago on July 11, 2019.
In the past week, Bitcoin’s price fell by 20% and according to crypto experts, with US Regulators’ clampdown on Libra, it may slide below $7000 in the next week.
While Bitcoin’s price may plummet, Patrick McHenry talks about the essence of Bitcoin, its core that is the distributed ledger that’s decentralized and open and says that it has made significant progress in the past decade. It would be interesting to see how one congressman’s views on Bitcoin are different from the others.
I am closely following developments on Facebook’s Libra coin and the ongoing proceedings. I’ll share further updates as this unfolds.
