Pieter Hasekamp, a high level official of the head of the bureau for the Netherlands, is advising the government to ban all cryptocurrency assets due to what he believes will be a crash that will leave many investors broke. However, some people think that crypto will not actually be banned but regulated instead.
Hasekamp believes that if the Netherlands bans crypto it would effect the markets in a highly negative way. And this doesn’t bother him in the slightest. Some crypto enthusiasts suppose crypto will be the end of fiat. But Hasekamp doesn’t share the same enthusiasm for crypto as these people. His views are in line with officials in the Turkish and Chinese governments both of whom set new regulatory laws for these digital assets. If Hasekamp has his way, the Netherlands will come down harder than both China and Turkey – he said he wants it banned altogether.
The current sentiment of crypto in Europe varies. As we mentioned in a previous article, some Ireland officials feel called to similar action. However, a couple of countries such as Switzerland have a more lenient approach. So, the battle for blockchain and crypto is an ongoing stuggle. Governments will likely find soon that they will have a hard time banning crypto, but this will lead to them regulating it instead. This isn’t the first time that a proposal to ban crypto has been introduced in the Netherlands. In fact, according to an article from yahoo.finance, in 2018 a bill was rebuked by the Minister of Finance Wopke Hoekstra. Hoekstra said:
“It is better to supervise it. My observation now is that that is more effective than a total ban in the Netherlands.”
But there are more officials in the Netherlands who agree with Hasekamp. Economist at ING, Teunis Brosens, said:
“I understand where it comes from if you look at the entire crypto field. Most of the hundreds, thousands of coins are bullshit or worse. There’s just scams and pyramid schemes in there too, so I understand the concern.”
Final thoughts
In an article about this topic, an author at rtlnieuws.com wrote:
“Ban goes too far. A ban only goes very far, even too far, he thinks. And it is not necessary, because there are already laws to deal with scammers and cheaters, you do not have to introduce a crypto ban.”
This is a good point. If there are laws already to deal with scams, why does crypto need to be banned? Despite what some say, not all crypto currencies are scams. It appears that those seeking to ban crypto currency might have ulterior motives. We will have to pay attention to the statements Hasekamp makes in the future to see if it’s possible to know what his real motives are.
Aaron is passionate about blockchain and has been an investor in cryptocurrencies for the past years. He enjoys engaging with other people in the cryptocurrency community online, particularly on Telegram, and learning from experts.
