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If Biden succeeds in stealing the election, two of the biggest enabling factors (other than outright fraud) will have been Wall Street money and Big Tech “canceling” every powerful opposition voice to his corrupt ruling-class agenda. Indeed, the biggest Wall Street banks lavished Biden with four times the money that it gave to Trump, according to the American Banker. Biden has rewarded the financial barons by filling his transition team with Goldman Sachs executives. Yet amazingly (or perhaps unsurprisingly), Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin, another Goldman alum, is pushing regulations which will benefit these big banks and enable them to “deplatform” anyone who is currently using cryptocurrencies.

The proposed regulations in question would affect so-called “self-hosted wallets,” which are cryptocurrency wallets not connected to a bank or other established financial institution. From Breitbart:

Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong is sounding the alarm over a proposed regulation from the Department of the Treasury that would clamp down on the use of independent cryptocurrency wallets and potentially strengthen financial censorship.

…

“Last week we heard rumors that the U.S. Treasury and Secretary Mnuchin were planning to rush out some new regulation regarding self-hosted crypto wallets before the end of his term. I’m concerned that this would have unintended side effects, and wanted to share those concerns,” said Armstrong.

“For those who don’t know — self-hosted crypto wallets (also known as non-custodial wallets or self-custody wallets) are a type of software that lets individuals store and use their own cryptocurrency, instead of needing to rely on a third party financial institution.”

“Self-hosted crypto wallets are important, because they allow anyone to use this new technology to access basic financial services — just like anyone can use a computer or smartphone to access the open internet.”

“This proposed regulation would, we think, require financial institutions like Coinbase to verify the recipient/owner of the self-hosted wallet, collecting identifying information on that party, before a withdrawal could be sent to that self-hosted wallet.”

Armstrong went on to list several problems with such a ruling.

“Many crypto users are sending crypto to smart contracts to use Defi apps. A smart contract is not necessarily owned by any individual or business who could be identified. It is a new type of recipient that doesn’t have any direct equivalent in traditional financial services.”

“Many crypto users are sending crypto to various merchants online, paying for goods and services. Does it make sense to require customers to help verify the identity of a business before they can buy a product there?”

“Many crypto users are also sending crypto to people in emerging markets, where it is difficult or impossible to collect meaningful “know your customer” information. Some of these individuals are living in poverty, and may not have any permanent address or form of government ID.”

“Many crypto users are using their crypto with new types of applications online. Imagine if every time you wanted to upvote some content on Reddit or transfer an item in a game you were hit with a form asking you to verify a recipient.”

“Finally, many recipients (in the U.S. or abroad) who value their financial privacy, may simply not want to upload more identifying documents to various companies, which could be hacked or stolen.” [Breitbart]

Restricting cryptocurrency wallets in this manner would primarily benefit Wall Street Banks and, indirectly, so-called journalists who use Stasi-like intimidation tactics to prevent conservatives from using traditional financial instruments and payment processors.

It is worth noting that the the self-styled Masters of the Universe at Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan have long been wrong about cryptocurrency. In May, Goldman Sachs released a report authored by Obama’s chair of economic advisors Jason Furman which denounced Bitcoin “mania” and concluded, “We do not recommend Bitcoin on a strategic or tactical basis for clients’ investment portfolios.” Since that report was written, Bitcoin’s value has more than doubled. Then, in August, Goldman Sachs executive Mathew McDermott revealed, “We are exploring the commercial viability of creating our own fiat digital token.” 

JP Morgan’s Jamie Dimon is also a notorious Bitcoin hater. In 2017, he called bitcoin a “fraud,” adding “It’s worse than tulip bulbs. It won’t end well. Someone is going to get killed. . . . It’s just not a real thing, eventually it will be closed.” Yet JP Morgan changed its mind with a major caveat, when Umar Farooq, its head of digital treasury services said, “We are supportive of cryptocurrencies as long as they are properly controlled and regulated.” In October, Dimon reiterated his dislike of bitcoin, while heralding his newly launched JP Morgan cryptocurrency, which was implemented in late October. Last week, Goldman Sachs announced it would start using JPM Coin for certain types of “repo” trades. 

So, after repeatedly and wrongly predicting Bitcoin and cryptocurrency would go away, the Big Banks led by JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs are trying to take over the market with their own digital assets, while making sure what’s left is “properly controlled and regulated.” Restrictions on self-hosted cryptocurrency wallets would of course not affect “JPM Coin” and whatever cryptocurrency Goldman Sachs decides to use.

As noted above, the free speech implications of these restrictions are even more concerning than the likelihood that they would increase the economic stranglehold that the Democrat’s Wall Street base has on Main Street America. Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies have functionally become one of the last defenses against financial censorship — that is, censoring patriotic content creators or businesses by choking off their ability to process financial transactions. As President Trump rose, numerous conservative websites were banned from using PayPal, Stripe, and other traditional payment processors. During this time, many of the deplatformed sites moved to cryptocurrency.

As Allum Bokhari correctly noted at Breitbart, 

Presently, it is impossible to blacklist someone from their independent cryptocurrency wallet. No one owns the wallet except the user. However, if platforms like Coinbase are required to collect information from the owners of independent wallets — or even deny service to them in some circumstances — that will change. [Breitbart]

The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), a far-left organization that has worked with and pressured financial companies to financially blacklist right-wingers, complained in an article in 2017 that Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies “leave a gap for hate groups.”

If cryptocurrency transactions are forced to go through banks, which already engage in deplatforming, this would effectively end one of the last means of financial independence available to those whose opinions run afoul of America’s corrupt ruling class and their enforcers in the media. President Trump must not allow Mnuchin to go through with these crypto restrictions which would only serve to enrich the his globalist enemies and empower them to censor and financially punish his supporters.

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