While speaking at an event, a senior official from the Chinese-state bank stated that the Asian nation regards most of the blockchain coins as digital assets, not as a currency, meaning that these are merely new alternatives to traditional investments.
The newly-appointed vice president of the People’s Bank of China, Li Bo, said that Beijing would stick to its current stance on the crypto’s assets class for now. However, he stated the state’s willingness to come up with regulatory measures due to the speculative nature of these assets, which could potentially lead to financial instability.
Bo’s remarks came after an American journalist asked him whether Beijing plans to toughen its stance on cryptocurrency trades. To which, he clarified the PBoC’s view of blockchain coins as assets.
China’s 2017 Regulation on Domestic Exchanges
In 2017, China imposed a ban on local crypto exchanges to facilitate fiat channels for consumers in a bid to halt their role as banking custodian for the Chinese Yuan. From then on, some of the major domestic markets in the Asian country have only crypto-to-crypto trades.
Besides that, he touted China’s digital currency, saying that the country was on track to widen its central bank-issued Renminbi usage. Plus, Bo stated that it would be available for international visitors in the next year’s Winter Olympic games. However, he made it clear that Beijing has no plans to emerge as a competitor to the American dollar. Instead, it wants the consumers and users to decide for themselves.
