The U.S. Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs organized itself on July 30th, 2019 to hold hearings regarding blockchain regulation and especially on cryptocurrency regulation. As one of the hearings progressed, Senate Banking Committee Chairman Mike Crapo (R-ID) spoke up:

“If the United States were to decide — and I’m not saying that it should — if the United States were to decide we don’t want cryptocurrency to happen in the United States and tried to ban it, I’m pretty confident we couldn’t succeed in doing that because this is a global innovation,” said Crapo.

Fascinating -- his perspective as well as his rather unfortunate last name. Chairman Crapo directed this statement to the CEO of Circle -- a giant in the global financial services arena -- Jeremy Allaire. Mr. Allaire responded by agreeing, explaining that Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies have created a new reality for finances.

“I think the challenge that we all face with this is some of these cryptocurrencies — they’re literally just a piece of open-source software,” said Allaire. “There’s nothing else. It exists on the internet, it’s open-source software, anyone can implement it, it runs wherever the internet runs, and these have a monetary policy where these assets are algorithmically generated . . . That is a challenge that every government in the world now faces — that money, digital money, will move frictionlessly everywhere in the world at the speed of the internet.”

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These comments are a refreshing and stark contrast to those made by Congressman Brad Sherman (D-CA), who asked Congress to implement a ban on Bitcoin -- even though Mr. Sherman had zero suggestions for exactly how to make that happen. Only that it should happen.

Unstoppable Crypto. Why?

But why? Why are U.S. lawmakers coming ‘round to the conclusion that cryptocurrencies are unstoppable?

Perhaps for the reasons that I saw, first hand, during my travels. Last year, I traveled around the world -- 20 countries, 12 months, -- on 1 Bitcoin -- and wrote a book about it: Stolen Wallets and Where to Buy Them. I discovered the truth: governments cannot ban Bitcoin because it is free speech.

If you think about it, money is a form of speech. We use money to communicate our most basic needs -- for food, drink, and shelter -- as well as our hobbies, interests, and activities. As governments around the world begin to crack down on cash (such as Australia banning cash for purchases over $7,500) -- they are effectively controlling our financial freedom -- controlling our freedom of speech.

People won’t stand for it

But more than that -- Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies are also unstoppable from a technological perspective. Economist Saifedean Ammous, who is best known as the author of The Bitcoin Standard: The Decentralized Alternative to Central Banking, goes on an interview to state:

“People think that if a government were to pass a law that bans Bitcoin, then Bitcoin goes away and they get to laugh at us and that’s the end of the story,” said Ammous. “I think it’s actually the other way around.”

Bitcoin is decentralized. It’s just like Circle’s co-founder Jeremy Allaire pointed out -- Bitcoin and most cryptocurrencies are open-source software. The only way to ban them would be to ban everyone’s personal computers -- and then for good measure -- shut off everyone’s electricity.

Obviously, that won’t happen. Therefore, crypto is quite possibly -- unstoppable.