My take here is that the US government is acknowledging that banning Bitcoin is useless. It is better to put in some regulations for the regular folks so it can go mainstream than to let criminals be the only ones to use it.

It is like when they banned alcohol. Prohibition proved to be unenforceable. Criminals took over the distribution and serving of alcohol. When they repealed the Prohibition, it generated taxes for the government and weaken the base of organized crime

I'm in china. I was not affected when they stopped RMB withdrawals on the Chinese exchanges or all the restrictions they imposed. I simply used Localbitcoin and bought all my BTC from there

http://www.cnbc.com/2017/02/10/bitcoin-drops-by-100-as-chinas-central-bank-corrals-the-market.html