The Russians are embracing cryptocurrency in a major way. They recently legalized crypto mining in the country. We are getting word that the digital ruble, a central digital currency (CBDC) will go live in 2025.
Its target date is July.
This is being done in an effort to bypass SWIFT and other actions placed on it by the West.
Moscow will attempt to use crypto for foreign settlements while creating a new electronic platform through the National Payment System (NPS) within the EPR framework.
It is just another example of how the West is shooting itself in the foot. The idea that it can control the entire financial realm is showing the arrogance. Russia is actually providing a blueprint for what will be duplicated multiple times, on many different levels.
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Russia CBDC Removing Intermediaries
SWIFT is an intermediary. It is also indicative of a legacy financial system that is going to be replaced by tokenization.
Cryptocurrency brings about the removal of financial intermediaries. We are seeing numbers levels where this is playing out. Decentralized exchanges are already starting to gain on their centralized counterparts.
As countries roll out their own coins, the need for a system such as SWIFT will diminish. This will allow countries to swap their digital currencies for each other directly, allowing for near instant settlement.
Removing Russia from SWIFT prompted these actions. “Over 30 regulators are currently working on national digital currencies,” Olga Skorobogatova, the first deputy chairwoman of the Bank of Russia, reported. “I think that this speed, with which the regulators have delved into this field, speaks volumes about the fact that, in 5-7 years, several countries surely will step forward with their own national digital currencies. Then, we can discuss the questions of direct integration. In that case, we no longer need SWIFT, since these are different technological interactions.”
Here is a quick rundown on what is taking place:
https://inleo.io/threads/view/taskmaster4450le/re-taskmaster4450le-s5supds6
While there are claims that usage is voluntary, we know how this will likely proceed.
Singular Control
We have to question what is the overall goal with these currencies?
On the surface it appears they are trying to get their foot into the game. This is certainly true to some degree. That said, we see governments, and especially those behind them, are not operating openly about their intentions.
It would seem to me the ultimate goal is to establish one singular currency. This was done in the EU with much of the power shifting to Brussels. Those people are unelected, being handed enormous amounts of power.
For the moment, the "fight" between countries can play out. This will allow of a fracturing which means the different sides will protect themselves. These moves by Russia reflect that. Naturally, China is doing much of the same thing.
Not to be left behind, the West is also toying with their own CBDCs. There are varying levels of development and planned use cases. Will this change in the future?
Another factor is taxation.
Governments, or we should say politicians, are spending themselves into oblivion. Most are aware that it is unsustainable. Of course, to the political elite, they feel that people paying more is the solution. Listen to how these people talk and the words they use. It is not their spending which is the problem. Instead, it is the people, whichever ones they target, are not paying enough.
Defaults are going to take place as a sovereign debt crisis hits. Where this starts is anyone's guess but it is also why war is evident. Historically, there is no better time to default than through war.
Technological Advancement
The challenge here, in my view, is looking at cryptocurrency as money. Here is where I think issues start to arise.
If cryptocurrency were simply money, then I could see a case being made for the path of control. However, crypto us not money. Instead, that is simply one thing it represents.
Cryptocurrency is actually data. This brings on an entirely new dimension.
Controlling data, especially on a global scale, is much different. We have seen how, over the last 40 years, technological advancements make it difficult. Whether we are dealing with open source, the darknet, or simply the volume of people, it becomes clear that stopping this cannot be done.
When it comes to cryptocurrency, we are in the early stages. This is coupled by the fact that people apply value to whatever they want.
Tokens are nothing new. We see them in many areas of computing. Does that mean governments will try to outlaw them? That is impossible since it is really a unit of measure.
Some feathers were ruffled a few years ago with the introduction of privacy coins. They have not made great strides. Will that always be the case? We do not know.
Another likely outcomes is that, at some point, we will see privacy layers built. An application such as Tornado Cash is just one idea. Others are floating around as ways to move data around anonymously.
There are many layers to this discussion. What we can presume is things are not solely playing out as we are shown. There are things behind the scenes that we are left to speculate about. It is up to us to consider them and operate in ways that can counteract it.
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It's not arrogance to try and sanction a country for an illegal and immoral invasion of Ukraine that has killed so many innocent people so far. If Russia wants sanctions to cease, all it has to do is stop invading their neighbour and killing Ukrainian citizens. It could stop that today.
This is a hugely reductive statement and not even on-topic.
Surrounding Russia with NATO allies was also illegal, immoral, and would obviously lead to this outcome, which is what they wanted because now the military industrial complex profits hugely as they siphon gobs of tax dollars and offload a bunch of product they don't even want.
The sanctions combined with COVID protocol crippled established supply lines and the global economy. It was absolutely arrogance to think sanctions were going to work. Completely backfired and fucked everyone over, especially Europe.
I'm sorry, I just can't agree that Russia is justified in causing nearly a million deaths and injuries (of both Ukrainians and Russians) because it was worried Ukraine wanted to join NATO after Russia annexed Crimea.
Literally nothing on the geo-political scale is justifiable.
Seriously can you name even one truly good thing that any leader of any country has done for the people in the last five years? Who gives a shit about Ukraine? Why Ukraine and not literally every other country facing the exact same atrocities? Because that's what the puppet show wants us to look at.
You know what I just can't agree with? People who take a stance of unquestionable moral authority as if they've somehow figured out the solve of a highly nuanced geo-political issue. That isn't insight; it's propaganda.
I totally get that geo-politics is extremely complicated and there is so much that I could never understand and so much information that I'd never get access to...
... but from the information I do have, I believe I can make some moral judgements on events that happen - and I'm happy to update those judgements as new information comes in.
Bombing a children's hospital - seems very bad. I'm not sure if there is a ton of new information that I could receive that might make me change my mind to agree it was a good idea.
Whereas, say, authorizing FEMA to help rescue people from a natural disaster - seems very good.
So if all the geo-political actions are on a spectrum from very bad to very good, then Russia invading Ukraine seems very bad to me, especially since they could stop at any time and it's likely impoverishing Russia itself. If I found out Ukraine was killing Russian civilians and Russia had tried everything else to get them to stop, then that would change my mind about the situation.
I care about Ukraine because I have friends from there, I care about Palestine because I have friends from there and friends from Israel. I care about the political environment in Venezuela because so many on Hive have written about it. I care about the atrocities within China, but I honestly don't know that much about it all. I'm aware there are conflicts in Africa, but I honestly don't know much about them.
I think the use of economic sanctions against another country can be good if it dissuades violence or war, it's a better alternative between the two - but I also understand sanctions can, and have, be used immorally - which is terrible.
Leaders do good things for people all the time. I truly appreciate when leaders support transitioning renewable technologies. I think in the USA, capping insulin prices to $35 could be literally life-saving for US citizens. I don't personally know much about it or anyone affected by it, but from what I know it seems good. I'm sure I could list a bunch of other good things if pressed and could research a heap, but this response is way too long already.
Good point but circling back to sanctions:
You believe there should be a centralized agent that can control the rails of public infrastructure to get what they want? This is a very anti-crypto pro-imperialist stance, which I find odd.
It's the same logic behind a criminal getting off on a charge on a technicality. Innocent until proven guilty. It's more important for everyone to be treated fairly on an equal playing field than it is to bend and break the rules to punish.
Ah, I'm absolutely definitely no expert but I haven't been viewing SWIFT as a centralized agent. I mean, it is in that everything goes through it, but it's not in that its a cooperative of 10 countries... so I've kind of always viewed it as a non-profit-driven community project. I personally haven't had a problem with SWIFT cutting off Russia's access to the network because I imagined most, if not all, of the member countries would have imposed their individual sanctions anyway (so I assumed it was just very efficient) - but now that I'm typing that out that might have been the wrong way to look at it.
As an XRP fan, I'm absolutely onboard for an alternative to SWIFT, especially one that is more efficient and less expensive. If a grass-roots Russian civilian project was building crypto infrastructure to help civilians get resources I'd be all for it, but I can't really get excited about the Russian government developing a CBDC to get around sanctions so they can get more weapons to bomb Ukrainian civilians in their homes.
I'm really excited about crypto to make people's lives better, especially where they are underserved by corporations and governments, but I think it's also important to call out where it has the potential for harm as well, as I do think it does in this case.
Regurgitating Kremlin propaganda talking points again. Defense cooperation against Russia is an existential question for Eastern Europeans. That you're drawing an equivalence between Russia's genocidal war of choice and NATO membership of EE is idiotic. No one will be attacking a country with thousands of strategic nukes. EE has seen many rounds of forced Russification (even Poland), mass deportation and murder under Russian occupation in history.
The sanctions are actually working, which can be seen in the high inflation in Russia necessitating the current 18% key interest rate of the Russian central bank. The Russian private sector is dying. Small businesses are being killed by the high interest rate. Most of the large multinationals have left slowly crippling even Russia's oil industry. And Gazprom went from being a crown jewel to a loss maker last year. Resources are being poured into the military and the military industry. Maintaining the war effort is diminishing all the rainy day funds and reserves Russia has. The Russian military industrial complex is highly dependent on imports and the sanctions are making the imports much more expensive. Secondary sanctions are causing even some Chinese banks not to deal with Russia.
Europe has done remarkably well all things considered. The price of natural gas is the same as before the sanctions. Letting Russia rearm would be a mortal danger to Europe because the Russian leadership is perfectly willing to have millions of its citizens killed. You're totally clueless when it comes to Russia and EE. For Russia, the economy and the well-being of its citizens always take a back seat to imperialism.
Since it is a digital ruble, I'm guessing it is also backed by ruble. I wonder how the digital currency can affect the price of the physical one. The physical ruble is still sanctioned so its use is still limited. If the digital ruble is exchanged more, can it drive the price of the physical one up? Since Binance and other CEx follow the governments, I assume it won't add the digital ruble. It will be interesting to see how this all develops.
They could always launch their CBDC on multiple chains like ETH, XLM, AVAX, and SOL just like USDC does. This way there will be defi exchanges that fall outside of regulation.
Adopting a CBDC would be yet another tool in the Ru govt toolbox to keep control and the stealth mobilization going without causing too much unrest.
I don't even understand why their citizens are still ok with this even after all this time.
The CBDC or the whole thing? Strong centralization of power under all all-mighty Czar is an old tradition in Russian society. I think the reason why Russians value strong and even cruel autocrats is how vulnerable Russia has been to invasions in history.
It's tragic that the existence of a vast strategic nuclear arsenal hasn't made them feel any more secure. Nothing like Hitler's or Napoleon's invasion of the Russia heartland can happen any longer. An enemy like that would have all their cities turned into radioactive ash before having any chance of success.
Russia will only undergo reforms when forced to, which is why its coming economic collapse is a welcome development.
Russia isnt much different than anywhere else. In fact, history is littered with the same thing.
Governments, no matter what the form, always turn tyrannical. It is only a matter of how obvious the corruption is and how violent things turn.
We can go back to the Romans and the Senate there. Look at what is happening in the US. Hell, look at how that government operates.
Russia is certainly not the only bad actor in history. However, I'm interested in the here and now because everything we're talking about is much more concrete to me than to those across the pond. Abstract arguments about government this or government that don't hold much sway.
That maybe true but when the totality of this is revealed, much of the world will be affected. To focus solely on Russia is a mistake. The West is doing their best to push this. In fact, it is looking to escalate it. World war 3 needs to be achieved to allow for government defaults.
A sovereign debt crisis is coming, something that most do not see. War is valuable as it allows for default to take place. This gives politicians someone to "blame".
That is why there is no peace with Russia. And people in other countries will realize the tyranny they are "suddenly" under.
This is really an issue, I'm still trying to place my finger on an opinion. The CBDC is great economic idea as transaction cost reduces, but the acceptability seems to be blurry, they all see it's value and are preparing to enter but haven't fully joined the idea which makes me think it's still theoretical until the move is established.
Anyways I'm sure trades are very vital to any nation and Russia is also important to other nation so eventually things will work out in their stead if they can hold on, but I think international trade with them might be secretive and I would how that will reflect on their GDP and currency valuation.
Yeah there are many layers to consider.
On the surface, yeah okay. But then when you consider the power it gives, the benefit seems to diminish. Then when we step back and look at this notion of global control, is this just an iteration to where they simply convert it all, ultimately, to one currency?
Is that the goal?
That will be crazy if it happens, how will the value of the coin by generated ?, The sentiment towards that by governments of nations might not be favourable as well.
We can presume governments will be against a lot of this. Anything that threatens their power is not viewed as good.
Indeed, it will take a lot of years for them to conform to this, the world is truly becoming a global village.
I would disagree with that. Humans arent designed to be that. We are tribal and it isnt going to change. If we were not fighting over race, religions, land, or whatever else we can think of, it would be short vs tall, ugly vs pretty, left handed vs right.
A valid argument, although we do like to bicker, doesn't actually mean we can't be a global village, we will eventually, take an actual village for example those still occur but there would be a limitation to how far it goes.
I have a strong feeling many other countries will have a CBDC but the USA wont.
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