The course of the virtual currency flies to the point that economists predict a next burst this bubble. At the European Central Bank it is considering how to regulate Bitcoin.
One member of the Board of Governors of the European Central Bank , the Austrian Ewald Nowotny has spoken in favor of regulation of Bitcoin, “purely speculative object posing a currency”, he said on Wednesday in an interview .
“It would suffice to apply the basic rule of any financial transaction: each participant must disclose his identity. This would break the Bitcoin “ said Nowotny in an interview with German daily Süddeutsche Zeitung .
“We need a VAT or Tax on Bitcoin as it is not a currency”, he also sketched.
Avoid money laundering
The governor of the central bank of Austria and takes up the creed of the ECB, which considers Bitcoin, the virtual currency and decentralized, like a bubble rather than a potential competitor of the euro, but advanced risk money laundering posed by the development of blockchains and crypto currencies.
“We just decided to stop printing of € 500 notes for this reason and we are seeing an extensive recycling of dirty money in Bitcoin”, he laments.
Bitcoin, the virtual currency which has burst on the international financial scene in 2017, has grown from about 1,000 dollars for 1 Bitcoin in January to over $ 16,000 in mid-December a dizzying ascent raising fears of a bubble, even in financial circles broken to speculation and volatility.
A currency fashionable
Moreover, the president of the Austrian central bank believes that the Bitcoin is primarily a mode and highlights the term inability to generalize the payment with a currency whose price is volatile.
“When I take the subway on weekends with my grandchildren there are always some people who come to talk to me before I was asked if we had to buy gold,” quips Mr. Nowotny.
Officials from the US Federal Reserve (Fed) also recently expressed fears on the subject, while the Singapore Central Bank recommended investors to act with “extreme caution” with the Bitcoin.
