Whenever Bitcoin starts an upward rally, discussion about its regulation and warnings from regulatory authorities about the risky nature of crypto-assets in general starts again. And this is what the ECB's Christine Lagarde recently did in an interview stating that Bitcoin is a "speculative" asset that has conducted some "funny business" and needs global regulation.

Against this background the central question remains as to how this shall be done. Bitcoin's code is publicly available on the web and is not controlled by anyone. In other words, there is no issuer of Bitcoin where regulations can usually be linked to.

U.S. congressmen already admitted during last year's hearings on Libra before the U.S. Congress, that Bitcoin can neither be banned nor stopped by the state.

In our opinion Lagarde's statement is purely based on the recent regulatory warnings and is a result of the price spike and subsequent price drop in Bitcoin in late 2020/early 2021.

Nevertheless, it will be interesting to see how the coming year will develop from a regulatory perspective for the crypto market as a whole. Stay tuned for more.

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