Julian Assange claims Bitcoin investment in Wikileaks granted 50000% return as Russia prepares to launch its own cryptocurrency.
As Bitcoin hit $5,746, Julian Assange, the Wikileaks founder, posted on Twitter, with a chart of the value of Bitcoin attached:
My deepest thanks to the US government, Senator McCain and Senator Lieberman for pushing Visa, MasterCard, Payal, AmEx, Mooneybookers, et al, into erecting an illegal banking blockade against @WikiLeaks starting in 2010. It caused us to invest in Bitcoin — with > 50000% return. pic.twitter.com/9i8D69yxLC
— Julian Assange ? (@JulianAssange) 14 October 2017
As Wikileaks has been revealing government corruption, Assange has been forced to live as a fugitive in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London since 2012. The antigovernment rhetoric of Wikileaks goes hand in hand with the free market principles that are embodied in cryptocurrencies today.
That said, not all governments are done with cryptocurrencies. Despite planning to ban cryptocurrency exchanges, Russia is to launch its own cryptocurrency tentatively called “CryptoRuble”.
According to the Russian media outlet AIF, a closed-doors meeting between President Putin and Moscow’s political elite at the city’s Capital Club led to Putin make the decision to have Russia issue its own cryptocurrency. Russia’s Minister of Communications and Mass Media, Nikolay Nikiforov, said: “I so confidently declare that we will launch a cryptocurrency for one simple reason: If we do not, then in 2 months, our neighbors in the Eurasian Economic Community will do it.”
While details of the technology used for the cryptocurrency remain scarce, Nikiforov said the cryptocurrency cannot be mined. He also added that the cryptoruble, effectively a cryptocurrency that will be legal tender in the Russian Federation, will also see certain adopters incur personal income tax. If the owner is unable to declare the source of cryptorubles, a flat tax of 13% will be levied when converting the cryptocurrency into Russian rubles. Similarly, an automatic 13% tax will also be levied on the earned difference of transactions involving buying and selling a crypotoruble. According to Nikiforov, these details are not set in stone yet.
The creation of its own cryptocurrency should not be read as an endorsement, nor any effort to legalize decentralized cryptocurrencies like bitcoin, the minister added. On October 10, Russia’s central bank revealed the authority’s intent to block all cryptocurrency exchanges in the country. The very same day, Russian president Putin spoke of “serious risks” with cryptocurrencies.
im sorry i do not get it. Does that mean if i buy a cryproruble for 100 and then sell for 200 then i pay a “capital gain” tax of 13 cryptorubles .how will they know how many and when i bought each lot of cryptorubles?
Transparency is the strength of blockchain smart ledgers ….. not necessarily bitcoin etc., which are opaque by design but for a national currency where the aim is to be transparent and eliminate fraud.
The transaction to buy the initial 100 ‘cryptorubles’ is recorded in the encrypted blockchain ledger. Everyone’s ledger who is associated with that currency has a copy of the blockchain ledger and your purchase of 100 ‘cryptorubles’ is recorded on each and every copy of the ledger. In order to hack, amend or steal that transaction you have to hack into the encrypted smart ledger of every holder of ‘cryptorubles’ and change the posting simultaneously ….. which is virtually impossible.
So now your investment has appreciated to 200 cryptorubles and you want to reap the windfall. You make another transaction to sell. The transaction is recorded on everyones smart ledger, including the tax department who levies the 13 cryptoruble capital gains tax on your windfall.
As in every human endeavour someone will figure out ways to cheat the system however it’s going to be very difficult to cheat a properly designed blockchain ledger.
Thanks grumpy.
What if i lose my pc,or smart phone? Do i lose the cryptoroubles or is it like email where i can log onto account on any pc smartphone etc
With a blockchain ledger every ledger entry is encrypted and recorded on not only your copy of the ledger but every stakeholders copy so in the case of a national currency there will be millions if not billions of identical ledgers proving that you are the legitimate owner of that currency. That’s the strength of these smart ledgers ….. everyones copy of the ledger has to agree. If you for whatever reason lose your copy of the ledger then as long as everyone elses ledger point to the money being yours you still have the money. It is more complex than this but that’s kinda the gist of it.
With blockchain trust is taken out of the equation. Either you own the asset and everyone agrees or you don’t own the asset and everyone agrees but in order to defraud you of the asset everyone else in the blockchain has to agree that their copy of the ledger shows the fraud artist is the legitimate owner of the asset which, in the case of a currency would require an unimaginable level of coordination in hacking each and every copy of the ledger.
Again this is simplified.
Thanks again grumpy.
I am too old to understand any of this shit about cypto currencies !! I just known about Molotov Cocktails and Sabotage !! So far we are winning thanks to that !! Not even buying all the Media in the World is saving the Empire of Evil !! Every day they lose something else in Venezuela, in Philippines, in Iraq, in Yemen, in Donbas, in Brazil, Catalonia, etc, etc, etc. !! I’m recommending not having a Bank Account or Credit Cards, not buying shit from any Big Brands, just buy used Cars, used Computers and used everything !! Buy food from small farms !! The more I try to lean about this Crypto-Shit, the more confused I am !!! :) :) :)
Catherine Fitts, former Assistant Secretary of Housing, says bitcoin is a pump-and-dump operation in which the financial predators are busy buying up real-estate property and gold with the money they’re collecting for sales of bitcoin, which they’re planning to collapse. They’ll have capital based on real goods, while bitcoin owners will have worthless paper. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c-2MiRPD6Dk