Cryptocurrency Or Fiat Money: Which Currency Is Most Used In Criminal Activities?

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Are We Criminals?

Don’t you hate it when the Federal Reserve tries to besmirch cryptocurrency to prop up the US Dollar? I sure do.

For example, the President of the Minneapolis Federal Reserve, Neel Kashkari claimed during an interview that cryptocurrency, specifically Bitcoin have no real use-case and was almost exclusively used for criminal activities.

“I was more optimistic about crypto or bitcoin about five or six years ago. So far, what I’ve seen is 99% … Let me be charitable, 95% fraud, hype, noise and confusion.” – Neel Kashkari

Ah yes… criminal activities…

If Neel Kashkari was to be believed then millions of oversea workers from Africans and Asian countries that choose to send remittance to their home countries through cryptocurrencies must all be criminals.

Thousands of regular people writing on platforms like read.cash, Hive.blog, Steemit, etc. and getting paid with BCH, HIVE, and STEEM, and other cryptocurrencies were probably criminals too.

How about those banks that are offering crypto-related services or online merchants buying and selling goods and services with cryptocurrency? Of course they’re criminals too, silly.

Oh, and let’s not forget charitable institutions around the world that had received cryptocurrencies worth millions, and the research project being funded by cryptocurrencies – no doubt about it those are criminal activities perpetrated by hardened criminals as well (sarcasm).

Cryptocurrency have many critics and naysayers but even they would not claim that cryptocurrency has no use-case nor is it (almost) exclusively used for criminal and illegal activities.

But then again, he is the president of the Minneapolis Federal Reserve so it’s only expected of him to talk trash about cryptocurrency. Of course that doesn’t mean that he should just be allowed to get away saying things like that.

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The Real Culprit Is Not Cryptocurrency, It’s Fiat Money

Although cryptocurrencies were indeed being used by some bad actors for criminal activities, it still fails in comparison to fiat money like the US dollar or Euros.

In reality less than 1% of cryptocurrencie (0.34% in 2020) are being used for illegal activities.  Majority of criminal and illegal activities around that world are still being perpetrated using fiat money.

This was made clear by US Congressman Tom Emmer who responded to Neel Kashkari’s claim that cryptocurrency was mostly being used for illegal activities with a tweet. Last Thurdays, Congressman Tom Emmer tweeted:

“Crypto-based crime represented only 0.34% of the entire transaction volume in 2020. Unfortunately, most crime is still conducted with the cash you print.” - Tom Emmer

Indeed. When Neel Kashkari claimed that 99%, or 95% are being used for criminal activities he was simply bullshitting. He might have seen the data analysis stating that less than 1% of cryptocurrency was being used illegally while 99% were being used legally so he decided to flip it around hoping that those who were ignorant about cryptocurrency would buy his bullshit.

It’s also possible that Neel Kashkari was just projecting. As Congressman Tom Emmer had said in his tweet, most crime is still being conducted with fiat money like the US dollar that the Federal Reserve had printed. So if less than 1% of crimes were crypto-related then we could assume that the rest (99%) were fiat-related.

He's basically putting all the blame on cryptocurrency even those crimes that were perpetrated through the US dollar (USD).

The President of the Minneapolis Federal Reserve wasn’t the only government official that chooses to completely ignore the data. There are lots of them on our government right now. It was because of these officials that the proposed amendment to clarify the unclear definition of the term “broker” in the new cryptocurrency bill was denied.

Fortunately, cryptocurrency also have its allies in the government so it’s not like the industry is completely at the mercy of these close-minded regulators. That said politicians that are supporting cryptocurrency are still in the minority but I believed that this will change in the future.

 A Changing Trend

The biggest obstacle that hinders cryptocurrency from gaining mainstream status was obviously the government or to be more precise, regulators. But the opposite is also true; if we could change these regulators from being skeptics to supporters then they could also become the industry’s greatest allies.

And you’ll be surprise to find out that this is already happening. Over the years, politicians that are supporting cryptocurrency have grown in number. Sure, there are still more politicians that are against cryptocurrency but the trend is changing and in my opinion it’s only a matter of time before the situation is reversed.

A good example of this is the Mayor of the US city of Jackson, Tennessee, Scott Conger, who believed that cryptocurrency is the future monetary system.

Mayor Scott Conger started to think this way after seeing the US dollar losing value as the federal government prints more money. And while all of this is happening, Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are gaining momentum.

The Jackson city mayor was so impressed by cryptocurrency that he was even considering converting the salary of the employees of his city to cryptocurrency among other things.

Mayor Jackson believed that by converting the city government's employees salary into cryptocurrency, he is helping them as the buying power that there salary entailed would be protected.

Moreover, Mayor Conger wasn’t the only politician that thinks highly of cryptocurrency. Younger and more open-minded politicians are replacing the old ones. And if the trend continues, which I think would; cryptocurrency would have a sizeable voice in the government before long.

That is all. Cheers!

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Disclaimer: This article was double-checked using the online tool Plagiarism Detector to ensure originality.

My other articles: https://read.cash/@beastion