China not yet done with pressures against the crypto industry 

The “ray of sunshine” that the crypto community in China has been waiting for a long time may not yet arrive this month, or to be more realistic — it may not come at all.

After months of crackdowns against any crypto-related activities, the Chinese government has announced that it would further intensify its actions against its crypto community.

The People’s Bank of China has released a document recently in which it stated that existing measures will be further toughened and intensified to completely eradicate crypto activities in the country.

It’s official: It’s illegal

The central bank said that services that let citizens exchange fiat currencies and crypto assets or between crypto-assets themselves are now officially treated by the government as illegal activities.

This also means that any citizens who would engage in these activities would be met with legal consequences from the government.

PBOC said that it will focus on over-the-counter services that are found to be still available in Binance, Huobi, and OKEx. These services allow citizens to exchange fiat into crypto assets which they will then use in crypto trading transactions.

The central bank also made it clear that it is also illegal for overseas companies to offer crypto services to the people of China. But even with this warning, it is not yet clear if Binance, Huobi, and OKEx would stop their over-the-counter crypto services.

It’s getting serious

The document that was released by PBOC was signed, not only by government agencies but by law enforcement as well, which means that police can be deployed anytime to clamp down on crypto activities in the country.

Since the previous crackdowns haven’t deterred crypto companies from stopping their operations in China, the government decided to further toughen its measures against these companies.

Image courtesy of Cointelegraph News/YouTube