Bitcoin Roundup: Senator Wants to Ban It, Chinese Still Excited, Price Still Stable

As I
noted the other day, people delight in interpreting every bit
of bad news related to Bitcoin as a sign that it’s dead, despite
evidence that people’s interest in owning and using it, as measured
by price, is barely effected; West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin can’t
wait, though, and calls for a (useless and impossible)
ban of the cryptocoin, The Hill reports:

Manchin, in a letter to Federal Reserve Chairwoman Janet Yellen
and other officials, said the administration should join other
countries in banning it as a currency.

Manchin said he was worried about criminal use of the currency
to launder money and traffic drugs, and warned it could pose a
threat to the U.S. economy — especially if other countries get
ahead of the U.S. in banning or regulating it.

“The clear ends of Bitcoin for either transacting in illegal
goods and services or speculative gambling make me weary [sic] of
its use,” he told the heads of the Treasury Department, Federal
Reserve, Securities and Exchange Commission, Commodity Future
Trading Commission, Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and
Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.

“Before the U.S. gets too far behind the curve on this important
topic, I urge the regulators to work together, act quickly, and
prohibit this dangerous currency from harming hard-working
Americans.”

While the Chinese government has made moves to quash Bitcoin use
in its nation,
it isn’t working that well, the South China Morning
Post reports:

Since Tuesday, more than 30,000 bitcoins have changed hands in
China. That’s four times the usual trade volume…

Bobby Lee, chief executive of one of mainland China’s biggest
exchanges, BTC China, said: “Much more bitcoin is flowing around
the system in China.”

Hao Hong, managing director and chief China strategist at Bank
of Communications, said: “I think people are trying to trade the
market….”

It marks a strong return to the market for Chinese investors
after the People’s Bank of China moved to cool interest in
bitcoin.

Mt. Gox, the big Bitcoin exchange whose disappearance launched
this week’s wave of “Bitcoin is dead” cheering, is the
subject of a federal subpoena, likely sent pre-collapse,
Reuters notes.

And the Los Angeles Times editorial page, which
intelligently noted today that we need to “Let
investors ride out bitcoin booms and busts,” should talk to its
news pages, which the other day ran a story under a headline that
was not supported in any way by the facts or what’s even in the
article itself, “Bitcoin
virtual currency is on verge of collapse.”

Bitcoin price as it dies, dies, dies?
Still in the $580-600 range. Which, depending on whether you
are looking at five months ago or three months ago, is either a
huge raise or a huge dip, but still barely effected so far by the
death blow of Mt. Gox.