Why are the actions by China read as self serving price manipulation instead of the expected approach of an autocratic and opaque government? Is the crackdown inconsistent with how they usually handle emerging and somewhat undefined threats to their control?
What higher order goal does profiteering serve? Or is the top of the government willing to let lower regulators run their own rackets on this scale?
Tether:
How much confidence do people have in this? You can see when new ones are created here
http://omnichest.info/lookupadd.aspx...o5LsPTW1zBTwXL
The largest exchange by far is totally dependent on these as are several others. They cannot be exchanged for fiat and it does not appear that will change anytime soon. Tether admits to playing a cat and mouse game evading bank policies banning them, what major correspondent bank will touch them? Everyone is buying BTC with new ones purported to be created by backing of large institutional investors. Who is buying 300 million of these if they come with no rights at all and it is almost impossible to send fiat to or from Tether.
Right now Bitfinex dominates volume, yet the only thing you can do with the USDT you receive for selling is buy more bitcoins. When people want actual money what happens?