Never let a good crisis go to waste: How the Feds could use the collapse of FTX to push a digital currency

FILE PHOTO: Samsung's new Samsung Pay mobile wallet system is demonstrated at its Australian launch in Sydney, June 15, 2016. REUTERS/Matt Siegel/File Photo

Revelations 13:16-17 Also it causes all, both small and great, both rich and poor, both free and slave, to be marked on the right hand or the forehead, so that no one can buy or sell unless he has the mark, that is, the name of the beast or the number of its name.

Important Takeaways:

  • The digital dollar is coming on the back of the FTX collapse
  • The arrest of CEO Sam Bankman-Fried may be the smaller news story coming out of the collapse of FTX…it is clear that those at the Federal Reserve and many in Congress have been salivating for such changes for years. This could be a fig leaf to justify it.
  • The purported remedy instead may be the largest fiscal overhaul since the creation of the Fed.
  • [They will sell you the positive side] an effective end to traditional money laundering, and difficulty for criminals to pay for drugs … an end to counterfeiting
  • Your Social Security, welfare or paycheck would be deposited instantly. Your bank accounts would be synced with the Federal Reserve databases, your movements tracked through transactions, and you would become an asset to the Fed just as much as digitally “printed” dollars.
  • [Negative side] It also can be used to track questionable purchases and donations… Considering the relative efficiency of the IRS, it is entirely probable that the agency could send out audit letters to people for Venmo-ing their friends back for their share of a restaurant bill or taxi ride.
  • Furthermore, the digital dollar likely will coincide with a gradual abolishment of physical cash. [Like] Franklin Roosevelt’s Executive Order 6102 banning most private ownership of gold, your financial autonomy would be at risk.
  • The vulture-like actions by those in power to take advantage of the disaster are both predictable and intentional. After all, to paraphrase Rahm Emanuel: Never let a crisis go to waste.

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Kudlow says Trump team ‘open-minded’ about U.S.-China talks next week

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow said on Friday that the U.S. team was “open-minded” about the outcome of U.S.-China trade talks next week, which will include deputy-level meetings on Monday and Tuesday, with minister-level meetings Thursday and Friday.

Kudlow declined to make any predictions about the talks but said that there had been a “softening of the psychology on both sides” in the past month, with the United States delaying some tariff increases and China making some modest purchases of American farm products.

(Reporting by David Lawder; Editing by Kevin Liffey)