In a recent development involving the Chinese messaging app giant WeChat updating its payment policy, and restricting the use of cryptocurrency services on its platform, slight tension may have been created in the Chinese Bitcoin market.
The development was brought to the notice of the larger cryptocurrency community in a Tweet made by Dovey Wan, a founding partner at cryptoasset fund Primitive, noting how the policy change may impact local liquidity as most of the over-the-counter (OTC) transactions occur on the social app.
Urgh, Wechat just updated its payment policy .. merchant can’t serve any token issuance/fund raising or crypto trading activities, otherwise account will be terminated
Given most OTC transactions are happening in wechat, this may impact local liquidity to quite some extent pic.twitter.com/TdNIO6cggS
— Dovey “Rug The Fiat” Wan?? (@DoveyWan) May 7, 2019
While the action of WeChat seems stifling to crypto adoption and usage, Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao (CZ) suggests they may have been pressured to do so. “But more and more restrictions are forced upon them (probably not their own choice),” he said. CZ further amplified his optimistic view on the matter in an accompanying tweet:
No need to worry. Some negative news often turn out to be positive in the long term. Chinese have a proverb for this. New (often better) opportunities always emerge during times of change.
— CZ ? Binance (@cz_binance) March 23, 2018
Although the news may not have directly impacted the global market in any noticeable way, as the price of Bitcoin has been somewhat resistant to negative media influence or the unfortunate series of events that have plagued the sector in recent times.
Last year, WeChat made a similar move when the central bank of China – the People’s Bank of China (PBOC) – began its clampdown on cryptocurrency trading and initial coin offerings. At the time, WeChat followed up the warnings with the suspension of cryptocurrency related accounts on its platform which affected many merchants and businesses subscribed to the platform. Although Leonhard Weese, the president of the Bitcoin Association of Hong Kong told Cointelegraph that many of the alleged suspended accounts were “blocked for talking about the vaccination scandal, not because of crypto.” However, this recent development has further proven the stance of WeChat towards cryptocurrencies.
In another news, Facebook seems to be doing a lot more than just developing a cryptocurrency, it is pulling resources to make way for the industry, perhaps carving an adoption path for its cryptocurrency when it’s developed. It is hiring experts from numerous fields and adjusting its policies to conform to a more crypto friendly stance.
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