Bit Coin
Bit Coin
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*Dr. Arvind Kumar Singh
**Karan Veer Singh
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ABSTRACT: Imagine a country which has a large economy and a despotic regime. This
place is prosperous despite having complex and arbitrary rules and regulations designed to
keep non-oligarchs perpetually nervous. Everybody has to carry an internal passport.
Censorship and surveillance are all-pervasive. Bank accounts can be frozen at will. Property
is confiscated on a whim. Nothing is denied to the oligarchs and their little princes and
princesses. But non-oligarchs must ask permission even for simple things like getting
married, having children, running businesses, et cetera. Those who have become rich, never
mind how, want to store nest eggs abroad in case the regime suddenly goes after them. But of
course, it’s a criminal offense to walk into the bank and convert local currency. Calling
bitcoins, the “next big thing since the internet and computing” themselves are major
statements to make. Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies may not be much of a threat fiat
currency today in India. Cryptocurrencies are a type of digital money that rely on distributed
networks and shared transaction ledgers to combine the core ideas of cryptography with a
monetary system to create an anonymous, traceable, secure and potentially stable virtual
currency and it will be effective in India. Bitcoin and Ethereum are two highly disruptive
cryptocurrencies looking to leverage blockchain technologies to drive innovation across
numerous industries in India. With regards to the Blockchain, India can’t be overlooked. It is
an incredible country with more than a billion people who recently experienced
demonetization. The objectives of this paper are to understand the future of cryptocurrency in
India, to evaluate the perception of bitcoin as the future currency and to analyze the
probability of legalization of bitcoins in India.
*Dr. Arvind Kumar Singh, M.Com, MBA, UGC (NET), Ph.D, Assistant Prof. Amity University
Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow Campus, Lucknow, INDIA
Email: [email protected], Mobile No: +91-9473662323
**Karan Veer Singh, MBA, UGC (NET), Assistant Prof. Rameshwaram Institute of Technology and
Management, Lucknow, INDIA,
Email: [email protected], Mobile No: +91-9026447923
OBJECTIVES:
To study the concept of cryptocurrency, also understanding the bitcoins and its scope
To study the legalization of bitcoins in India, its comparison with other
cryptocurrencies and the government’s stand towards it
To study the future of cryptocurrency in India, and the views of experts for investing
in the same
INTRODUCTION: That is the time that numerous Indians started capitalizing their cash in
Bitcoin and proceed to owe them now. This spike drove some tech-savvy citizens of the India
to purchase Bitcoins as well as accomplish something with the blockchain protocol itself in
India. One can argue that while Satoshi Nakamoto invented Bitcoin, it is India that may well
be the first country to entrench its credibility as an alternate monetary system. Every year, we
have seen the crypto network growing at a rapid pace. Apart from that, there is no one who
understands Indian consumers better than native companies. In a country like India, where we
value everything by its monetary worth, the sure-shot way to beat cash is to make currency
that is more valuable than cash. A crypto exchange and a wallet that would allow hundreds of
millions of citizens of the India to become part of the crypto economy will be a great leap for
the entire blockchain community. Currently, the crypto-currency is neither illegal nor legal in
India. The government is considering the introduction of a regulatory regime for virtual or
crypto-currencies, such as Bitcoin, that would enable the levy of the Goods and Services Tax
on their sale. The new regime may possibly bring their trading under the oversight of the
stock market regulator, Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI). The idea is to treat
such currency in a manner similar to gold sold digitally, so that it can be traded on registered
exchanges in a bid to “promote” a formal tax base, while keeping a tab on their use for illegal
activities such as money laundering, terror funding and drug trafficking. Crypto-currency is a
digital currency that allows transacting parties to remain anonymous while confirming the
transaction is valid. It is not owned or controlled by any institution – governments or private.
There are multiple such currencies — Bitcoin, Ethereum and Ripple are some of the popular
ones. Currently, they are neither illegal nor legal in India. “One bitcoin today is worth as
much as 60 grams of gold. The market cap for all crypto-currencies has just crossed $100
billion, with most of the increase coming in the past few months. On April 1, 2017, the total
market cap was just over $25 billion, representing a 300% rise in just over 60 days,” said a
senior government official.
“The discussion on whether crypto-currencies should be banned or regulated has been on for
some time. The pros and cons for both aspects were put forth in the meeting chaired by
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley last month,” the official told The Hindu. A proposal to ban
such currency altogether was also considered at the meeting, but found few takers among top
officials from the Ministries of Finance, Home Affairs and IT as well as SEBI, the Reserve
Bank of India, the State Bank of India and NITI Aayog. Bitcoins were in the news recently
when during the two global cyber ransom ware attacks Wanna Cry and Petya attackers sought
about $300 in bitcoin as ransom. Crypto-currency can also be used for a lot of legal activities
depending of which retailers accept such currency. Even as economies like Japan and Russia
move to legalize the use of Bitcoins, India, despite being at the cusp of a digital revolution is
yet to officially recognize the cryptocurrency. India's central bank, the Reserve bank of India
or the RBI, which regulates Indian rupee, had earlier cautioned users, holders and traders of
Virtual currencies (VCs), including Bitcoins. "The creation, trading or usage of VCs
including Bitcoins, as a medium for payment are not authorised by any central bank or
monetary authority. No regulatory approvals, registration or authorisation is stated to have
been obtained by the entities concerned for carrying on such activities," the central bank had
said In March, RBI Deputy Governor R Gandhi warned against crypto-currencies such as
Bitcoin. "They pose potential financial, legal, customer protection and security-related risks,"
Gandhi said. "Payments by such currencies are on a peer-to- peer basis and there is no
established framework for recourse to customer problems, disputes, etc. Legal status is
definitely not there," he added.
What is Bitcoin?
Bitcoin is a cryptocurrency and worldwide payment system. Bitcoin is a digital currency
created in 2009 by Satoshi Nakamoto. It based on the ideas set out in a white paper by the
mysterious Satoshi Nakamoto whose true identify has yet to be verified. Bitcoin regulate and
generate units of currency using the rules of cryptography. It is also called as decentralized
digital currency. The transaction fees of traditional online payment mechanisms are more
than the transaction fees of bitcoin transaction. These transactions operated by a decentralized
authority unlike government-issued currencies. Bitcoins are completely virtual coins designed
to be self-contained for their value. There is no need for bank to move and store money.
Bitcoins are not physically present, so that only balances are kept on a public wallet in the
cloud. All bitcoin transaction is verified by a massive amount of computing power. A
personal database that you can store on your computer drive, on your smart phone, on your
tablet or somewhere in the cloud is called wallet. Bitcoins are transferred from one personal
wallet to another.
In India, the Mumbai film industry seems to love bitcoin, given the number of celebrities who
have burbled about it. But the Chinese crackdown and fears that India might see a similar
crackdown have led to wild swings in rupee-values of bitcoin. The bitcoin was trading at Rs
3.01 lakh on September 1, it dropped to Rs 1.95 lakh on September 15 as panic took hold,
and it is back to Rs 2.58 lakh on September 20. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has been
consistent in warning citizens of the risk associated with cryptocurrencies and traders of its
perils, Indian Prime minister, Sri Narendra Modi, indirectly promoted Bitcoin, on July, 2,
2015, with his ambitious Digital India. Plans included digitizing government data, improving
India’s digital infrastructure, and optimizing its online connectivity. The Finance Minister in
the country has labelled cryptocurrencies are not being legal tender. In recent time a debate
has emerged within the country as to whether profits from crypto transaction should be taxed
or not. Last week, India’s Department of Economic Affairs in its Ministry of Finance met to
discuss how Bitcoin could be regulated. The committee suggested the following, that
cryptocurrencies should be governed by the Reserve Bank of India Act of 1934, that Bitcoin
investors should be taxed, that guidelines for buying and investing in cryptocurrencies should
be drafted. As per business standard report the Indian government is going to introduce its
own Cryptocurrency similar to bitcoin. They also added that the government might its
cryptocurrency “Lakshmi”. In a move to regulate the cryptocurrency market in India, Finance
Minister Arun Jaitley today cleared that it is not legal tender and it will discourage its use.
However, he mentioned that the government will look at the utilization of blockchain
technology. During the run-up to the budget, there have been talks that the government could
come out with a roadmap to regulate the cryptocurrency market. There has been rising craze
among investors to put in their hard-earned money into the highly volatile cryptocurrency
market setting off alarm bells in the government. Even before the budget Jaitley had already
said that the Cryptocurrency is not legal tender in India. The recent action of conducting
survey by the IT department over all the major exchanges has also triggered issuance of
income tax demand notice by the department to the users of these exchanges. There have
been reports that several banks have frozen account cryptocurrency exchanges in India, while
the registrar of companies (ROC) has stopped registering companies intending to act as such
exchanges.
ENTRANCE OF RBI:
Will the Reserve Bank of India try to regulate bitcoins and other crypto-currencies? Almost
certainly. No government that imposes capital account currency controls can afford to ignore
non-fiat currencies. Will the Indian government mess up attempts at regulation? Almost
certainly. The RBI doesn’t have a shining track record in terms of its recent actions and it
could fumble this task, for sure. In fact, the RBI is supposedly considering setting up its own
crypto-currency, which is a step in the wrong direction. Crypto-currencies work for people
who want anonymity and who are seeking alternative stores of value. No fiat currency, crypto
or not, can reasonably offer this combination. What’s more, crypto-currencies have features
(and bugs) that fiat currencies don’t and that’s precisely why users love them. The blockchain
system of generating an exact increase in money supply gives comfort to speculators. This
eliminates worries about inflation caused by a sudden expansion of money supply by the
central bank since there is no central bank and the money supply is governed by pure maths.
This also makes fractional reserve banking cumbersome since currency swaps or exchanges
are always required for such actions.
Also, while bitcoin, ethereum, and other crypto-currencies can be banned by government
decree, these cannot be withdrawn from circulation except by peer-to-peer consent. A fiat
crypto-currency – well, that could be deleted in a minute at the whim of an oligarch. Indians
started trading in bitcoins and other crypto-currencies enthusiastically after Nov 08, 2016,
precisely because they became wary about such possibilities. It’s hard to see a fiat crypto-
currency catching on.
Bitcoins vs bonds
A bond is where the investor lends some money to a corporation for a certain time period at a
fixed interest rate. This option for investing is not safe as it depends upon a third party,
whereas bitcoin is independent where a user doesn’t depend on a third party. Bitcoin allows
the user to be powerful on their own.
Bitcoin seems to give you better when you talk about Bitcoin Vs Bonds.
FUTURE OF CRYPTOCURRENCY
Cryptocurrencies like bitcoins are rapidly mutating into real money that will give a healthy
competition to the different currencies issued by the centralised governing bodies. Bitcoin’s
current price hike could reflect a bright future therefore, it can be clearly seen that Bitcoins
has a very bright future ahead. Cryptocurrency is also called as digital money in any payment
system such as the points we get in some random stores can be called as digital money or
cryptocurrency because it can be used instead of physical money for payment. The genuine
cryptocurrency is the decentralised. Cryptocurrency will be grown in future and will have a
huge scope ahead, however this new form of currency does not benefits all systems of power
and control that are currently in place. It’s hard to tell what fight will be put up in order to
control cryptocurrency and the obstacles that will need to be overcome to solidify its presence
in everyday life.
It has the potential to be the world’s currency in future there will be no need to keep a
specific currency for every individual country all the time. With a type of currency which is
difficult to regulate , which is decentralise, that anybody can use and that eliminates the
exchange rates across the world makes the future of the world by being a centralised currency
across the world. This suggests the concept one world one currency. Central banks are slowly
arriving to the conclusion that cryptocurrency are here to stay. And according to various
research papers and economist the value of digital currencies such as bitcoin are market
determined still there is a lot of analysis to be done regarding the effect of cryptocurrency in
future. Example of cryptocurrency:- Ether(ETH), Litecoin (LTC), Bitcoin . And in these
“Ether” is the second largest cryptocurrency in terms of market cap. Litecoin enables faster
block time around 2.5 minutes whereas, bitcoin needs 10 minutes so Litecoin enables faster
exchange between users.
The analysis of the price movement of 10 largest cryptocurrencies in the past two and half
months throws up interesting patterns. Although Bitcoin has got the highest attention in the
world, there are other currencies that actually fetch far higher returns for investments. If you
had bought Rs 1 lakh worth of these crypto currencies in October, how much your investment
would be worth in Dec?
CRYPTOCURRENCY IN INDIA
In India bitcoins has been available since 2012.And at present in India there are 11 trading
platforms and around 1 million users of bitcoin. At the movement RBI has banned the
transaction of bitcoins in India. So, one cannot use the cryptocurrency for the payments of
goods and services. Recently in 2018 during the union budget declaration the Indian
government declared that cryptocurrencies such as bitcoins were not a legal tender. There is
no protection available to those using and trading them or dealing in them. In recent days
finance minister Arun Jaitely said when asked by the media the Government views on
cryptocurreny he said the government was aware that the cryptocurrency is being used for the
illegal activities such as terrorism, cryptocurrencies function within the community and they
enjoy the trust of that.
According to the Indian government people using these types of currencies should take
certain caution because there is no lawful protection for these currencies. And no help can be
gained by the people from the government side if some fraud is faced by the people.
Regarding the future of cryptocurrencies in India an expert committee also constituted to
measure the risk involved in it. This committee will examine the action of cryptocurrencies
and release the report in few months. Some countries are accepting the cryptocurrencies
while some are not, some of them are yet to make their decision. Cryptocurrencies has its
own set of complications.
CONCLUSION:
Observers predict that India’s government will regulate Bitcoin in stages. India’s Bitcoin
industry welcomes these changes knowing that government acceptance will give the
cryptocurrency the backing it needs. In fact, India’s Bitcoin industry has long tried to
popularize Bitcoin with strategies that include conducting security checks, requesting
identification from users, such as government-verified address documents, Permanent
Account Numbers (PAN) or Aadhaar IDs, and sometimes even checking bank details. Private
Bitcoin companies have also launched an association, called the Digital Assets and
Blockchain Foundation India (BFI), to educate lay people on Bitcoin benefits and usage.
Government intervention credits their efforts. In terms of creation, Bitcoins are definitely one
of The greatest innovations of man. Most banks these days are trying to use the block chain
technology and since the government has not authorized Bitcoins, it has decided to introduce
its own cryptocurrency named “Lakshmi”. This information was revealed by RBI‟s executive
chairman Sudarshan Sen who also mentioned that the committee that proposed this idea is in
its process of research. On the other hand, experts wonder whether some of these intended
regulations will harm Bitcoin in that government interference contradicts Bitcoin’s allure,
while other rules may hamper the blockchain innovation and development
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