This week the Canadian government ordered crypto exchanges to freeze certain accounts tied to the Ottawa freedom protest.
This set off a wave of concern over the risk of government seizing crypto assets. And that’s a very real danger.
There was an interesting exchange on Twitter where Jesse Powell, co-founder and CEO of crypto exchange Kraken, essentially said government seizures do happen and crypto owners who are worried about them should get all their money off the exchange.
100% yes it has/will happen and 100% yes, we will be forced to comply. If you’re worried about it, don’t keep your funds with any centralized/regulated custodian. We cannot protect you. Get your coins/cash out and only trade p2p.
— Jesse Powell (@jespow) February 18, 2022
Long term, it’s definitely a smart move to take control of your own coins. But only do so once you have a good plan in place for cold storage and backup. I recommend a hardware wallet — such as a Ledger — and a place to securely and secretly store it.
If you’re dealing with a large amount of crypto, it probably makes sense to use a multi-sig (multi-signature) provider such as Casa, which I hear excellent things about.
Long term, these moves will solidify bitcoin’s role as an alternative form of money. In the short term, however, we might see crypto holders sell off due to fears of government interference. We’ll have to see what Biden’s executive orders on crypto reveal next week. I don’t expect him to take too hard of a line, considering how unpopular his administration is already.