Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC)

[tw0122]

As previously stated China will not completely clamp down on Bitcoin as this would put it a technological disadvantage. They will also protect NK who Imports 90% of goods from China. The problem is, however, that Beijing has valid reasons not to be too harsh on Pyongyang. While Chinese leaders do not like North Korea’s nuclear program, they are afraid that truly comprehensive sanctions might, indeed, push North Korea to the brink of economic collapse, which would be followed by political disintegration. From their point of view, North Korea in a state of civil war would be a greater threat than the nuclear-armed but relatively stable North Korea that exists now. Even worse, a crisis in North Korea might result in a German-style reunification of the country under Seoul’s control — that is, the emergence of a united, democratic and nationalistic Korean state that would probably be an ally of the United States. This is not an outcome that would be welcomed in Beijing.

Apart from this, the Chinese experts know that North Korea sees nuclear weapons as the only guarantee of the regime’s survival and thus will not surrender its nukes even under the greatest pressure imaginable. Thus, a Chinese boycott of North Korea — something the Trump administration would like to see — would be highly unlikely to produce the desirable result of denuclearization but much more likely to provoke the kind of crisis that China fears.

So the expectations of the Trump administration are misplaced. Beijing would rather deal with consequences of a trade war with Washington than with those of a real war nearby — even though it is no hurry to advertise this position.