French government FOMO's into crypto!! Biggest news all year
French Minister of Economy and Finance Bruno Le Maire is going all-in into blockchain. At the opening of the Paris Blockchain Week he disclosed that he is a great believer in the technology and wants to make France a global leader in it. The French government wants to create a blockchain-friendly ecosystem and is going to actively work on stimulating the sector domestically. Le Maire also called on other international leaders to follow in France's suit.
France is the first big nation to FOMO in!
His speech today was covered by some media, but nobody seems to have taken the time to actually translate what Bruno Le Maire was saying. The French Minister of Economy and Finance turns out to be a MEGA-BULL when it comes to blockchain!
He says he believes firmly in blockchain and that it is not just a technological revolution but a democratic one too. The way that blockchain can flatten hierarchical structures is of great interest to him because of the freedom and democratic benefits it brings to citizens and consumers.
He mentions that it's not just about finances, but also about logistics in the food industry and farming sector, among others.
He further goes on to say that "The [blockchain] revolution has already begun" and if that is the case then France wants to be at the forefront of it instead of lagging behind.
So France is going all-in on blockchain and Le Maire expressed a desire to make France the global leader in blockchain. To accomplish this the French government will actively try to create a blockchain friendly ecosystem without any of the hurdles that the blockchain-industry currently faces. That includes clear and friendly regulations, to which he points to the recent crypto-laws that allow French insurance companies to invest directly in crypto.
Furthermore, the state will invest as much as €4.5 billion euros in the next five years for innovative projects such as blockchain.
Additionaly the government will create a crypto-whitelist to which companies can opt to be placed on. It is not mandatory but it serves as a way of showing which projects are OK'ed by the government. Projects not on the whitelist are not hindered in any way.
Lastly, he calls upon his colleagues in the EU and internationally to follow France's model and come together to form international guidelines inspired by the French model.
Make no mistake: This is absolutely huge!!!
This is basically a huge thumbs-up from one of the biggest economies of the world and one of the major ones in the EU. Le Maire makes it clear in his speech that he has every intent of making sure blockchain is stimulated so it can further develop.
It is a giant endorsement and ALLIANCE with the direct leader of the French economy. He has the crypto-bug!!
This will have a huge effect on the EU decisionmaking and policy as well. France is likely to exert a very positive influence on the rest of the EU countries. And with France FOMO'ing in first, how long is it going to take before the FOMO strikes every other nation as well?
Blockchain is real and it's here to stay. We even have the French Minister of Economy on our side! ✊
You can watch the speech too (here), but it's in French. That's probably why you haven't heard of all of this yet! The news outlets seem to be too lazy to try and understand it. Luckily, Youtube has an in-built mechanism for autotranslating the speech. It sucks pretty bad, but you can make out what he's saying pretty well if you pay a little attention. Have a look/listen!!
Posted from my blog with SteemPress : https://mentormarket.io/cryptocurrencies/pandorasbox/french-government-fomos-into-crypto-biggest-news-all-year/
Though I believe that this is good news, I think it's important to note that "blockchain" and "crypto-currency" are not synonymous. Many big companies around the world are getting involved with blockchains that do not have crypto currencies associated with them. This could potentially be another case of blockchain adoption that has no impact on crypto. Just something to keep in mind
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Heya! Actually, I think you are right in that the french government means blockchain, not per se bitcoin. But I think it is wrong to seperate blockchain from cryptocurrency. It's okay that the French are confused still, they will figure out that it makes no sense to have one without the other.
What most don't realize is that blockchain isn't a magical new technology.
It is very simply put a safety mechanism to prevent against 51% attacks.
51% attacks are only possible in an open network with untrusted parties (decentralized)
In order to incentive people to run the decentralized network, there is a crypto payment. 'Centralized' (trusted parties or whatever) blockchains need no monetary incentive to run a node, but then again they also do not need protection against 51% attacks.
Ergo, if you don't have an open decentralized network then you don't need a blockchain. In fact a blockchain would be the worst technology to use. It is already and has been for a long time possible to create a distributed network amongst trusted parties. Tokens, smart contracts, all possible in such an environment and have been for a long time.
The only reason to use blockchain data structure is thus to obtain decentralization. And in order to incentivize the decentralized nodes, there needs to be a cryptocurrency. Therefore once 'they' get it, they will understand that in reality the terms are more synonymous than they are not.
You are way smarter at this then I am and understand it more than I probably ever will. I see what you are saying but I'm still confused because I know there are several companies (i believe Microsoft is one of them) that are offering blockchain technology sevices to large corporations. So if I'm understanding what you are saying correctly, the blockchains that these companies are offering are centralized (without a crypto currency) which in turn makes them useless. Is that right?
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Basically, yes. There is a teeny tiny but of nuance maybe but that is the gist of it.
The main reason why companies and governments are piling on blockchain is because they want the benefits, but don't understand the underlying technology. So they take out what they don't like without realizing that also takes away one of the key aspects of what makes it interesting and new.
But there are billions to be made out of this general lack of knowledge. Adding 'blockchain' to your corporation is enough to quadruple it's stock prices.
But decentralization is truly the only thing that matters in a blockchain. You can use existing tech far better for everything that doesn't need decentralization. And what needs it, you ask? Well, things that need high security. Like money or high value things. And in the case of money and high value things, if given the choice between 'completely decentralized' and 'less decentralized', to which blockchain would you trust your billions more?
In my opinion it is inevitable that the majority of wealth will flow into the most decentralized chain, because that is the most secure. Other blockchains can be used in parallel and probably will, though. you might spend and earn money through those, but inevitably once it starts piling up and you want to store it somewhere safe, then it's the decentralized secure chain that you want to store it on.
Interesting and good to know. It's still a bit over my head but I think I understand what you are saying. It makes sense. Thanks for taking the time to explain it. I appreciate that :)
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You're welcome! :)
To finish up my speech, let me just add one little bit.... which is to say: no matter what your favorite coin, be sure to get plenty of btc.
Probably good advice. I dont think that you can ignore bitcoin
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A big step in the right direction
Well I watched the whole video clip (with the translator and I struggling our way through) and MAN is it bullish! Of course I did keep thinking "it's a blockchain conference and he's a politician - he'll tell them what they want to hear" - which is normal for politicians, but if only half of what he says is true then that's already massive news!
Clearly he favours local development and probably private blockchains, but that won't matter in the long run. The only really successful blockchains will be public ones.
Yeah, seriously! He says like one or two things that are negative (used for illegal purposes, energy consumption) but other than that he's totally onboard. IMO he's the most influential and high placed blockchain proponent thus far. You could argue Christine Lagarde perhaps, but Le Maire has actual direct power while she has only indirect power
Lagarde is VERY much the politician when it comes to crypto (even though technically she isn't one). She blows hot and cold. At one stage I thought she was a big crypto bull too, only to read completely contradictory statements shortly thereafter. I wouldn't trust her further than what I can throw her.
Oh yes, I very much agree on Lagarde. I was just referencing that she sometimes speaks positively about blockchain now. But like others she's on the blockchain not bitcoin bandwagon.
It's okay though, one day people will figure it out. I think everybody goes through the same evolution in understanding bitcoin and crypto. They have passed stage 1 where they realized that 'Ok, maybe there is something there' and they are now at the stage where they think they are into alts.
I mean.. 99% of the blockchain projects out there are crap. And I am convinced that in many cases the founders don't know this themselves, because they don't get what the innovation and revolution is at the core. You can see this in Ethereum too. They started out very much on the 'We are better than bitcoin' train but you can tell that Vitalik is having his doubts these days, and he's in it differently than he used to be. Everybody is realizing that it's BTC that matters, and narrative is now shifting to a more 'how can we add/improve on BTC'. Even EOS founders are now saying BTC is likely to succeed and they are suggesting that EOS may be used to scale BTC.
If it took this long for all the altcoin founders to come around, imagine how far off the general public and politicians still are. They're atleast two evolutionary stages behind.
Wonderful reply Pandora, I feel like applauding! I'm busy writing an article somewhat along these lines. I'll only publish after Easter though (I've learnt that weekend posts tend to get ignored). Nice little infographic thingy - I don't completely agree with it, but the message is right. At the end of the day I hold alts to build and maximise my BTC value. Eventually I hope to convert some BTC value into fixed assets. Eventually. Maybe. Lambo. Moon.
Perhaps you remember these:
https://steemit.com/cryptocurrency/@bitbrain/analysis-of-an-analysis-the-imf-trying-to-stop-the-marshall-islands-from-adopting-cryptocurrencies
https://steemit.com/cryptocurrency/@bitbrain/analysis-of-an-analysis-part-2-the-why
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