Pan Gongsheng, an anti-bitcoinist and deputy governor of the People’s Bank of China, has been appointed as the Communist Party Secretary of China’s Central Bank on Saturday. As per the latest revelations, Gongsheng’s accession to the position of the Central Bank’s party head is an initial step toward becoming the Governor.
A Chinese reporter Colin Wu took to Twitter to throw light on the party’s new move. He reflected on a previous statement of Gongsheng, tweeting, “Sit by the river and watch, one day, the corpse of Bitcoin will float in front of you”:
The Central Bank of China has announced a new head, Pan Gongsheng. In 2017, he once said: "Sit by the river and watch, one day, the corpse of Bitcoin will float in front of you". https://t.co/vD8U4Wi3Hc https://t.co/cmRrB0EmZR
— Wu Blockchain (@WuBlockchain) July 1, 2023
Li Guohui, A Financial Times reporter narrated a meeting in 2017, where Gongsheng shared his insights on China’s stringent regulations on crypto, asserting that China’s ban on Bitcoin trading platforms and Initial Coin Offerings (ICO) has been a good decision.
Citing an article by the French scholar Eric Pichet, Gongsheng spoke:
The Bitcoin bubble is just the latest incarnation of crazy speculation. Historically, crazy speculation has hit financial markets from time to time, such as the ‘tulip mania’ in 1637, the Internet bubble in 2000, etc. No one can predict the speculative wave. How long it lasts and where the top is.
The Central Bank Head continued to quote Pichet’s words, stating, “Markets can be irrational for long enough to bankrupt you.’ So there’s only one thing to do: sit by the river and watch, someday, Bitcoin dead bodies will float by in front of you.”
Though the Central Bank assured that new monetary policies would be implemented by the authority in a “precise and forceful” manner to ensure the growth of employment and the economy, the new Party Secretary’s anti-Bitcoin stance creates anxiety in the crypto space.
