The clash between decentralized instruments and regulatory bodies is getting hotter and hotter these days. Centralized actors could not find a proper way to control the crypto market and especially Bitcoin; however, they give rise to a disturbance through some practices. The last example was witnessed in the UK.
A Bitcoin advertisement created by Coinflooor has been banned by the UK Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) due to the reason that the ad was “socially irresponsible” and “misleading”.
The ad was published in the Northamptonshire Telegraph on 3 December 2020 with the title: “There is no point in keeping your money in the bank.” After the title, there are words from a 63-year-old woman: “I come from a generation of savers, not spenders…Today there is no point keeping it in the bank – the interest rates are insulting…That is why when I received my pension, I put a third of it into gold, a third of it into silver and the remainder into Bitcoin.”
The ASA stated that they followed a complaint pointing out that the ad aimed to manipulate retirees. Another basis of the ban was the lack of information about the risks of Bitcoin trading in the ad. The Bitcoin market is not regulated in Britain and this decision can be seen as a challenge between the market and the regulators themselves.
The reader also told that the ad was “socially irresponsible” since Bitcoin is not secure to invest with savings and pensions that can be an assurance for the elderly people in the future.
The counter-argument of Coinfloor was that the ad shows the point of the woman, not the exchange. Moreover, the cryptocurrency exchange stated that there was actually a brief warning in a small print indicating the risk of loss of the invested capital.
However, ASA claimed that the disclaimer is not enough to make people realize the real risks of the cryptocurrency and banned the advertisement which cannot be published in its current form.
