Bitcoin News, Update: US-China Cold War Brewing over Cryptocurrency; White House to Weaponize Ripple?

Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are already considered to be the future of the world economy by many financial experts, and China’s major control over the market has caused a huge concern. Now, it would seem that the White House is finally taking notice and has come to fear China’s Bitcoin authority. As such, there are reports that the Trump administration wants to use Ripple as a countermeasure.

As Forbes reports, it would appear that the considerable control that China has over Bitcoin has finally made Trump’s White House take notice. With the Asian giant controlling the bitcoin hash rate by 70 percent, there is no mistaking who is the top dog is in this race. In order to counteract this influence, Ripple might be the U.S.’s only hope.

In an interview with Breaker, the chief strategist at Ripple Lab, Cory Johnson, explained how the White House is now turning to the cryptocurrency to take away some of the power that China has amassed. It basically depends on the fact that, unlike with Bitcoin, Ripple is not mined.

"The White House, in particular, seems to be thinking about what it means to have 80 percent of bitcoin mining taking place in China and a majority of ether mining taking place in China," Johnson told the publication.

"When you look at XRP [Ripple], there is no mining, so from a foreign-control aspect or from an environmental aspect, XRP is a very different beast. And in conversations we’ve had with the administration, they seem to get that and think that might matter."

This would certainly make sense since mining is basically where China has an edge with regards to Bitcoin. Due to the country’s overwhelming focus on trying to edge out the competition in any way it can, it is able to pour resources into activities like mining. This is just not how things are done in the U.S., which is why it is losing the crypto battle.