This is not a "beartroll FUD, OMG U NEeD CHEAP MY CHEAP COINS" post, its a simple argument:
A) Imagine that you are running an exchange that is so big, that every other exchange is simply following what you do. The price is pretty much attached to your action.
I think this is a reasonable claim. If you monitor the current price action, the western exchanges never lead, it was not like this in the past, there were actually serious actors, and were leading the price with china following them, and vice versa. But not anymore, now the scene is dominated by OKcoin/Huobi.
B) If A) is true, what should happen naturally is this :
A big miner, or most likely a group of miners will approach you with the deal.
What is the end game for the miners? As any investor, they want max ROI % on the investment. What is the best way to do it? To make the BTC price high and sustained.
If someone has the potential ability to control the price (OKcoin/Huobi), miners absolutely MUST try to bribe them into the manipulation(if they are know what they are doing as the investors). Its a very simple game theory move.
Now, any reason to OKcoin/Huobi to deny the deal?
Long term price manipulation is basically impossible in any market.
Remember the good ol' Mt. Gox days? That was a good example
of when there was one centralized place that published the price.
However, the situation is far more decentralized today. If any
exchange tried to manipulate the price, they would have to
continue to pay for it because arbitragers would take advantage
of the situation.
If the price was too high, I would buy lower elsewhere, and
sell on the manipulating exchange, and if the price was too
low, I would buy coins on the manipulating exchange and
sell them elsewhere.
The only reason people couldn't do this with Mt. Gox is
because they couldn't get their money out! lol.
If there really was only a single exchange, it would be
easier to manipulate the price in the short term, but
would still be playing a risky game, either buying higher
or selling lower than market prices.
No. I strongly disagree. If you are not chineese its very hard to gain an arbitrage on differences in chineese and foreigners exchanges if its not higher than 30 usd on a bitcoin. If that would be the other way around, if the bitcoins would be once higher and once cheape,r it would open the way to arbitrage. But its always higher. Ok you have sold your bitcoins there. What do you do with those Cny? Do you withdraw them? No you cant. You are not a chineese.
Have you ever tried to arbitrage in chineese exchanges? You had plenty of time now. Half of the year price was 30 usd or higher. Why wouldnt you arbitrage? Youve said you would. You had a chance.
Lets face the reality and stop being in denial. Chineese are far aware of their superiour position to dictate the price and noone can mess around their machinations if they have at least a bit of oil in their heads.
Btw there are too many man in their country and not enough woman. So the woman they have are extremely needy and picky. The drive to success and greed is beyond our ability to understand. Those people are terminaly sick with greed.