Who knows, if the Chinese government hadn't acted against Bitcoin, we could have seen $8000 or even more. The Chinese are the most populous nation on earth and you can't ignore them.
If China did this, or if China did that, then things would look like this or that -
if has zero value. China is known for interrupting the growth of certain sites and services (doesn't just relate to crypto) by using their ban hammer. Bitcoin offers one, actually two, very important features; 1) It allows people to lock their wealth outside the reach of their government. 2) People can use Bitcoin to move their wealth from their country, to another one, and that in a matter of seconds. These two aspects of Bitcoin are what the Chinese government fears the most, and that's pretty well known in general.
You really do have a point there mate. It has been a norm for China to always try their best to want to manipulate everything but I guess they have been able to find out by now that trying to manipulate bitcoin isn't just going to work the way they want. I am in China today, if you ban bitcoin, I will definitely move to another country that accepts bitcoin. Moreover, it is not like they will wake up one day and just have a right over my wallet. After all, this is one of the value of bitcoin in the first place... having a currency that cannot be controlled or manipulated by any government or body.