Is it surprising that this was their first reaction? Indeed, a few years ago, Russia's Prosecutor General said that BTC payments were illegal. And US Congresspeople were also calling for it to be banned. But look at how far we've come..... now Vitalik Buterin is meeting with Vladimir Putin, and a local Russian governor invited miners to set up farms in his province. And the US market is now getting regulated futures products from LedgerX and the CME group.

I heard once that Bitcoin needs to be banned in a few places for it to remain relevant. I guess it means that governments can see that it's gaining a foothold among their citizens. In the end, governments can't stop it. They can't stop P2P transactions, no matter how much surveillance and packet analysis they do. Recently, Vietnam and Morocco have banned the use of BTC. It looks like BTC is still relevant!