An article has emerged from Het Financieele Dagblad, a Dutch newspaper that focuses on business and financial matters with comments from Da Hongfei regarding NEO and the state of regulations in China.

In the article titled, “Chinese Crypto-emperor: ‘I have not seen a regulator'”, Da tells the reporter that the regulators in China have not contacted him specifically regarding NEO.

“No, none of the supervisors have contacted me. But before they started cleaning up the market, I was asked for information and suggestions.”

During the Reddit AMA back on July 27th, Da repeatedly said that as a community project, NEO has no formal co-operation with the government. He did say however, that there was a level of communication with certain governing bodies though OnChain, who is also a member of an organisation that has established blockchain standards in China.

“As I’ve said replying other questions, NEO as a community project has no formal cooperation with government. But Onchain is in good relationship with local governments and various governing bodies. Onchain is one of a dozen of members in an organization under MIIT to establish Chinese blockchain standards.

*MIIT – Ministry of Industry and Information Technology”

It’s not a surprise that regulators would seek the knowledge of members from such an organisation before making sweeping changes within the blockchain industry.

Da told the reporter at Het Financieele Dagblad that the recent regulations were born out of a fear of losing control of the financial markets, but also said that the ICO ban was probably necessary considering the amount of fraud taking place within China.

“I think the supervisors are particularly worried about the challenges that Bitcoin and other crypto currencies entail. The status of fiduciary money came under pressure.”

“It is worried that crypto currencies will take over existing ways of money transactions and investment. One is afraid to lose control.”

“What the Chinese are doing now is the right thing.. The vast majority of ICO projects were fake and fraud.”

These sentiments echoed the comments made by Da and Patrick Dai from QTUM on the Unchained podcast recently, in which they explained that people were getting scammed out of money on ridiculous ICOs such as the “mooncake” token sale.

Ultimately, Da seemed relatively unfazed by the impact Chinese intervention will have on the NEO project globally, and his focus is on advancing the technology rather than the market price.

“I think you can better check what’s happening in South Korea and Japan. That applies to the Bitcoin, and also to the NEO. China will continue to be an important factor in the course of the short term, but I think most of the issued NEO’s are now in foreign hands.”

“The price moves on the basis of sentiment. The way the market looks at the product does not always allign with the way that product is currently advancing. I’ll keep an eye on the price, but I do not trade much with NEO.”

“We want to be a widely applicable ecosystem with many developers on which many smart contracts can be built.”

“There we still have plenty of room to grow.”

Finally, the article ends with the reporter asking Da Hongfei if there is potential for collaboration with the Chinese government in the future, to which he had the following to say –

“I do not expect the government to call me in the short term and say, ‘Let’s use NEO as the blockchain technology infrastructure in China.’ But in the medium term? Why not? I think it’s possible.”

The article can be found on fd.nl at this link – https://fd.nl/beurs/1219457/chinese-cryptokeizer-ik-heb-geen-toezichthouder-gezien. The article is behind a paywall, but you can sign up for a free account that will allow you to view 5 articles a month.

A translation can also be found on Reddit here – https://www.reddit.com/r/NEO/comments/723sg0/da_hongfei_interviewed_by_dutch_financial_times/

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