In a surprisingly explicit report on January 18th, CNBC discusses responses to Asian regulatory moves in banning cryptocurrency trading. Talking to locals and industry experts, the report suggests various ways in which regulation may be circumvented, including VPNs, soft wallets and decentralised exchanges.

In addition, there are derivative products offered by some of these exchanges that allow speculation on the price of a given cryptocurrency traded against fiat (legal) currencies, which include Chinese yuan and Korean won. The only drawback is that cash may not be withdrawn in a fiat currency. Alternatively, bank accounts can be opened in countries where Bitcoin is accepted (like Japan), and then trade them for fiat on a local, centralised exchange.

Another option is to trade altcoin holdings for a crypto market leader such as Litecoin, Ethereum or Bitcoin, and then sell them. 61 countries currently operate 2,064 crypto ATMs, although there are high transaction fees. Yet again (and most securely), altcoins can be stored in hardware wallets offline, in jump drives similar to a USB stick. Encrypted private keys on thumb-sized wallets can be stored securely, accessing multiple accounts in different global locations.

If opening an account overseas is hindered by government action, people are likely to enlist their families, friends or members of the local crypto community to access an external exchange via encrypted P2P social media apps, but this is more risky.