If you have any crypto on any exchange this crypto is not yours.
You don't own it. All you own is a ledger entry on the exchange that you supposedly have crypto on there under your username.
Ownership of crypto is only proven by having the private key of the wallet that crypto is in.
(On the Steem blockchain we call this private key the master password or owner key, I recommend you never use these keys for anything ever, use the posting key or active key instead). If you have no clue what I am talking about please stop reading and educate yourself about the keys here. It's extremely important.
On an exchange you don't have the private key so therefor you don't own anything.
So when you send STEEM to any exchange you are no longer the owner of this STEEM, you are the owner of a ledger entry on the exchange that you supposedly have STEEM on there under your username.
Tomorrow on the 3rd of January the proof of keys event is scheduled. Specifically for Bitcoin.
It's an interesting event where Bitcoin holders are asked to remove their Bitcoin from the exchanges and store it in a private wallet to proof they actually own it.
This should highlight several things of importance but mostly:
It should proof that the exchanges actually have all the Bitcoin they say they have.
As you can imagine it could be very tempting to create some 'extra' Bitcoin in the form of changing some of the Ledger Entries. Creating an extra 50 or 100 Bitcoins...who is to know?
As long as not everyone pulls their Bitcoin from an exchange this should work fine.
I'm not sure how many people will participate and how much traction this event will get.
But I guess it's never wrong to remind people of the fact that if you don't have the private keys of your crypto you don't own anything!
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