Bitcoin Forum

I am quite a fan of Andreas Antonopolous. I have seen numerous videos of him on YouTube and his enthusiasm for bitcoin is fantastic. I have heard him say before that bitcoin is a threat to Western union and in the latest video I watched of him (brilliant BTW) he again mentioned Western union.

"We are going to see bitcoin impacting remittances long before we see it impacting retail. We are not going shopping with bitcoin, we are taking out Western union."
https://youtu.be/SEJGFY0iDUw

He mentions that UK to the Philippines is a major remittance route and bitcoin ATMs are facilitating this today and hints at a 1% fee but I believe that bitcoin ATMs have higher margins than this. If this is happening, where is it happening and how can we speed it up?

Absolutely true! How many immigrants send money home from developed countries (UK, US, EU, etc.) to their home country? Millions...and that means hundreds of millions of dollars is flowing through these transmitter services. Bitcoin can absolutely provide a better option - lower fees, easier transaction, faster transaction, potential for asset appreciation.

The Philippines seems to be a hotbed of BTC activity compared to elsewhere. It's humming along.

https://www.goabra.com/ seems to be pushing the remittance angle. I've no idea how many people they've signed up and it's pretty interesting that there's virtually no mention of Bitcoin anywhere but I'll be keen to see how far they get.

Western Union will be replaced for sure, because they can't compete cost-wise with the entirely free infrastructure of Bitcoin. Though it remains to be seen how fast. WU can lower their margins and slow down customer drain.

In my opinion omnipresent possibilities to shop with Bitcoin would be a huge leap forward and would actually speed up adoption in the remittance market as well. The reason is simple: If you don't have to convert your Bitcoin anymore to buy things, a whole step in the remittance process becomes obsolete and any conversion fee will be eliminated. There will be absolutely no remaining economical difference in global vs. local transactions.

So the key to Bitcoin succeeding in remittance is the same as for Bitcoin succeeding in general: Acceptance by businesses (esp. brick-and-mortar businesses).

ya.ya.yo!

This is so true. The best of all is that the ultimate solution is already here. All they need is a two-way Bitcoin ATM in both countries and Western union is dead! Foreign workers feed fiat on one end, send Bitcoin to the family's address. Wait for a few confirmations. The family relay the coins to another ATM at home and cash is home within 2 hours (time for confirmations).

WU is up for replacement ASAP... many services are already facilitating fund transactions across boarders with Bitcoin for a very small fee, we've had examples of such companies on the forum in the past. And when people are literate enough to fiddle with Bitcoin themselves, costs will reduce, and the advantages comparing to WU will be immense and will make people save a lot of money.

Enough of remittance empire for these companies :)

Their rates are despicable but surely a fair chunk of the cost is down to having to comply with local laws and probably bribing their way into being allowed to operate in certain areas.

As we've seen with Uber, these disruptive companies are delighted to ignore laws wherever possible. You might just be able to get away with that in the taxi world. When it comes to money they're going to hit the buffers pretty rapidly once they get beyond the minnow stage.

the only way to wester union to remain in the market and create a crypto currency propia fixed value, which does not happen with other crypto thus would avoid the high rates and could stay in business otherwise already began to lose customers and soon will be asked to close .

Although Bitcoin does seem to be some sort of obstacle for WU, couldn't Ripple (XRP) be a simple and efficient solution for them? Their users could be given XRP which would be redeemable at any of their outlets...

WU would still charge exorbitant fees. That's what they are all about. Their dependance upon huge fees IS their business model. BTC should, and probably will, destroy them. Good riddance to bad trash!

There are multiple regulations around know your customer, anti-money laundering, etc, which these companies have to comply with. A big chunk of their costs is in relation to these regulations. Having said that, Bitcoin will still make the process much more efficient.

People trust western union.  Right now most people don't think bitcoin is safe.

Ironic.

Not really.

In a well-regulated western country - losing access or getting scammed out of ones money in a bank account (without getting the full amount refunded by the bank) happens very very very rarely... in fact in my entire life I have never heard about a single incident in my country...

People losing access to or getting scammed out of ones bitcoin is much much much much higher occurrence.

...

So, obviously for now bitcoins are much more unsafe.

"But that is because people are dumb and do not jump through hoops to keep their btcs safe"....

yeah maybe, but that is not a legitimate argument. If this is meant to be an improvement - it should be an improvement... not make things harder and unsafe etc.

I think he is right, but I doubt there are any ATM's with fees as low as 1%.

Due to ATM cost, leasing fees for their location and regulatory expenses I suspect fees would need to be a lot higher

There are far cheaper ways to use BTC without involving ATMs

i havent used western union in ages, what is % they charge to send money to other countries like an average?

You're comparing apples to oranges, but I suspect you know this.

Banks function differently from bitcoin. Very differently. Identity theft, wire fraud, money laundering, and other crimes exist within the banking system. Likewise, they can exist under bitcoin. You say, "But that is because people are dumb and do not jump through hoops to keep their btcs safe." To which I could make the same argument about the people who have lost fortunes under the banking system.

The famous UNIX quote is fitting:
UNIX was not designed to stop you from doing stupid things, because that would also stop you from doing clever things.
Replace UNIX with Bitcoin and it still makes sense.

What do you do, MoneyGram? Join the fight against WU and adopt Bitcoin as a means of remittance? Or go down the same dead-end path as WU?

My site www.morsecoin.com is up and does exactly this, for only a .5% fee. It is in beta but the basic functionality is there. Private keys are handled locally and are not stored or sent across the internet. The only place they reside is in the form field itself. And there is no risk of sending bitcoin to the wrong address because the recipient must confirm it with their private key. There is no longer any need for Western Union or any wire service for anyone using bitcoin.

If you want to help speed it up I could use help marketing it and would be open to a revenue sharing arrangement. Hit me up at admin@morsecoin.com

Everytime I see a Western Union death thread, it fails to point out that WU has been experiencing record growth and profits over the past few years, so Bitcoin hasn't been making any sort of dent in it.

I want to understand how it can be as low as 1%

Using UK to Phillipines as an example there are two conversions.
1. GBP to bitcoin
2. Bitcoin to Phillipine Peso

Todays exchange rate is 1 GBP = 70.5682 PHP

So the nurse working in the UK wanting to send £100 home to family in the Philipines would like her son to get as close to 7,056.82 PHP as possible.

I was going to write about the two conversion costs necessary, but it kind of seems unnecessary now that I have seen WU's cost seems to be around 1.5%

1.5% is decent no?

https://i.imgur.com/8Kf92cV.png

1.5% is good, the point is, it could be pushed to 0.5% or even 0.1% to 0.04% at a profit for some btc businesses.

So talk me through that. Whilst bitcoin is not spendable prevalently in the Phillipines there needs to be a third party for the son to change his bitcoins in to Philippine Pesos. A third party that wants to make some sort of profit and also a third party that is exposed, for a certain amount of time to the volatility of the value of bitcoin.

There's also the predicament of the nurse needing to convert here GBP in to bitcoins initially. Again this presumably requires a third party wanting to make a profit and that is exposed to risk. I know in the UK that you can buy pretty much instantly from a market place but you are looking at 4%+ for your purchase. Purchasing £100 from an exchange would probably be more expensive due to bank fees and exchange rates and would require a wait of 2-5 working days.

I am failing to see how bitcoin can compete with WU. Even if bitcoin was spendable prevalently in the Phillipines, the purchasing cost in the first place is more expensive than WU.

Of course the cheapest methods are the most time consuming. Let's look at a free service such as https://localbitcoins.com (https://localbitcoins.com). This makes it possible to find local bitcoiners who are in need of someone willing to give them those precious pesos for bitcoins via face-to-face trade I.e. leaving bitcoins transaction fee, 0.0001 (£0.02, PHP 1.28, $0.03) or 0.00000000, in the picture. Now you can either hold those coins yourself or directly redirect them to the recipient (who only needs to repeat this process to complete the circle) There's nothing more I can say in regards to bitcoins price volatility; it could either come as an advantage or disadvantage.

http://cdn.static-economist.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/full-width/images/2012/04/articles/body/20120428_FNM955.png


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where do you see 1,5% ? i see a 3,9% fee + they can cheat you with the exchange rate.

When bitcoin achieves widespread mainstream adoption Western Union is going to be one of the first big companies to suffer. Bitcoin will basically wipe them our & take most of their business. The fees are incomparable, Western Union are robbing people to send money abroad, it's disgusting. There is only one winner long term & it isn't Western Union.

Hmmm I worked out the amount to receiver figure as a % of the exchange rate figure taken from xe.com.

7056.82 - 6951.13 = 105.69 / 7056.82 * 100 = 1.4977%

You are right though, there is a £3.90 charge and a poorer exchange rate.
So I think I understand now that the sender receives a 3.9% fee and the receiver suffers a 1.5% fee on top.

Looking at the localbitcoins options I don't think that it is currently competitive for someone looking to remit money to their homeland from a developed nation. I have never seen a bitcoin ATM, but from what I have seen online, they don't typically have very flattering buy/sell margins either.

So, if this is something that we are going to do..... what's the plan Andreas?

I am looking more in to this. Thanks for sharing.

I don't know how operational it is. It might just be busy burning VC money but at some point they might deliver. Worth a watch at least.

You couldn't be more correct. As the adoption of Bitcoin grows, the need to convert btc to fiat, vice versa, would also increase at a local level, therefore, making it much more possible to locally source individuals willing to trade. This would reduce the need to use bank transfers, online exchanges, WU and the fees they impose.

This is an interesting breakdown of remittance costs

http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/ng-interactive/2014/aug/19/-sp-remittances-countries-highest-fees-interactive

I think it varies vastly between source and destination. Those WU costs you posted are probably cheaper and faster than a conventional bank transfer.

Weirdly, Iceland costs 10% to transfer £100 to and the Central African Republic costs 5%.

I used a have a local friend go broke who refused to have a bank account so I'd have to bail them out via WU when they starved. They lived 50 miles down the road and the cost was 5-10%.

I like that the discussion here has shifted from "lets shut down their business" to "how can we do a better business than WU does".

Extinguishing WU isn't something that we will do, it's something that WU will do... by not taking advantage of what Bitcoin offers.  At any moment that can change.

They have money service licenses everywhere they are needed, and points of presence globally.  If they wake up, they could be one heck of a Bitcoin business.

Sure, WU has been gouging the great quantity of poor-but-loyal-to-remote-family hard working people everywhere for generations.  The cash from such gouging can buy up a bunch of existing Bitcoin businesses to ramp up fast and gain some talent.

Full disclosure:  I'm short WU stock (until they seem ready to pivot to Bitcoin).

I would argue that this claim is incorrect. The main problem is that people do not understand Bitcoin. If your sole wish is to send someone money then there is nothing problematic about Bitcoin.
Just register at some verified exchange and buy it, then withdraw to the address of your choice. You could even directly withdraw to the person that you wish to send the money.

The problem is that people either do not clearly see the benefits that Bitcoin offers or just do not understand it. Wasn't there a chart recently that showed that the 7d volume had surpassed WU's 7d volume at that point?

that is the point i guess.

maybe BTC lacks adoption and proper options to remit money worldwide at the moment. BUT this has already changed and will change even more in the future.

in the future you will pay 0,xxx % and not 5-15 %
(+ instant transactions with BTC)


@LaudaM

people dont know about BTC, trust is not the problem.
+ we need more infrastructure.

http://static3.businessinsider.com/image/52a0b77269bedd7b1cc3403b/the-daily-value-of-bitcoin-transactions-has-passed-western-unions-and-its-catching-up-to-paypals.jpg

Not decent at all, especially when you think how many users they have, and how many "1,5%"'s they take...

Aye, but there is no one out there using bitcoin to do anything like 1.5% at present.

I would agree that money transmitting, especially internationally, is something that bitcoin is great at.

It would be easy for an association of money transmittal firms to use bitcoin to settle or facilitate transfers.  Who know, maybe WU will do so itself!

I do worry that fees will increase as regulation increases, but right now, sending money internationally via bitcoin is virtually free.

Great chart Litecoinguy!

stop saying its 1.5% as its not.  as someone said its 3.9 plus 1.5 = 5.4%.  plus fx spreads.

my own experience is that it cost me roughly $60-$70 to send $1000 to Argentina.

and I think you have a bad attitude toward business.  who cares if they are making money.  they are a business.  that's what businesses do.  if you don't like the fees, and there is something better, don't use them. that's the point.

https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3812/19806771552_a2e741c0d8_c.jpg

Western Union share price for 5 years, massively underperforming the S&P 500 (red line).
Note that the drop at the end of oct 2013 coincides exactly with the first Bitcoin BTM at Vancouver which was a huge media event and preceded the $1150 run-up. WU claimed their share price was hit by "cost overhead from increased money transmission regulations" though it suffered in Oct 2012 too (more regulations then as well?)

Bitcoins are much faster than any other fiat currency. When it comes to speed, the fiat currency system is nowhere near the promptness of Bitcoin. Whenever you need to exchange from one fiat currency to another or to make a transaction, the wait is sometimes unbearable. In the era of speed and precision, you can either get through the banks, their questions (not to mention their fees) and wait an eternity for their approval, or you can just use Bitcoin to transfer millions of dollars, for negligible fees, in a matter of seconds.

It's interesting to see how this will turn up and how it will affect the future money transfer business. For instance, if you look at Rebit.ph, what they are offering is considered something similar to what WU is offering and without the extra fees. Question is how many people knows how to utilize it. The biggest barrier to mass adoption might be that the bitcoin community is still dominated by the groups of people having IT knowledge and we need to over this to bring the knowledge to all the common people.

Western Union cancels transactions all the time for no reason except "business decision". My last 2 xfers to Africa to pay graduate students for work were cancelled. When I went to go pick them up the girl behind me had her WU that she sent to her parents in Peru cancelled too.

They should die and bitcoin should replace them. If I can't find somebody on localbitcoins I usually then turn to Worldremit, as they have dozens of local payout methods as I need MTN Mobile Money in Rwanda/Uganda often, and MPESA in Kenya. I don't think bitpay or coinbase will allow their services to be used for remittance though or else Worldremit could accept them unfortunately.

A totally decentralized remittance method, that abstracts away all the complexities of bitcoin would be ideal. I like localbitcoins but it's centralized so if they are down everything is down, plus fees are large for small traders in the developing world, should be a free market of exchange fees.

not to mention that people are still making a comparison between bitcoin and big company that have a long history behind it, they were not born yesterday and skyrocketing overnight

this generation can't udnerstand bitcoin, we need to get rid of the old mentality to embrace bitcoin better


it will be possible to incorporate in on top of open bazar, therefore it will work as a decentralized market and exchange, the ultimate platform for anything related bitcoin

Exactly. There are a lot of people who either do not know about it at all or fail to understand it/see the benefits that it provides. The infrastructure is coming along slowly with all these VC investments that we've had to date. Good job finding that image again, it clearly shows that Bitcoin isn't as tiny as some people think.
I'm guessing that in a few years (4+), the network will be ready to take over everything.

I think its a bit of a catch 22. You cant get low rate remittances unless you can go shopping with bitcoin. It seems it is some years away yet. Perhaps when inflation is down to 2%

I'm doing .5%, just in bitcoin only. If you have to pay 1% on either end to exchange into bitcoin, it's a little bit more, but if you get paid in bitcoins or buy them directly with localbitcoins.com, etc. it's cheaper.

Bitcoin only transfers cost a penny. How much business are you doing? Perhaps I am missing something, but isn't your service obsolete?

About western union, do not forget that they started as a telegraphic company.
They evolved one time, and can probably do it again.
It would be very easy for them to add a "bitcoin transfer" offer

Why we need to use western union if we have blockchain in our side? And if they add bitcoin transfer option, what the profit they will get then? I think they can't compete with bitcoin or adopt it.

People will still need their local currency at the other end for a long time to come. If WU set themselves up as more of a currency conversion business via BTC they could stay relevant whatever develops. They have all the infrastructure set up already. I'm not sure they could give up those big fat fees.

Western Union could evolve and embrace bitcoin, but then how they are gonna explain high fees of each bitcoin based transaction?
Maybe they would try to capitalize on exchange fee - Fiat->BTC. But then again what would the point of using them if you could send someone BTC and he/she could exchange it directly.

I have friends in Africa and Asia and know very well, from personal experience, how difficult is to send money to them.
They usually can't get even simple Visa card for example, or paypal account, and often have problems with losses of electricity and internet access.
Western Union fees are very high, it's true, but in such third world countries this is often only way to send or receive money.
Bitcoin is great solution for them, but before that they have to solve their infrastructure problems, otherwise they will have difficulties to use bitcoin.
WU may also add bitcoin as their additional currency, sooner or later. 

I've been proposing this to them for years.
They have all the licensing they would need, they could buy an exchange or several with cash on hand, especially one in a jurisdiction that is cracking down on licensing stuff.  They could get some of those very cheaply.

As a company it is afraid to eat its own children, but if they don't, someone else will.  It is just a matter of time and time is not on WU's side.

I think most bitcoin user prefer to use blockchain than WU in case for transferring money, no doubt about it. They just depend on non bitcoin user then to survive and compete with blockchain.

Yeah we almost forget this infrastructure issue, which no internet access then no bitcoin. Maybe its the advantage of using WU than blockchain.

Every time I see a Western Union sign or a commercial, I just smile and think, guys enjoy this time while you still can, because Bitcoin will get you and shut you down! :)

No seriously, WU is used heavily by the immigrants who are sending money back home to their families etc.. They are essentially being ripped off by the 15+ percent fees, these poor people. Just wait until all these people don't get more familiar with BTC!

they will be the first company to allow bitcoin as an option on the next years, otherwise they will loose several users as bitcoins gets more interest daily they would close their doors,they must play together otherwise they will loose these war without fight ;D

The point of this thread is rendered moot when you consider that Western Union is trial testing blockchain technology with various fintech companies including Ripple Labs. Remittance companies will have adopt some form of blockchain technology if they want to compete.

Interesting, I didnt know that.  Do you have a good article you can link please?

exactly.

The blockchain is open source.  it is not unexpected that companies like Western Union leverages blockchain technology to streamline its own operations thereby bringing down its costs.  Cost savings can be passed on as lower prices to customers as the market heats up.

so in the end it is likely to be Blockchain vs Blockchain.  the point is how will Bitcoin fare in this market?

http://lifeshifted.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/drink-the-kool-aid.jpg

Please, please, please, ...quit drinking Andreas' Koolaid, then sober up and read the fine print! He gets paid generous speaking fees to serve up that sweet beverage.

If this type of legislation (the stuff nobody actually reads, below) continues rolling across America, the only thing getting extinguished is Bitcoin. You do understand that the costs of complying with this type of regulation will handicap bitcoin companies in terms of competing with the Western Unions of the world.

http://www.ncleg.net/Sessions/2015/Bills/House/PDF/H289v1.pdf

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http://puu.sh/j6TsI/c42525f503.png

^^^^^^ Notice how the banks are explicitly exempt from every single provision in the bill! ^^^^^^

Bitcoin isn't a company.  I think it's time to put you on ignore. tired of your fud

A a community we're doing a poor job of getting this message out to the Western Union customer base.
It's easy to imagine that we'd have an significant conversion rate if they were made aware of the savings...
So how do we do this?

I've tried the burying my head in the sand approach, but never found it to be that productive.

Fud = facts you don't like


The issue being ignored is how Bitcoin companies are now being forced to systematically block entire states (IP blocks) from using their services. New York, North Carolina, and the list is growing.

How many times was this new trend mentioned in the "Kool-Aid" lecture?

Here you go:

http://www.coindesk.com/western-union-pilot-program-ripple-labs/ (http://www.coindesk.com/western-union-pilot-program-ripple-labs/)

Whether WU adopts the blockchain model remains to be seen.  Ripple Labs is now Fincen compliant. That would help bridge the gap for a traditional remittance company like Western Union looking for a legitimate player in the crypto world.

True story about Western Union:

Back in the late 1870s, Western Union essentially owned the communications network of the United States which was the telegraph. Along came Alexander Bell who offered his telephone patent rights to WU. The president of Western Union turned down the offer as he thought the telephone "Was just a toy."

To quote the wikipedia on Alexander Bell:
"Bell and his partners, Hubbard and Sanders, offered to sell the patent outright to Western Union for $100,000. The president of Western Union balked, countering that the telephone was nothing but a toy. Two years later, he told colleagues that if he could get the patent for $25 million he would consider it a bargain. By then, the Bell company no longer wanted to sell the patent.[87] Bell's investors would become millionaires, while he fared well from residuals and at one point had assets of nearly one million dollars."

This is considered one of the greatest blunders in the history of business.

If they can't turn to bitcoin, they will turn to a laundry company or maybe a kebab :)
there is no question about the fact that bitcoin is either a threat or an opportunity to WU...

Some problems with this idea;
1. Bitcoin ATMs currently charge a lot. Two ATM transactions will cost more than a single WU transaction for most (not all) transactions
2. In remittance markets, the ATM in the sending country would constantly need to be emptied of local currency and loaded with Bitcoin, and in the receiving country it would need to be constantly loaded with local currency and emptied of Bitcoin. If you were operating this service in the US and Philippines (say) you would end up with a lot of cash PHP sitting in the Philippines that you would need to repatriate to the US (not easy for a lot of money) and convert to USD to load up the US ATMs. There isn't a lot of people in the Philippines sending wads of money to the US to counterbalance it. Try running a business that needs to get a few million out of the Philippines or Brazil or Argentina every single month. I can tell you with absolutely certainty that this is not easy.

With WU, the sending of the transaction is not what people pay for; it is maintaining local cash liquidity and converting the transaction to local cash... that's the hard part and the expensive part.

It is only naive people who think that Bitcoin can replace WU entirely. Bitcoin can certainly replace part of WU, and provides a neat way to transfer value trustlessly. But it's the local cash handling bit that is the hard part that WU and Moneygram get right.

And before you say "all we need is local businesses to accept BTC so that the recipients don't HAVE to convert to PHP!" yes I get it, we all get it. Easier to say than to do.  

Bitcoin ATMs and other services which 'enable' you to remittance your money are in my opinion a form of extortion to be honest.
There are services dedicated to do what bitcoin does by default but in addition they want your money for doing so.
Its time for people to realize that they don't need any company to transfer money, in fact remittance companies are obsolete.

im pretty sure western will allow bitcoin to enter or they will create their own blockhain to send and reduce fees otherwise they will loose custumers.

The site doesn't require downloading a software wallet, which is a major hurdle to user adoption. The only thing users have to know is the private key (and where they want to send it, of course). Boom, they can send the money. Even though to a technical person wallets are easy, to a non technical person it may make more sense to simply hold on to a key and use a one page, Google-like website to quickly send money. Helps educate people on how bitcoin works too.

Similar to the non-software wallet on blockchain.info?

I use Bitcoin for remittance from US to Germany.

The guys in the office who have the same pay setup usually pay around 5% to get euros. But they do it through their bank. They have to pay an international wire transfer fee plus they exchange rate they give is always a few percentage off of the real exchange rate.

I get paid in bitcoins through BitWage and charge 10% to sell bitcoins via localbitcoins.

Ideally for those in the Philippines or anywhere else for that matter they would do something similar. The person in the US could choose to get a percentage of their paycheck direct deposited into bitcoins. Then their family back home could set up a business selling bitcoins, even for just 1-2% and they come out ahead while providing a good service to the locals who want to buy bitcoins at a good rate.

I always have a lot more people buying bitcoins with euros than I can spend in a month, so I just deposit the extra in the bank and buy more bitcoins.

Though people need to remember, there are over 500,000 Western Union locations in the world. They're not going down any time soon, if just for the convenience of it.

One guy here at work sends money to his ex-wife via Western Union. He's into bitcoins and has some and we tried to figure out how he could do the same thing using bitcoins. But his ex always wants that money the same day. She could probably do localbitcoins but I think he'd rather pay the extra money than deal with fighting with her over it.

When you consider that the likes of BitPesa charge up to 7% you realise the existing means for trading in bitcoin is insufficient at replacing Western Union (which has about 15% fees). An exchange needs to be halved again to around 3.5% maximum for it to claim to be cheaper than Western Union and banks.

So bitcoin has the potential to replace Western Union, there must be cheaper and easier ways for people to access and use bitcoin in certain regions including Africa.

Bitcoin definitely has this potential. Replacing Western Union is just a question of time. There should be more bitcoin startups like this one
http://www.coinfox.info/news/company/2479-bitcoin-instead-of-western-union-philippino-company-enables-money-renittance-without-bank-account

No, not really; that's just an online wallet. So you still have to sign up with a username and password, and the site stores your private keys. This means that if you lose your password/mnemonic, you lose your bitcoin, and you are vulnerable if blockchain.info ever gets hacked.

Morsecoin.com is simply a bitcoin transaction front end. It does not require a user account or store any private/public key info. You can secure your private keys however you think best, and when you are ready to send money, you simply go to the website and paste the private key into the form. The balance is checked using the public key; the private key is never stored even in so much as a javascript variable. It only exists as the value of the form field. Transactions are built and signed client-side using javascript, and only the signed transaction is transmitted to the bitcoin network (uses the bitcore.js library). So it is completely secure, does not require any accounts or initial set up, and there is nothing to be hacked!

Furthermore, morsecoin.com provides a feature which ensures that you do not send bitcoin to the wrong address by mistake. If you send bitcoin using the "confirmed" method, an email will be sent to the recipient requiring them to verify that they own the address with their private key. Again, the private key is not stored and is simply used to verify ownership of the public address, after which the signed transaction is released to the bitcoin network.

http://static2.businessinsider.com/image/52a0b7066da811f769734dc2-960-684/chartoftheday_1681_daily_transaction_volume_of_payment_networks_n.jpg

It's obvious to anyone with grey matter and a long term vision: Western Union is the next Kodak. A company that charges ridiculously 30% fees just because they can get away with it DESERVES to be extinguished, and it will. Bitcoin will crush every single competitor in the business, it's unavoidable.

The incumbents have a great deal of protectionism from most of the governments.  It is not enough for Bitcoin to be better, it has to be massively better and this be apparent to everyone.

I hope wunion burns to the ground they banned me for sportsbetting

Yea centralized organizations have the power to corrupt and the financial backing to monopolize a industry. It's not only WU though... It's the whole remittance industry that needs a kick in the butt. {MoneyGram etc. etc.}

Millions of people around the world are paying between 10% to 30% of their hard earned money to these remittance companies, to render a service that Bitcoin can do virtually FREE.

This industry is ripe for disruption, but they will go down with a fight... They already partnered with companies to make use of Blockchain technology to transfer money cheaper. They too, like the banks will just

develop a competing Blockchain technology, and then lower their prices to stay competitive... It's not the last Horaah we see from them.  >:(   

How do you think Bitcoin could prevent crimes by remittance? How could you prove the origin of the funds?

We could pick a "Western Union day" and show up near each of our local Western Union locations with some information and bitcoins?

Nowhere in the definition of money does it include the ability to prevent crimes.

That is what police are for. Maybe focus on updating the ancient police system? Bitcoin is taking care of updating the ancient money system.

In the Philippines we now have Free Instant Atm Cardless withdrawal. Western Union can't beat that. Trasferring from bitcoin to local currency is practically zero rate.

 

That sounds good! How many of them are there in the PI, and where are they located?
Who's installing these? Can you provide a link?

Very true, in fact, the Bitcoin system is better for law enforcement than straight up cash since everything is recorded on the public ledger, while cash is total obfuscation as long as you don't move it through banking system. If Amir keeps working on DarkWallet tho.. they'll have problems.