Bitcoin Forum

Hi,

I've been reading upon crossing the borders with money lately.
I'm trying to inform myself about the laws and regulations about the transport of money.

From what I've read, there is a maximum of €10,000  that you can transport over the borders WITHOUT registering it first.
(This is a regulations withing Europe)

I understand that in some way this is to prevent illicit activities etc, but it's hard to believe (for me) that you can't transport your own fucking money without telling the government.

Does anyone have more input on this subject (laws, regulations?)

~Flowz

Welcome to the 'free' world  ;D

Some info (scroll down): http://ec.europa.eu/taxation_customs/common/travellers/enter_eu/index_en.htm

You also have to pay attention to the currency conversion amount. Let's say you take 10,000 Euros into the US as cash on a plane. Well that's over 10,000 USD so they will seize all of it. This happens all the time Canada/USA cross border when somebody writes "10,000" on the customs paper and forgets to include the currency symbol. The box is USD only. If your CAD is worth just $0.20 over it's all getting seized.

Diamond, gourmet mushroom and gold traders routinely get on planes with bags full of cash to buy commodities will have to figure out how they do it (legally) if you want to attempt this or encrypt your wallet, upload it somewhere and get at it later after crossing the border

Another reason of why bitcoin is better!

You can always send it out by mail..

Or you can always buy bitcoins, go to where ever you're going and have a pre-planned trade agreement with someone.

ahhhhh, you took the red pill,

welcome

That's actually seems good, I'll look it up if it has some regulations.

Reality is not a bliss, but neither is ignorance.

The problem with mailing it is it has to go thru customs. You will have the same exact problem.. or worse, customs will probably put your money in their pocket.

Or keep some in online wallet.

I have bank accounts in two different countries.  I can either wire money between accounts, or use my ATM card to withdraw money from one country and deposit it in another.

I am also considering setting up Bitcoin exchange accounts in both countries...

There are banks that offer no fees for withdrawing money nationwide, for example Ally.
Many places accepts visa or MasterCard and some of their credit cards do not charge you a foreign transaction fee.
With mobile technologies, possibilities are endless.

Don't do mail over borders.. it will get "lost"

Why not Bitcoin?

I wouldn't trust any mail system to send more than a $20 bill properly.

Not to mention that US & Canada Post (and most post offices, I imagine) both advise NOT to send cash...

How about money hidden in electronic devices (in the casing for example)?

This is starting to look like a smuggling operation of your own money.

What about gold/goods?  You can convert into some other medium I suppose right?  A lot of $$$ is not that much precious metals, anybody besides me remember tecshare's rhodium "sale" gambit thing he was trying? 

+1. If you need to convert (some of) it to cash at the destination, just find someone local who is looking to buy bitcoins; easy enough.

In the U.S., be aware of the "suspicionless, electronics search rules":

- http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2013/02/electronics-border-seizures

Who said anything about electronics? Use an Electrum wallet, and memorize your seed passphrase. They haven't come up with a way to search your brain (yet). You don't even need to install the software until you reach your destination; there won't be anything for them to find.

The post I was replying to suggested doing a trade once you've crossed the border.  Presumably 100% of trades will involve electronics.

Just print out an encrypted private key in the form of a qr code and cross the border. even if border control knew what it was, they couldn't see the public key, so they wouldn't be able to tell the value.

OK, sure, electronics will be involved at some point. However, there's no requirement for you to have any electronics with you while crossing the border, or if you do want to bring your own hardware, it doesn't need to contain any software or data relating to Bitcoin. You can download the software and enter your private key or seed passphrase from memory after you reach your destination.

I'm sure you have your reasons but I'm still curious as to why anyone would feel the need to transport more than 10k of cash at any time. As was said, you can transport more within the EU, as long as you declare it first, so why not declare it? Though I would like to know what happens after that, does the government place you on some watch-list as a potential arms trader?

I doubt that transporting bitcoins is a problem though. I would think that it's more like carrying a credit/debit card with a high limit rather than cash. Technically you don't "own" those bitcoins at all (no one does), you just have the right to use them and they can't expect you to lose your bitcoins before traveling.

Perhaps I'm making a purchase ... of soemthing that is entirely legal for me to do.


Me carrying a lot of cash is something I don't wish to broadcast to the world.  The only person that needs to know is me up until the point that I meet with the seller.  By having to disclose to anyone else that I am carrying that much cash creates a security risk where one didn't exist previously (or at least not the same risk).

If it was very important then I think it would be possible for anyone to memorise a private wallet key, use some rhyme or song to encode a minikey, then it would be very secure, it only existing in your mind.

Fair enough, I'm not trying to say it's wrong or anything. I'd just be very worried about carrying that much cash with me, and if I was making a purchase, I'd prefer to withdraw the cash at the target destination. But I guess there might be cases when that might be inconvenient. Bitcoin is great when the wallet can at least be encrypted, if only there were easier ways to exchange it for cash quickly.

You make a good point about declaring the cash. Especially when there are plenty of countries where safety might be a concern (inluding when dealing with the officials).

That's what insurance is for

In the USA, you can register with the U.S. Department of State and move just about any amount of cash you want (or feel safe doing so). Your passport will get flagged as a legitimate cash transporter AFAIK and a few other Government Agengies will keep a very close eye on you but if you are legitimate this shouldn't be a problem.

Maybe it's the same process in Europe?

Just deposit it into a bank, cross the border, and withdraw it from another bank. $3 or $4 in fee's is worth the hassle you'll end up going through.

I'm not sure about 10k limit I think if you rolled through any airport with even half that they would say it was 'suspicious' and seize it quoting some AML shit if you can't prove where its from and what its for. And if you try and conseal it it will look even more suspicious and you could get a million years in jail for conspiring to money launder if you havnt a good defence. screw that why wouldn't you just put your bitcoin wallet on an encrypted flash drive.