Bitcoin Forum

Do you think they will go after the other exchanges? I am nervous.

FFS

Do you really think this topic belongs in Bitcoin Discussion?

no it doesn't...mis-post and I changed it before you even commented.  My apologies.

Please correct anything I have wrong here, but as far as I'm aware:
    Bitstamp is based in slovania
    Bitstamp has been in operation for nearly 2 years
    It's accounts are all european
    It doesn't have any relationship with dwolla.

From what I can see it doesn't seem as if the US can do much about bitstamp, this of course    doesn't rule out action from Europe, but given the length of time they've been in operation (and the fact that they are a much smaller fish)

    Gox's mistake was that they had to use a US account/subsidiary to transfer money to Dwolla
    This wouldn't have happened if they had transferred everything straight from japan or if had they jumped through the hoops to register
    To be perfectly honest, I can't imagine a transfer account having any more than a million dollars in it under the worst case scenario, hardly enough to deal a fatal wound.
    I'm hard pressed to believe that this is the start of a legal storm, and I'm pretty sure the government is far more interested in having a taxpaying business than spending money on a legal battle. MtGox will get fined, they'll get the paperwork sorted out eventually and unfortunately they'll probably still control 60% of the market


    If you're really concerned, check out campbx, based in US, 2 years of operation (although a chunk of that was beta I think) and they their FAQ has a legal compliance section where they at least claim to have dotted all their i's. That's more than can be said of most other exchanges.

No.
Slovenia is a young country part of EEA (so SEPA transfers work) but has less restrictive laws than, say, Germany.
Slovenian people by nature have some attitude and won't bend over to American requests unless they really have to.
For transfers BitStamp is using the local branch of UniCredit which is a big Italian-owned bank recently in financial troubles due to credit crunch.
Slovenian banks have a liquidity problem and rumours say Slovenia is soon to be the next Cyprus.
Bank fees on BitStamp transfers are a reliable, steadily increasing cash cow for Slovenian Unicredit so IMHO the latter is likely to defend this source of revenue if they can.