Bitcoin Forum

Like the topic title asks which countries do people think have the most lax or inviting bitcoin related legal frame work, that could be used as a stepping stone for bitcoin businesses.?

I am talking about a place where bitcoin could atleast be legitimate. Are there any countries like that now or is bitcoin in the grey everywhere? For example does mtgox operate in japan through loops holes and grayness or are they fully complaint?

You can cross the UK off the list of Bitcoin friendly places straight away.  >:(

Well yea lol...the US and and most of the eurozone were places i figured wouldn't work out right off the bat.

You're looking for a technologically advanced non-centralized-bank-based economy, otherwise known as nowhere.

North Korea

http://i43.tinypic.com/2u3y1sl.jpg

They often wear Casascius Coins on their clothing.

Isn't it funny that nobody answered the question? That says a lot about the BTC ecosystem.
I have been thinking about this but there is no simple solution to this problem.

Issues that make it almost impossible to answer this question:
 
1. laws can be changed anytime, so no country is "safe"
2. All countries will be affected by a drought in tax revenue sooner or later, even those "friendly" to BTC
3. Most countries have extradition agreements, or can be forced to do what the US says, in several ways (military force being the last, and least sophisticated one)

So the results is that realistically, no country is safe for BTC right now.

China? I think there is a misunderstanding about their intentions. Knowing the Chinese culture I don't see any reason to believe they're BTC friendly. They are a culture that always plays things like chess, so they can "change their mind" at anytime, even if they were friendly, as some think.

North Korea? Cuba? Iran? Good luck getting hosting and reliable Internet in some of these, let alone the problems of running a business "from" there. Moreover, if you set up in the "axis of evil" countries, you'll stand out more and the US will go after you first.

African countries? Dictatorship, civil wars...total instability if you want to do business. Rule of law is not worth the paper it is printed on, depending on the country.

South America? They'll go against US interests only as long as the US does not use its ultimate card, which is the military one. Venezuela is a mess. Brazil has important business ties with the US so they can be blackmailed that way. Argentina can only challenge the US so far and is in itself in political turmoil. Uruguay, Chile have never been safe harbour from the US and when the time comes, I don't think they'd hesitate to not risk their rship with the US by complying with its requests. Yeah I know, that's sad news for BTC.uy and any BTC business Jeff Berwick would like to base there, but c'est la vie. If they think their companies, or investor's money is safe there, time will teach them an expensive lesson.

Iceland? Sounds good, but I heard that they just voted back in power people that got them into the mess into the first place, because the wonderful revolutionaries of the "constitution of the people" did not deliver on what they promised. Yeah, I know, wonderful world we live in.

Please note that I am generalizing, and I know it, so please don't bother telling me how great the net access is in Iran, or that Africa is not a country. I know that, I am just trying to make a greater point.

In the end of the day it seems that the only (least bad) option is Russia, but good luck promoting a serious business in the BTC environment based there, and good luck with Putin or the local gangsters asking for "protection money".

Conclusion: best place to based a BTC business in right now is in one of two places: out of this planet, or in the future ;)

Bitcoin is simply too new for any locality to be "friendly".  Banks consider Bitcoin to be high "risk" even if the entity/company has absolutely no cases of fraud, customer complaints, etc.

Among least Bitcoin friendly I would put USA, UK, and to a lesser extent Australia.
Among Bitcoin "friendly" I would put Canada.  Probably more accurately is that Canada is Bitcoin neutral.*  

The bigger issue is that most Bitcoin related enterprises (this doesn't mean companies buying or selling goods for Bitcoins) need to interface with the existing financial networks in some fashion.  Banks however are private property and in most countries an account can be denied or closed for any reason or even a lack of reason as long as the Bank doesn't violate some protected class (race, religion, etc).  Banks are highly risk prone (unless it has high rewards) and most startups aren't going to generate meaningful amounts of revenue for any major bank.  Hence the default option is close the account.  The account has unusual activity, no reason to investigate, close it.  The account scores as high risk, don't negotiate contingencies just close it.  The account is involved in business the bank has little knowledge or understanding of, don't ask the owner for information just close it.  To overcome this on a large scale may require chartering a national bank or credit union that is at least Bitcoin neutral.



* Canada at least respects the rule of law.  Canada has stated their EXISTING laws/regulations on MSB and Money Transmitters doesn't cover virtual currencies.  This isn't to say Canada doesn't want to regulate Bitcoin related enterprises or that they won't pass new laws in the future however unlike the US they are honest enough to say "hey look Bitcoin likely should be regulated but current statutes don't give us that authority, to do so we need new ones".  FinCEN on the other hand did a bunch of mental gymnastics (hint: if you need to define 18 new terms which don't exist in current law in your "guidance" in order for current law to "fit" you have just defacto written new law), to force Bitcoin a square peg into the MT round hole because it was the only one which was even sorta close.   This has a whole range of unintended consequences and creates additional vagueness in compliance because some of the MT requirements simply don't even make sense when not dealing with a third party (i.e. MT regs are built around the concept of   PERSON-A ----> Money Transmitter (regulated) ----> PERSON B).

I guess i am looking more for a place where bitcoins would be legal within the framework of that country as long as i only do business there. SO i am not talking about setting up shop in Iran and servicing US users, sense like many people said the long arm of US law would just stop me out right, like they did to megaupload.

Could be N.Zealand.

Switzerland!

Remember kimdotcom  :-\

Seasteading?
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=208333.0;topicseen (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=208333.0;topicseen)

Finland, followed by Canada. In Finland some companies are already paying out salaries in Bitcoin and some minister/whatnot said that they have no problem with it. In Canada, Bitcoin does not fall under the strict MSB ruling and is considered a commodity like Gold and Silver.

Bahamas.

The U.S. government won a victory against tax cheats with offshore bank accounts after Swiss officials agreed Wednesday to let banks release information on the overall holdings of their American clients.

Switzerland moved a step closer to settling past legal issues over suspected tax evasion by Americans using Swiss bank accounts after the country’s cabinet agreed to a plan to allow its banks to deal directly with the Department of Justice. John Letzing reports.

The move is expected to pressure U.S. taxpayers holding secret bank accounts to declare them to the Internal Revenue Service, tax experts said. The Swiss cabinet agreed to the framework, which will be decided by parliament, likely this summer, said the Swiss Federal Department of Finance.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324412604578512783477933910.html

China? https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=229733.0

Romania! We already have 2 restaurants and a fashion house accepting Bitcoin, that I personally helped with the integration.

Possibly Kenya, and the African countries where they have the M-Pesa service (more about it here: http://www.economist.com/news/finance-and-economics/21574520-safaricom-widens-its-banking-services-payments-savings-and-loans-it ). People exchange money via texting and there are exchanges all other the country to convert it to cash.

Neighboring countries have it, too.

Maybe Iceland?

Very important question. I say there won't be any country who'll show support for BTC.

If we check the 2 following sites:

http://blockchain.info/nodes-globe?series=mostStable (http://blockchain.info/nodes-globe?series=mostStable)

and

http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/68042000/gif/_68042497_global_bandwidth_624.gif (http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/68042000/gif/_68042497_global_bandwidth_624.gif)

It's no surprise that "developed" nations have access to the most bandwidth and have the most people connected. bitcoin has the most users in these countries obviously, but the burden caused by our own banking systems makes adoption very slow, or at least slower than possible.

As these are also the financial leaders in the world I would expect a long, hard struggle between bitcoin and the leaders of these territories.

I consider friendliness towards bitcoin as pure wishful thinking. Not many people understand what it means to be able to transfer "wealth" without forced and mandatory "middleman". If you look at the propaganda against btc in popular news sources like BBC it's apparent that the war is on.

actually bitcoin is not illegal in the places listed above.

the best place to start a bitcoin business is europe, but as long as your offering legit goods or services for bitcoin you can pretty much start anywhere.

so if everyone started acting like the real world where there's only handfuls of gold miners /exchangers in an area but millions of retailers. that is how bitcoin can and should legally expand. everyone seems to be under the misguided concept that the only way to make money is through mining or forex exchanging.

where i am (in the UK) my bank manager knows about bitcoin, knows the risks, and knows me. yet has no problems allowing me to do business with bitcoins. the same with many countries.

the problem lies where bitcoin entrepreneurs suddenly think that because they own bitcoin, they can also act anonymously when it comes to their fiat trades too.

this actual thread should not be, which country is the most bitcoin friendly.. but which country has the cheapest money transmission licences. as its the licence to play with large amounts of FIAT that is the problem.. not bitcoin

so that the naive guys that are not finance experts can afford the licences, to naively become an exchange and make their money. i say naively because there's millions of other ways to make money and there are some people with financial exchange experience that can afford the licences, which should be doing it instead. purely on the bases they have better money management skills to be trusted with other peoples money.

there needs to be a big push away from exchanges and mining, and more of a push on retail start ups. its all about knowing the rules and following them. and to not be an "teentrepreneur" rebelling against the 'man' like a teenager rebels against parents.

but i would love to see a pricelist per country/province for money transmission licences

Vanuatu is the Pacific's premier offshore financial center, featuring :

    No personal or corporate income taxes
    No capital gains taxes
    No withholding taxes
    No estate or death duties
    No tax treaties
    No exchange controls

Vanuatu is a long-established offshore banking centre, with over 60 banks either incorporated or registered there.

http://www.offshore-library.com/banking/vanuatu/

That country sounds nice to live.

Unfortunately, not Israel (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=173108.0)

Very nice indeed.

I'd have to agree that any of the countries with the more lax regulations regarding business or personal income taxation (commonly referred to as tax havens) would be likely candidates for setting up bitcoin-related businesses like exchanges.

If you're a more regular type of business who happens to accept bitcoins, common wisdom at the moment seems to be declare them on your taxes and leave it at that. (That's been Canada's position, anyway. They've said outright that they are taxable as either income or capital gains, depending on how one uses or acquires them.)

Enjoy a smooth bowl of kava at the beach while your online business hums away  ;D

"Several file-sharing groups, such as the providers of the KaZaA network of Sharman Networks and the developers of WinMX, have chosen to incorporate in Vanuatu to avoid regulation and legal challenges."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vanuatu#Economy

Finland, Iceland and, as of today, the Netherlands.

Germany.

But the whole thread is pointless. a currency can never be banned. As long as people accept it as currency and a cashflow is present a currency can and will be steady/in existence. And with currency I mean everything you can think of as payment. in germany after ww2 cigarettes were pretty common as black market currency. or take the worst example, blood diamonds; they are banned pretty much everywhere but you still find them everywhere.

I would say them as well.

Sweden is, I wouldn't call it friendly, but neutral.

No actual laws prohibiting anything. Only law concerning bitcoin is that last fall the Swedish Financial Supervisory Authority stated that any company that deals with currency trade, has to register and follow their regulations* to prohibit money laundering and funding of terrorism. Wich isn't strange since this was controlled by the banks before digital currencies was introduced.

Sweden is both in the very frontline of technology as well as a quite free country to live in. So dont see any problem in owning, managing, selling, starting business with bitcoin here.

I am myself starting a btc oriented company here :) No loopholes what so ever, just connections with thee supervisory authority and I am good.


*The regulations state that any transfer of money by a person, greater than X Swedish crowns/week has to be checked for identity.

Canada, Iceland, Finland..
Canada, no need for an MSB licence
Iceland, it's to the internet was switzeland was to money
Finland, Central bank spokeperson told they have no problem at all.. it seems a very smart and permissive country

I am a proponent of legal compliance and mitigation of risk. With that in mind I am curious to hear thoughts on...

1. Establishing corporate entity in Marshall Islands
2. Establishing banking in Singapore
3. Vetting any partner to ensure they are in compliance with regard to their operations in various jurisdictions

Seems to me that most targeted operations were in fact not complying with regional law. I believe there are plenty of ways to operate within the law and mitigate risk.

SOUTH CENTRAL LOS ANGELES >>SWEDEN >> SANFRANCISCO>>DUBAI>>TORONTO>>COSTA RICA>>DENVER CO....hmmmm>>CAYMAN ISLANDS LOL!

I think the best countries are those in the Northern and Eastern Europe.   They seems to be able to accept Bitcoins far more readily than those of USA.

Canada at least respects the rule of law.

are you serious now i needed a good laugh!~type: pinksheet pipe financing haha

~ya thats where the quality drugs are coming from? 8)LOL

In Holland the tax department has acknowledged bitcoins and included it as an asset to be counted when to calculate wealth tax. I think that's a good thing. Those Dutch, if they'll legalize everything as long as a tax can be levied on it  ;D