Bitcoin Forum

Fellow UK Bitcoiners,

We are all aware that buying bitcoins in the UK is not as easy as it could be, rather cumbersome and quite pricey compared to other locations around the world. 

It is exciting to see the emergence of new UK based Exchanges such as Coinfloor, Bitprice, Bit121 and IBWT, however when it comes to P2P exchanges, we've noticed the current duopoly of Localbitcoins and Bitbargain is not as attractive to buyers as they once were. 

What can help make this situation better for buyers as the price premiums can sometimes be out of control and quite off-putting. 

Look forward to hearing other UK Bitcoiners thoughts on this.

Cheers.

I was not aware of some of the exchanges you mentioned in the UK so thank.you .

Buying bitcoins is expensive in U.k. My bank charge £15 to change £ to euro an give me rubbish exchange rate, Four euro less than market value .
Even coinfloor has euro bank account so whatever we do we have crappy exchange rate and fee .

We need exchange that we can put £'s into without fee .

The exchanges avertise that they are uk based but name one that has a UK account ,I cannot fin one .
I'am not sure what UK laws they have to abide by but no-one seems to bank in the UK .
I cannot understand why since all the global banksters have a presence in London,and they are all self regulating.

Does anyone know why exchanges in bitcoin are afraid to bank in the U.K.?

RapidCoinz: it's definitely not a UK problem. I think it's almost the same in most of the european union... :(

bitstamp.net is located in the UK

Their bank is in Slovenia.

Presumably you could send British Pounds changed to USD in a pre-agreed exchange rate with services such as currencies direct. Think probably better than letting your bank or Estonia changing the GBP to USD.

Bitstamp is a bit hard to understand .

1) advertised as based in UK .

2) They want you to change GBP to Eur to go into slovacian account ,then they change Eur to Dollar free ,all this for a UK based exchange ??

If it is a UK exchange why can we not simply put GBP into it ?? I o not understand ?

Barclays branch manager assumes it was for tax avoidance ??

It costs me £15 an a crap exchange rate to fund my Uk bitstamp account lol

The only problem with OTC is that it is difficult for noobies and joe bloggs public to use and trade coins.  Localbitcoins has been and still is a great service to the BTC community in the UK, it's the inflated prices at times, considerably higher than the prices offered on the exchanges, which is off putting to many regular UK buyers of coins. 
But as you mention, this, along with Bitbargain, are what we have to rely on for the time being. 
The possibility of exchanges disappearing are frightening, even when Bitstamp 'froze' for a week recently, it was enough to cause many people sleepless nights with other BTC sites around the globe dropping like flies and doing a Houdini disappearing act.

Out of the ones I have mentioned in the original post, Bit121 are UK based, using a Payment Service Provider to circumnavigate using a UK bank, so Pacnet, (the PSP) deal with Barclays, their UK bank.

See this article for more info on that particular example: http://www.coindesk.com/barclays-bank-uk-bitcoin-exchange-bit121/ (http://www.coindesk.com/barclays-bank-uk-bitcoin-exchange-bit121/)

I have personally used this service and can confirm you deposit your £ into a UK bank account.  But it seems, they (or Barclays) are sidestepping something here.  It does seem strange that London and the UK are a beacon of banking, yet they are so restrictive and stringent with its laws.  Well, actually, I think that statement may have just answered itself.