Bitcoin Forum

I think a lot of people misunderstand what "legal tender" means.

Legal tender means that the government forces everybody to accept Bitcoin whether they want to or not.

Typically a country only has one currency like that, which is their sovereign national currency.

In other words, when you are asking for legal tender status, you are asking for a free, open and decentralized thing like Bitcoin should become controlled by the government because they force everybody to own it. Not only is this immoral, it will absolutely backfire because anything you force everybody to own will always end up being controlled by the government.

Understand that "legal tender" does not mean "legal". Bitcoin is already perfectly legal in most countries: you can own it and you can trade it if you want to. Even in China, where people consider Bitcoin "banned", individuals there can own it and the laws only apply to financial entities there (which are already highly regulated in all kinds of ways and there is probably a long, long list of things they cannot own).

So please stop asking for government help in proliferating Bitcoin by forcing people to accept something they don't want to accept.

And concede that Bitcoin is already legal for the most part, and governments at this point are not meaningfully "holding it back".

Totally wrong, a legal tender is a type of payment that a country considers as legal and its law allow it to be used to settle debts which simply means a type of asset that can be used for financial things. A country never force you to use a legal tender but if you live in a country then you need to use it for trading of goods.

Let's say each country's fiat is a legal tender but they won't force you to use it, however if you want to purchase something from a shop or from someone then you will need it for the purpose. If Bitcoin becomes a legal tender then the governments won't force others to accept it but they will allow anyone to trade goods with it without any legal concerns. Ultimately, you'll be allowed to settle debt with either fiat or Bitcoin if a country makes it a legal tender.

For any currency to be a legal tender, it means that the government have made it part of the currency of that country by law, that should be accepted for payment of goods and services and also for paying debt. So, any country that makes bitcoin a legal tender does not really mean that the government will force its citizens to use it, but it will be an alternative means of payment to fiat. and it will be accepted by all.

Making bitcoin a legal tender by the government of a country does not give the government any power to control bitcoin. Let's take a look at El Salvador, it is not all of them that is using bitcoin, and Bukele didn't force anyone to use bitcoin.

Every country has its own native fiat currency, which is legally accepted by every individual, business, organization, and company in that country. The government of every country or your country doesn't force you to use your local currency, but you have to use it because it is what can be accepted in exchange for goods and services in your country. Unless you have someone who agrees to accept payment through other means, then you can pay, and you will not face any penalty as long as the person you are paying agrees to accept your offer. Categorically, what I am saying is that the government will not force you to use a particular currency, but if it is made legal and people accept it, you have no other alternative of payment unless the person you are dealing with agrees to accept a different means of payment from the one that is legal.

In my country, Bitcoin is not banned, nor is it a legal tender, but yet some people accept Bitcoin payments, and they don't face any government penalties for not accepting Fiat.

This recent time that the rate of inflation has hiked and the value of fiat currencies keeps depreciating, citizens in most countries, which are greatly affected by inflation, are looking for some asset to invest their money in that can appreciate in value and earn them a significant profit. So, it's not everyone who is suggesting that Bitcoin become a legal tender. Anybody can own Bitcoin as long as they understand the workframe of the coin and its technologies. It doesn't need to become legal tender before they can own it. People are looking for a safe heaven asset, an asset that they are sure can add value to their capital, and if everyone realizes that Bitcoin can be a solution for them, they will all be investing in Bitcoin.

Totally wrong! Legal tender means that government recognises a certain method of payment/currency as legal in their own jurisdiction. A country can have multiple legal tenders which means they can have their own fiat currency active while also recognising Bitcoin as a legal means of payment.

There are multiple countries where Bitcoin is not yet a legal tender but there is only a handful of countries where Bitcoin is considered as legal tender. Now a government can choose whether to force a certain method or not.

Yeah that's true I think because Bitcoin is a legal tender doesn't mean its forced upon by everyone to use it and I can also relate this with other countries that don't even use Bitcoin, because I am believe that some countries do have two currencies as their legal tender and this means the two currencies are to be accepted for exchange of goods and commodity just as you explain but this doesn't necessarily mean every one is forced to use and doesn't mean that government controls the two currencies used cause I believe one of them might be a different currency maybe like the dollar.

The people in El Salvador still can use USD for their businesses even when BTC is legal tender. It doesn't necessarily be enforced but BTC is an option for the people. I don't think you will be able to make BTC a sole currency in one place, we still need the stablecoin ffor its value to be recognized.

I'm not sure if people are asking BTC to be a legal tender. The majority accepts the fact that BTC will have to exist side by side with the government-backed currency, no one can remove those national currencies as they are part of a country's sovereignty.

This is very very wrong and I don't think you know what you are saying at all.
please you better not forget what's human rights is about (https://www.un.org/en/global-issues/human-rights#:~:text=Human%20rights%20are%20rights%20inherent,and%20education%2C%20and%20many%20more.) because if you forget that, people will have to use you like you are nobody and you will be slave forever.
Everybody in their countryside have right to agree and to disagree, but corruption have make many of we to always put eyes in where money is coming and not something that will benefit us and others, don't be surprised to hear why some government don't want to make Bitcoin legal tender on there country.
Maybe some have received money from others who have higher authority than them so they have to follow the decision so they will won't lose their job's, if your government legalese Bitcoin and you don't want to accept it, you won't be forced ti accept it because you have right not to accept same the ither way, when your government didnt make Bitcoin legal and you are using it quiet without informing anyone who will be ni harm for you.

I don’t think any Americans will be forced to accept Bitcoin anytime soon. The Lightning network is unreliable and just plain terrible for use in a large country while the main layer couldn’t dream of supporting so many transactions. I won’t even go into the technical challenges for people who might not know how to use a computer… Legal status isn’t something that needs to worried about right now.

By that definition, cigarettes are "legal tender" in the United States since you can legally settle a debt using cigarettes. Or gold coins. Or furniture. Or baseball cards. Or whatever the counterparty accepts as payment.

So there's great news for you: by your definition, "Bitcoin is Legal Tender in the United States!".

But that's not the legal definition....

Bitcoin is legal to hold and trade for individuals (including China) in almost every country in the world except for a tiny few.

You are making up a problem here where there isn't one. You don't need to force people to accept Bitcoin. It does not need to be officially anointed as "legal tender" in order for it to be legal to trade and hold.

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The definition of legal tender is that "all debts, public in private" must be able to be settled with this form of payment.

If I arrange, by some sort of trade, to get your car, and I pay you, and you don't give me what I asked for in return, when we go to court, the court can order you either give me the thing I wanted in trade, or the equivalent in US dollars.

That's it. That's all "legal tender" means. It means that everybody in the country must accept this currency whether they want to or not.

It's the government forcing the adoption of a means of trade.

The definition people seem to think it means is, "legal to trade", but Bitcoin and all cryptos are perfectly legal to trade in almost every country in the world, including the USA.

I think you’re the one actually misunderstanding this whole legal tender of a thing, been legal tender doesn’t mean it is enforced to be accept but rather you do that at your own comfortability. Yes bitcoin isn’t banned in most countries but there are restrictions on the use of it and where there is a restriction then that entity is usually risky to been used publicly because you never might tell maybe it would later get banned.

The reason why you see people are clamoring for bitcoin as a legal tender is because once the government accepts as such it means they full support such currency and its citizens need not to be afraid of any policy change in the future. But right now without a proper stand on it and just restrictions you never can tell what they will decree about it in the future and that’s why it’s users can not openly use it even if it is not stopped

Please learn to merger all your replies together

The subject of bitcoin as a legal tender or not is subjective of the nation in question in this discussion, for those people living in El Salvador bitcoin is used as a legal tender in their country as it has the government legal backing for use of buying and selling of product and services. And it's worthy to remind you or anyone that the acceptance of bitcoin in country like El Salvador wasn't a forceful act on the citizens by the government because what I know they still make use of their country's fiat currency for exchange of goods and services.

For the fact that the government gives a legal backing to a thing as a legal tender it's appropriate to address it as that in that very country. Whatever thing we call money or give money value today is based on the value we as humans in a particular society consciously attached to it, and by the virtue of that unanimous attachment and acceptance as a government that what automatically makes it a legal tender.

You are right that when Bitcoin becomes a legal tender, everybody is mandated by the law to accept it as a means of payment or settlement of debt. But you are wrong that if Bitcoin becomes a legal tender it is now under the control of the government. People are mandated to accept or use Bitcoin for financial transactions but they are forced to use centralised platforms. Bitcoiners in countries that have legalised Bitcoin are allowed to use any platform they deem fit. They can decide to make payments using decentralised wallets and they will not be sanctioned. Making Bitcoin a legal tender doesn't make the government control Bitcoin except they begin to make policies that are targeted at regulating or controlling the space.      

Making Bitcoin a legal tender means that it is compulsory that you have to accept it as a means of payment. An example is that if I want to make payment for a house in El Salvador, the owner of the house is mandated by the law to accept either dollars or Bitcoin. If I insist that the currency I own is Bitcoin, the house owner will have no option but to accept Bitcoin because it is a legal tender.  

Again, the word "legal tender" has a specific meaning derived from the US Constitution (https://constitutioncenter.org/the-constitution/articles/article-i/clauses/767).

And shares of Apple (AAPL) are not "legal tender" and clearly investors are not living in fear that the government might "someday" make Apple illegal because investors have bid its worth to trillions of dollars.

In my opinion, the reason why people want "legal tender" status for Bitcoin is to use the power of the government to make their Bitcoin holdings more valuable. Just like anybody holding AAPL shares would like the US government to say something nice about it and enforce that into law.


Done.  :)



This was a point I was making about the "practicality" of the situation. Countries that force their citizens to carry health insurance, for instance, necessarily heavily regulate the health insurance business.

That would be true of the US government forced everybody to accept Bitcoin as payment: Congress would regulate it much much more. Instead of being "just another asset people can invest in", it's now something the government officially supports and voters are not going to accept giving that status away for free.

Exactly there is no denying the fact that government wouldn’t approve any currency as legal tender as long as they can’t control or regulate it and if you look at the nature of bitcoin it is definitely hard to control or manipulate it like the government will want and that’s why the government is actually trying not to make it a legal tender and instead warn people off it that it is not something they should go into. Looking at this, it tells you that the government is not actually stopping it from been a legal tender just because they don’t want to enforce it on people but because they don’t have control over it.

The illegality pronunciation on Bitcoin in some countries are either buttressed that the government ecosystems such as the banks and other government owned financial institutes should desist from any form of the bitcoins transactions which means you can't sell nor buy Bitcoin in any of the affirmed mentioned.
While some countries tends to buttress the laws in a general overview that not even an individual is authorized to transact with the Bitcoin which means anyone caught on trading or transacting with the Bitcoin in any form must has violated the laws governing their system and the Bitcoin currency. So anyone that insists on involving with the Bitcoin is at its high risk indulgences.

If a country makes a currency a legal tender it doesn't mean you're forced to use it. It's like with languages. Some countries have 2 legal languages and this means you can file your papers in one and they have to be legally accepted by public services and such. When 2 different currencies are legal tender, you can pay using one of them, or even both, paying half of the price in one and half in the other.

I'd say that becoming a legal tender is great for any currency and this is one of the reasons why Euro is doing so poorly. The EU plan was to make all members accept common currency, but some did not do it years after joining the Union. I can bet you that if bitcoin becomes legal tender in a first world country the price will go crazy.

legal tender is not about replacing countries FAIT. its about allowing businesses to sell goods/services and pay taxes and such in bitcoin..
the negative side is as you later say, it then allows those countries governments to apply licencing/permitted use rules on the use of it and start requiring regulations on the services that use it. but legal tender is not about replacing fiat

the way governments achieve "legal tender" acceptance is usually a covert or overt ban. either just overnight or longterm. and then a permit/licencing acceptance of use under certain conditions acceptable to government (even the NYbitlicence done a covert ban, with overnight acceptance under conditions for NY citizens and businesses)

in short your first three sentences are inaccurate but the rest of post is a correctly a concern we should think about.

Legal status is limited to a specific country and that means bitcoin is recognize as medium of exchange, nobody in that country that can challenge you for using Bitcoin to buy any thing and nobody has the right to reject it either. This is only good for Bitcoin adoption, it has nothing to with with centrality or decentralization of bitcoin. The only place I see it becoming centralized is when people hold it as reserve without been use for the purpose is where I see centralization.


Bitcoin is not legal in all countries and just because a country has not said anything regarding it legality makes it legal in any form. They have the right to say it's illegal and they have the right to make it legal which means anybody can own Bitcoin but this doesn't in anyway makes it legal tender. Legal tender means ready to be accepted as a settlement of debt anywhere in the country but the legally recognized is not a legal tender. Countries like China has ban Bitcoin for years now, Bitcoin is legal in US but not a legal tender while in El Salvador Bitcoin is legal and it's also a Legal tender.


There is nothing like forcing people, only you can't hold bitcoin forever do you, you have to make other people come and have a taste of it and because you can't fight the government, you need to be friends with them to get into their pocket and that's where legal way comes in, we need everyone to buy and use Bitcoin atleast to convince them to taste what they have been missing out.

That's actually the exact definition of "legal tender".

Again, don't confuse the term, "legal" with "legal tender". They are two different things.



Again, like many here, you are confusing the terms, "legal" and "legal tender".

Bitcoin is legal in most countries. Anybody can trade in Bitcoin if they want to.

Bitcoin is not truly legal tender in any country, including El Salvador, since even there they don't universally enforce their law.

Legal tender means payees must accept Bitcoin as a means of settling a debt whether they want to or not.

It's also worth noting here how incredibly rare it is for this to even be an issue.

The US dollar's legal tender status only comes up in court judgements where there is disagreement about a settlement of a debt denoted in some other form of payment (e.g. a barter), in which case the court can make a judgement that an equivalent US dollar amount be paid, and the payor is forced to pay in that currency.

That's it. That's all "legal tender" actually does.

First of all, I do not understand your "allergy" to the situation of people asking for "legal tender status", they are free to ask and demand what they believe, it depends on those who make these requests to make the respective declarations that this is what they want.

Bitcoin is accepted in many countries in different ways, since you simply buy it and sell it like any other asset or digital possession.

In many places on the planet, people buy things with art, watches, vehicles, etc., let's say that barter is still active, and none of that is "legal" to pay for goods and services but they use it, that configuration obviously depends on the country, now, to declare that in a sale contract the legal tender must be justified with a deposit in an account or check if applicable.

So, there is a fiscal order in that sense, so making bitcoin legal for payments, even if it is not legal currency, is a solution for many users, in those cases that "legal status" is welcome.

Making something legal tender means you can freely use it in that space no body is forcing anybody to make use of anything, we have freedom of what currency you want to use and which one you don’t want to use the only thing their is that you don’t need to hide and use bitcoin again if they have been made a legal tender and when they are now legal tender you can use it to go into contract agreement which is qualified to be sued and can go into any court case.

In countries where bitcoin is not legal tender their are some point of sales you use bitcoin to make and they can take legal action against your and you have no prove of payment since your means of payment is not recognized in that region. Their is nothing wrong with legal tender their might be some level of control up to a certain level when it comes to the bitcoin owns and distributed to citizens by their government they can be monitored.

..
you are not understanding the bigger out-of-box thinking looking into the whole thing

saying something is legal is saying government say its in legislation to allow..
saying something is not illegal is saying government have not said in legislation its not allowed..
see the difference?

lets explain
pre 1900, alcohol was not "illegal" as it had no rules. thus not illegal... nor legal.. it was just out of scope of legislation due to having no legislation
thus no scope for government to do anything (no jurisdiction) thus no crimes can be claimed for using it

then the 1920's prohibition ban where legislation was written it make it illegal.. then the licencing permit of alcohol, with rules attached, where legislation was written. which made it legal to sell to [insert minimum wage] legal to consume [insert location conditions] blah blah blah

bitcoin is the same. by having no rules it was not ILLEGAL.. because pre to 2013 there were no rules
however countries did then recognise it and start forming rules thus started making legislation

whats legal and illegal is based on legislation rules.
if there are no rules its not "legal", nor not "not legal" its just not "illegal" either.. in short has no scope in legality..

next "legal TENDER"
unlike other things that are LEGAL in legislation. 99.999% of those things are not treated as convertible currency and common accepted moneys
governments that declare something as legal tender then allow businesses to treat it as good as money.. but this does not mean replacing current fiat. it just means extra regulations apply to the rules of legislation when getting legal tender status.. such as banking rules and taxes

I think OP misunderstood and mixed everything. Legal tender doesn't mean being forced by the government to hold or buy Bitcoin. It does mean that if someone offers a Bitcoin payment, you have to accept it. If no one offers you Bitcoin to exchange something, you don't need to be involved with Bitcoin. Its like two currencies in the same country. When someone offers native currency against something, you are forced to accept that native currency. Where Bitcoin is accepted as a legal tender, there are two native currencies.

Again, you are already free to trade Bitcoin in most countries. Nobody is stopping you. Bitcoin is already legal for payments and has been since it was invented in almost all countries.

People who are asking for legal tender status are asking for the government to use their power to force people to accept Bitcoin.

It is also perfectly legal to use barter to pay for things in most countries.



Again, that's not what the term, "legal tender" means. The word you seem to think it means is, "legal". You can currently pay for things with Bitcoin if you want, and the counterparty freely accepts it.

What legal tender means is that you want to force people to accept Bitcoin even if they don't want to.


Any business in the United States, right now, under today's laws, can accept Bitcoin as payment. Nobody is stopping them.

I can also accept gold as payment, or baseball cards, or shares of AAPL.

There is no law against any of this.

What "legal tender" means is that businesses are forced to accept Bitcoin as payment.

And people should stop asking for that, because it's wrong...

bitcoin is not "legal" everywhere as that involves legislation
bitcoin was everywhere deemed not "illegal" due to no legislation(pre2013~)
there is a difference. and worth learning

the correct term is bitcoin is not illegal in countries where its not recognised, banned, licenced .. (basically places where theres no legislation)

EG
"It is also not illegal to use barter to pay for things in most countries." would be the more accurate wording

by wanting legal status officially = creating legislation.. something that comes with negative commitments/conditions

i prefered bitcoin in the days when it was not illegal. far more then the days where its now legal

there was a pivotal point around 2013-2014 in US-EU and most large countries where bitcoin changed from being not illegal to being legal, even if not attaining the higher status of tender recognition

think of it as four statuses
not illegal = no laws, no regulations, no legislation exist for it(do as you please with it, theres nothing stopping you(lawless))
illegal = laws, regulations, legislation wrote to say its not allowed
legal = laws, regulations, legislation wrote to say its allowed
legal tender laws, regulations, legislation wrote to say its allowed, and also extra regulatory oversight to be treated as good as money within condition

...

something being legal. is allowed because the law says so
something being not illegal vs being legal are two separate things

hope that clarifies things

That is the meaning of legal tender, it is perfectly allowed by the government for the people to use it freely depending on what they want to do with their Bitcoin. Once a country officially announces the legality of Bitcoin, it is an indication that Bitcoin is very welcome in their country and this will also help people to have confidence about accepting/using this as a payment option. In some countries, like mine, I haven't heard it was considered legal but authorities don't ban this which still gives us freedom to use Bitcoin in whatever we want as long as it is never used in illegal activities.

Being a legal tender is simply considered a national currency which means that it’s legally valid to be accepted as a payment option for any commodity. However, the government will not force the people to use it or utilize it most especially for bitcoin that it’s known more being an investment and trading purposes. But I believe the government has certainly some plans to control bitcoin and monitor all its activities or transactions once the country decides to accept bitcoin as a legal tender.

I thought that this debate has ended several years ago now?  ???

Frankly I could not care less about whether or not bitcoin is legal tender. As you say legal tender status is just a government endorsement, which means very little when it comes to actual adoption. We've seen massive growth in BTC adoption, both as a store of value and medium of transaction, without it having been recognised as legal tender in most advanced nations.

There are plenty of merchants that accept BTC already who don't care either. And you are always free to convert your BTC into fiat in order to spend, if that's what you desire.

its more about the ramifications of becoming legalised (wrote into legislation)
before 2013 bitcoin was jsut lawless, open, free-trade. like pokemon cards or anything of barter
but when wrote into legislation, it then becomes conditioned. where governments gain jurisdictional control of utility and permitted use of

when deemed legal tender.. (a status above just legal) it then becomes dependant that people log where the funding came from, who it went to and what reason, for tax purposes.

where as just the "legal" status still had some conditions but not as much as "legal tender" does

there are other categories such as being recognised as asset or commodity.. rather then tender
where by the rules are not about banking laws, but about the securities and commodities regulators laws

so when certain institutions were lobbying to get bitcoin recognised as a asset and/or commodity.. this then allowed those regulation rule makers to start righting conditions of use too

That's really not how legal tender works. Legal tender is a designation. It has nothing to do with the government controlling it. No government is forcing anyone to use Bitcoin. That would only happen is a country GOT RID OF their current legal tender and made Bitcoin the ONLY legal tender, which is not something any country is going to do.

The legality of Bitcoin doesn't matter to me as far as I can do what want with it. the only difference is it's not accepted for some transactions. the truth is Bitcoin works viz vice with the current currency of any country.

legal tender doesn't really meant it most be accepted for all transaction but at least it's recognized by the law or it passes through the law for its use in the country. Bitcoin isn't a legal tender but it's not also illegal so it's just a misconception in the term legality.

The term "legal tender" is only related to debts, what you are talking about is a "legal payment method". And that varies heavily from country to country. Some are quite liberal in this regard and allow people to use any currencies they want, while others are very strict and only allow the national currency to be used and punish those who use other currencies. This is actually one of the major obstacles in Bitcoin adoption - if they don't allow even the US dollar to be used as a payment, why should they allow Bitcoin? Bitcoin in this case is a lot like another foreign currency.

Well, this really differs by country or government, just like what OP said. For me, overall what we are experiencing is a misconception, which most people misunderstand how legal tenders work.
And for me, as far as I know, only El Salvador right now is the country that accepts Bitcoin as "legal tender".

Here in the USA at least, there's no distinction between "not illegal" and "legal". If there is no law against it, then you can do it.

"Legal tender" is a different classification wherein citizens are forced to accept a means of payment even if they don't want to.


Usually countries don't announce, "such and such is legal now!" unless it was previously illegal. In the US at least, Bitcoin was never illegal.

The term, "legal tender" has a specific meaning that is not the same as "legal", but it would appear that almost nobody is willing to understand this so maybe I should just give up trying to explain it :).


No government is forcing anybody to use Bitcoin right now because no government has designated Bitcoin to be "legal tender" and enforcing that (they announced this in El Salvador, but they clearly aren't serious about this since they don't enforce the law so even they are not truly "legal tender" for Bitcoin).

The definition of "legal tender" is that the government forces people to accept that currency whether they want to or not.


What country does not allow US dollars to be used as a payment? I suspect there might be a few somewhere in the world, but come on, how many could there be? And why would a country even care?

Like Bitcoin, you can use US dollars as a means of payment almost anywhere if the counterparty will accept that payment. Governments almost never get involved in trade like that unless it's a really crazy draconian government.

So since there's not actually a problem here, this is absolutely not a major obstacle for Bitcoin adoption.

Bitcoin is legal for individuals to trade and hold in most of the civilized world already.

correct if there is NO LAW then yes you can do it. and yes it is NOT ILLEGAL
but for something to be legal there needs to be some legislation, paperwork, contract that makes something legal and binding allowed condition

if there is only one currency available then its the sole currency businesses have to accept within reason
its for tax, income, and auditing of a businesses finances for a multitude of government agencies.

however if a currency adds another currency as legal tender, it offers choice

ill give you an example
the US dollar is deemed the only legal tender of the US. where bitcoin is not legal tender status. nor are airmiles
however US airlines can also accept "travel miles" it is not forced to only accept dollars, however dollars are made to be accepted as the main form of payment that businesses cant refuse without good reason, where a businesses accountants measure value, wages, taxes in dollars

Let the people freely ask what they want to ask from the government. And let the government decide what they think is better for the nation and her people.

As far as I know, Salvadorans, the citizens of the beautiful El Salvador where Bitcoin is a legal tender, are not forced to use Bitcoin. Bitcoin is a legal tender there, meaning the people, businesses, the government itself may accept it. But since there is another legal tender which is the US dollar, everybody has the option to prefer the US dollar. It would certainly be a different case if Bitcoin is the sole legal tender of a country.

Anyway, worry not about governments controlling Bitcoin. It can never happen.

Even though several countries have been able to legalize Bitcoin as a means of payment, they do not force every person or resident to use it, this is done so that the existing local currency does not lose its value or divert the use of Bitcoin.  More precisely, if several governments can legalize Bitcoin as a means of payment, of course this is intended as an alternative that can make things easier for all people who don't have cash, such as making it easier for foreigners who come to that country

As I said above (and I provided a link where you can read about El Salvador and Bitcoin), they are not "really" implementing legal tender there because they don't enforce it. (And I suspect it's because they simply couldn't in practicality--and I further suspect that El Salvador did this as a publicity stunt, not real policy).

I don't worry about governments controlling Bitcoin--it's legal almost everywhere. But the only thing that could change that is a government forcing everybody to use it, which means they'd need to regulate it.


Again, "legal" is not the same thing as "legal tender". People in these forums say they pine for "legal tender status" for Bitcoin even though it's already perfectly legal almost everywhere. (They want the "extra boost" that a government forcing everybody to use Bitcoin would give the price of Bitcoin I guess  :D.)

There's no need to use lightning network if the government want to accept Bitcoin as legal tender, they can just create their own centralized exchange, and force the citizens to use that exchange as their wallet, just like Chivo in El Salvador. They only need to install the application without need to care about the technical thing, pretty much like other applications where you only need to remember your email/username and your password.

I think he was just trying to give a example about how the government of the US will do. And so there are not force acceptance if ever bitcoin will be legal tender. You can choose what and how you want to used it, as money, assets, hedge against the current status of the economy. Remember though that in El Salvador, even if Bukele won the reelection, he can't force as well 100% of the population to used BTC. We already have the approval of Bitcoin Spot ETF in the US, I think it's big enough to say that Bitcoin will stay and will be look at it as something that is legitimate as US still wields great influence in the financial world.

Bitcoin transactions can be broadcasted and confirmed borderless so you can use your bitcoin anywhere. If you use no-KYC exchanges, you don't have to concern about legal tender status of Bitcoin in a location, nation you are living in.

Running a Bitcoin full node, with Tor, is not expensive and it will help you increasing your privacy.

[Guide] How to run a Bitcoin Core full node for under 50 bucks! (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5364742.0)

Bitcoin becoming legal tender only happened in El Salvador and the Central African Republic, apart from that other countries only consider that Bitcoin can be used as a trading and investment instrument by their citizens. Being legal tender means that Bitcoin can be used as a means of payment for goods or services in that country, whereas in countries that only consider Bitcoin as a trading instrument you cannot use Bitcoin to buy goods or pay for services and violating this will result in penalties. So there is a real difference when Bitcoin's status becomes legal tender and when Bitcoin is only a trading instrument in a country.

It's enough for us to have bitcoins in our country as something that is not banned considering it complex for some people because whenever we want to buy, we can just easily access our local exchanges and simply buy them whereas in other countries they don't have this options because of tight rules and regulations when it comes to owning bitcoins and they surely face legal charges if they caught red-handed. The only problem that we wish they didn't implement is the huge tax for the bitcoin owners, so far in some countries as well this is not a problem but they cannot make sure that it will last long.

Actually, the op is kind of right. According to Merriam-Webster (https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/legal%20tender), legal tender is "money that is legally valid for the payment of debts and that must be accepted for that purpose when offered". I've also seen similar definitions in other dictionaries, including a Google prompt based on Oxford dictionaries that you'll get if you google the meaning of legal tender. If something is legal tender, it means that it must be accepted as payment. So it's not obligatory for customers (if there's a different legal tender as well), but merchants are obliged to accept such payments, meaning, in case of Bitcoin, that they must have some wallets, at the very least, to accept such payments. So there is an element of force here, and it's understandable that some might be against such policies.

That is simply not true. Bitcoin is already perfectly legal to be used as a means of payment of goods or services in most countries across the world.

The reason why people don't use Bitcoin to pay for ordinary things is because transactions are far too slow and far too expensive. Why would anybody pay for their $5 cup of Starbucks coffee with something that takes 30 minutes and costs $30 to complete a transaction?

Asking the government to force Bitcoin down people's throats like you are asking them to do here isn't going to help. Most people in El Salvador don't use Bitcoin for anything even though the government there literally used taxpayer money to bribe them into doing so and passed a law saying everybody must accept Bitcoin.


While there are a few countries where individual ownership and trading of Bitcoin is banned, that list is very short. For almost all of the world's economy, there are no significant restrictions on Bitcoin.

And in the US at least, there's no taxes on Bitcoin that aren't present on every other kind of investment. It sounds like you might be asking for a tax break just because you chose to invest in Bitcoin as opposed to other investments, but that's not very fair to others.

No, that's the point, you didn't understand the situation well, barter is not legal, you cannot put in a commercial purchase and sale document that you delivered a Picasso painting, for example.  There are taxes to pay etc.

In my country, barter is not accepted, nor is bitcoin, it is illegal, for formal payments.

Now, the dollar is not the legal currency in circulation, but it is accepted for formal, legal payments.

In the USA at least, it's legal to buy something (using whatever means you want), but yes, you have to pay customary taxes. I wouldn't call this "illegal", but at minimum it's the same thing no matter how you buy it. I don't see why that would need to be any sort of impediment to using Bitcoin for payment as you are only doing what you'd need to do for any other kind of payment.

What country are you from that outlaws Bitcoin and barter?

I think that the adjective "legal" does not have the same connotation in your country, no matter which one it is, but legal in my country requires that any transaction of purchase and sale of high-value goods and services be made in the currency of circulation that governs in the country. Since you have to justify the income of the money involved in said purchase, then banks, transfers, account deposits and/or checks are used for that, they cannot even be paid in cash.

So, bitcoin circulates in fact there is p2p, etc. but for "formal" procedures, payment is made in local currency or American dollars, and banks are used as essential to track the money involved.

Now, it exists in my country that someone sells or barters, yes, on the street, family, friends, etc. Anyone will receive what you give them as long as it has the exchange value.

But the above and I repeat, although bitcoin circulates as a valuable asset and exists for you to have, etc., is not allowed for legal, formal procedures, etc., that require a legal process from the state.

Now, the solution to that is, you sell "the Picasso painting" or "your bitcoins" to a third party and with that money you process the good you want to acquire in the Fiat currency or USD.

^{It's nice that you attend to your thread, and don't leave it abandoned, it is very rare for OP to stay active.}

Ah, that is a pain. But I suspect the issue is more practical, since tax must be calculated on purchases. I suspect they have a mechanism figured out so that foreigners can visit your country and use a credit card which has a balance in their own currency, and it does the exchange for you. I suspect somebody could create the same kind of technical solution with Bitcoin so that you pay the proper taxes for the transaction, using the current exchange rate.

But this is just a technical problem having to do with paying taxes, not a prohibition based on disliking Bitcoin, etc. And obviously a country needs to collect their taxes, so they are all going to have this problem no matter what form of remuneration one uses.


People do the same thing with physical cash here in the US. Lots of smaller vendors say they only want cash, "wink wink", and we suspect it's because they don't want to pay taxes on the payment. But this only works for "small" amounts that the government probably wouldn't bother with. (Try to buy a new car or a house with physical cash and you'll wind up with the FBI knocking at your door!)



Thank you. It's always interesting for me to hear viewpoints from all over the world.

I wonder why you have to insist on your own definition of legal tender. You may be right, at least partly, but that's what it is. The lawmakers of El Salvador has passed a law which recognizes Bitcoin as a legal tender. You may agree or disagree with it or their implementation of it, but that's a fact. Bitcoin is a legal tender in El Salvador. You may continue to insist that it is not, but that doesn't change a thing.

How can a government regulate something they cannot have control over? At most, what they can regulate are businesses which make use of Bitcoin in one way or another.

Forcing? Since when did the definition of legal tender changed because based on Investopedia (https://www.investopedia.com/terms/l/legal-tender.asp), this is the definition of legal tender:
I don't see the word "force" on that definition nor in the whole website. The government doesn't force you to use Bitcoin if it's a legal tender in the country. It's just that they are allowed to use to settle anything including debt or whatever it is. It's like an alternative option, and it's supported by the government.

Well, I'm a bit curious. Is there anybody here who is asking or begging Bitcoin to be a legal tender on their own country? I mean Bitcoin can be used by pretty much everybody in anything as long as the government don't interfere right? As long as they aren't banning it, they can be used in pretty much everything as long as 2 parties agreed to it. Legal tender for me isn't needed at all but correct me please if I said something wrong. :)

Well, "my" definition is based on place where the term originated, which is the US Constitution.

And I object to the use of this term for two reasons:

1. Bitcoin enthusiasts are insisting that governments force citizens to accept Bitcoin whether they want to or not.

and/or

2. Bitcoin enthusiasts insist that Bitcoin will become ubiquitous "as soon as Bitcoin becomes legal tender" even though most people don't understand what the term means, assume it just means "legal", and, wrongly, assume therefore that Bitcoin is not legal in most countries, which it most certainly is. And from this, they assume that what is holding it back from ubiquitous adoption as a payment method is government intervention, and not, say, the fact that Bitcoin transactions take 30 minutes and cost 30 dollars.

As for how a government would regulate Bitcoin, while I could probably think of a lot of ways, I would just say it's naive to think they wouldn't since they would be giving a single product in the marketplace near monopoly status, which means it would be beholden to the government.

And on that note, I guess if I had a third, less technical reason for objecting to people clamoring for giving Bitcoin legal tender status, is that it's inherently unfair: why Bitcoin and not, say, Ethereum, Dogecoin, other cryptos, or Haypenny currencies (https://haypenny.net/)? Why should the government pick Bitcoin over all of those others?

People clamoring for "legal tender status for Bitcoin", for me at least, sounds like people wanting their favorite product (probably the one they have the most of in their investment portfolio) to be given special help from the government. I've said before here that Bitcoin has strayed very, very far from it's quasi-libertarian roots, but this would make Ayn Rand roll over in her grave...


If you recognize a means of payment as a means to settle a public or private debt, that means the payee is forced to accept that mechanism of payment. If Bitcoin was made legal tender in the US, somebody could pay you in Bitcoin even if you didn't want to be paid in Bitcoin.

Like many here, you are confusing the concept of "legal to be used as a form of payment" (which Bitcoin is almost anywhere), and "legal tender", which is totally different.

And yes, I read these forums a lot, and lots and lots of people insist that Bitcoin should be made "legal tender", which is why I started this thread  :).

I completely agree that it is not necessary, or even desirable.

I agree partly with the OP. This discussion shows that many really misunderstand the concept of a "legal tender". ;)

But it's also not as black-and-white as you write, @legiteum. What a "legal tender" is, depends largely on the jurisdiction.

For example, in Bolivia I read there is a system similar to what @FamososMuertos described: every "formal" payment, i.e. every payment registered in the financial system, or every tax payment, has to be done with the national currency. What you do privately (i.e. buying Bitcoin from a friend, exchange Pokemons or other low-cost barter, etc.) is another story, these types of exchanges are also not prohibited but the financial system can't intermediate.

In other countries like Argentina and Germany instead, bartering and also paying with Bitcoin is not restricted in "formal" contracts and also the financial system can partly intermediate. But in Argentina there are financial entities which are banned to use Bitcoin (banks and "digital wallets"), and in Germany I read there are some restriction on high-valued goods which can only paid with the legal tender and additionally have to be paid electronically (i.e. not in cash).

So the assets you can use for payments and/or not is largely dependant on the country's legal system. In some, there's really a restrictive system where the legal tender is the only formally recognized way to do payments, while in others you can pay and barter with a lot of different assets.

About the government "forcing you to accept the legal tender": this was a matter of a heated debate in El Salvador, and the result (as I remind it) was that smaller shops are allowed to not accept it, and larger ones can always use the Chivo app to exchange Bitcoin instantly into fiat. So while there is often a kind of obligation to accept the legal tender, this is also not universal and there are often exceptions.

I disagree though that legal tender allows the governments to control Bitcoin itself. They can control the way contracts in Bitcoin are made, but not interfere in the technical aspects. They have to accept it as it is. They can also not force everybody to own it, only to accept it in some circumstances (e.g. in commerce) but even in El Salvador nobody is forced to hodl it. So no, I don't think there is any risk of "backfiring" if BTC is designated "legal tender".

While it might be possible the term occurs somewhere deeper in history than the US Constitution, I'm pretty sure hardly anybody would know about those definitions. Since that's the case, I would call this a "US term", and thus the definition means what it means in the USA even internationally. In other words, by asking for "legal tender status" for Bitcoin, people are basically saying, "make Bitcoin like the US Constitution says the US dollar is".

I agree that all kinds of means of payment are regulated by governments, and when I say "legal" in conversation I mean, "as legal as any other form of payment". Obviously governments want their taxes, and they tax transactions, and they will always find a way to do that. But that goes for any form of payment, not just Bitcoin.

And yes, as I mentioned, El Salvador tried to go full "legal tender" with Bitcoin and it's been a fiasco--and they aren't fully enforcing their law.

And finally, while I wouldn't want to get into a long debate about how governments could control the use of Bitcoin in their country, I would just say that it's naive to think they couldn't. Obviously this doesn't mean changing the Bitcoin codebase, but they wouldn't have to.

1. You've done a good job promoting whatever it is.

2. Legal tender didn't originate in the US. Neither did the constitution. Neither did the English language. Neither did anything else. But the real Nayib Bukele is on Twitter; you can actually reach out to him, "Hey, Mr. President, you should do things the way we do them over here in 'Merica!"

3. 99% of Bitcoin enthusiasts are here for the money. You can actually ignore them.

4. Out of those "lot of ways" that a government can regulate Bitcoin, you can actually give us 3.

Okay, fine. Off the top of my head:

1. A government could create a network of citizen spies wherein they give any citizen ten thousand dollars if they give information about any fellow citizen using Bitcoin, wherein the fellow citizen would be arrested and imprisoned for 20 years.

2. A government could setup a network of honeypot agents all over the Internet in order to catch its citizens using Bitcoin illegally, wherein if they are caught doing so they are imprisoned for 20 years.

3. A government could monitor Internet traffic transpiring within its borders and detect connections to Bitcoin servers.

Governments have guns and prisons on their side. You really can't win.

to add to this

1a. the IRS already offers bounties to citizen spies
1b. when the bitlicence first came out. if a NY service without licence operated, users could report it
1c. when the bitlicence first came out, NY DFS agents using NY geo-located pc's would check international businesses without bitlicence to see if the blocked NY citizens, and if not they got caught

2. when unregulated(binance) operated in the US without registering with SEC, agents actually would sign up to binance to see if they got blocked. and if able to get an account binance got caught

3. much like police can monitor homes that use excessive electric to identify weed farms. or see homes in infrared that produce too much heat for identifying weed farms, unregulated services not licenced under legislation can be found via many means. (much like 1&2).
but just swapping data over the internet does not equal serving customers in a legislative controlled area requiring licences/conditions of use, but can be used to identify possible targets to then do 1&2 prove licence evasion

the words "legal tender" for bitcoin do not mean that it must be accepted by everyone. because bitcoin is different from fiat
Indeed, the government does not legalize Bitcoin, but it does not prohibit Bitcoin transactions, and even then only certain shops or people accept it without any coercion.

Yes and no. It simply means that the law obliges the merchant/receiver to accept payment in Bitcoin. Don't think anyone would go to jail for refusing it though. I know plenty of places I've lived in where they won't accept small change or large notes, or torn notes or dirty ones. These are all legal tender, but a shop might refuse to accept legal tender when it inconveniences them (say, 10000s of coins, or a huge 500-euro note which anyway would be hard to come by).

Bitcoin being a legal means of payment in a country does not mean that it is a compulsion for citizens of that country who adopt bitcoin as a legal means of payment. But it actually gives the citizens of these countries the freedom to have more legal means of payment. You can use that country's currency (if you have one) and you can also use bitcoin. For example, in El Salvador, Nayib Bukele has now been re-elected, which indicates that the people are also okay with Nayib Bukele's policies which also made El Salvador legalize bitcoin as legal tender there. And now in this country even literacy related to bitcoin is also continuing to be encouraged. And it doesn't hinder the economy there, in fact I see that several sectors in that country have improved. It would be considered coercion if a country prohibits the use of other currencies and only allows bitcoin. But what is currently happening in El Salvador is that they legalized Bitcoin as a legal means of payment and of course still allow their citizens to transact with the legal currency there, namely dollars. Because El Salvador's currency has lost value a long time ago. And there they use another country's currency, namely the US Dollar. And now there is another option for transactions, namely with Bitcoin. More choices in my opinion is better. But everyone's opinion is definitely different.

I don’t see or hear that anyone en masse asked the government to accept this as legal tender. Bitcoin was originally conceived for precisely a different reason, from user to user with its own internal market, bypassing banks and other financial elements.
At the moment, I have enough of everyone functions and I can easily exchange crypto for fiat money in my country, without notifying the government. Yes, they are trying to regulate everything and propose a legislative framework, but to be honest, this worries me very little for many years, I somehow managed without them.

again OP keeps mixing the terminology

not illegal=no legislation either way thus no one says its not allowed
     -this was bitcoins status 2009-2013, it was not banned it was not disallowed, it simply had no rules thus open to be used in anyway
     - much like there is no pokemon card legislation. thus nothing against pokemon cards being traded, auctioned,

legal=there is legislation. and legislation is allowing it, but comes with some conditions of use, for things like financial services
    - much like contracts being legally binding if there is written contract documentation
    - this was the 2013+ of bitcoin when lobbying the "mainstreaming" campaigns of recognition legally

legal tender= extra regulations that allow banks, courts and government to custodianise and offer services

asset/commodity = when (in US) SEC/CFTC wrote regulations to recognise bitcoin. where by regulated businesses could get licences to custodianise and offer services

in none of the terms of legal, tender, or asset/commodity does it force services or institutions to accept the currency attining such status, its to allow them to accept it as equal to rules of other currencies they accept

..
however the attaining of such status means that conditions of use if accepting it then apply. meaning its not as open and free to play with in any which way services seem fit, they have to use it within the conditions set by legislation/regulation

In real life or social medias, people aren't really asking for that, but in this forum you will find there are a lot users especially newbies want Bitcoin to be accepted as legal tender when they're not even use Bitcoin frequently as a currency. :D

Imagine if Bitcoin is already accepted as a legal tender in their country, they won't use Bitcoin for paying something and they will give many excuses e.g. complicated, high fees, privacy concern etc.

most institutions, even banks want bitcoin rules wrote into legislation/regulation as it then offers a barrier of entry whereby they can profit from it. they then use social media to get newbies to then promote it should be "mainstreamed" "tendered" using hooks like "it will make the price rise"
and then newbies then without thinking of the ramifications, do the marketing for the institutions

i prefered bitcoins openness, (lack of legislation) pre 2014. where it was not illegal(no legislation) and no conditions of use inferred by any government

Words mean what they mean. The phrase, "legal tender" has a very specific meaning derived from the US Constitution, Section 10.

What most people want--and already have in almost all countries--is for Bitcoin to be legal. The phrase, "legal tender" means something completely different, and it's not what one should strive for.


When you are asking for a government to pass a law, as would be required to make Bitcoin legal tender, then you are effectively asking that government to send people to jail (or fine them, or whatever) if they don't accept Bitcoin as payment. 

It is true that El Salvador's (ridiculous) law has not been followed because it's impractical and stupid, but that doesn't mean it's not a law.


Again, like so many people here, you are confusing the terms, "legal" with "legal tender". They are two very different things. Bitcoin is "legal" in most countries, and El Salvador passed a (hardly followed) "legal tender" law in order to force its citizens to accept Bitcoin.

And if Bitcoin loses 66% of its value again, like it did 18 months ago, we'll see how Nayib Bukele's reelection prospects look  :D.


You don't have to go any further than this very thread to see lots of people asking the government to make Bitcoin legal tender.

I agree with you that they don't actually know what they are asking for, and if they learned the actual definition of the term most people would not want that, but people do indeed ask for Bitcoin to be given a government-mandated duopoly (which, I guess if you own a lot of Bitcoin, that's really good for your investment portfolio, right?).



Again, that's simply not what the term means. Please use Google to learn more about what this term actually means, or read about it in this thread.

This is the entire point of this thread: people are using the term, "legal tender" and not understanding what they are actually asking for. Please learn, and I think if people did learn it, they would stop using this phrase.

It's fine to ask for Bitcoin to be "legal" or even "regulated", but that's very different that a government forcing people to accept it which is what legal tender does.

no one is FORCED to only accept legal tender.. else bitcoin would have been outlawed by default/from the beginning if the only currency acceptable was legal tender

no business is FORCED to accept legal tender as only currency

i can without touching the US dollar in the US. Pound in the UK, yaun in China can pay for my flights in airmiles or other forms of payment
legal tender puts a currency into the top valid status of common accepted currency which banks, courts, treasuries CAN accept/audit/account. but doesnt force people to pay using it

force is about making it the only option. yes if there is only one legal tender. then courts, banks, treasuries will only want payment in that tender.. but its a different story to forcing everyone to only use one currency between each other and businesses
legal tender is about the banks, courts and treasury acceptance

even you can admit. retail stores can refuse to accept nickels and dimes. refuse to accept bank notes, only ofer products for debit/credit cards. and even refuse certain cards like american express.. .. and the opposite applies(refuse debit cards and only accept cash) businesses can even decide to only offer products in loyalty points. so its not enforced at B2C or C2B or C2C or B2B (Consumer Business) level

the legal tender status is about reaching a HIGHER level of acceptance whereby banks, treasuries, courts CAN accept the currency

the downside in the ability to be accepted comes with extra conditions.. and its the conditions we should be aware of

..
el salvador made bitcoin legal tender. but does not force people to only use bitcoin. it just means that el salvador treasury can now accept bitcoin for taxes. el salv banks can custodianise bitcoin and offer services, accounts for bitcoin. el salv courts can accept bitcoin for court fines. retailers can accept bitcoin and pay its employees in bitcoin and still account/audit profits and losses in bitcoin

the downside in the ability to be accepted comes with extra conditions.. and its the conditions we should be aware of

you might want to read the BIS reports (banks of international settlement)
right now banks cannot custodianise bitcoin and offer direct services, deposit accounts in bitcoin. but from jan 2025. they can start doing so.. but with conditions

Exactly.

Furthermore, having Bitcoin acknowledged by a government of an entire country as legal tender is one hell of a PR stunt for Bitcoin. This means more adoption, more investments and more people added to the Bitcoin community. That is a huge bonus that comes along with the legal tender news. If you are a true Bitcoiner, you would be cheering for this, not asking people to stop demanding for it. Anything that helps Bitcoin grow and become more valuable (because more people want it and there is a limited supply) is a good thing and it should be supported...

Correct. But legal tender laws means that you are forced to accept a given method as payment even if you don't want to in court judgements.

Today in the USA, the only form of payment like that is US dollars.

In El Salvador, they are forcing everybody to have the crypto app so citizens can follow the law. It doesn't work and it's stupid, but that's what they are doing.


No, force is about making it a mandatory "option" (which isn't an "option" if the law says you must accept Bitcoin).


Yes, but if forces people to accept bitcoin if a payer wants to settle a debt in that medium.

El Salvador basically gave one technology procuct--Bitcoin--a duopoly along with their sovereign currency.



Um, yeah, I guess the government forcing people to use your product sure does give it a boost in the marketplace.

Question for you: why especially should Bitcoin be given this status? Why not Ethereum too? Dogecoin too? Why not Haypenny currencies (https://haypenny.net/)?

How come Bitcoin should be given a special status by the government and not other products?

go fly to el salvador.. you will soon realise that is not the case
bitcoin being legal tender status there offers more choice

however by bitcoin being legal tender status, comes with conditions such as its taxable(registering your earnings/acquisitions)

..
highlight
el salvador still accepts USD as legal tender too
even if el salvador courts made a court order of a fine/debt repayment denominated in bitcoin. if the guilty party does not have bitcoin. he can still ask the court for a USD value and pay in USD

I don't think why many people still get necessary bitcoin have to be legal payment tender for every countries around the world, exactly all countries has their own currency as legal payment currency transaction and had regulation about bitcoin have been illegal as payment transaction but get legalizing as commodity assets. During bitcoin not restrict by all countries around the world for trading and investing why many people afraid with bitcoin not adopt as legal tender status however get benefit with bitcoin as investment assets for long or short term.

Lest positive thinking with all regulation about bitcoin still not adopted as legal tender, we can acceptable bitcoin have been legal for commodity assets and I think more enough how to earn profit with bitcoin trough trading or investing way than have been legal payment currency transaction.

I know it's not the case because they don't enforce their law: they can't, because it's a stupid law (or it was just put there so the country's leaders could profit from their Bitcoin holdings).

And the government forcing you to do something you don't want to do is not "more choice" it's less choice. Like any government-granted monopoly, Bitcoin being given a special status will necessarily diminish other products that didn't get the benefit of the government's largess. It would be like the US making McDonald's the official fast food of the USA: this would screw-over Taco Bell, Burger King, and Wendy's, and everybody else who isn't McDonald's.

as for you saying that it deminishes others.. well yes el salvador does treat the rupee, pound, yuan, peseta peso as a lesser currency. and yes COURTS, BANKS, TREASURIES wont accept fines, taxes in rupee, pound, yuan, peseta peso..

but its not about forcing C2B B2B C2C to only use legal tender.... else in 2009. bitcoin would have been banned right from january 2009 by default if legal tender was as you describe

It's true that Bitcoin is legal mostly in majority of the countries in the world but the trust that's being said and classified as a legal tender is what people think that the non coiners will make them use and invest on it. And we've seen this in some countries that have their own legal tender but due to inflation, many of their citizens prefer another currency like in Venezuela, they have their own bolivares but many citizens prefer to pay in USD. And just as with country that have adopted bitcoin as a legal tender, they have a choice aside from own local currency.

For the umpteenth time, "legal" is not the same thing as "legal tender". I know they share a word, but they are not the same thing. Bitcoin is legal in the USA and in most countries. It is de jure, but not de facto legal tender in El Salvador and nowhere else.

Please google what "legal tender" means...


Something being legal for payment is not the same thing as "legal tender".

But yes, forcing citizens to accept a currency (which is what legal tender does) will certainly promote it. Why should Bitcoin get this privilege and not say all of the other forms of payment like other cryptos and Haypenny currencies (https://haypenny.net)?

This sounds like the government playing favorites to me, which is unfair (and also very unwise).

If we want Bitcoin to grow, we don't need the government but if we want bitcoin to go far, we need to stop fighting the government because what they say is final, you can't win a government if they don't want you to use something, they will fight you until they get what they want, we don't want that between bitcoin ecosystem and the government because it will always hurt the price, most likely up and down without much growth even in the long term.

The government doesn't like bitcoin but institutional investors like bitcoin and the only way they can be allow to use it without any problems is legality status been approved, if it's approved it's going to make it centralized but I think it's going to be on the level of the coins they hold, it wouldn't affect bitcoin protocol because we all can see how the hash rate is been distributed across the world, if the government policy is going to make every household hold bitcoin, I'm cool with the legal status.

It is not about the government giving Bitcoin any status. It is about the government acknowledging that Bitcoin is the new generation of money, making fiat completely redundant and outdated. That is why the government should make Bitcoin legal tender. And no matter how badly the government wants to keep the old system of money, it is definitely getting replaced, whether they like it or not.

Why shouldn't Bitcoin replace fiat as the next generation of money?

YOU are the one combining terms

"not illegal" is SEPARATE to being LEGAL
you keep thinking they mean the same thing

being legal means there is legislation
not illegal means NO legislation to stop it
bitcoin 2009-2013 was not illegal because there was no legislation stopping it. much the same with many things that have no legislation involving it

learn the difference

as for legal tender
that is something separate again. requiring further legislation AND REGULATION
i have told you this before, that the legal tender status is above legal status
legal tender status is a HIGHER status.
its about the bank, court, treasury custodial and service acceptance

you really should get out and explore more.
i have already challenged you twice to experiment in the real world
a. go to retailers or services that do loyaltypoints/airmiles and realise businesses are not forced to only accept legal tender
b. go to retailers and see many that are not forced to accept all denominations/forms of legal tender. (places that only accept cash, places that only accept debit card, places that refuse cash and coinage... businesses can choose)

...
the arguments of bitcoin and legal status have not just been about legal tender or not
over the years many changes of status have occurred incurring more and more legislation and regulation(more ways in which governments are clawing at the edges digging their jurisdictional grounds into aspects of bitcoin economy)

2009-2013 - no legislation, no regulation. bitcoin was freely open to be used how ever by whomever due to no legislation. thus not illegal
2014-2016 - legally recognised as currency by some countries(us, eu, etc) (not legal tender, just currency recognition.. there is a difference)
2016-now  - commodity/asset category, means extra regulation jurisdictions added
2017-now  - some countries legally banned it(china, etc) making it illegal. via making legislation to call it illegal

in el salvador, people are not FORCED to pay everything in bitcoin. banks are not forced to make their customers deposit in bitcoin nor forced to accept bitcoin as withdrawals government dont force citizens to pay taxes in bitcoin(especially if people dont have bitcoin)..
people can CHOOSE. however if people have bitcoin or fiat(both legal tender) they have to account and pay taxes/debts of the acquired value they have in those forms.

It's as if you are saying, "It's not about the government giving McDonald's any status, it's about the government recognizing that McDonald's is the best fast food that puts all of the other places to shame because their hamburgers taste better, so they need to pass a law making McDonald's the country's official restaurant".

If Bitcoin is such an awesome replacement for US dollars, why would you need the government to pass a law forcing people to accept it?

No other popular technology needed this kind of help from the government. What does Bitcoin need this kind of help?

(Could it be because Bitcoin transactions take up to 30 minutes, and can cost $30 each?)



You've acknowledge that "legal tender" and "legal" are different things, so I'm good...


In El Salvador, the legal tender law there is a joke because making Bitcoin legal tender is a practical impossibility there. So they have the laws on the books, but they don't enforce it.

And legal tender laws do not force people to pay with a certain mechanism, they force people to accept payment in with a certain mechanism.

You can pay with cigarettes or matchsticks or gold or Euros or whatever you want if the payee will accept it. There are almost no laws anywhere about how two entities will settle their payment except in the case of a dispute in court, as which point the court can order payment in the "legal tender" medium, which for most countries is their sovereign currency. This is why legal tender laws effectively force vendors to accept the currency in question.

What El Salvador tried to say with Bitcoin was, "you must accept Bitcoin as payment, and if you don't, you go to jail or we will fine you".

Of course Bitcoin is unsuitable to be used as a mainstream payment mechanism, and the entire thing there is a government boondoggle that was a huge waste of money there, but on paper at least, they were indeed trying to force people in their country to accept Bitcoin.

You're right, once Bitcoin has been said as a legal tender and already made into law then all citizens are forced to adopt it. But what's good with most of the governments that don't have any stance against making it a legal tender or using it as a payment is that they don't ban it. IMHO, that's a better thing to accept than seeing them banning Bitcoin but even with that, we're seeing citizens that still use Bitcoin whether as a payment choice or an investment/asset. So, regardless of what is the government stands for with Bitcoin, as long as they won't ban it. Then, that's the favor that they can do to us and of course, to Bitcoin.

The best status for Bitcoin was unregulated, in the early days after its creation and launchment. After regulations started being applied to BTC and crypto market in general, the decline has begun. The less governments get involved with Bitcoin, the better it's going to be for adopters. Legal tender is a double edge sword. If you live under a fair and honest regime (what I really doubt in most countries), it won't difficult adopting Bitcoin, or making it heavily expensive to deal with due to taxes, but if you live under an abusive state, then you will surely miss those old good times when Bitcoin was unregulated.

About legal tender giving power to a government to enforce its usage I think it's possible, but not every governments will act like this. We have El Salvador's example. If the government wished, they could have forced everyone to only deal with BTC from the moment it has become legal tender on, however, it wasn't strategically and financially interesting for them, as the country would be under heavy unstability, so dollar remained as regular currency, and Bitcoin as a public investment asset and secondary currency.

Aside from guns and prisons, you may actually specify that there's also torture, arbitrary arrest, even murder and whatnot. These tools have been at the government's disposal for centuries. Have they minimized crimes though let alone stop it? If these tools aren't effective at stopping people from doing even illegal and useless things, would they stop them from fighting for their precious rights and privacy and freedom?

Anyway, none of what you mentioned actually regulates Bitcoin. It may regulate its use to a certain degree, but not Bitcoin itself. That's beyond the reach of any government.

Well I guess if you get reductive about it, then no thing in the world is regulated, only people who use those things are. You can't regulate dollar bills, either, only the people who carry them. You can't regulate illicit drugs, only those who traffic them. And so forth. I'm not sure how useful this analysis is  :).

The bottom line is that a government can stop its citizens from holding and trading Bitcoin if it wanted to, and it could dictate the way people use it if it wanted to.

How can the government not regulate dollar bills when it's fully under their control? They can stop its release. They can print truckloads more of it. They can color it pink. They can change the person printed on it to Justine Bieber kissing Snoop Dog. They can convert them from paper to polymer. They can reduce its size to like that of a card or increase it to A4. They can declare it not a legal tender anymore. They can convert it to digital. They can do whatever with it.

And Bitcoin? The most they can do is call it a criminal money, pedophile or drug lord's currency.


Can they?

I guess I don't want to argue semantics. The bottom line is that a government can control the use of Bitcoin if they want to.


In all of the ways I and others mentioned in previous posts--and a lot more ways we haven't thought of, yes, yes they can.

If you live in the US or a relatively free country like it, you shouldn't take that for granted. All I'm saying...

in march 2013
when the US treasury wrote legislation that bitcoin was recognised as currency(but not legal tender status), this allowed the FINcen/FATF(financial action task force) to gain traction writing conditions of use of bitcoin on businesses that accept bitcoin, whereby they needing register as money service businesses to KYC their customers under regulations such as the BSA(bank secrecy act).. this started the ability to then write more regulations over the years

in march 2014
when the IRS recognised bitcoin as property currency(asset) (a subclass of "currency" thats not legal tender) this then made bitcoin treated as currency but not legal tender. so employees receiving wages in bitcoin need to declare it for income tax (much like americans have to declare foreign income not treated as legal tender in the US)

in 2015 when the US CFTC recognise bitcoin as a commodity currency(another subcategory of "currency" thats not legal tender)
they stating that to be a commodity exchanger bitcoin futures businesses who wanted to futures/derivatives trade needed to register first as commodity exchanges..

i could go on..
point being. when being recognised as forms of currency of different levels, new regulations and conditions apply

because of the 2013 recognition as currency. this then activated the BSA jurisdiction. which then conditioned usage.. whereby by recognising it as a currency instead of just property(like pokemon cards, cars, art) bitcoin using businesses could not then swap openly. they could not offer ETF/(spot or futures) unless later regulations then allowed that functionality.

its also worth noting that due to 2015 classification as commodity allowed futures ETF. but not spot
its also worth noting that due to 2024 classification as security allowed spot ETF

its also worth noting due to commodity classification it allowed other agencies to get involved like the EPA and EIA(environmental protection and energy information agencies) wanting to survey bitcoin miners about who they are, where they are and what miners they have, how many, how its powered, who powers it, etc

I agree with all of that. I'm not sure what any of this has to do with making Bitcoin the second legal tender currency in the USA though.

legal tender status is yet another category to all those listed in my previous
which incorporates even more legislation/regulation

however, as a separate debate
your incessant rants about "force" are exaggerated and can be proven exaggerated should you dare go on a flight with airmiles or buy products using loyalty points. you are not forced to use legal tender and only legal tender, else that would mean bitcoin would not have been open and "not illegal" in 2009-2013
if people were forced to use only legal tender, then any other non legal tender would have been banned and illegal by default
there is no legislation that bans anything not recognised as legal tender.

banks/courts/IRS prefer legal tender and account/audit in legal tender and request/measure peoples income and gains in such. however even they can seize PROPERTY to settle debts, should you not have the legal tender they request

---

the whole "pro" talk of make bitcoin legal tender is about allowing banks to directly custodianise bitcoin and offer deposit/withdrawal accounts in bitcoin. allow court fines to be measured in bitcoin and allow taxes to be directly paid in bitcoin.. (i see no benefit/pro, as its just way for institutions to take bitcoin more easily and own it)
the "con" of making bitcoin legal tender is more legislation, regulation and rules about who how when and where people can use it
EG only able to withdraw X from atm. only allowed to transact Y before KYC even at citizen level. as well as deeper rules about miners and transaction format features

I've said many, many times here that there is no law (in the US at least) that stops anybody from taking any form of payment they want, including air miles--and legal tender has nothing to do with that. I don't know how more times I will need to say this, but I guess I'll keep going until it's no longer necessary.

Legal tender status forces the payee to accept the form of payment whether they want to or not.

It would be like an airline that does not want to accept air miles, but you passed a law in Congress forcing them to do so anyhow.

And yes, a court judgement can list things other than legal tender currency, and they often do. The legal tender law says, "all debts, public and private". That does not preclude other things from being used to fulfill the debt as long as the payee agrees. If you smash my car, I can say, "give me a new car now", and you can do that to settle our dispute--but thanks to legal tender laws, you can also provide just compensation in US dollars.

And if you thinking, "gee, legal tender hardly ever comes up as a legal issue" then you'd be right--and that's the whole point of this thread: not only is begging Bitcoin to be given special status by the government immoral, impractical and against the philosophy of Bitcoin, it's actually almost... meaningless in practical reality...

"Legal tender is typically issued and regulated by the central bank or monetary authority of a country. It ensures the stability and integrity of the monetary system by providing a standardized form of currency that is universally accepted within the jurisdiction. The acceptance of legal tender is enforced by law, making it obligatory for creditors to accept it as a means of payment." ^(source) (https://fastercapital.com/content/Legal-Tender--Quid--Understanding-the-Significance-of-Legal-Tender.html) Do you understand now what is meant by legal tender status? When a currency has entered the legal stage, it means that it is accepted by the government as a legal currency for transactions and debt payments.
If today you pay Bitcoin in the US or in another country, that's fine, because there are no regulations prohibiting it. Something is prohibited when there is a law that regulates it. But that doesn't make Bitcoin legal tender just because you can pay Bitcoin for various transactions in the US.

you have just contradicted and debunked yourself.

if you do not have dollars, the IRS, courts can seize your property to settle debts(bye bye mansion, bye bye lambo). you are not forced to only pay in legal tender. only preferred that legal tender is used as its deemed a higher status recognition level than other currencies/mediums-of-exchange.. a higher status that comes with a higher level of conditions of use

..
for instance
2009-2013 no one cared if people moved millions of value of btc
2016+ legislators/regulators cared about movements of value of $10k of any property/asset/commodity designation of bitcoin
if bitcoin becomes legal tender. they will limit ATM to spot valued limits of $500 a day and want services to report spot valued amounts of bitcoin moving over $1k

if bitcoin did get legal tender status in US. banks and treasuries can accept deposits/taxes in bitcoin as its reached the higher leve recognition stations.. but that does not then mean banks/treasuries will force everyone to only pay in the form of bitcoin
not unless further legislation is wrote to dictate such separate from the legal tender declarations
EG
el salvador still accepts US dollar as legal tender too, but could separately declare that dollar is no longer legal tender and deem it a lesser currency

your exaggeration of force has been contradicted by even yourself... because if there was force. then no other currency could be used for normal things. meaning bitcoin would have been banned by said force you infer

The world is keeping advising on daily basis and the way of thing's is gradually changing, like when it comes to financial sector, digital assets is growing rapidly than analog transaction, in which it takes most educated once to understand how things actually going. While looking for legal tender is to create more panic to the government when them actually know the average amount that is going on in Bitcoin daily transaction, most of them won't approve legal tender, because then believe in cash, not digital currency in respect of protecting their citizen not to loose their funds.

You are constructive enough, Bitcoin is such that has been active even as many governments of the world ban it. Even the citizens in the country where it is banned are still using it due to the decentralization of the coin, and thanks to the P2P initiative as well. This is why I know that the government of the world will not be able to legalise Bitcoin as a sole means of payment and others, and this is because of its decentralization characteristic, it is too dangerous to rely on it. I wonder why people would think that if the government legalizes Bitcoin, they will now believe that their citizens will rely on it only, no, that will never happen.

Even if they legalise Bitcoin, it will only co-exist with fiat, just like what we see in El Salvador, it can't be more or less than that. And nobody will be forcing either it or fiat on anyone, it will solely depend on the choice of the person in question to use it for payment, trading or investment. But the citizens, private and government institutions will be obliged to accept it as a means of settlement whether they like it or not. Only that they will try to plan their risk with it effectively, and life goes on. But still, I do not think this will be possible in most countries of the world as Bitcoin will only continue to exist just like how it is now but with more countries legalizing it.

Legal tender status doesn't mean forcing everyone to accept Bitcoin. It simply means that the government recognizes it as a valid form of payment for debts. If you think about it, debate around legal tender status often revolves around issues of regulation, acceptance and potential government control. While Bitcoin is legal in many places, discussions about its legal tender status involve complex considerations about its role :)

Legal and legal tender are different. With legal tender status, citizens in that nation can not refuse to receive bitcoin as payment from their customers. With legal status, they are free to refuse bitcoin payments.

With this legal tender status in El Salvador, a first nation ever make Bitcoin legal tender, people were hyped a lot in the past bull run. They did not actually understand what legal tender status means.

So far there are only two nations with Bitcoin-legal-tender status but they are not big nations. [1]

[1] https://coinmarketcap.com/legal-tender-countries/

I think this is where you're getting it wrong and you need to change your impression towards bitcoin and the word legal tender. The government can't force everyone to start using bitcoin if bitcoin becomes a legal tender, you just want a fight when there's nothing to fight about.
Making bitcoin a legal tender is just a means for citizens and bitcoin enthusiasts to freely use bitcoin as a means of payment etc. Secondly if you're actually sounding like this about the government bodies then you're actually saying they're foolish because even if bitcoin becomes a legal tender today you don't expect government to kick out their fiat currency, forcing everyone to use bitcoin simply means the fiat currency is no longer needed. The issue with government controlling bitcoin I can't relate with such and I don't see this happening sooner or later

I'll try this one more time, and then I'm done.

The country's legal tender currency is the "backstop" of the legal system with respect to debts. A judge can order an amount in US dollars to provide just compensation for a debt, along side compensation that the plaintiff would agree to. In other words, if I am owed a car in court, the judge may say I get a car, but failing that, I will be awarded some amount is US dollars. I have no choice about the latter since US dollars are legal tender: I must be prepared to accept US dollars whether I want them or not.

That's all legal tender means. It does not mean the same thing as "legal". It does not do anything else that is tangible. It does not preclude people from freely trading in some other currency when both sides of the transaction agree to the trade (as you keep asserting that my posts assert, which they don't).

And again, I'm done with this branch of the thread, I think we've beaten it to death.


Please please PLEASE lookup the definition and origin of the phrase, "legal tender". The government forcing people to accept the form of payment is exactly what it means.

It does not mean the same as "legal", which is the way you are using the term in your post.

And I do think this is something to fight about, because governments do stupid things based on people having false notions, e.g. what El Salvador did by giving Bitcoin a duopoly and spending millions of dollars that tiny country doesn't have in what amounts to a massive pump-and-dump scheme. I could very much see a push like this happening in our totally crazy Congress here in the US, but in our case it would cost us tens of billions of dollars just to implement the laws, we'd have an army of lawyers ready to exploit the law and sue people over it, and the US making such a move to put so much focus on one volatile asset could destabilize the world economy.

I said yes and no -- there are plenty of laws that are never enforced. My own country has the death penalty for several offences, never carried out, never even used to threaten -- okay outside the point but in this case, there isn't even a stated penalty for this law. Not jail, not fines, nothing. Show me, cause I couldn't find it.

Show me one El Salvadoran who's been told the law penalises them for not accepting Bitcoin or one who said the law will penalise people for not accepting it (that's making your life easy, because we're not looking for anyone who's been penalised).

We've definitely beaten this to death though... so I'll say no more too.

i was the one telling you about the courts.. the treasury, the banks
i even underlined them several times in previous posts

you were saying how average payer-payee have to be forced.. which contradicts the openness of lack of legislation of such that allowed bitcoin free open use 2009-2013 before legislation was even wrote in regards to bitcoin in any way

yes a judge can order a $$ amount but the judge may also say "give back the car"
the judge may also refuse the car to be the settlement and demand it be dollar.. but thats CHOICE

a judges order is final.. but that order is not forced to only be in dollar amount. a judge has the choice. which usually is dollar first due to the highest level standard status dollar has by being legal tender

..
the point being things are measured in legal tender as its the highest level status currency deemed medium of exchange for a community/nation. where by being at that status assumes the most conditions and rules.
..
yes the SEC chooses to PREFER that ETF dissolvent of shares to be redeemed "in cash" instead of "in-kind" of a pegged asset.. but thats SEC CHOICE

yes the legislators write other laws like taxation and min wage to be rated in USD amounts, as its strengthens the EASE of people to just default choose to use dollar as medium of exchange. but its not FORCING businesses to only accept USD as payment of goods and services.. its just that legal tender has the legislative highest ranking standard of acceptance of trusted medium of exchange for a community/nation

but people are not FORCED to only accept USD in america for products, services, debts, fines, taxes.. courts can also request confiscation of assets or other items of value as conditions of settlement of fines/debt

---

now getting to the point of the topic now that i hope you dont exaggerate the "force" stupidity as the real world outside of your house has millions of examples everyday where you are incorrect about your use of "force" perceptions

by bitcoin being a legal tender. comes with consequences.. new laws to attain legal tender status means new conditions of use of said currency too.. such as auditing where your accumulation of currency come from and taxation of it and also having to explain things if you get or give certain amount of and how businesses must act, treat, and use it
.. and no its not about when people are forced to use it.. its more about if people choose to accept/give it they need to play by the rules of the status its given when/if using it


there is no legislation in el salvador that puts people in jail if they choose not to use bitcoin

please get outside of your house and explore the world of real life examples

I've said this several times in this thread: El Salvador's law is not enforced. Indeed, El Salvador's law is, practically speaking, a joke.

I began this topic by trying to tell people to not ask for legal tender status for Bitcoin because it's not what you want for multiple reasons, and it's usually not what people think it is.

I suspect that the El Salvador law was initiated by politicians who didn't understand what the term specifically meant, and then the lawyers wrote the law according to actual legal definitions. Probably all the politicians understood was that the value of their personal Bitcoin holdings would go up in value if they passed this law, so they did it.

But some people actually understand the exact legal definition of "legal tender" and would necessarily find people clamoring for this status for Bitcoin rather appalling, going against everything Bitcoin has ever stood for and being unfair and impractical all at once. That's all I'm saying...

We're all optimistic about the adoption of Bitcoin and going back several years ago, many of us were telling that it is going to replace cash or fiat system. But as time gets by, we get to see how these governments react to these changes and what matters now is that they're not going to stop any way of adoption into their jurisdictions. Bitcoin doesn't have to be a legal tender for everyone to use, as long as there is no law that stops its people from using it, we all good with that. So with that, using it as an asset, investment or payment for any transaction is just the same. But we know that majority of us are going to use it more with being as a store of value than of currency but we're all free to do that and no one can stop its growth even these governments.

The "definition" based on dictionaries obviously matters, but at some situations the words could have different meanings in different industries as well. So in crypto, "hodl" is a thing, "moon" means something else, "lambo" is different than just the car, there are stuff that do not mean anything similar as it used to. This is one of them, legal tender of "forcing" people to use, or not use, those are all very valid reasons.

Basically, as long as the other person you are talking to understands what you are saying, then I do not think that it means anything, it should not be a problem, we could very well do whatever we want. I hope that we could see something that changes eventually, but if people understand each other, life is fine.

again and finally
legal tender status is not about forcing only use of that currency and to not accept anything else..
if it were true that "force" was there.. bitcoin would be illegal be default

however legal tender status is a higher tier/standard/level of trust in a currency to such a higher standard that courts, banks, treasury accept it
but what comes with achieving this higher tier standard.. are conditions of use. such as needing to audit who/where funds came from/going to. taxation of said currency and many other things like limitations on spending amounts before certain levels of reporting of suspicious behaviour are triggered.

Tron is legal tender.

This isn't the case in politics. In fact, the very opposite is true in that context.

In fact, this is the way bad laws get put on the books that cause disasters and end up accomplishing the opposite of what people intended.

My guess is that politicians in El Salvador wanted to pump their Bitcoin holdings, and heard the term "legal tender" thrown around in casual discussion, not knowing what the term actually means when you pass a law making a trading instrument "legal tender".

Then lawyers needed to draft an actual law and thus had to understand the real legal meaning of the term and they basically put a law on the books in that country that cost them a ton of money to implement and isn't actually followed by over half of the population because it makes no practical sense.

Indeed, this is the whole reason I started this thread :-).

I would rather people say, "I hope the government uses taxpayer dollars to promote my favorite investment instrument so it will go up in value!" rather than asking their elected reps for a legally loaded term like "legal tender".