Bitcoin Forum

If you are hosting anything crypto in USA, you might of heard about the new legislations that are going to be in effect on usa soil soon.
Especially this part (

(1) Records of Virtual Currency transactions. Each Licensee shall maintain the following information
 for all transactions involving the payment, receipt, exchange or conversion, purchase, sale, transfer, or
 transmission of Virtual Currency: the identity and physical addresses of the parties involved, the amount or
 value of the transaction, including in what denomination purchased, sold, or transferred, the method of payment,
 the date(s) on which the transaction was initiated and completed, and a description of the transaction)

This will be IMPOSSIBLE to do as anon / or even key based transactions is the only thing a pool operator knows.

See Sig if you need colo

This will only apply if you are doing business in New York state and only if you are in the business of converting bitcoin to or from fiat. If you are a restaurant for example that accepts bitcoin then this would not apply to you (the same with most other types of businesses that could accept bitcoin). This proposed regulation is really trying to prevent something like MtGox from happening again.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! Thanks for the laugh.

That is the intention behind the regulation. One of the rules is that exchanges must be subject to audits that prove they have sufficient BTC to backup the amount deposited by customers.

Literally every US court operates in equity/admiralty law, however, because fiat is not substance and cannot be part of any common law contract, they become "colorable" contracts, and thus require "colorable" statutes for dealing with it.

Bitcoin is separate from all of this. A bitcoin contract falls completely outside of the entire US legal system UNTIL you use fiat (like during exchange). One way around this may be UCC 1-308.

I will lead the centralization of BTC and lost meaning of using BTC, which will definitely scare out of a lot BTC related business there.

I think it will lead to some bitcoin exchanges to be somewhat centralized, however this would not necessarily be a bad thing as people would have a greater amount of certainty that the exchanges are not a scam.

As far as scaring businesses away, I am not sure about that because the vast majority of businesses would likely not be subject to the regulations (only if they trade bitcoin for fiat - if they do not engage in this then they would not be subject to the regulations).

Reposting this from CryptoCrypt where I'm still editing the draft, but thought it may be good to share here as well...
https://cryptocrypt.org/index.php?topic=5060.msg114770#msg114770


Many people will say that Bitlicense proposal is bad simply by virtue of the fact that government regulation is bad.  Others may question the right of the state of New York to make any such proposal or to regulate an international technology that will affect people far outside its borders.  Some suggest that there is nothing to be gained from any engagement in discussion with an entity such as the State of New York that only seeks to restrain shackle bind and even destroy the liberties of its people for the purpose of extracting fees for some smaller amount of freedom and uses the threats of imprisonment and confiscations enforced by force to achieve these aims, not for the good of its people, but to sustain its own power for power's sake.

However in the interests of discussion on its own terms a close look at the Bitlicense shows that it simply does not do what it hopes to do, and this requires significant revision at the risk of giving credence to such detractors.  Even with the assumption that these policy goals are necessary, and that the New York State government is the right and best entity to enforce such a regulatory framework, the proposed Bitlicense framework fails at its goals and instead harms those goals.

It has become increasingly clear that Mr. Lawsky believes that he knows better than any of the experts on the subject matter of his proposed regulation and that the solicitations for feedback are not sincere.  It is also increasingly plain that the proposal is not merely misguided but does not achieve its policy goals and instead increases the risk to consumers.  We need to go over Lawsky's head on this, he is failing in his responsibilities as a public servant.
 
The policy guys have to see how the proposal doesn't achieve their policy goals.

I'm not a political person myself, but Circle and some others seems interesting in discussing with them.

I met their CEO Jeremy Allaire, at the hotel we both stayed at in Amsterdam.  I'll likely send him a letter, and copy Bruce Fenton and the policy guy at TBF, Jim Harper, Perianne Boring, Jerry Brito, professor of law at GMU, I've met all those folks but I'm looking for maybe a few others you might suggest to carry the message because they have standing in the state, and a greater interest in seeing the matter handled better.

I want to polish and perhaps flush out the draft a little and would like to solicit the good people of the CryptoCrypt for any comment:
--------------
The Bitlicense proposal arose presumably for the purpose of reducing financial risks within the economy, and from the state of NY desiring to protect its consumers.  This initiative is some confirmation that the state of NY believes that Bitcoin is an integral component of the state's economic activity.  New York has taken a forward looking position by this stance as Bitcoin currently composes a tiny percentage of the economy of the state.  While this visionary approach deserves some acclaim, and it fosters NY's image as a visionary financial technology hub and shows its high concern for its citizens, it also suggests no particular urgency for a regulatory framework.

The irony is that the proposed Bitlicence dies not accomplish its policy goals and will instead accomplish the opposite of these policy goals.  For this reason, the Bitlicense proposal ought be abandoned in favor of following the guidance put forth by the experts called before congress to testify on this matter In November of 2013.   Using only existing processes and procedures and offering a Bitlicense that certifies compliance with these.  This will both provide the necessary clarity for business to prosper in the geography at issue with the proposal, as well as avoiding the increased risks inherent in the proposed Bitlicense framework.

1) The proposed Bitlicense framework increases centralization

By producing a new and onerous regulatory framework, there will be fewer market participants in the Bitcoin economic space, and each of these will by necessity be larger in order to support the new regulatory compliance function.  The unintended consequence of this is that increasingly the larger companies will outgrow the smaller ones within the state, irrespective of innovation. 
This will occur, as it has with other financial technology companies under regulations as the compliance requirements will be a smaller fraction of the overall budgetary requirements.  In turn, the larger companies will be able to purchase the smaller companies at a discount to their value with the prospect of reducing the redundant compliance regimes that are so expensive for the smaller companies.

We have seen these same effects with the Dodd-Frank regulatory framework which although with the intent of reducing the risk of the too-big-to-fail systemically important institutions, instead increases the centralization and size of the largest of these and reducing the quantity and quality of innovative smaller entities.

The result of this effect is to reduce competition and increase centralization of these companies.  Alternatively Bitcoin companies could exit the state and elect not to serve its constituents.  Indeed there are some that are already doing so, and selectively prohibit the citizens of New York from engaging as customers.  The cost to New York in lost opportunity, revenue and even in lost population for those that would avoid its jurisdiction ought be a factor in considering a regulatory framework as suggested by

2) Centralization is the risk Bitcoin is designed to avoid.
The increased centralization of Bitcoin companies due to the proposed Bitlicense
- fundamental to the design, white paper
 - Chase et al banking hack

3) The Centralization occurs at the highest risk point in the Bitcoin economy.
 - alternative is forensic and transparent
 - private companies dealing in dollars in USA do not have this transparency auditability and accountability to the extent that they do not make use of Bitcoin.

4) The Bitlicense proposal is fundamentally harmful to the goal of protecting New York's consumers from risk.

Instead of the current proposal, an effective Bitlicense might be one that more simply provides a certification of compliance with existing New York State rules.  This would provide some assurance to the consumers under the protection of New York State that the company with which it is transacting has fulfilled these criteria.

--------
Thanks for any feedback.

How would it centralize bitcoin? The regulations have nothing to do with mining which is how the network is secured. They have nothing to do with nodes, which is how TXs are propagated/sent.   

Uh... "equity/admiralty law?" Let's not bring that sovereign citizen stuff in here...

the only thing that i find concerning is the 'new york residents' part

this does not mean only new york businesses. but any business around the world where a single new york resident does a fiat/bitcoin exchange, automatically makes that international business under the jurisdiction of new york and thus without a licence, that business would be sued, in essence.

this will cause all exchanges and all local bitcoin users to be more vigilant and require proof of ID even for a 1 btc transaction just to make sure who your trading with is not a new yorker.

Aint gonna happen.

Only a fool would show ID. They will only catch the stupid.

The smarter thing to do would be to allow brokerages to freely trade in bitcoins and let the old mtgox model of exchanges go extinct.

what i mean to say is, imagine Lawsky himself, as a new yorker went to bitstamp (UK based) and signnd up. 'Wham bam thankyou maam', bitstamp now needs a bitlicence for transacting with a new york resident. he then moves onto all the other exchanges. as a sting operation of sorts, purely to force businesses to get a licence due to using himself as evidence that these businesses are trading with new york residents.


brokerages=localbitcoins (well in my opinion)

this would be fun for lawsky too as every person localbitcoin trading that he comes into contact with, he would slap them with a bitlicence requirement notice. and he could repeat this a thousand times without ever having to leave the localbitcoin website.

The regulations do not change mining.  They do govern companies.  Increasingly mining is done by companies, rather than sole individuals.
The regulations also do not affect the protocol, just the companies that use it.

The centralization occurs when, in order to do business in the state of New York, a company has to obtain the Bitlicense.  Small companies will not be able to afford the expense and will simply not do business in the state of New York, like BitSimple today.
Middle sized companies may be able to afford it, but will be at a competitive disadvantage to larger companies for whom compliance is a smaller percentage of their business revenue.
The result will be the largest will buy the smaller, and this creates the sort of centralization that we have in traditional banking.

That 7 of the largest US Banks were hacked over the last few months shows part of the risks of this sort of centralization to consumers of the services of those banks.  The Bitlicense regulation as it stands, INCREASES RISK TO CONSUMERS which is the opposite of its policy goal of consumer protection.
They need to start over and rethink their strategy for consumer protection in the state.

The Bitlicense will reduce business in New York state.  The remaining choices will be the few large businesses, centralizing the risk and increasing that risk to consumers within the state.  They will not legally have the option of choosing a better smaller service that doesn't have the Bitlicense.

It's yet another example of regulatory overkill. Overzealous regulators see a problem in the marketplace and decide that in order to prevent it from happening again they need to introduce extremely burdensome regulations.

The problem is that they end up causing far more harm than good and often fail to accomplish the intended purpose anyway. The bitlicense is absolutely horrendous and designed by government bureaucrats with no idea what they are doing.

If it passes, nothing good will come of it except more businesses in smarter states as people leave the Crazylands (California and New York among others).

This is valid only if you are doing business in new york state.

dont worry, it will spread out to other parts soon.

this is part of the regulations that are both needed and undesired by users.
on one hand it will make scams a bit more hard, but it will take a part of anonymity on the other

FTFY

There is nothing in it to make a scam more difficult other than making business more difficult generally, it merely assures greater magnitude of any scams generated in NY.
Scammers are not so concerned.  Legitimate business is what will receive the compliance hardship.
The primary effect will be for existing Bitcoin business to no longer serve folks in New York.

I think legit customers would not mind to deal not anonymously. After all Bitstamp and some other exchanges require full verification and nobody seems to be bothered by it. But this legislation is making everything so difficult that I would think twice before opening a business in the US.