Bitcoin Forum

The Portuguese ex-PM José Sócrates is being accused of money laundering of 20 million Euros into private accounts.
If he has bitcoins this could be huge in terms of mediatic attention to bitcoin.
Do you think the Portuguese ex-PM José Sócrates holds some coins? This could be huge.

I have no idea if he has any bitcoins and in my opinion, the last thing bitcoin needs is more negative press and association with money laundering or drug dealing.

 :(

I have almost absolute certainty he does not hold bitcoins.

Impact for bitcoin is nil.

Using bitcoin would not have help in his case.

You are right. I was just thinking...

How can you be so certain?
Also, why do you think bitcoin would be of no use to him? Couldn't he use it as a safe store of value?

What makes you think he has BTC? Just a wild guess?

And if he does, he would probably have bought them as a small back-up funds (to not be left with nothing when something goes wrong). If he's not a moron, he would do that anonymously without obvious links/traces, so in any case - we'll probably never know.

Bitcoin is almost unknown in Portugal, he started receiving bribes in the 90's way before the invention of bitcoin.

Moving so much money from the banking system to bitcoin would not help his situation, he would still get caught, besides that, what would he do with a few million euros in bitcoin?

It is being said that his driver was bringing him loads of cash from Portugal to Paris in a car, not long ago. Using bitcoin would make much more sense, I reckon.

It would leave a similar digital trail, plus what would he do with a bunch of bitcoins in Paris?

You cannot buy a 3 million euro apartment in Paris with bitcoin, or pay for college tuition.

It's too much money to get away with without a really good plan, plus he recently said on national television he had no investments, no savings and he had to take a loan for his tuition in France, this was clearly a lie...

Yes, clearly lies... but he could have had his money under his control anonymously instead of having it in a friend's account in Switzerland.

Sure, but he could not spend it, that's why he got caught, and his illicit enrichment began way before the invention of bitcoin.

I saw that movie, had Jason Statham in it.

Why would a PM of a nation state own any Bitcoin?

PM's of a nation state are expected to hold national coinage only when engaging in money laundering. It's a matter of honor. :D

Apart from that, statists will be the laggards in understanding and using Bitcoin.

ya.ya.yo!

Imagine Satoshi knowing in advance that he would be in trouble paid a locksmith to enter his house while he was away, the day before him being arrested at the airport, and put the 50 BTC from the first block reward in his house. That would be the real thing  ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D
 

In media there's no good or bad I guess, it's all about the publicity.

So whichever way it is, Hoping for the publicity of the bitcoin.

I agree I am so tired of the negativity that spreads like wild fire, but I never see on CNN how bitcoins could save you a lot of money if you want to send money to another country, or how you can buy beautiful homes in spain with bitcoins, or luxary cars. I wish Bitcoin had someone in the media on their side that could bring up an astoundingly good story every months than constant bad negative press.