Bitcoin Forum

Hi guys,

I'll update the head with salient bullets and we'll try and stay on top of questions as they come up in the thread as well.

Let me start about by saying some bloggers have one thing really wrong so far, I seriously respect Gox' hard work on security and uptime and anti-fraud. Most of you have no idea how hard this is, and how well Gox does. The kind of attacks they withstand, social engineering, technical, financial, legal are non-trivial. I don't expect that CoinLab can or should be set up to duplicate that effort; we wanted to team up together because we can offer something that I think will turn that baseline into lots of value for our whole community.

How Will It Work? I've gotten a bunch of questions about this -- APIs, deposit mechanisms, web interface, etc.

In brief, on March 22, nothing about your interactions will change. You'll log in to Gox, do your trading, and go home. You might notice some rebranding on the website. You'll see a different wire-to address for instructions.

Your USD will be in the states at that point, and you'll be able to send to our SVB account for deposits. More about the bitcoins below.

We'll also be using something like trade.coinlab.com as the mtgox interface, at launch. We will be rolling out more features on our site, (beta.trade.coinlab.com?) incrementally and aim at a nicely UI-designed easy to work with site. To do that we'll be instrumenting the Gox site at some point, and figuring out how you all use it. Right now our analytics are fine from a marketing point of view, but we need to get better at knowing how you all use the site, and how we can make it better.

I don't trust CoinLab's Bitcoin or Web Security One thing we're exploring right now internally is leaving the Bitcoins with Gox at launch, and moving them over once we're sure we've got a battle-hardened high transaction volume system in place. Gox is happy either way, so I'm interested in feedback on this. We have a highly secure (I think best in class) storage system we're about to roll out, but it trades rapid response for security, and that won't work for all Gox customers, for sure.

As Mark and others at Gox know, we have a lot of respect for the work they've done. I have no intention of hurting customers by yanking that work; instead, we want to layer on top of it.

Deposit Timeliness
This should improve, if your customer profile is low risk. At the very least, you will be able to deposit at a US bank, rather than wire to Japan. We're doing our first run-throughs of the system at SVB next week with a few early adopters, and that will lead to more details as to what you can expect, but we did take a deposit today and cleared it onto the trading account in 30 minutes, so that's nice!

Often customers who complain on bitcointalk about delays have triggered some risk system at Gox; I can't go into detail, but let me just say, there are many, many bad folks who want to use the exchange. Some of them happily take their complaints here without explaining that they are using, say, fake documents, or are lying about one thing or another.

I credit Gox with simultaneously wading through these folks and trying to give legit customers a good experience, especially because it can hurt reputation to see these folks in the forums, and of course, given the nature of risk management systems, Gox cannot explain publicly why Jane identity thief in Serbia is not allowed to use the system.

I'm hoping we'll be able to communicate better with new customers and existing ones to sort of settle people down if they're freaking out, and meantime get legit and longtime customer transactions through at high speed; I know that will help. It's tough to watch the price move and be delayed, and have it be working hours in the states, and midnight in Japan.

How will this transition effect withdrawal limits?
Good question. At launch it won't effect withdrawal limits. The history of withdrawal limits has to do with some FinCEN rules about transaction size. We've registered with FinCEN as a seller of prepaid access, they do not distinguish MSBs that sell prepaid access by transaction size, so I would hope we'll see our way clear to increasing these limits or doing away with them.

There's also a risk-mitigation factor -- we'll probably always have a human look at large transactions going out. Think of the different attacks over the last few years and how many would have had little impact if there were systems to block large wallet transfers.

How will this transition effect the verification process?
My hope is that it will drastically improve the process in terms of simplicity, ease of understanding, communication about the process and shortening of wait times. We've been batting around figuring out how to just do it on a video camera live, how awesome would that be?

How will this transition effect users [that] have already gone through the verification process with MtGox?
We are still spot auditing Gox' AML documents to make sure they are up to our promised standards. If they are, (and I have no indication they are anything but excellent), I would expect that users would stay at the same verification level you have now. TL;DR: Hopefully, once is enough. :)

Will this transition remove the ability to use Dwolla for withdrawals?
No. It is possible we'll have a small delay while we make sure we're comfortable with the Dwolla withdrawal API, we're still talking to the Dwolla folks right now. That said, we want to support Dwolla, and Dwolla wants to work with us, so I don't anticipate major changes. I agree that once you've got the accounts set up, the fees at Dwolla are rocking.

Is Peter Vessenes twitchy and high energy?
I think so. I'll ask employees for comments. Update General Response is "yes."

Did Mark sell my personal data to CoinLab without my $#!$ permission?
Quoting Mark: "MtGox did not sell users identities, and acted in the best interest of its users to ensure CoinLab had no access to said data.  None of users private information will be shared with CoinLab until the user accepts CoinLab's ToS on the site. If you choose to never accept CoinLab's ToS, then your data will never be shared with CoinLab."

Will My History be available post transition?
Yes, you'll still be able to log in and see all the same data.

More Coming
Our folks will start slotting in questions here, and I'll respond throughout the day; from here on out, I will try to not respond to other threads about the transition, and just keep everything here, so post away.
Thanks for all the support so far! We're all really excited.

Peter Vessenes
CEO, CoinLab

Reserved

The killer app for a Bitcoin exchange would be to give customers an account number they can use for ACH push transactions and direct deposit.

I am sensitive to the potential for you guys to shut down and retain all of my sensitive identification data.  At that point there would be little reason not to go ahead and sell it for market value.  I have the same concern about Mt. Gox and any other exchange which is why I have yet to use them in a way which demands high quality documentation.  Nor have I allowed them to sucker me into needing to do so.

My hope is that there is some program by which you could make an 'API call' to Fincen or whoever for authorization to move USD around on my behalf (and in particular, to send it to me.)  I don't know much about how these surveillance organizations are structured or are evolving, but I would rather prove to the government that I am who I am than prove it to a private organization, and particularly one who operates in Bitcoin-land.  I feel that the government already has my information and tracks my financial activities so in that case I am giving little away.

The killer app for a Bitcoin exchange would be to always show the correct "Last price" on their home page, a feature that I would like to see come to MtGox soon:

https://i.imgur.com/LtUZ1pg.png

Will the Gox / CoinLab integration also include this "feature?"

Is this the reason Mt. Gox decided to no longer deal with US customers?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_Account_Tax_Compliance_Act

Also, how did storing funds abroad prevent larger investors from purchasing coins?

I'm sure it's just a coincidence that this results in the acronym "FATCAT"

Has anyone done any extensive background checking on this Peter Vessenes guy ?

What was his motives of going to Japan to 'audit' the MtGox systems ?

How and why has he befriended Mark Karples into giving up control of 80% of the MtGox liquidity ?

Why couldn't CoinLab make their own exchange ?

Now, with the Bitcoin Foundation and MtGox operating 80% on US soil, this doesn't look too good.

We all know that if the US Govt for whatever reason dislike the activities of Coinlab/MtGox, they'll shut them down in a heartbeat and block all customer funds virtually indefinately.

Perhaps it's time to move your coins away from MtGox at this point ?

What guarantees do we have that this is going to turn out well ?

The scary thing is that if there's some SilkRoad investigation or IRS investigation, the customers of MtGox will know absolutely nothing, and the customer data will probably be gone in bulk.

Probably my concerns are unwarranted, but we need to ask ourselves hard questions.

My main questions which weren't answered in the post:

1) How will this transition effect withdrawal limits?
2) How will this transition effect the verification process?
3) How will this transition effect users which have already gone through the verification process with MtGox?
4) Will this transition remove the ability to use Dwolla for withdrawals?
4b) If it is removed, is there going to be a similar virtually free withdrawal method ($0.25 at any size is tough to beat)?

Why would you ever leave bitcoins in an account somewhere instead of in a wallet under your exclusive control?

I tend to feel that in most cases like this the answer is not knowable to a high degree of confidence.

My personal strategy is to assume the worst and make what use I can of things under that assumption.

So Petter Vessenes is the CEO of Coinlab and Executive Director of the Bitcoin Foundation ?

Am I the only one that think these roles should be held by different persons ?

No you're not.

If mtgox does this move, its clearly they're confident they're the best and only exchange.

Here's a video of what I think is Peter Wessenes. I also think he has a father with the same name, but a different middle initial.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a7S9aK22ld0

To me, he seems a bit high strung as a person, and from what I could find from google, he's helped starting a dozen different businesses?

Look how he's constantly moving around in that video, like he can't sit still. Will he have a long term involvement with CoinLab and bitcoin in general, or will he jump to a new exciting project in a couple of years ?

According to Bitcoin 2013: Brown University with an Sc.B. in Theoretical Mathematics, and an emphasis in cryptography.

That in itself sounds impressive.

And also, why's Tihan Seale invested in CoinLab, didn't he lose enough in the Bitcoinica scandal ? And what about Nefario, why did Peter Wessenes and Mike Koss want to work with him ?

http://www.geekwire.com/2011/coinlab-center-bitcoin-projects-created-seattle/

Are these guys to be trusted, or are we looking into a new clusterfuck to happen ?

I doubt that you are.  But the simple fact of the matter is that unless you are a core Bitcoin developer or a high tiered member of the Bitcoin Foundation, your only practical option is to suck it.

Most people who spoke up about the Bitcoin Foundation when it was in request for comment stage were fully in support of it and by extension, of it's goals of taking Bitcoin mainstream.  So forward we march.

Re: Nefario,

I think I can fairly characterize our decision as deciding to drop any plans to move ahead with him after he was barred entry in the states. :)

Re: Tihan, he invested in us first, we looked at Bitcoinica (and Tradehill) at CoinLab and passed on investing/buying/running them for a variety of reasons.

Also, it's weird to see video of oneself, but the linked youtube video up there is me; I'm much, much more excited about Bitcoins, though :)

It's funny you say that, the data feed issue is a big one, actually. All I can say is we're working hard on this with Gox, and I feel your need.

who will have access to my already sent verification documents ?
who will have access to bitcoin and fiat deposits currently on gox ?

A programmer can fix this in 30 mins or less, it's not something one needs to work 'hard' to achieve. Only use USD for calculations, not other currencies.

http://fc06.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/087/0/2/free_troll_face_icon_by_fluffycuddlypooz-d4u84ek.jpg  kinda slapstick like how you play with the card ;) 

<--- now  :-X

I do think the Bitcoin Foundation is a good idea, but the person being in charge there should do that as his full time occupation, not as a 5% occupation. Seeing Vess having some many balls in the air at the same time, how can he put in the hours that Bitcoin deserve in his role at the Bitcoin Foundation ?

Yes, the Foundation definitely needs full time executive leadership. Lindsay is great, but we need like five people there. I would love to get a full time director in there that's a good fit for the Bitcoin community. I have been thinking we'd talk more about it post-conference.

The video has officially been projected on the wall at the CoinLab offices. Sigh.

How do you plan on getting high-net worth individuals to invest in bitcoin?  Will you really go to Wall Street as the title of the recent article suggests?  Once at Wall Street what will you do?

Hi Bracek, what do you mean by 'access'? Do you mean read access? If so, then once we've transitioned, our chief compliance officer will have access to verification documents, or someone else on our AML/KYC team.

By 'access' to bitcoin and fiat deposits, do you mean current balances? We need a policy, we don't have one written up now, but I've flagged it in our launch TODO list. I would imagine a general policy is that most employees will be able to see deposit amounts but not identifying account information without customer permission.

Well, that part is done already at coinlab.com, enjoy. We don't try and convert other currencies to USD for quotes, though.

HNW Individuals already invest in Bitcoin, but only really nerdy ones. They need simple handholding account managers and safe storage. And also integration with their existing brokerage accounts. It's not anything fancy, it's just blocking and tackling to get them access in the systems they are used to.

Use the bitcoins to create fractional reserve financial products. In the same way paper gold is traded.

I dont think its wise to give any of your information to coinlab or the bitcoin foundation to be honest.

Will the bot I used with MtGox be usable with coinlab (is the API going to change)?

This would dramatically increase the risk of fraud.  Banks spend billions of dollars on fraud prevention and detection and they still can't totally eliminate it but at least their deposits are insured.  By comparison, Bitcoin exchanges are tiny and can only mitigate some risks by avoiding them altogether.  Their deposits aren't insured and they don't have unlimited reserves to cover losses - as the Tradehill/Dwolla debacle showed.

Yep, see the top of the thread. The APIs will stay the same at launch. We will probably layer on FIX support for CoinLab customers.

I mean access in two ways, access to actually copy/paste my documents sent there in digital form,
and second concern about access is if some regulatory entity could get those in their hands, how hard will they have to "ask" for them.

access to bitcoins, means ability to send.
As I see it now, gox has the ability to send my coins, and I do.
anybody else gets to hold my private keys ?

Once you hand over your bitcoins its moot at that point because you dont control the private keys. If the US gov gets your bitcoins youre fucked. See gold confiscation.

Have you had any issues with the authorities or anyone from the government in the US? Does everything seem okay on that end?

I suggest everyone get out of MtGox b4 the transition. You rather be safe and sorry.

All of these seems like an overnight thought.

I'm glad to hear you say this. How about Coinbase? They both seem to originate with the same interests so I wonder if some of the security precepts are the same.

So in summary, MtGox will hand out all its AML documents to some company on US soil. Basically they get a Bitcoin user list, including names, addresses, account ledgers, deposit and withdraw addresses. There will be a fight between several three letter agencies who gets this data first.
I think this time they will finally succeed in "closing" SilkRoad.

Another one would take its place.

Let the powers that be rant and rave all they want. The only way they can control Bitcoin is to shutdown the internet. Grabbing gox might throw a wrench in the machine but Bitcoin would recover.

And the same people with this data control the bitcoin foundation, a massive identity honey pot.

Coinlab will need to build trust.  But, please, if you hold MtGox in high esteem and trust them with your private data, well, they just sold it to Coinlab.  Also, Coinlab will be subject to US laws and lawsuits, so if they wrong you, you will at least have some hope of recourse.

Assume all of your USD transactions are tracked, that MtGox's have been, and Coinlab's will be.  Assume they are both fonts run by the CIA.  The important thing is that you have the ability to be discreet once you are in BTC.  Just cause I may have bought $3 million worth of coins doesn't mean I still have them.  Maybe I lost my private key =(.  Prove it.

Hang on a second.  Where in the MtGox TOS does it say MtGox has the authority to sell sensitive identity information to third parties without the express written permission of the account holder.  Last time I checked with wasn't a merger.  I gave my identity documents to MtGox not Coinlabs.

Did it even occur to you that you have right to that information?  I guess not.  Client's identities are just something to be bought and sold to the highest bidder.  When you grow tired of playing Bitcoins I am sure you will sell off financial and identity information to anyone who will throw a few dollars your way.

Totally agree,

Sorry Vess, i dont know you. I dont care how exciting you are with bitcoin. I'm trusting Mark , not you.

You had your chance to keep your identity documentation private and from the sound of things, you blew it.

In my mind, sending off one's identity docs to anyone is a one-time thing.  Think of it as a tattoo or a circumcision.  You might get lucky and realize no ill effects, but it's damn hard to undo completely.  Maybe getting all lawyered up (likely a yawn inspiring hollow threat like 99.9% of them) might help, but how are you going to know?

Is this really possible? can they get this done? is it in the realm of possiblity? Would it meant that you could direct deposit and could convert your salary instantly to bitcoins?

I know Etrade can do it for their brokerage accounts, and as far as I know most companies in that space can do it as well.

Worse than that. He sold the info and you dont get compensated.

People should support localbitcoins.com rather than letting a few guys have control over all your data.

Mt gox has to expand. If they simply hired someone directly then you would have to trust someone new with your data. So either way you are going to be trusting someone new simply due to growth.  It makes sense for them to partition out their company. If bitcoin is going to grow since it is a borderless, stateless money then you don't want a monolithic exchange that is centered somewhere. Partitioned all over the place is a much better idea.

I already made my point if this transition take place, i will withdraw all my fund.

Which brings me to a different question, will CoinLab have a verified account's transaction history (deposits, withdrawals and trades) that occurred prior to the transition?

How about users that never verfied their identity but are from the U.S. or Canada.   Will they be forced to use CoinLab as well (in order to trade or access their funds?)?     Same question as above, will CoinLab have their their transaction history?

Already explained this a bunch of times, but I will again. The last price shown on MtGox is the price for the last trade, no matter which currency. If someone buys a lot in another currency than USD, he'll end paying more (in his own currency) than the highest price in USD, but will not cause the highest USD price to move up.

I explained this quite a lot already, and the ticker API provides various varieties of last price.

MtGox did not sell users identities, and acted in the best interest of its users to ensure CoinLab had no access to said data.

None of users private information will be shared with CoinLab until the user accepts CoinLab's ToS on the site. If you choose to never accept CoinLab's ToS, then your data will never be shared with CoinLab.

Don't be obtuse. That's just mislabeled. It should read "Future Price".
Works like a charm on price prediction ;)

i'm not sure what country you live in, but since this new entity is going to be located in the USA, there are privacy laws in the USA that would prevent such information from being handed over w/o person's acknowledgement

I live in the US.  In fact it is more likely the case that it is forbidden to tell the customers about a hand-over at this point.  That would be a hand-over to the government, but it would probably stop there only briefly on it's way to private contractors such is the state of our evolving political system.

I say again, it does not bother me if the US Govt has my info.  They issued me my passport in the first place for Christsake...and they don't need to steal from me since they have a printing press.  Ideally anyone who wants authorization to send me money could just ask the goobmint if it's OK to do so.

But anyway it's a mute point.  D&T gave his info to Mt. Gox (apparently) and while it's less likely now that they will again lose it to hackers, it remains a possibility.  For the purposes of planning I assume that Mt. Gox would hand it over to the US if asked the right way, and if the close shop for some reason, who knows what will happen.  I'm sure Mark is a great guy and all, but even if he is willing to flush a lot of value down the toilet it does not necessarily mean that everyone in that organization who might get their hands on it...particularly in it's final days...would be so upstanding.

You don't have to pay taxes? ::)

I currently use MtGox just to store my bitcoins. I live in the UK, but I've done some play trading in USD on the site. No currency withdrawals or deposits. You know nothing about me apart from my email. Where will my bitcoins end up? MtGox or CoinLab?

i have a concern.

it has to do with CoinLab acting as an exchange AND as a broker for moneyed interests.  namely the Wall St guys who want to buy $1M blocks of BTC.

seems to me there might be a conflict of interest in buying that amount of BTC for big clients who might be willing to slip in a higher fee either on top of the table or under the table to obtain the very best price perhaps gotten thru an orchestrated dip? 

this would come at the expense of the smaller free marketing buyers and sellers who can't or won't pay the extra fee to do so.  or they might not even understand that that's an option.

Peter Vessenes:

How long are you going to stay with CoinLab. Is the plan to stay with them for 2 years, and then sell the company ? As far as I understand, you have started a dozen companies ? Why so many ? And how have they fared, have they all been successes, or have there been some failures?

I meant to say that the government does not need to steal from my by stealing my identity documents and tricking the financial institutions with them.  But yes, the fact that I pay taxes also reduces their need to steal my identity, and there are various other reasons why I'm not greatly worried about that.

Great!

'Free Market' bee-otch.  If you cannot stand the heat then stay out of the kitchen :)

+1 I think it will be a fun and interesting time when the US.gov finally runs its USD off the cliff, has its giant credit card refused, and "nationalizes" CoinLab and maybe even MtG along with everyone's B there, under the pretense of the "War on Whatever", and "a threat to national security..."  8)

A lot of investors worldwide will be squealing, and will have mostly their own carelessness and lack of foresight to blame.

Will be a drama not to miss, IF/WHEN it happens!  ;)

All your bitcoin belong to us.

Not if I keep most of mine and only send to the exchange what/when I intend to trade.

Oh that's good to know :).

Joe

Actually we have the same kind of laws in Japan, and no data will be handed over without approval.

I think a lot of you guys are undervaluing this transition. The more bitcoin companies become integrated into the US economy and follow all the laws and regulations that are in place.... the more it protects bitcoin itself. If more and more companies use bitcoin in the US and fully comply with the laws there exists a legitimacy that didn't before. Right now the news only talks about silk road. It's better to have them talking about legitimate things. just my opinion

Can't see this obviously spelled out elsewhere...

What about non-US, non-Canadian Mt.Gox customers, do their records and day-to-day interaction with MtG stay in Japan, or is everything moving to California...?

Since your statement is a little bit vague, I'm going to continue to assume that Mt. Gox complies with most or all subpoenas, court orders, and search warrants and honors all gag orders which might accompany them.  Particularly if they come from Japan or a government with friendly relations to them.  Please feel free to disabuse me of this misconception if you feel inclined.

Assuming that the conversation is supposed to be taken to mean transfer of information except those outlined above, it's not the protection of my identity information while Mt. Gox remains a viable entity which bothers me so much as what happens should Mt. Gox shutter it's doors.

So...the same guy who's the head of Bitcoin Foundation is the owner of Coinlab...?

Mtgox "pays" Bitcoin Foundation 10,000BTC to be a "platinum member"
Coinlab then does a deal with Mtgox to hand over a large percent of their operations to this US company?

Anyone else think that something smells a bit fishy here?  Conflict of interest to say the least.

Non-US/CA customers have no change at all. All data remains here.


Japanese privacy laws are actually stronger than the one you may find in other countries (for example USA).

If you want to know more about our privacy policies, you may want to  read them (https://mtgox.com/privacy_policy). Either way there is no way a company, no matter where it is located, would be able to go against an order from a court of its own country. This said, unless you are involved in some kind of fraudulent activity, there is little to no chances that your data would be ever the subject of a court order.

The general trend in the US is toward having the security apparatus hoover up more and more information, and keep it for longer periods of time.  Of this I am fairly confident.

I also expect that at some point involvement with Bitcoin in any way could well be considered 'fraudulent activity' for the purposes of obtaining data acquisition authorizations.

If Bitcoin involvement is ever considered "fraudulent activity", it'd mean we have failed (not only MtGox, but Bitcoin as a whole).

I have faith in Bitcoin (and our legal advisers do too) and that's why I'm still here pushing for things to move in the right direction. If you believe you are doing something wrong just by the fact of using Bitcoin then let me know.

Handing over 80% of the bitcoin users details certainly makes network analysis a whole lot easier. When combined with access to the bitcoin foundation database thats a massive data goldmine.

'Failure' and 'success', while they sound mutually exclusive, are not at all so.  It just depends on one's perspective.  Same goes for 'right' and 'wrong'.

I'm doing nothing wrong with Bitcoin as far as I am concerned.  In fact I am doing not much of anything at all.  I bought a bunch through Tradehill and I'm now in the initial phases of figuring out how and when to cash in my chips.  I'm actually pretty excited about the developments on the CoinLab front to be honest.  They well could be a giant positive for me personally.  We'll see.

You're over-estimating the number of US customers, or under-estimating the rest of the world.

Thanks guys for the crystal-clear message. Much appreciated.

I concur! While everything "started" there things are moving fast, very fast pretty much everywhere!

So will my bitcoins be held in Japan or USA in a months time if I do nothing?

Will the US government have the potential ability to immediately seize any of Mt Gox/Coinlab/Customers cash and/or bitcoins after this transition?

I take it that currently the US would have no jurisdiction to seize assets from a Japanese company, in Japan, but if those assets are now held in the US, by a US company does that not open up that kind of situation?

If the US government were to seize assets from Coinlab in the US, would Mt Gox still cover all customers' balances/deposits (including US customers)?

So, you trying to use Coinlab in the US like you used your French company in Europe? Think the courts in the US may be nicer than in France?

How do I know if my account is considered a US/CA account or not? Is this determination based on the IP address used when you opened the account, the source of funding or something else?

To my understanding USD is always held in the US, banks in Japan or any other country have holdings accounts with US banks, so if you have a currency account in another country, the USD still are in the US, it only appears to you they're not.

https://bitcoinfoundation.org/blog/?p=63

If you do nothing (ie. do not accept CoinLab's ToS on MtGox), then your funds are still held by MtGox Co. Ltd. in Japan (bitcoins and currencies).


We base this on various information, including source of funds and IP address. If you used Dwolla (which is only available to US customers) or if your bank reported you as a US citizen when sending funds to our bank, then you are automatically considered a US citizen.

If you ever connected only from the US, you are also considered a US citizen.

If you believe there was a mistake (ie. when we go live the site asks you to accept CoinLab's ToS), you will be provided an option to specify that you are not a US or CA citizen. Such cases will be reviewed case by case afterward so we can find out what went wrong.


I do not believe having the funds held in the US would make any easier or more difficult for the US government to seize funds should it find a good reason to do it.

Please note that as you accept CoinLab's ToS, you are in direct contract with CoinLab and no longer with us. In even something would happen with CoinLab (which is unlikely), we would be unable to interfere directly.

one questions i have is right now my account I just use for day trading and holding really, and dont plan to even do any bank wires. In this case would it be possible to keep it with mtgox even tho im in the US?

If I do have to be switched over to coinlab is documents and becoming verified a must, and if i dont become verifed what cant I do?

Right now my mtgox account is just for day trading and thats really it and I would prefer to just leave it like that without having to go through verification or anything

Since Mt Gox currently has a bank account with Dwolla, the US government has the potential ability to seize funds from there.

By closing their bank accounts in the US and sending US customers to CoinLab, Mt Gox shields themselves from legal action in the US.

Are you going to forbid Canadian citizens from trading directly on MtGox?

Given your talk of citizenship rather than residence, would I be right in assuming FATCA was an element in this decision?

It sounds like US citizens who live outside the USA will not be able to trade on Mt Gox at all. Indeed I suspect no exchange that's sensible will take them :(

I am not such a person fortunately, but I feel sad for those who are.

That's what I think too, but it seems MtGox will also apply the same restrictions to Canadians, so I assume that Canadian customers were sold to Vess as a package deal.

Both Canada and Japan have way stricter privacy laws than the United States so I would not be surprised if a Japanese company denying service to Canadian customers because the latter choose not to waive their privacy rights to a level below that of both Canada and Japan is against the law in both Canada and Japan.

Treating Canada as the 51st state of the United States can open a huge legal can of worms here.

You realise a private company can refuse to do business with you for pretty much any reason which doesn't violate human rights agreements?  They're well within their rights to stop servicing North American (or any other) customers, to change their ToS, to make all sorts of other changes you might not like.  Your remedy is not longer dealing with them if you don't agree to those changes.

Actually, US and Canada have many banking agreements and similar system, making it easy for a US entity to open an account in Canada or the other way around. It makes sense to handle both countries at the same time in order to reduce deposit/withdrawal fees at the same time.

Does anyone know what will happen with non-verified accounts?

I do but a private company cannot amend their TOS in order to circumvent privacy laws for example and if they do violate privacy laws then in Canada and I suspect also in Japan my remedies go a lot further than just refusing to do business with them. In this situation we can easily have a Japanese company telling a Canadian citizen living in Canada that he has in effect to comply with a US law that does not apply to him in contravention of both Canadian and Japanese privacy laws in order to do business with them.

The key difference here is that while it is very likely perfectly legal and in fact a legal requirement for MtGox to force this on US citizens and residents, it does not follow at all that the same applies to Canadian citizens or for matter to citizens of countries other than the US living in Canada. The bottom line is that in this situation Canadian citizens and residents may well have way more rights then US citizens and residents.

It is not that simple. Canada and the United States are very different countries with very different laws. In fact when it comes to opening an account with a Canadian financial institution I would not be surprised at all if a Japanese citizen or entity would have have a way less problems than a US citizen or entity. The reason, which I suspect is the same reason behind this deal, FACTA. In any event here is a list of questions I placed in another thread on the Canadian issue.

Some questions from the perspective of a Canadian MtGox customer.

1 ) What is the location of the assets held BTC and fiat held by MtGox on behalf of the customer Japan or the United States?
2 ) What is the location for tax purposes where the trades take place Japan or the United States. Furthermore which tax treaty will apply to the business relationship that between Canada and Japan or that between Canada and the United States?
3 ) Which country's privacy laws apply to personal information of the customer Japan or the United States?
4 ) Will the customer be required to change banking information for withdrawals already on file with MtGox?
5 ) Will a Canadian customer be able to continue to receive funds in US dollars into a US Dollar account with a Canadian bank?
6 ) Will the customer be required to provide an IRS form W-8?
7 ) Will withdrawal limits change as a result of this for Trusted and Verified customers?
8 ) Will there be any restrictions as a result of this for logging into MtGox by Trusted or Verified customers from outside of Canada and the United States for example while travelling?
9 ) Will USD on deposit benefit from FDIC pass through insurance?

and some more that I thought about later.

10) How will the Canadian dollar denominated MtGox accounts be impacted by this?
11) What measures if any has Coinlab to comply with Canadian financial laws and regulations. Has Coinlab completed any of the registrations required in Canada?
12) How familiar are the principals of Coinlab with Canada and its laws and regulations. Have any of them visited Canada?
13) How will Coinlab deal with the Canadian GST/HST?
14) Will Coinlab be providing service in French? This is a requirement in many parts of Canada

Welcome to Canada / Bienvenue au Canada

Does this provide enough of an answer?


So it appears it doesn't matter, verified account or not your account is moved over to Coinbase (if one or more of the above criteria matches).

The US government is doing a great job at turning their country into the pariahs of the world. Forcing other countries to follow retarded laws because George Bush bombed the twin towers is something to be proud of too.

Actually for a Japanese citizen or company, it is impossible to open a bank account in Canada, except if holding a Canadian visa or creating a Canadian subsidiary, while a US company can ask its bank to have a deposit method available in Canada and route transfers to Canada domestically.


1) For now all BTC assets are still held by MtGox Co. Ltd. in Japan. Already explained this earlier, but basically we are waiting for CoinLab to have a deposit handling system secure enough first.
2) It depends in which country you are located (ie. on you own country's tax laws). For more details please contact an accountant or lawyer in your own country.
3) For Canadian customers who accepted CoinLab's ToS, privacy policies will be those specified in there.
4) Customer withdrawal data will be ported, however customer has the option to ask for his banking information to be removed (by contacting the support) prior to transfer.
5) Of course
6) No idea, it depends on US and CA laws. I believe CoinLab will be able to answer that.
7) It depends on US implementation of FATF rules, which I believe are mostly similar to Japan. I believe CoinLab will be able to answer that.
8 ) Shouldn't.
9) I guess it should since CoinLab is registered as MSB, however I'll let CoinLab reply to this.
10) No impact unless the holder is either Canadian or American. Canadian and american customers will see their balance in USD and CAD ported over to CoinLab upon accepting the CoinLab ToS. Any balance in other currency will have to be closed and converted to one of CAD/USD/BTC.
11~14) I'll let CoinLab reply to this.

Thank you for your answer. I also expect Coinlab to be able to answer this. There is one further question to you regarding 2). Yes of course it depends on Canada's tax laws, but it also depends on the tax treaty with the country where the entity I am dealing with is located. The first question my accountant or lawyer will ask me is: Is it Japan or the United States? So I must ask you this question again.

That's complex, because while you are currently dealing with MtGox Co. Ltd, a Japanese company, according to Japanese laws the trades do not happen in Japan. If you're in Canada, you're hitting our San Jose intermediate datacenter, which means that based on Japanese laws, trades happen there.

Thank you for clarifying this.

MT, will you be inspecting/verifying CoinLab's security measures?

... and complicance with Canadian laws and regulations?

Actually people under CoinLab ToS will still be using mtgox.com and our system, just under a different contract.

How are they obliged to comply with Canadian laws and regulations if they're not operating in Canada?  Australia has some of the world's toughest privacy laws, but I can assure you that they aren't extra-territorial and a company not operating in Australia can't be forced to comply with them.

IANAL

A Japanese company doing business in Canada is ulikely to get anywhere near the kind of scrutiny over privacy from Canadian regulators than US company will because Japan has way tougher privacy laws than the United States. In addition there is legislation in the United States that can put an US Company doing business in Canada in the near impossible position of having to break the US law or the Canadian privacy law. The PATRIOT act in the United States comes to mind. This is a well known issue in Canada that applies to a US company but not to a Japanese company.

There are many examples of US companies doing business in Canada being called to task over privacy by Canadian regulators. I would be very surprised that MtGox buy doing business in Australia is not subject to Australian privacy laws. The reality however from a practical sense is that if they follow Japanese privacy law they are unlikly to attract adverse attention from regulators is Australia. The same is not true for a US company.

Your point regarding the banking transfers is well taken but I see it only as an interim solution. The reality is that in the long term the proper solution is to either setup a Canadian subsiduary or work with a Canadian partner since I doubt a US entity will have any better results in opening a Canadian bank account.  The danger I see here is that if this deal is for 10 years Canadians may as a result be relegated to less than optimal service since the opportunity of a Canadian partnership has been in effect eliminated for a decade. In short long term pain in exchange for a possible short term gain.  Nevertheless I am prepared to keep an open mind on the Canadian impacts of  this deal untill I see the responses from Coinlab.

Thank you sir.

my 2 cents worth...from a think tanker

if Gox had any sense, coin lab as well

they would have 50% or their operation in JP and 50% in the next location


but each 50% be self contained, Ie can operate independently , but synchronize the results eg price/volumes

this because say what you like the regulatory regimes are different

however they are set up now appears to be working....no matter what they tell you it only takes on politician/executive officer or administrator or oversight to stuff you up.

to go all in to a new jurisdiction is asking to fail and cause big issues.....


why would they risk this being so well entrenched in Japan

further

not being in the USA or near and being in say JP or CNY or others is a natural buffer, as other countries allow things other countries crack down on for all sorts of reasons and often to frustrate the country cracking down for geo-political reasons/advantages/pressure.

Gox and OC are looking politically naive particularly if they are sure about the huge success of BT/Ripple etc. I see on BT coin foundation and Gox they are pretty light on think tank brains/geo political types....they need to beef up on this seriously, start ups pro's, lawyers, scientists, IT people, are not usually the best for this, nor have the time, mandate or background to think this through, a lawyer may come close if having done a lot of international law...

...I would stay in JP and also set up shop, albeit through holding companies and the like or even Intellectual Property licensing so the money is remitted to them for their systems + conditions of using IP eg how company must operate = transfer of money up (and distribute) and almost complete insulation, in china and vietnam, then you are NOT going to be taken down in any hurry by any western govt. I do not deny that this throws up other problems but more on that later

I, for one, will be greatly looking forward to it.

Your thoughts on pretty much all of the points you touched on in this post seem unusually close to my own.

Ok next part

(I should be charging for this stuff)

Let be realistic CNY is a different social os, fraught with issues,

however, they are less likely to kill an enterprise that makes them money and gives the potential openings in emerging areas and outs they want.

See even when they do "kill them off" for political expediency, they will just be re-branded and quietly go on making money for the "owners" but therein is the rub

a company of any significance is going to have to sign up with local "officials", "companies", "soe" and know who to sign up with.

If you make any serious money, you may find your self offered a window seat and a portion of that money. IF you fight it (as one certain British chap did) they will take your operation...though with BTC they will be more reluctant to rely on entirely local staff to keep the money press rolling, and want foreigners to blame if it does not turn out as much money as the higher ups had promised/owe their higher up etc etc.

With BTC though you have an ideal vehicle on several fronts, you can keep a lot of your value/profit in BTC or you have to run very lean and cash out into other currency's to minimize the day when CNY govt/ses "takes" over an you get a window seat.

But who cares you have most of the value by drip feeding out, they will want to keep your operation going and at least have some of you their....meanwhile your JPY/Viet operation keeps going as normal if not even better, as you shift the bulk of the transaction through them, leaving at least some in the CNY outpost (if you have this much control left). You want the CNY operation to be alive even if you have to cut the profit their because it acts a anchor to other operations, this cost or dimisihed profit is properly an insurance premium in the Geo-poltical insurance market.

CNY demonstrated recently with FATCA they would politely, but publicly humiliate the US financial/legal/govt system, while the western client powers at least paid lip service to it (the reality is here the western powers will let the US kick a few doors down if it make the USA happy for domestic political expediency but will most likely find it "prohibitive" and counter productive follow the FATCA that closely)

Further while BTC/CRYPTO is miniscule CNY has diversified already to a breadbasket of currency, and are looking for every potential lever it can to quietly unload USD...pretty hard to do when you have X Trillion...but look at what btc/ripple may do....this will not be lost on CNY and they may even actively back it just in case it works out to get big enough...even if it remains small it will provide the more "important" government offices a means to diversify their interests.....

Now on to Vietnam, similar to CNY but no friend of CNY...enough said...an you only need somewhere to keep you stuff with an internet connection...(that's fast and hard to block)

back to JPY....a nightmare for the US to try and enforce anything at all or at least quickly and not always on the friendliest terms with regional neighbors

I would also probably look at Singapore.

Anyway...diversification of the machinery of the BTC/RIPPLE beast and it friends is a prudent decision, partricaully when you are clearly ensconced in JPY already.

Of course this could be a double feint here and Gox actually keeps everything quietly operating in JPY and is just making a lot of noise about going to new US friendly jurisdiction....one hopes so.

Bitcoin is fully illegal in China, and our negotiations with the local government so far have been without success.

Either way let's be realistic here. Most of our customers are located in countries such as US, Europe and others. Running away to Vietnam or China would make it basically impossible for us to receive or send funds to anyone in those countries.


Japanese government is friendly to US, and also implements things such as FACTA. Also the US government can pressure any bank worldwide by threatening of cutting them off USD. A bank in any country that can not transfer USD anymore is of no use to anyone. US government has been doing this so far to get accounts held by "terrorists" (people linked to North Korea, mafia, actual terrorists, etc) and while Bitcoin is still too small to get this kind of response, it's a good idea to stay friendly with the US govt. at this point and let Bitcoin grow and gain in legitimacy.


Anyway none of this advice is actually applicable as it would shut us from our customers, makes us unable to hold any USD and potentially limit our transfer solutions to non-conventional methods (liberty reserve, webmoney, etc...).

We are doing our best to see Bitcoin grow as an actual alternative to the existing system, but until Bitcoin is large enough to stand on its own, we need the current system to accept and support us.

No Australia has very week privacy laws the HCA has ruled their is no tort of right of privacy, the fed legislation says the fed govt can collect information about you and give out information about you as long as you are aware or should have been aware this was going on. The have only privacy principles that are adhered to ad hoc. State legislation in nsw at least is a bit better to the extent

but by and large useless and un-enforcable

Talk about the 'audacity of hope.'  I'm not holding my breath for that one, but wouldn't it be cool!

In the here and now I think it does make sense to consider geopolitical competitions and how crypto-currencies might exploit them for protection and growth.  But at the end of the day, no government is really going to be very fond of them in the form which appeals to most of us so I continue to believe that a plan for out to deal with pretty full global animosity toward the solution is worth putting some thought into.

The Bitcoin Foundation and Mt.Gox/CoinLabs are well positioned to make nice with the Western powers and this will provide a huge propaganda value among other advantages.  So I hope they continue in this track and have the best of luck for as long as possible.  I also hope that we don't evolve to a point where the existence of the Bitcoin solution is predicated on acceptance by the Western powers whether it be friendly or passive.  If this happens I strongly suspect that it will be because the solution is being leveraged for the surveillance opportunities it presents.

I'm done spamming this thread, but would look forward to an OP which focuses on geopolitical considerations.

Its "fully illegal" because there is a very specific way to approach things in china,  and its not by asking if it legal from some CNY govt dept in the first instance, you are almost always going to get a "no" because some relatively low level functionary (who got there by being conservative)...that first official rebuke acts like a red light to every other fiefdom in cny

You have to really know who to get your proposal seen by and it does not start by getting rulling's from govts

it starts in a much more sideaways manner by finding the right local quasi govt "company" to partner with, perhaps changing later...and then going from there, you would not even start out as $btc exchange but IT transaction consultancy.

and you wouldn't be doing it in manner to shut out anyone, if you set it up right....

anyhow...the scope of what your doing if you believe in what you are doing will come to fruition requires a lot more seeding and thought about where you backups and bases are...and the implications of what you are doing....you may force the hand of the people who can quickly shut you down.

sure it all "look" great going into the know USA/CAD western environment but that sthe genius of the system

It is USD not USA and it is as related to CAD as CNY is related to VND. Seriously just because two countries share a border it does not mean one can blindly just treat them as one.

It starts to get really tiresome sometimes when Canada is treated as if it were the 51st state of the United States.

In spite of my promise to keep quit, I cannot let this one pass.  The Mt.Gox/CoinLabs goings-on are one of many examples which point to your being wrong.  I think you are blinded by hope.  Most Western countries are vassals of the US (almost by definition the of term 'Western' at this point) and Canada certainly so as a country well within our sphere of influence geographically and rich in resources.  Even New Zealand which has neither of these problems is demonstrably subjugated as evidenced by the Dotcom events.

I personally have some disagreement with the assertion that the US is the 'leader of the free world', but it's the term 'free' which I have issues with.  Not 'leader'.  If you don't believe me on this just pay attention to future events.

Actually the Kim Dotcom case is a prefect example where the United States government already got rebuked by a court in Canada and their case is New Zealand is slowly falling apart. So it is actually turning into a case for the exact opposite. If anything the United States has already lost influence in New Zealand because of this. Ever wonder why Kim Dotcon is using a .co.nz domain for his new venture?

As for the MTGox / Coinlab deal let us wait and see what happens when it comes to the Canada portion.  

I humbly suggest you research the term client state

as >> tvbcof notes, influence is being lost by USA...why?...CNY on the rise...note news

[1] spratty's island claims VND/CNY/JPY [USA quite quiet about this]

[2] note encirclement of CNY BY USA

[3] rumblings about FLK when us will have to put pacific before FLK for UK who have no carrier right now.

Almost USA is sorta (very sorta) becoming what USSR was a massive spending machine on weapons, at the expense of domestic needs...though not yet to the same degree, because the investment infrastructure is vastly different.

The only real hope the USA has is some of the Boston boys took a really long view on CNY from 200 - 60 years back they saw a rise of china, and that's  a lot of what the rebuild Japan / extended Marshal plan was all about...its sorta bearing fruit for the US now as it has bases on CNY doorstep, but alot more debt than it expected in CNY ledger...at this stage....so it may only really succeed in shooting itself in the foot. Conversely CNY would like nothing more than to quietly unwind its position to the USD, and by quietly I mean while being able to choose thier own RMB level...due to domestic implications.

Are the mt.gox yubikeys now junk?  Or can they be paired with coin lab now as well for affected users.
Will coin lab only be working with u.s. and can. Or if you like the service they provide and you're from elsewhere will we be able use it?  What about 0 balance accounts, are they going to be transferred as well?  What will the nature of coin labs and mt goxs relationship be? Is coin lab just a fund holder/deposit withdrawal wrapper/AML law compliance vehicle for u.s. and can. users while gox is still the engine under the hood or will coin lab be provided independant service offerings that overlap mt goxs such as trading?

Yubikey continue working the same as you still use MtGox.com.


CoinLab will only provide service to US and Canadian customers at this point. 0 balance accounts will be transferred too. The engine will still be MtGox's.

Trojan Horse. US government will close the business as soon as they will have all information they need.You have been warned

I very much doubt it. In any event the US Goverment will have its hands full dealing with all of those who do not comply with FACTA  worldwide to concern itself with those that do comply.  As far as I can see in the US side of this deal MtGox by partnering with a US based partner has found an excellent way to avoid having to deal with FACTA, while at the same time improving service to thier US customers and remaining 100% compliant. I fail to see why the US Government woud have a problem with this at all.

When it comes to the Canadian side of this deal all, I can say at this point is that I am waiting for answers to my questions from Coinlab.

because if this ever takes of in a big way....the US and many other govts will face destruction, as they will have no revenue base/financial control

they will have no choice but to make it illegal...the only real hope is that so many billion people are already in with cash, that it would be be like saying you cant drink water any more....which would be undoable even for a a govt

No. There's a whole other solution in which governments, including the US, co-opt Bitcoin. And a third in which they essentially ignore it,

I think they will have to choose the third solution. ;)

What about Dwolla deposits? I currently have a recurring transfer set to send money to Mutum Sigillum twice a month. Should I suspend this before the CoinLab transition, to make sure my money doesn't end up in limbo?

Hi vess,
Your new 'asset' is killing the market and unable to function properly on a busy day.
Even on a normal day it performs poorly when the market moves.
Not just bad, REALLY bad.

The parallels for this Mt. Gox - Coinlab transition are eerily similar to the Bitcoinica -Intersango transition.

I really wonder who thought it would be a good idea to move such a large part of the Bitcoin business to the country with the most overt, aggressive financial industry regulatory-capture regime? It's like they are walking into the lion's den willingly. Anyway, good luck to those of you sticking with ship .... although it appears to be taking on water. The announcement last week was that iceberg was indeed real, not that the boat did not hit.

 Get out now before Leonardo DiCaprio appears in Mt Gox the movie.

This is a very legitimate concern when it applies to the Canadian part of the deal but not to the US part of the deal since US citizens and residents are subject to US law in these matters but Canadian citizens and residents are not!  As far as US residents and citizens are concerned this is a good thing in my opinion. If they do not wish to be subject to US tax law then they should leave the US and renounce thier citizenship; otherwise this deal makes tax compliance  and funds transfers for them way easier.  In addtion for those outside the US and Canada it has the very desiriable effect of insulating MtGox from US regulation.

Nevertheless as I have indicated before I will keep an open mind on the Canadian part of the deal pending a response from Coinlab to my questions.

Yes I think at this point the total lack of an exchange that can handle real volume is worse for Bitcoin's reputation than anything happening over at Silk Road.  Real money can't take seriously a market where the quotes lags behind by a ridiculous amount, and where the matching engine and APIs behave like they were implemented as one giant mutex.

The entire application and/or hosting infrastructure needs to be taken over by people who actually know how to build and deploy high-capacity transaction systems.  Glad to see that one of the Bitcoin startup ideas listed over at BoostVC was the creation of a brand new exchange.  

I notice that Coinlab site constantly coming up with messages like this on the homepage:


If they can't even get the current trade price reliably, how can they be serious about this major integration?

There is a critical difference between Canada and the United States here. Take GoldMoney for example and where they store gold on behalf of their customers. http://www.goldmoney.com/faq/where-are-metals-stored.html (http://www.goldmoney.com/faq/where-are-metals-stored.html) Canada is listed as a gold storage location but the United States is not. I wonder why. May be it has something to do with this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_6102 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_6102)

People make really bad decisions when based on really bad precepts. The more traditional mercantile elements of Bitcoin are either unseeing or uncaring of the predatory nature of the regime. They do see the dollar signs though, which can be overpowering to even the most conscientious of businessmen.

Personally, I hope this move destroys Goxilla. Actual decentralization of Bitcoin won't happen until this last vestige of centralized pricing is gone.

Dude. Please.  The US government already has all the information they need, and some more. MtGox intermediate servers are in San Jose, California - even in this thread MT reminded us of that.

Even the "Canadian" exchange Cavirtex - and I've been their happy customer for a long time - is registered as a .com with at least some infrastructure physically in the U.S.

Now, you are aware of the provisions of the PATRIOT Act, right?  What's all this bullshit about U.S. government "needing all the information"??? They have all the information, and they've had it for a long time. And Bitcoin is doing just fine. So quit bullshitting about the government, and let's focus on real and practical issues here.

Admittedly I skimmed, but I took the guys quote to mean that perhaps the US govt does not have Mt. Gox's books (meaning the PII on where fiat and BTC came from and went to) and when they obtain this info (e.g., via an NSL) then they would shut things down.  Chances are they could come up with ample examples of interaction between just about (or aboot for you Canuks) any exchange and other parties who's behavior can be classified as objectionable.  Thus giving even more power to do so even absent changes to our current laws.

I personally doubt that the US Govt would shut all the exchanges down, though they may try to cultivate a particularly cooperative one to a dominant size.  The info to be obtained from a gox-sized record of BTC transactions would likely be extremely useful in understanding the block chain from a historical perspective.

+1

If one only takes the trouble to dig a bit deeper one will find that the the A record for cavirtex.com points to IP 184.71.215.146, and the location of this IP is in Calgary, Alberta Canada.  The only thing here under United States jurisdiction is the technical contact of the domain and the domain itself (since it is a .com). There is no evidence here that the client data is stored on a server in the United States, quite the contrary the evidence points to the server(s) containing the client data being located in Canada. I am  very much aware of the PATRIOT act in the United States, it simply does not apply in this case. Please get the facts straight before spreading FUD about an exchange that is turning out to be a Canadian Bitcoin success story.

That's not strictly true, although it is the norm.

US dollar deposits held entirely outside the US have existed since the 60's and are called eurodollar deposits (regardless of whether they are actually physically located in Europe - although originally they invariably were).  They were basically created to satisfy the Soviet governement's desire, during the cold war, to hold US$ funds in the Western financial system but outside the reach of the US government.  These days eurodollar deposits are fairly routine (and similarly eurosterling deposit are sterling deposits held outside the UK, and euroeuro deposits (!) are Euro deposits held outside the EU.

roy

Can I not accept the Coinlab ToS and keep my Mt. Gox account.  And then open another account at Coinlab, so I would have 2 accounts at the same time?

Sounds like people residing in USA and Canada cannot continue to have business relationship with MtGox. The deal is exclusive. There may be workarounds if you incorporate outside of North America (just guessing).
You can certainly close your MtGox account before March 22.

I am in the U.S. but let's say I do swing trading and hold CADs for trading on BTC/CAD, EUR for the BTC/EUR market and AUD for the BTC/AUD market.  Will I still have those accounts after being transitioned to Coinlab? 

I just received a Deprecation Notice from Mt. Gox via e-mail:


Does that mean I can still create and redeem a MTGEUR code after April 10th?

I just got this answered on #mtgox IRC:

Funny shit ;D No inter-currency arbitrage on Mtgox for you US guys.

Weird, it is like the govt. hates its citizens or something ... drone strikes, bank account snooping, wiretaps, ....

"Land of the free" don't ya know?  "Home of the brave" too so they say.  Both are looking like more and more of a joke to me.

Actually countries of our size have a lot more to fear from it's own citizens than any other threat.  China is the same.  I read that they spend more on domestic security than on other forms of defense.  The US probably would also if we were not so involved in building and maintaining our empire presently.  But the focus that the US is putting into domestic defense recently is something to take note of.

I may be wrong, but I have a little suspicion that it has more to do with Coinlab's bank accounts being only in USD/CAD and them not wanting, or their bank not having, accounts denominated in other currencies than with government interference.
AFAIK paypal doesn't limit the currencies US users can have balances in, so why would coinlab? ;)

If someone could, as a U.S. citizen what are the pros and cons from this integration?

Cons:

No more redeemable currency codes?

From what I gather, there will be an initial delay for transferring funds via Dwolla - ultimately in the end will we still be able to use Dwolla?

What else?  I don't think government seizure of funds is realistic for the average user / trader.

Pros:

There will be a way for U.S. customers to directly link a bank account to the exchange?

I am not 100% sure but I think there are some IP addreess restrictions, that may trigger an AML/KYC/whatever-crap-people-come-up-with check if a proxy/vpn/Tor exit node IP is detected.

I must point out that is has been over a week since anyone from Coinlab has responded or posted on this thread. While I do understand the challenges and time constraints involved with launching this project, the silence on the part of Coinlab is starting to not inspire much confidence in this transition. I must add that the responses from MTGox on the other hand have been timely and appropriate.

Gox is unusable again.

couldnt agreed more, check out my thread on why you should stop using mtgox and remove all funds prior to the coinlab integration
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=149935.0

Hello,

I have two questions:

1) Will CoinLab subject their Bitcoin holdings to an audit?

2) Will CoinLab keep a 100% reserve on Bitcoin deposits?

As we know, MtGox primarily deals in off-block transactions, which is fine.  However, this takes away transparency.  If there were a run on MtGox, how can a user be assured their deposits will be available for withdrawal and have not been used as a margin account or equivalent.  Thanks.

Still waiting for a response from Coinlab to my questions.

Question for Coinlab:

If I obtain an account at SVB (which I am not yet sure is practical), would I be able to sell BTC for USD and collect the proceeds without sending high quality proof of identity to Coinlab?

The amounts we're talking about would be somewhat North of $10k initially, and over time it would depend on what happens in the market.

I am sensitive about sending high quality identity documents to small companies is why I ask.  Thus far I have avoided sending such documentation to Mt. Gox (or any other exchange) because I've not sold BTC in significant quantities.

I'll be in the Bay Area next week and it would be handy to get an answer to my question, or guestimate, in time to explore the possibilities further.

Question for either party (support ticket also in @ gox support)

I did not know the transition was so soon. My mtgox account is currently locked for 2 weeks due to losing my OTP. Can I transfer my coins out before Coinlab gets ahold of them?

This problem is getting increasingly annoying.


edit:
According to MagicalTux, the answer is that I will have a chance to move my coins out and then agree to the Coinlab ToS afterward. Crisis averted.

I have a new mtgox account with no BTC bought.  If I buy BTC with USD on the 22nd (final transition date from Coinlab) will my money ever go overseas at all? Don't want to deal with the headache of registering an overseas account.

I have a question.

What the fuck is it (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=156833) and how long we (traders with good liquidity and own professional tools) will tolerate zero-give-a-fuck behavior from Mt.Gox side?

Thanks you.

Id like to know how this will affect US UNVERIFIED USERS?

I haven't heard a word on the fees that CoinLab will charge. I'm hoping it will be the same.

Until they have a proper competitor.

I thought all the users were supposed to be over at coinlab by the 22nd

Live -- March 22
We'll have everyone moved over by March 22!


Did I miss something, misinterpret what they were saying or are they just behind?

Yeah, I'm curious myself.. 

I haven't had to read through and (dis)agree to any new ToS, so right now I'm still trading through Gox.

They pushed it back "a couple weeks" on March 21.

I posted a serious of questions regarding the impact of the MTGox / Coinlab integration and transition on Canadians over three weeks ago. MTGox for their part were quick and efficient to provide a response, in spite of the fact that they are swamped with new account openings and the corresponding AML/KYC. Coinlab on the other hand has not provided any kind of response, not even an acknowledgement that they will respond.

I will let the reader be the judge.

What is the new go-live date?  - the coinlab website still says 22 march

Hey Coinlab,

I scanned your site again for info on how you are going to be doing proof if identity.  Saw nothing.  I already have an miiCard account and I want to know if that will suffice.

I want to have some BTC with a reliable no-bullshit exchange primed to sell if an opportunity comes along.  I'll go with either you guys or Tradehill depending on who get's their act together first.

What I won't be doing is sending anyone either BTC or USD if they are going to hold it hostage until I provide passport scans and what-not.  I want unambiguous information on exactly what your policy is here.  To me USD and BTC are replaceable.  The loss of my identity is not.

Peter,
Could you please explain what the F@#$ is going on with MtGox?!?!?

Source?

http://coinlab.com/status

http://coinlab.com/status is a bit stale - March 21, 2013 was the last update -I was kind of hoping that coinlab would be humming along  by now. It would be nice to hear something from the coinlab people on this especially given the challenges over at mtgox today- I sent coinlab an email about two weeks ago that went unanswered.

I assumed that Coinlab got the class of customers they wish to provide service to and are happily chipping along.  Same with Tradehill.

I figure that some months ago Bitcoin markets generally move into the same mode as Wall Street.  That is, where a bulk of the participants are getting ass-raped without even knowing it and the real action happens outside of the channels they see.  Unlike in traditional markets where there is some token body who is, in theory, responsible for protecting the participants there is no such thing for Bitcoin at all.  Also unlike the traditional markets, the 'normal' participants still have plenty of wealth though.  The markets will, I'm confident, evolve to be highly efficient as stripping this.  When that task is done they can move on to mostly playing amongst themselves.

My understanding is that CoinLab was to transition ALL US and Canadian business through them (originally by the 31st of March 2013). In fact they indicated that if you were in the US or Canada that MTgox would no longer service you. Has there been a change of plan and if so what source did you get that information from?

I pulled the info straight out of my ass.  That's why I used terms like 'I figure' and 'I assume'.

Not that some of my conjectures don't have some basis in observation however.  For a period of time I had hoped to make use of either Tradehill or Coinlab's services so I've been watching for updates and noticing how extraordinarily silent they've become.  At least in terms of threads on this forum, responsiveness to communication attempts by us plebs,  and updates on their respective web sites.

It is especially interesting to note that in addition to being the CEO of this organization, ~vess is also the chairperson of the Bitcoin Foundation.  Or at least has a strong leadership role in each.  One has to conjecture that their interests are aligned to some extent.

Interesting  - It will be interesting to see what their position is once they do send out the next communication

Quoting this ample sack of shit for later reference. Who knows when somebody starts a forum scrub.

I do not know a lot about Peter Vessenes - I take it not everyone is thrilled or perhaps I misinterpreted... -  His linked in profile is interesting:

http://www.linkedin.com/in/vessenes (http://www.linkedin.com/in/vessenes)

other than that I dont know a whole lot about him

Personally I'm pretty ambivalent about the guy.

My hopes for Bitcoin to be 'revolutionary' in a healthy way were at one time significant albeit always guarded.  Now to me more and more "it's about the money, Lebowski."

The:

 - Mt. Gox owning the pleb's exchange (at least), the bitcointalk.org forum, a good portion of the Bitcoin Foundation, etc
 - The likelihood of mining effort being significantly monopolized when modern ASIC's come out
 - The prospect of full nodes being as rare as hens teeth when system growth can be unleashed
 - Various other things which I won't mention

all have worked to quash my own more altruistic hopes for the solution.  But the efforts and bodies which have evolved are producing a solution trajectory such that the actual value of my own BTC stash will be maximized.  I cannot complain about that, and can honestly thank Mr. Vessenes for the role he has played and is playing in the ecosystem.  Or that I suspect him of at least.  If I fail to capitalize effectively that will be my bad.

Any news on the transition?

seems to be just tumbleweeds and crickets right now - curious...

A lot of press and buildup and then a seeming withdrawal from updates and movement by Coinlab

Perhaps Coinlab figured out that teaming up with the single business which has directly excacerbated the two biggest crashes in Bitcoin's history is not a great idea.  If your business associates are incompetent, you will also be perceived as incompetent.

If I was them, I would lay low and not bring this up again, until there was hard evidence that MtGox had deployed an actual working scalable platform that wasn't going to publicly embarrass all participants in front of the watchful eyes of VCs and other big money.

it could just as easily be the other way around.  just what expertise has CoinLab proven to have?

yeah, i'm disappointed in gox's trading platform as well.  but at least he hasn't allowed it to be hacked in almost 2 yrs.

and i'm not sure confining/caging US investors to CoinLab is such a good idea.

I agree that Coinlab has no good expertise or reputation to speak of.  But Silicon Valley Bank is a major partner, and they definitely do have a reputation to protect.  And ultimately, I'd guess that the people in Coinlab prefer having no reputation whatsoever, to having a bad reputation by association.

My feeling (and others, see below) is that Gox really needs this deal, else they must open a US subsidiary this year or risk being upended by some new entrant.  It's not realistic to expect US customers to be sending wires to Japan indefinitely, or dealing with Japases hours and holidays, etc...the whole thing looks byzantine and unserious.



Doc, our standards in this community are sadly very low at the moment.  Not being hacked in 2 years should not be a badge of honor, a measure of competence, or an unusual achievement.  It should be the minimum expectation for any business holding Bitcoins.


Agree, hopefully at least one or two additional US exchanges get launched this year.

You see Bitcoin years are similar to dog years (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_unusual_units_of_measurement#Dog_year). 2 calendar years is about 150 years ago in Bitcoin terms. Ancient times.

i have to say that i think there are alot of US investors who would like to keep it this way (as in out of the US).

Does anyone how many users MtGox actually has currently? I'm wondering about the size of the entire Bitcoin market.

:) Ha ha, yes, I understand that sentiment, several times the past couple of years I have also felt grateful and lucky that Bitcoin was off the radar and buying was just too hard for the average person.

But alas, the cat's fully out of the bag with last month's giant wave of press coverage, we are now on an unstoppable express train to either heaven or hell, and personally I'd like to get there as fast as possible.

Coinlab is still working on it???

I guess.  I haven't seen any announcements in a while.  Though, I did notice that their about (http://coinlab.com/about) page not lists Jodie Brady as their CFO, which, unless I missed it, is something new.

Seriously last update March 21st? I just don't understand why folks running these businesses can't do basic PR.

It doesn't have to be anything fancy, just a really a small note saying "we're working on it".... would make all the difference.

Or perhaps if I was a member of the Bitcoin Foundation I would be in the know.

I'm a lifetime member. They don't tell us squat.

I honestly can't believe what I'm seeing and reading. I'm lost for words.

Madness!

I doubt that "we're about to sue MtGox" is something they wanted to advertise.

Would you care to elaborate - was it one of your famous humorous pennings ?  ;)

The very last line of your post I quoted, coupled with the recent $75M lawsuit.

Yes I can see that. I had many questions for Vess, and I can understand that some of them seemed offputting and alienating to him, but really - I would have nothing else for the community than successful exchanges, I really don't want drama to unfold like this. And besides, I think if you have good intentions, you have nothing to fear from people asking hard questions. Then your ACTIONS over time will prove that you're trustworthy. For what it's worth, Mark has proven over time that he is to be trusted, and I do trust him. But as for Vess I had many questions, and now this..

Now, lets take a look a month or so on. I recommended Don't Go to the US, Tux shot me down.

Just touch the US and get sued for $75M (not even Gov, by your "partner"),  if that is a legit law suit (pacer has it but I expected to see an Official Court Stamp Somewhere)

BitCoin trades in CNY and CNC now comes out based in CNC, so much for "illegal" in CNY. The whole concept of Illegal in CNY is very different in CNY to West. I mean even Civil law and Common law are quite different.

If anything my position was way too conservative....stay clear of the US....until you are in a really really strong position, and have iron clad indemnity clauses from any US "partner" before you get in bed with them in anyway!!!

I hope I am wrong and some how this law suit is fake, or gets dismissed, but I humbly suggest you need to get some long term strategic planners in there at Gx, if your serious about seeing this all through....

Apart from the documents being on PACER, CoinLab has confirmed they've filed suit and Mark has confirmed that he's aware of them filing.

I wonder how they came up with nice figure of $75 Million?

I guess if you can get a couple of mil for spilling your hot coffee, then $75 mil is only fair.

God Bless America  ;D

Recent appearance of Vess in media:

http://video.cnbc.com/gallery/?play=1&video=3000161954&utm_source=Kazi+Media+Group&utm_medium=Kazi+Media+Group

http://www.bloomberg.com/video/vessenes-discusses-bitcoin-trading-BPTEFzR6Q0G3KzjlZaAxjw.html/

Apart from that fact that he can't sit still (probably just how he is), he's not the worst representative for Bitcoin I've seen.

Coinlab start off great by showing legal weapon,

Imagine what would happen if us customers were moved to them.

According to Bitcoinity market stats,
http://bitcoincharts.com/markets/mtgoxUSD.html

MtGox trades 560 million USD (volume) per 30 days.

At their 0.60%-0.55% transaction fee, that's about 3 million USD per month turnover for MtGox. I assume their monthly expenses are below 100K? Those guys are doing fine.

so it looks like CL went 24 x 3 = 75 or close enough

Coinlab don't need 75 mils, they probably can get the same amount by unloading all their coins before filing the lawsuit, and take them back before withdrawing it.  8)

so No brainer lawsuit, sell coins fud market buy back = Win....

the law suit you had to have

you can double that I think as they charge on both sides off the trade.  (gox  I mean)

Or, if you do business in the US, you will be expected to abide by any contracts you sign.

Except- market is not falling for it by any significant measure.

I just don't know why coinlab is bothering with mtgox. If they COULD make a decent exchange, they could bury gox easily. Just put the damn thing up and go. Mtgox is such a boatload of fail people would dump them in a heartbeat if something better and reliable were available.

they don't need customer account and passwords. That's BS no one should be handing that over anyways.

Why do real work and program a real exchange when you can just pay lawyers to sue someone else and take their money that they got from doing real work?

I know this is kinda mind-boggling

Mt Gox should settle the lawsuit in bfl miners. That way coinlab will never see a cent :P

Why do you think coin lab is the bad guy here?  If there were contractually binding agreements that coin lab honored and mtgox wasn't then they deserve it no?

75 million USD.  Driving a competitor bankrupt through lawsuits is a very USAnian form of "free market competition" which the rest of the world don't understand.  MtGox deserves it just like people sharing a few music files on the internet deserves to pay millions of USD in compensation to RIAA, or someone selling hot coffee deserves to pay millions of USD in compensation to someone spilling it on themselves.

No court in the rest of the world would take this seriously.  Which is probably the reason why CoinLab wanted a court in the USA, probably known for outrageous compensations like this, chosen in the contract.  CoinLab has been a scam all the way.

Ok necroposting much, but may I point out how that volume on "Bitcoin is fully illegal in China," btcnCNY 42K v Gox 32K last 24Hrs