Bitcoin Forum

I just don't get it.... why people are getting into legal trouble with Bitcoin. How can they say you need a Money transmitter license for Bitcoin? What is the difference between Bitcoin and Swagbucks or XBox points? To me it's just a digital product with no need for Government regulation at all.

And I don't want to hear about that "Cash equivalent" nonsense. Every THING is a cash equivalent.

TL;DR: yes.
It is a virtual currency as defined by  by FinCen (http://fincen.gov/statutes_regs/guidance/html/FIN-2013-G001.html).  The reason it was defined as such is FinCen wanted control over it.  By virtue of being defined as currency, presently FinCen does.  The exactingly codified body of law exists to avoid ambiguity & need of deferral to "common sense."  If you disagree with the law, you can disobey it or work to change it.  If you choose the latter, appealing to logic & analogies usually ends in tears & fail.

Fortunately U.S. is not the single country on the Earth! ;D

FinCen has chosen to - practically speaking - disregard any differences between virtual currency and fiat.  With very few exceptions, if your business would be a money transmitter for its use of fiat, it is a money transmitter for its use of BTC, LTC, etc.

Amen to that. If I lived in the US right now I would be pretty intent on getting the hell out of there. And I'm not saying anything against the people, I am talking about the government.

So bitcoin is considered a currency? That is good news, I suppose!

Fiat in, fiat out. There is your simple answer..

From http://fincen.gov/statutes_regs/guidance/html/FIN-2013-G001.html

Buy unusual hat (TF2) with USD, sell unusual hat.

Everything can be defined as "Fiat in, fiat out" as soon as it have a value.

That is WAY oversimplified. If that was the case, then PayPal would not need to be licensed. Same with MoneyGram, Western Union, Square, etc. Using fiat has nothing to do with it.

Who are you ???

Unlike Xbox points, you can take your Crypto coins and convert them back into Fiat.  This is the reason the US gov't has a target on everything crypto at the moment.  All Crypto currency is atm, is a means to digitally transmit Fiat.  It may in time grow to become something more.  Which is the main reason I am here, not to make money, but would be awesome to be in on something as it is coming out of creation.

And doesn't matter what country in the world you are in (aside from maybe North Korea).  Once they put the label that Crypto coins are being used by terrorists to transfer funds, they pretty much will attack cryptocurrencies in no matter what country you happen to be doing business.

My bet is that he is Dank.

That's the problem.  All those other companies you mention are licensed, and follow strict gov't guidelines when it comes to anonymity to those transferring large amounts (Over $10,000).  There have been a few Bitcoin companies that went legit/are going legit, so you won't have any more problems using them legally then you would using PayPal.  But the Cryptocurrency users have been nailing these companies in the forums, and stop doing business with them as using them is "The reason they use Cryptocurrency in the first place for complete anonymity"  MtGox is I believe currently going down the route of going legit.  It's not hard to find posts on this forum nailing them for doing so.

Welcome aboard, good to see you here.

And I'm still stuck on the "who are you" part.  Who is this "we" you keep referring to?

Looked through the link in your profile, but did not see your name anywhere on that website, unless your profile name is not your real name.  Keep in mind that this community is VERY skeptical of newbies since they tend to turn out to be scammers more often lately.

If he is who he appears to be, he's one of our heroes.
Or at least for those of us old enough to remember BITNET.
My former company, Infonet, was also a founding member of the Internet Society.
So, either he's one of the good guys, or wearing the mask of one.

Still, I found the exact picture used in the profile in a Google Images search.  This forum doesn't verify you are who you say you are when you sign up.

Plus it's unusual for someone to actually use their real name.

The thing is, just because Bitcoin is popular is no reason to start forcing regulation on a digital commodity. Bitcoin is essentially a number on a computer screen. I can write a number on a piece of paper and sell it to you for $500. It's the same thing in my opinion.

It wasn't always unusual to use our real names online. 

That's not a very strong argument if you accept that official currencies can be regulated. Most official currencies are also just numbers in a computer. Try replacing "bitcoin" with "euro" in your statement.

There is an important distinction to be made. Due to Bitcoin's decentralized nature, it is nearly impossible for a country or group of countries to regulate Bitcoin itself. However, regulation by a country of the people that use bitcoins (within its jurisdiction) is inevitable.

Of course it's not him, ffs.  The real one is an old academic -- old enough to capitalize & use proper grammar when he types.  This is a smartphone baby.
[ S]He spews out boilerplate cliches with 0 depth or insight, and his vocab is that of a fourteen-year-old reaching for adult-sounding words.  

Bitcoin is not a real money, it's an online money or virtual tokens alternative to dollar and euros it can be exchanged for goods and services at places that accept it. Bitcoin is a decentralized currency meaning there are no central bank to regulate it it more a p2p transaction.

As long as the virtual currency is accepted to your country then it is legal, besides many people are using it. However bitcoins popularity is unstoppable there are a lot of news going on about it's legality

Bitcoin is money according to one ruling:

www.courthousenews.com/2013/08/06/Bitcoin.pdf

Page 3:
"Therefore, Bitcoin is a currency or form of money, and investors wishing to invest in BTCST provided an investment of money."
(Asserted by AMOS L. MAZZANT UNITED STATES MAGISTRATE JUDGE in court opinion order establishing jurisdiction)

I believe that the Bitcoin Foundation's argument is that in California BTC doesn't meet the definition of a currency.

That's irrelevant as it never went to court therefore it's not case law like the Texas ruling is.

Eh... I'd barely call what was done in Texas "case law". It was an opinion by a magistrate judge in one federal judicial district. Magistrate judges -- while technically possessing all the adjudicative powers of district judges over cases they're assigned to -- aren't confirmed by the Senate and their opinions are rarely cited as "case law", merely "persuasive authority", even in the districts they are in. I am not going to research specifically whether magistrate opinions are even publishable (other than on the case docket), further restricting their precedential value; it won't surprise me either way.

Regardless, this judge barely analyzed whether bitcoin is money, because it pretty obviously is. Any other judge that's faced with the question will likely rule the exact same way.

Yes, that is not a decided case,  nor appellate reviewed (which is something you really want if you are looking for a strong precedent).

The question of "legally a currency" is a strange one to raise.  Law is defined by geography so depending on where your feet are at the moment, the answer can change.  Whether it is a "currency" or not isn't even much of a matter of law as there is very little law on currency.  There is law on "current money" which is a very different thing.  
A better question would be whether Bitcoin has "value" under the law, and that is clearly a yes is most jurisdictions that will matter.  Value can give you standing before the law, as losses, damages, and enforcement will all hinge on this.  Chickens can be a currency, hugs can be a currency, whether or not Bitcoin is a currency is not so important to the law. What matters more is value.

What irked me a bit was the weird logic used by the defendant using outdated literature that said that Bitcoin had no specie, and that this would count against it as to whether it was money.
It now does have specie.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=269535.msg2883593#msg2883593

And, for what it is worth.  The USA Federal Reserve Notes don't have any specie either.

I've read various portions of California law and they are very explicit. They uniformly define "money" as something authorized by the U.S. or foreign governments. The laws distinguish between "money" and "monetary value", and in many cases the two are treated differently. Granted, these definitions apply only to the specific context (in this case, California financial regulations).

From the California Financial Code

So next you need to look at the definition of "authorized or adopted by the United States".

Since California relies on the US Federal for this, for that geography, there is a strong argument to be made that anything that requires authorization by the US Federal FinCEN as a MSB is an example of "authorized by the United States".   This is far from a decided issue, as the FinCEN guidance is yet to be formalized by either the legislative branch or judicial. 

But miners aren't creating bitcoins; Satoshi was the only person ever creating bitcoins, when he started the blockchain; miners are simply finding the bitcoins that have always existed in the protocol...

What has historically made a currency legitimate is the ability to pay perceived tax obligations, so no, Bitcoin is not a currency, because currently no taxing authority will accept it..

In the USA the US Dollar must be accepted for existing debt, under law and criminal penalties if not, so it appears the modern definition, at least in the USA, is to pay existing debt byway of coercive threat of force/death.

Some might confuse "currency" with "legal tender".  The meaning is as distinct as the spelling.
The first has a practical definition, the second a legal one.
There are private currencies.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_currency
(Hey look, Liberty Dollar made the list and not yet Bitcoin?  Someone should update it.)

Then I guess the hinge-pin is my use of the word 'legitimate'. Allow me to replace that with 'defacto'.

Bottom line at the end of the day is mean men with guns will kill me if I dont pay them with it and resist their attempts to imprison me for my inaction, which realistically requires me to earn it and use it, or I could go to prison or die, because they never deescalate or back off until equal-to-greater force is applied. They will keep sending more and more men until I pay, am in prison or dead. Then they take my property away from my heirs, sell it and recoup my refusal to obey.

So, for my purposes, I meant a currency you can pay Caesar what is Caesar's with.

You maintain the confusion between terms.  Your description is of legal tender, and nothing really to do with currencies, legitimate, defacto or otherwise.
That a particular currency is legal tender within a geographic region does nothing to invalidate all other currencies that may be bartered about.  Legal tender just means that it can settle a debt under the law, such as a tax debt, which you can get by hanging out in an area with a government that taxes people.  Legal tender also means that you are obliged to accept it to settle any other debt.  It does not require you to transact using it, only to not refuse it if used to pay a debt (you can't require BTCBTC instead if $$ are offered) unless these are specific terms in a contract, and if that contract gets litigated, it will likely end up being $$ anyway as "specific performance" (another legal term that can require a different payment) is much more difficult to get from a judge.

Look at other debts such as a restaurant bill.  The restaurant is required to accept legal tender if paid, but is free to accept dishwashing, a good review in a magazine, hugs or anything else they might choose.  So dishwashing can be a currency.  What makes a currency is the fluidity by which transactions can occur with it.  Like the current in a river, the more money flow, the more defacto it is a currency.  

So bitcoin is a "currency" but there is nothing either illegitimate or legitimate about that term.  50K transactions a day make it a pretty good one (though maybe not as good as hugs).  Currency is not a legal term of art in the way that "legal tender" or "current money" are.

I don't know that anyone would argue that BTC is authorized or adopted by the United States.

Not in history prior to recent legal tender laws. If you could pay your taxes, the currency was acceptable anywhere and by everyone in the land. That is true today as well. I was not arguing that there were not other forms of currency, but valid to me means I can live on it. You cant live lawfully and without charity on a currency that is not accepted for everything, everywhere by everyone, especially taxes. It requires conversion. In that context, Bitcoin is indeed illegitimate/invalid, Yes, I know I can jump through all sorts of fancy hoops to convert it. That isnt the point.

Well definitions are only useful when agreed upon by the masses.  I can start calling day the period of time when the moon provides enough illumination to read a street sign from 10 ft away but it doesn't really do any good.  In fact all it does it create a huge amount of confusion (two different groups calling the same thing different names). 

For example the euro is most currency a currency but if you have Euro's in the US you have absolutely no choice but to convert some of them to dollars to pay your taxes.  That doesn't magically make the Euro "not a currency".  The fact that someone, somewhere can pay their taxes in Euros doesn't really help you or meet your somewhat nonsensical definition.

The Euro is a currency.  The Bitcoin is a currency.  The dollar is a currency.
The dollar is not legal tender in the EU.
The Euro is not legal tender in the US.
The Bitcoin is not legal tender anywhere (yet).

Right... trying to deal in Bitcoin in the USA is slightly better than Zimbabwe Dollars at the moment.

It's in the news: The german Ministry of Finance accepts Bitcoin as a currency.

http://www.tagesschau.de/wirtschaft/bitcoin100.html
http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/Berichte-Finanzministerium-erkennt-Bitcoins-an-1937531.html

And German Kapital Gains..
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/globalbusiness/10252383/Germany-plans-tax-on-bitcoin-after-virtual-currency-recognised-as-private-money.html

Well it's not so much about planing taxes over here. Bitcoins can be considered a kind of income, thus there is a kind of income tax to be paid. Plus if you owe money to the state but your bank account is void, they'll happily take your bits.

I read the Bitcoin Foundation's arguments against the California Regulators and that's not the argument they used.  The CA regulators were arguing that the Bitcoin Foundation was engaging as a money transmitter and the Bitcoin Foundation replied that they are not.  Their argument is that they aren't doing any money transmitting, and that even if they were, they aren't doing business in California so that the California Regulators have no grounds to regulate them.  See their letter (http://www.scribd.com/doc/151346841/Bitcoin-Foundation-Response-to-California-DFI) for the full details of their response.

While bitcoins may or may not be considered a currency, Bitcoin[//b] certainly is not a currency, or not only a currency: it is a computer program, an accounting system, p2p network, a protocol, a public ledger of digitally signed transactions, decentralized time-stamping service, etc.

Keeping this in mind will  help you think and argue more clearly.