You will note the word "virtual" or "decentralized" don't appear anywhere in the actual law. What FinCEN provided in April was guidance. The simple version is that guidance is FinCEN way of saying "this is the way we interpret EXISTING law". No new law was created in April. Not a single line of public code.
In this regard, I am very curious what Mt. Gox's plans are. Rather than simply complying with FinCEN guidance, it would be nice if a big exchange, like Mt. Gox, which could afford it, decides to challenge them in court. |
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Uncheck money laundering is a huge deal. It is by and large used for criminal and/or politically motived (IE: terrorism or otherwise) operations. One of the core methods that holds organised crime at bay is the government's ability to constrict their money supply. You can only get so large as an organisation if you do all your transactions in cash.
What is the real evidence that this is true? As I've noted before, what is the magnitude of terrorist related transactions? And is there any evidence that these AML laws actually inhibit transfers for such people? |
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Yea, the only sad part is that the last 30 years, in my opinion the US no longer has been a democracy, (1 person, 1 vote) not sure what to call it but nowadays its (1 dollar, 1 vote)
Is it called a "plutocracy" ? |
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Likely a reasonable thing for some of the U.S. exchanges to do, to make sure they are in compliance. I suspect the rest of the world will ignore them.
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The site is presently returning database error when you access it on port 80.
It is registered using the privacy service at enom (surely a warning sign) and has cloudflare. Only answers to ports 80, 8080, 443, and 8443.
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Firstly, I have to agree completely with the OP. This AML business is just lazy policing because they can't actually enforce the original laws. Many of these likely wouldn't even be laws in a free society, such as drug trafficking.
The other part I love about the reasons given for AML is that they are needed to prevent use of the money by "terrorists, drug dealers, and child pornographers". Some of these are really the modern boogeymen, aren't they? These frequently seem to be the three groups that are mentioned.
How large is the market for child pornorgraphy? Or how much money do terrorists really need to move around the world in a year? Obviously I am not endorsing these activities in any way, but I can't imagine the market for them is anything compared to the total amount of money being move around for drug markets.
It is absurd, we clog up whole financial markets on the slight chance that such laws will make the original activities slightly more inconvenient to the criminals.
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Anyone interested in a meetup in the Tempe area in the next few weeks?
Perhaps at Extreme Bean ? southwest corner of McClintock and Southern?
Peter
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It is an interpretation of the CFR, not a rule in and of itself. Rules that end up in the CFR must complete a process called "Notice and Comment" before they are promulgated.
This is what I always suspected. So that seems to imply that Mt. Gox could contest this interpretation. Certainly they have the funds to do so, and I hope they will, as I think the best conclusion would that BTC are not legally currency. |
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Well, hopefully CampBX has their application pending.
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It looks like it is the transfer of the money from the Iowa bank account to Dwolla, in order to facilitate a customer transaction, that will really get them in trouble here. That transfer is denominated in USD, and appears to be based on customer requests.
The application made by M. Karpeles for the bank account which stated they were not in the money transmitting business is also going to hurt. Perhaps he can argue that the account was originally intended for a different use. It will sort of depend on when it was linked to Dwolla.
Overall, this seems like more trouble for Mt. Gox arising from their unprofessional practices.
CampBX had better start gearing up for an increase in volume.
I am trying to figure out a way that you could argue that Mt. Gox is not involved in the transfer of USD, only BTC.
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Perhaps CoinLab suggested to the Feds that they may be interested in investigating this issue.
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One maxim to keep in mind - never assume malice when incompetence will suffice as an explanation.
If Mt. Gox has been responding to inquiries from DHS like apparently deal with the business partners and customers, it could be the DHS decided they just need to grab the account and get this straightened out.
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BTC-e is reporting on their page the Vircurex was hacked. Vircurex says that receiving wallet addresses have been changed due to a security problem.
Does anyone have further news about what is happening with that exchange?
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So what specifically do you want to do?
I would suggest contacting Unicef to see if they have an interest in this, offering to help them gather BTC donations and implement the required changes on their web-site.
Good idea, hope you can push forward with it.
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More exchanges the better. Hopefully this recent Mt. Gox - Coinlab dispute may result in a separate U.S. Exchange.
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Gox was supposed to provide services exclusively to Coinlab, and Coinlab was prohibited from becoming or opening a competing exchange.
Details on the liquidated damages clause (K) are discussed in the thread in the Legal sub forum, but the liquidated damages clause appears to apply only to section (F.1) and thus Mt. Gox licensing materials, not simply servicing customers. I don't see part of that clause saying Mt. Gox would provide services exclusively to Coinlab. In any case, I look forward to the report in Let's Talk Bitcoin and hope it will ask Coinlab some of the hard questions that have been raised in the legal thread. |
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Thanks darkmule for that clear look at the stipulated damages provision and how it may be a penalty clause. I was just starting to dig into that last night.
The other issue here is that it appears that Mt. Gox providing services to U.S. users doesn't quality as an activity that is excluded. Only licensing materials seems to qualify. The last sentence of the Mt. Gox side of the exclusion even states that providing services isn't covered.
So simply continuing to service U.S. customers doesn't seem to violate the exclusivity terms. As noted, perhaps the facts will indicate otherwise, perhaps Mt. Gox has licensed materials to another company, but we will need to see.
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Yes, there is clearly a huge upside in the long run, which is probably why I continue to hold mine.
The risk is clearly that something will kill Bitcoin in the meantime, such as the over-dependence on one exchange, hacking, etc.
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I moved the discussion of legal issues to a separate thread under legal [topic=194377].
And what would you suggest Coinlab do? They've been marketing themselves on the expectation of being able to serve customers via the agreement with Gox, and Gox has failed to perform - Should they just say "Well, too bad everybody! You came here but we're having a problem getting our contract terms fulfilled so just hang out a few months while this sorts itself out in the legal system"
Of course not, they act like professionals and point their customers to someone who *can* service their needs. They didn't partner with Mt.Gox because of their personalities, it's because Gox is the biggest player and they want to supplement and expand that, not reinvent the wheel.
Meanwhile, Mt. Gox has $5M of volume today. The best thing for everyone involved would be for Coinlab to start running a U.S. Exchange and competing with them. They could make money and help the Bitcoin ecosystem. Competition is always best for the consumer. It is hard to escape the impression that Coinlab may be trying to flip a $500k VC investment into a $50M claim. |
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