Trying to pigeonhole Bitcoin into defined parameters in a financial world of cronyism for Wall Street and junk bonds for Main Street profferred by financial thaumaturgists is nothing short of ridiculous. Most of what is done is done behind closed doors, buried within arcane terminology, and obfuscated by contractual encryption.
Bitcoin is not a currency, it is a published token of a private intellectual property. Offering a Bitcoin product for bitcoin that has no currency attached to it is simply barter. I suspect that trustless contracts will be designed without ever needing any arbitration. Anonymity will remain secure, and profits will be made with none-the-wiser. Opportunities to invest in enterprises can open up based on social networking and rating systems. P2P transactions, decentralized exchanges, and a transparent but pseudonymous (plausibly anonymous) ledger should even make inside traders weep with joy. It may seem risky to many of us to defy financial laws, but
those outmoded laws serve no purpose for transactions that could not benefit from them anyway. Even barter is still subject to taxation, so that should be the only legal obligation.
BTW if you haven't seen this, it's probably one of the best takes on the future of bitcoin
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2GiQEECNcZMJon Matonis on Max Keiser May 31, 2011.
