What is the best country to start an exchange in?

[blurden]

Give all the FINCEN Regulation and lack of clarity - where can a US entrepreneur go to start an exchange?

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[Driice]

The U.S.

ie: Make an exchange that accepts U.S. domestic wires and bank deposits

[superduh]

switzerland?

[Serge]

there is no lack of clarity, as a matter of fact it is precisely clear, although sets high bar to enter:

"The guidance requires certain intermediaries that handle virtual currency to register with Fincen as money services businesses, which entails recordkeeping and reporting responsibilities. And it says some of those businesses may additionally be money transmitters, which would mean fingerprinting of directors and officers and compliance with a patchwork of state licensing requirements. "

basically to run a legit US bitcoin exchange one would need to be setup similarly to Paypal

[pera]

Panama? Uruguay?

[Kazimir]

The U.S.

Yeah right. Where the big banker's puppets government can seize your bank account and close down your business at whim.

No, the U.S. sounds like a very bad option. You'd need a country where the government lets you alone doing your business as long as you don't mess with them. The Seychelles perhaps?

[tclo]

The U.S.

ie: Make an exchange that accepts U.S. domestic wires and bank deposits

Yes it seems that CampBx is the only US exchange although I suppose Coinbase is sort of one.  But being able to get your money in and out easily is great.  CampBix makes it very easy with Dwolla which is why I like them, even with low trading volume.

[Walter Rothbard]

Tor.

[CasinoBit]

The U.S.

Yeah right. Where the big banker's puppets government can seize your bank account and close down your business at whim.

No, the U.S. sounds like a very bad option. You'd need a country where the government lets you alone doing your business as long as you don't mess with them. The Seychelles perhaps?

+1

Basing yourself in the U.S. and registering with Fincen just renders you as less stable in our eyes, somewhere in south america would be my choice, I wouldn't however purchase coins from a south american based company unless they had already established a reputation.

[marcus_of_augustus]

Any US based bitcoin business should be viewed with the utmost skepticism. The regulatory environment there is very aggressive and anti-thetical to free enterprise in the financial space.

I wouldn't put any bitcoins into a US-based exchange, not because I do not trust the operators (most who are stand-up guys) but because the govt. there is very unpredictable and capricious. The rules are left purposely vague with all the power resting with the regulators and little to no chance for businesses to recompense for losses in the event of an illegal move by the authorities. Basically, there is no rule of law, just the appearance of one that leaves all the power with the govt. and the encumbent big players (most of whom are technically insolvent and harbouring known criminals). Your bitcoins will more than likely get tied up in endless legal battles with govt attornies who just escalate the legal action using the tax-payer funds after every case they lose until the opposition is financially exhausted.

Singapore? Iceland?

[BitcoinUK]

if you want to set up an exchange have these three things

1. get the licences / regulation requirements fr dealing with large amounts of fiat
2 have alot of your own investment in the project EG paying for licences yourself
3. set up the code to be secure and reliable to do many many trades per millisecond.

WHY you may ask?
1. it shows your within the law so fincen cant shut you down for breaking the law
EG don't be dumb working from china accepting dollar for instance, thinking they are immune due to foreign location
EG don't avoid regulation thinking that its regulation that gets your bank closed (actual fact its lack of meeting regulation that gets bank accounts closed)

2. having a lot of money shows that (A)you are good at money management. (B) more positive signs that you probably have experience in Forex markets to know what your doing professionally

3. nice code that works well will get you great reputation as a stable service and many people will trade with you.

for all those guys with just 4BTC to their name thinking that they can be the next billionaires by starting up an exchange. forget about it, do something small scale like trading locally, using OTC.

we don't need run of the mill script kiddies opening 300 clones of MTGOX for just 1BTC worth of labour and domain registration, We need proper forex experienced coders with large investments to do the job right, and then set up multiple branches where each bitcoin/FIAT is based on average incomes of the locations not based purely off of a central exchange price.

[dmartig]

india

[Inedible]

Anywhere you can set up an exchange that can freely accept cash from other countries without difficulty and won't have your bank account suspended.

[BitcoinUK]

anywhere that has cheap international FIAT accepting licences. as it seems the only reason peoples accounts get suspended is that they try to be money transmitters but don't bother buying the licences.

[BlackLilac Grant]

The U.S.

ie: Make an exchange that accepts U.S. domestic wires and bank deposits

Yes it seems that CampBx is the only US exchange although I suppose Coinbase is sort of one.  But being able to get your money in and out easily is great.  CampBix makes it very easy with Dwolla which is why I like them, even with low trading volume.

What about Tradehill?

[andrewsg]

Singapore or HK

[oakpacific]

What about Japan? Fast network+lenient government regulation. HK also sounds good but shouldn't say it as if it's a country.

[lixiaolai]

Japan.

[Elokane]

Are there any countries besides the US, Canada and the UK that have attempted to regulate, or have mentioned, Bitcoin at all?

Anything in Europe? China? Japan?

[the founder]

Your best bet would be to convince these guys:

http://www.nasdaq.com/symbol/slv

to create a bitcoin ETF

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exchange-traded_fund

They are required to purchase the same number of ounces of silver for each share

So if that SLV is trading at 25 dollars,  Silver is roughly worth 25 dollars.

Now if that happened for Bitcoin,  everyone's 401k plan could buy into that,  and force that ETF to buy massive amounts of bitcoins to keep it funded.

That's how you go from $130 to $130,000

Starting an exchange now is like putting a gun to your head.   There are so many regulations designed to keep you out of that type of business.