Mt. Gox - Dwolla and the DHS?

[calaber24p]

mtgox has its place I personally like BTC-e but I think it wouldnt be able to handle the influx of new users if Mt.gox was shutdown. However that being said Mt.Gox will be fine for a couple of reasons. 1 the owner co founded okcupid and has connections and money within the tech industry 2.The government has no protocol to actually take or consider bitcoins as currency or worth anything.

[I__Know__Things]

mtgox has its place I personally like BTC-e but I think it wouldnt be able to handle the influx of new users if Mt.gox was shutdown. However that being said Mt.Gox will be fine for a couple of reasons. 1 the owner co founded okcupid and has connections and money within the tech industry 2.The government has no protocol to actually take or consider bitcoins as currency or worth anything.

i think those are really good points.  I would be more worried about btc-e disappearing overnight than mt gox.  he is well connected and has plenty of experience.  In all honest the dwolla/mtgox/dhs issues is probably very benign, I expect to see something about a low level prosecutor casting a wider net then he was supposed to during a drug investigation.

[scab]

I hope they are going after an actual crime or criminal. Not just using the faulty logic of "bitcoins are known to be used to purchase illegal items and for money laundering, and dwolla, a US company, enables this by allowing the purchase of bitcoins by US citizens." I hope there are some trade agreements in place between the US and Japan to stop this kind of strong arm tactic.

I agree.

[bitdominion]

Ok so lets get speculative then:

A piece of the IRS/DHS collecting process:

5.1.18.14  (03-27-2012)
Treasury Enforcement Communications System

The Treasury Enforcement Communications System (TECS) is a database maintained by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and it is used extensively by the law enforcement community. It contains information about individuals and businesses suspected of, or involved in, violations of federal law.

For IRS field Collection, TECS provides two sources to help make contact with taxpayers or locate assets :

Revenue officers can request that delinquent balance due taxpayers be entered into TECS, and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) will then advise IRS when those taxpayers travel into the United States for business, employment, or personal reasons. The taxpayers entered into TECS for this purpose are on a DHS lookout indicators list. IRS employees must help maintain the TECS database by requesting that appropriate taxpayers be entered into TECS or be deleted from TECS.

Revenue officers can also request information housed in TECS on past travel that a taxpayer has made to and from the United States.

&

5.1.18.15  (09-17-2010)
Foreign Bank and Financial Account Report

A taxpayer is required to file a Foreign Bank and Financial Account Report (FBAR), Form TD F 90-22.1, if he/she has financial interest in, or signature authority over, one or more foreign financial accounts that have an aggregate value greater than $10,000 at any time during a calendar year.

When a taxpayer files an FBAR form, IDRS command code IRPTR will reflect that Form TD F 90-22.1 was filed by or for the taxpayer. However, command code IRPTR does not provide any of the specific information entered on the form such as the name of the bank, account number, account balance, etc.

See IRM 5.9.4.19, Foreign Bank and Financial Account Reports (FBAR).

FBAR forms are loaded onto the Currency Banking Retrieval System (CBRS) so all the information on the FBAR form will be available from CBRS. IRPTR includes the filing of an FBAR (Foreign Bank and Financial Account Report) form by a taxpayer. Although IRPTR will not reflect all information present on the FBAR form, additional information may be obtained by researching the CBRS which lists all FBAR filings. CBRS will reflect any foreign bank account or other information that was listed on the FBAR form.

Conduct CBRS research when IRPTR reflects that a taxpayer has filed an FBAR form to obtain the name of the bank where the account is located, the amount in the account, co-owners, and other useful information. Complete an OL5081 to become a system user and obtain a User ID and password.

Reminder:

The information is not always complete as it will only reflect the information the taxpayer entered on the form.

IRM 5.1.18.2.2.2



So the reasoning for utilizing this process begs the question... is it:
The result of a stalling tactic within the chain of tax submission... deliberate on the governments behalf to achieve some objective?
If not.... is it a result of poor tax reporting on Dwollas behalf?
Or is Dwolla really a large money laundering system bent on world financial domination and DHS has come to the rescue?

My guess is it is temporary, to the tune of 6wks to 6 months until Dwolla gets their crap together


In the meantime try to catch a couple good waves of buying and selling.

[YaCoinYeah]

MtGox is the vortex of bitcoin's legal issues. BTC-e is destined to be quite the competitor.

[sprout]

Updates from Betabeat:

Department of Homeland Security Shuts Down Dwolla Payments to and From Mt. Gox

[JimCGSavings]

Da feds: "Hey, you guys know anything about this bitcoin thingy? I dunno, but people are getting away with not giving us our cut! It's on the internets? Didn't we just decide to tax those? Ah screw it. Just go take somebody's money. That'll teach em. And if it doesn't, well money, so we win!"

[bitturbo]

Was definitely sweating a btc withdraw from gox today but i Just received it whew.

[Kennji]

MTGOX Sucks Dont Use IT!, Mtgox almost killed BTC completly.

That is why I have never used Gox!!!

I use CBX.

[InSpades]

From everything I have read so far, Mt.Gox ran afoul of US law regarding MTAs.  BitCoin is bigger than one exchange, person, or company.  Bitcoin dipped a little, but has recovered just fine.

[tillyoufind]

Always gotta ruin a good thing. You know how it goes

[Yago]

The DHS is just one of many regulatory bodies that are likely to begin to take an interest in cryptocoins. It is probably not even the worst of them. Nothing is more highly regulated and nowhere is control more coveted than finance and money. We need to galvanize as a community to deal with this threat - because the threat is not to the technology but to the growth and the continuation of the community.

[sagamore9]

They are doing it to see how to tax it, my last best info is that they view bitcoins as a stock.

[sagamore9]

Just figure out how to convert your bitcoins into a different currency, then into dollars if you so choose, water it down some kinda way, there are ways be inventive, that's what this is all about.  This is why we do this in my opinion, to take out the central banks from the equation.

[jamesgarfield]

Mtgox and Dwolla SUCK!!!!