Flying to China to Arbitrage 100-500k

[sethsethseth]

So to arbitrage, I need to first sell my coins in China, then buy them back outside China.  If you know anything about any part of this plan that might help, please contribute.

To sell in China, I can either use an exchange like BTCChina, or sell for cash locally (localbitcoins?)

Once I have the CNY, I will either wire it to Hong Kong through a friend, or fly the cash to Hong Kong.  I'm not sure what the rules are in order to be able to just wire straight from a Chinese bank account to my US/UK bank account or bitstamp.  I'm a US citizen.

Once I have cash in Hong Kong, I will either wire it to Bitstamp, fly to someone anywhere in the world who will sell me a large volume of bitcoins at the Bitstamp rate, or convert the cash to gold 1oz pandas and hoard them because they are pretty and shiny.

Thanks for any advice.

[mogs]

PM sent, I can help you easily accomplish your goals here.

[AndrewWilliams]

So to arbitrage, I need to first sell my coins in China, then buy them back outside China.  If you know anything about any part of this plan that might help, please contribute.

To sell in China, I can either use an exchange like BTCChina, or sell for cash locally (localbitcoins?)

Once I have the CNY, I will either wire it to Hong Kong through a friend, or fly the cash to Hong Kong.  I'm not sure what the rules are in order to be able to just wire straight from a Chinese bank account to my US/UK bank account or bitstamp.  I'm a US citizen.

Once I have cash in Hong Kong, I will either wire it to Bitstamp, fly to someone anywhere in the world who will sell me a large volume of bitcoins at the Bitstamp rate, or convert the cash to gold 1oz pandas and hoard them because they are pretty and shiny.

Thanks for any advice.

Don't fly cash to Hong Kong, it's stupid. They have dogs that are trained to smell money at the airports.

Last thing you want is to be stopped when a dog picks it up and you are ushered to customs where they would detain you and take your money.

[PRJGen_bit]

So to arbitrage, I need to first sell my coins in China, then buy them back outside China.  If you know anything about any part of this plan that might help, please contribute.

To sell in China, I can either use an exchange like BTCChina, or sell for cash locally (localbitcoins?)

Once I have the CNY, I will either wire it to Hong Kong through a friend, or fly the cash to Hong Kong.  I'm not sure what the rules are in order to be able to just wire straight from a Chinese bank account to my US/UK bank account or bitstamp.  I'm a US citizen.

Once I have cash in Hong Kong, I will either wire it to Bitstamp, fly to someone anywhere in the world who will sell me a large volume of bitcoins at the Bitstamp rate, or convert the cash to gold 1oz pandas and hoard them because they are pretty and shiny.

Thanks for any advice.

Don't fly cash to Hong Kong, it's stupid. They have dogs that are trained to smell money at the airports.

Last thing you want is to be stopped when a dog picks it up and you are ushered to customs where they would detain you and take your money.

+1

don''t ever fly cash above a few thousand in tourist money.  besides taking your money, they may (will) even xray you or worse looking for more of it.

[B!tC0in]

Buy BTC > Fly to china > Sell BTC for cash > Buy diamonds > Leave China > Sell Diamonds > > Profits

[mrhelpful]

Go find a Rich Kid, in China / Taiwan. Give him a % for helping you out.

Or network to find one. If your in California 626 area has a bunch of them.

[aspiring]

Hey Guys,

I can confirm Mogs has got the necessary networks to help you conduct arbitrage. I've got BTC China side covered as well and have also made a killing during the price fluctuations a few days ago.

Anyone else looking for a partner to conduct arbitrage, feel free to PM myself or Mogs.

Cheers,
Sam

[BitPirate]

Hi,

Some people have been finding ways to arbitrage successfully on rmbtb.com.

As a foreigner, you can get an Alipay account, but you can't withdraw more than CNY 2k without being verified (which requires a Chinese ID).

However, some people have been able to buy products/services on Taobao using their Alipay account but indicating us as the payee. This is fine for us; we charge a 0.5% fee. On Taobao you should be able to find money transfer services (e.g. PerfectMoney). We are not affiliated with these in any way, and don't offer any recommendations.

[Indamuck]

I'm an American in China. If you can source cheap bitcoins and send them, I can sell them here and credit your accounts overseas in USD ideally ACH in the US. PM me for more. I have insatiable use for RMB here, and access to USD overseas. Need a flow of cheap BTC.

[Lewis2]

How big is this arbitrage possibility that it will be worth flying there?

[sethsethseth]

The arb is very small compared to what it was in the two days after I posted this, so I am not considering it anymore.

[cxboyminer]

I live in Hong Kong... Going back to HK from UK in 11 days time

So to arbitrage, I need to first sell my coins in China, then buy them back outside China.  If you know anything about any part of this plan that might help, please contribute.

To sell in China, I can either use an exchange like BTCChina, or sell for cash locally (localbitcoins?)

Once I have the CNY, I will either wire it to Hong Kong through a friend, or fly the cash to Hong Kong.  I'm not sure what the rules are in order to be able to just wire straight from a Chinese bank account to my US/UK bank account or bitstamp.  I'm a US citizen.

Once I have cash in Hong Kong, I will either wire it to Bitstamp, fly to someone anywhere in the world who will sell me a large volume of bitcoins at the Bitstamp rate, or convert the cash to gold 1oz pandas and hoard them because they are pretty and shiny.

Thanks for any advice.

Don't fly cash to Hong Kong, it's stupid. They have dogs that are trained to smell money at the airports.

Last thing you want is to be stopped when a dog picks it up and you are ushered to customs where they would detain you and take your money.

Agree. Even though Hong Kong is the safest place on earth (I LOVE HK), don't send money to HK via mail. It's dumb. It's not a smart idea to send money via mail to anywhere to be honest...

[moneygames]

So to arbitrage, I need to first sell my coins in China, then buy them back outside China.  If you know anything about any part of this plan that might help, please contribute.

To sell in China, I can either use an exchange like BTCChina, or sell for cash locally (localbitcoins?)

Once I have the CNY, I will either wire it to Hong Kong through a friend, or fly the cash to Hong Kong.  I'm not sure what the rules are in order to be able to just wire straight from a Chinese bank account to my US/UK bank account or bitstamp.  I'm a US citizen.

Once I have cash in Hong Kong, I will either wire it to Bitstamp, fly to someone anywhere in the world who will sell me a large volume of Bitcoins at the Bitstamp rate, or convert the cash to gold 1oz pandas and hoard them because they are pretty and shiny.

Thanks for any advice.

If you are planning to maintain a position in Bitcoin throughout the arbitrage, the method you are describing involves a risk that during the time required to wire the cash out of china, the price of Bitcoin on the exchange where you plan to make your final purchase may have increased past the price you bought at in china. Arbitrage by definition should involve a risk-free profit, rather than merely a decent chance of profit if the exchange rates don't change too much in the time required to complete the process. Your method allows you to gain USD essentially risk-free because the time required to buy Bitcoins on Bitstamp, send them to BTC china and sell them for CNY is pretty fast compared to the timescale of price changes. However when you wire out CNY, convert to USD and buy back Bitcoins, this could take a few days, Bitcoin price could change a lot, and it is conceivable that you end up with fewer Bitcoins than you started with.  

The best way to arbitrage without risking your Bitcoin or USD holdings would be to have a reserve of cash waiting on Bitstamp to purchase back the coins you sold at essentially the same time as you are selling the coins on BTCchina. So if coins on BTCchina are $1200 and coins on Bitstamp are $1000, you can have $120k and 100 coins on Bitstamp, send the 100 coins to BTCchina, then sell the coins on BTCchina for around $120k and at the same time buy $120k of bitcoins on Bitstamp. This leaves you with 20 more Bitcoins than you started with without any risk to USD or bitcoin holdings.(You could also have gained $20k without risking your original 100BTC, depending on whether your goal is a risk-free increase of USD or BTC) If you send everything to BTCchina you could make twice as much money if all you want to do is gain USD short-term without maintaining a BTC position, but if you want to keep your BTC position, you will have to wait days to get the cash moved back to Bitstamp and the risk efficiency is much lower with respect to your Bitcoin holdings because there is a possibility that your Bitcoin holdings will ultimately be reduced if the Bitstamp price increases substantially while you are waiting for your cash to transfer.

[jixin55]

im a us citizen. ive been in china a while. ive purchased on okcoin before.

u are not allowed to bring more than someting like 20k rmb out of the country.  however bank of china can do international wire transfers. u can make a bank of china account with a us passport.  the cost is about 0.1%+30 dollars or so.

pm me if you need more advice.  i could use a trading partner too. let me know maybe we could work something out

[jonanon]

So to arbitrage, I need to first sell my coins in China, then buy them back outside China.  If you know anything about any part of this plan that might help, please contribute.

To sell in China, I can either use an exchange like BTCChina, or sell for cash locally (localbitcoins?)

Once I have the CNY, I will either wire it to Hong Kong through a friend, or fly the cash to Hong Kong.  I'm not sure what the rules are in order to be able to just wire straight from a Chinese bank account to my US/UK bank account or bitstamp.  I'm a US citizen.

Once I have cash in Hong Kong, I will either wire it to Bitstamp, fly to someone anywhere in the world who will sell me a large volume of bitcoins at the Bitstamp rate, or convert the cash to gold 1oz pandas and hoard them because they are pretty and shiny.

Thanks for any advice.

Don't fly cash to Hong Kong, it's stupid. They have dogs that are trained to smell money at the airports.

Last thing you want is to be stopped when a dog picks it up and you are ushered to customs where they would detain you and take your money.

Sorry had to bring up this point even though it is quite old. Are you aware that there is no limit to the amount of cash you can take in to Hong Kong? One of the only places that offers this.

[joesmoe2012]

im a us citizen. ive been in china a while. ive purchased on okcoin before.

u are not allowed to bring more than someting like 20k rmb out of the country.  however bank of china can do international wire transfers. u can make a bank of china account with a us passport.  the cost is about 0.1%+30 dollars or so.

pm me if you need more advice.  i could use a trading partner too. let me know maybe we could work something out

There are limitations on what a person can send out of china though. you can just walk into a bank with 500K RMB and send it to the US.

[BitCoinPokerBro]

Agree. Even though Hong Kong is the safest place on earth (I LOVE HK), don't send money to HK via mail. It's dumb. It's not a smart idea to send money via mail to anywhere to be honest...
[/quote]

I've sent money (cash) via USPS priority mail internationally (Canada, Europe, Australia, etc) hundreds of times. Never had any issue whatsoever. Although this was not 100's of thousands of dollars. So that probably makes a difference.

[acegilz]

i was also exploring this business beut the arbitrage thing on bitcoin was killed on beggining of month with the first crash

[philip2000uk]

I live in Hong Kong... Going back to HK from UK in 11 days time

So to arbitrage, I need to first sell my coins in China, then buy them back outside China.  If you know anything about any part of this plan that might help, please contribute.

To sell in China, I can either use an exchange like BTCChina, or sell for cash locally (localbitcoins?)

Once I have the CNY, I will either wire it to Hong Kong through a friend, or fly the cash to Hong Kong.  I'm not sure what the rules are in order to be able to just wire straight from a Chinese bank account to my US/UK bank account or bitstamp.  I'm a US citizen.

Once I have cash in Hong Kong, I will either wire it to Bitstamp, fly to someone anywhere in the world who will sell me a large volume of bitcoins at the Bitstamp rate, or convert the cash to gold 1oz pandas and hoard them because they are pretty and shiny.

Thanks for any advice.

Don't fly cash to Hong Kong, it's stupid. They have dogs that are trained to smell money at the airports.

Last thing you want is to be stopped when a dog picks it up and you are ushered to customs where they would detain you and take your money.

Agree. Even though Hong Kong is the safest place on earth (I LOVE HK), don't send money to HK via mail. It's dumb. It's not a smart idea to send money via mail to anywhere to be honest...

I love hong kong too, i went there all of Jan and a bit of Feb hopping around countries.  It's the one place that I can truely wear a tshirt saying I love hong kong.

Have you been to marketplace and tried their sandwiches OMG! that sandwich is 2 meals and so nice, especially the thai chicken

[BenAnh]

I know you're from the US and me too but right now I'm looking for form a small group in the US and Euro to do arbitrage between BTC-e and the US or China depending on the market. You can PM me to discuss the details as 3 to 5% profit daily is very attractive between exchanges.