Bitstamp BLOCKs withdrawals to verified users

[frito]

Cant withdraw bitcoins and I dont know why and they are not responding to tickets? What to do?

 

I got my withdrawal activated(see the edit note of the first post in the thread).

[Saicere]

I'm a verified BitStamp user since June 2013.  USD wire withdrawals in the past without issue.  I tried to do a USD withdrawal this month, and received the KYC questionnaire.  I answered all the questions and provided high-res scans of the documents they requested.  It's been about 2 days so far, no response to the support ticket.

It was about five hours for me back in January. The withdrawal was processed the next day.

[btcxyzzz]

I'm a verified BitStamp user since June 2013.  USD wire withdrawals in the past without issue.  I tried to do a USD withdrawal this month, and received the KYC questionnaire.  I answered all the questions and provided high-res scans of the documents they requested.  It's been about 2 days so far, no response to the support ticket.

took 5 days in my case, few days ago.

for all i know, i withrawed everything from bitstamp and i'm waiting for the developments...

[stefffe]

Cant withdraw bitcoins and I dont know why and they are not responding to tickets? What to do?

 

I got my withdrawal activated(see the edit note of the first post in the thread).

Yes I Saw, but they havent responded to tickets... 4 days passed

[MrPiggles]

i'm going on weeks with no response lol

[bananas]

Don't believe you cannot withdraw BTC due to KYC/AML.

I've been saying here in this thread and around backed by the exchange manager of my bank, that BTC is not money and so it is out of the scope of any financial institutions / kyc / aml. It is free of any financial regulation.

Today even the Federal Bank of the United States said that:

"I think it's important to understand that this is a payment innovation that's taking place entirely outside the banking industry," Yellen told Sen. Joe Manchin, D-WV. "The Federal Reserve simply does not have the authority to supervise or regulate Bitcoin in any way."
http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2014/02/27/yellen-bitcoin-senate-testimony/5872039/


Whoever can't withdraw BTC from Bitstamp or any other exchange is being scammed. And is a red flag for the same situation of Gox.

[orlinm]

Bitstamp = Mtgox 2.0 . I think they have financial problems which they don't share with their users. Now they come with excuses to delay withdrawals. Do you really think they didn't lose any money during the 'transaction malleability'. Their platform was vulnerable and every other vulnerable service lost some amount. I think they lost a lot but like gox they are trying to hide it.

[MrPiggles]

They denied my verification request with all real details 

lol no reason given

[bananas]

Dear #######,

we sincerely apologize for the late reply.

The thresholds are set internally for easier monitoring and anti-fraud and anti-money laundering purposes. After you complete your KYC check, your future withdrawal requests should be processed without any additional delays.

Would it be possible to provide any documents (bank transfer confirmation) which would confirm your deposit to Mt. Gox and the purchase of your Bitcoins?

If you have any additional questions, please feel free to contact us again.

Looks like they are going full gox...

totally

[smoothie]

I moved all my funds off of bitstamp. Can anyone confirm BTC withdrawals are happening with reasonable amount of delay?

[tvbcof]

Guys if no one understood this - this is how COIN VALIDATION happens.
So now they are verifying coins to make them marked. Unfortunately I did not tumble my coins, I suggest everyone to tumble coins before and after sending them to BitStamp.
...

Peter Vessenes warned against using tumblers at the San Jose conference a year ago due to the possibility that one might end up with coins which could be tainted.  (He was then and is now the top dog in the Bitcoin Foundation.)

Parenthetically, that was at a time when the Mt. Gox/Coinlab deal was falling apart.  (Vessenes was, and afaik still is also the CEO of Coinlab in addition to heading up the Bitcoin Foundation.)  He'd already gotten $5M from Mark but had not bothered to get MSB licences which, accd to Karpeles, was part of the deal.  The interesting thing was that Vessenes made specific mention of the historical customer data that he presumed Mt. Gox to be holding and how useful it could be.

[tvbcof]

It's pathetic that BitStamp became new Gox... and even worse
They do what they couldn't have been EVER asked in any country of the world (because bitcoin falls out of any control in any country), and yet they do it for 'free'.

Gentlemen, we need to boycott Bitstamp as they are playing dirty 'coin validation' games, which not only will devalue Bitcoin, but devalue any other 'blockchained' system.
We need to tumble our coins all and everyone.
If every coin is tainted then NO COIN IS TAINTED.

Go ahead and tumble your BTC, but you better hope like hell that when coin validation comes there will be a grandfathering for it.  Of course if you DO have stolen BTC the calculus is inverted.

I've got documentation that all my BTC came through an exchange.  I wired in fiat and bought at market price and can document both.  I anticipate that this, at least, will be sufficient to obtain grandfathering.  Relatively fewer people are going to have sympathy for those who actively attempted to mix BTC so I'm less confident that this will be grandfathered in.

While I am rabidly against coin validation, {color}-listing, taint, etc, I'm not about to take a bullet for others.  Bitcoin as a system is simply not worth it at this point.  You won't get anywhere near 'every coin is tainted', and it's meaningless anyway for anyone who understands how tainting would likely work.

Coin validation (and general loss of fungibility) will almost certainly kill Bitcoin eventually, but it could take a while.  Those fortunate enough to be sitting on clean coins might have a sharp boost in their net worth as the 'dirty' coins are exposed and devalued.  If just touching a tumbler itself turns out to be sufficient to taint coins to 100%, and it might be since it would simplify the math, that would increase the value of 'clean' coins in circulation even more.

[tvbcof]

Then if there are people like this - bitcoin is dead, because whenever you sell privacy for security you get neither. With coin validation it will be like blockchain split, not what you imagine. The tainted coins will be traded and used in the criminal ways. But the Bitcoin market cap will split, probably in the middle. The price will tumble twice at least and then more and more, as more people will leave both sides (because the difference of using the bitcoin will be corrupted)

I'm projecting that you are more right than you are wrong, and it is why I say that loss of fungibility will 'almost certainly' kill Bitcoin.

I doubt that there will be a blockchain split, but there will certainly be a big market opened up for playing the spread(s) between coins with (potentially various kinds of) taint.

The tainting authorities with real teeth will be the ones which can obtain a government charter since it is they who Overstock, TigerDirect, etc, will be forced to honor.  If these authorities get into gaming the spread markets there could be some real fireworks.

One way or another, a solution which correctly implements anonymity (among other improvements) will prove much more reliable and useful in the end and Bitcoin probably will ultimately wither on the vine.  But it could take years and there could be a lot of money to be made in the interim.  Especially if the VC's keep plowing funds in.

[QueenElizabeth]

I've done some research into the matter and here's what I found:

1. Bitstamp is incorporated in the UK and, based on FCA/HMRC statements made in 2013, Bitcoin businesses in the UK do not require any specific license. They have no legal obligation to request KYC/AML information to their clients, as far as British law goes. They are requesting it because they want to, as confirmed on the Bitstamp site: "Whilst Bitstamp are currently unregulated and do not fall with the scope of the AML/CTF obligations in the UK the senior management have implemented systems and procedures that meet the UK AML legislation."

2. Bitstamp - much like every other exchange - uses a traditional bank, Unicredit in Slovenia, to conduct their operations. Unicredit has a legal obligation to subject Bitstamp to KYC/AML, and they're going to be fined in case Bitstamp does something dodgy (see the 1.9bn fine paid by HSBC for not monitoring their clients as they should have done).

3. This has nothing, repeat nothing, to do with the fact that Bitstamp is a Bitcoin-related company. There's no EU, euro area or Slovenian law governing Bitcoin businesses. The ECB and the EBA issued warnings about Bitcoin, but a warning is not regulation. Probably there will be regulation in the future, but right now there is not. Any requests made by Unicredit to Bitstamp are simply in compliance to obligations a bank has with respect to any customer, Bitcoin or not.

4. Bitstamp - much like every other company - would incur sanctions if they were discovered to be involved in money laundering (duh). Again, that's not because they're a Bitcoin business. If the authorities discover someone is laundering money through a real estate business, they'll go after them (duh #2).

So where does this leave Bitstamp users? Here's some options:

a) Bitstamp's bank is subjecting the company to extended KYC and Bitstamp is in turn asking customers for the necessary data.

b) Bitstamp is anticipating new regulation (e.g. they believe they will be required to apply for a money transmitter license in the UK or similar) and they're trying to gather what they believe to be necessary documentation to be fully compliant with UK law as it applies to money transmitters.

c) Bitstamp suspects some customers are laundering money through their services and they want to kick these people out before the subpoenas start coming, leading to account freezes, and hence damaging image and revenue. They have a right to do so; they're not obliged to provide their service to anyone.

These are the good options which should leave all users pretty much relaxed, provided they're not doing anything awful. Of course the questionnaire is pretty invasive and some Bitcoiners might conclude it's at odds with crypto ethics; in that case they should just move their business elsewhere, much like a vegan would not finance a meat-producing company.

However, there are not-so-good options too.

d) Someone at Bitstamp is building a new service / product based on the wealth of data they have, e.g. anything along the lines of data mining for marketing purposes, and they're gathering as much information as they can so that they can improve the service / product and sell it for a higher price. Not particularly scary, although this would violate the privacy policy in case a third party is involved in the handling of personal information ("Your information, whether public or private, will not be sold, exchanged, or given to any other company for any reason whatsoever, without your consent, other than for the express purpose of delivering the purchased product or service requested by the customer"). It would be borderline legitimate if they're using the service / product internally, as per "We may use your Personal Information for the following purposes:

    To personalize your experience (your information helps us to better respond to your individual needs);
    To improve our website (we continually strive to improve our website offerings based on the information and feedback we receive from you);"

e) Bitstamp is undergoing financial difficulties, maybe connected with the recent downward swing in prices (they overextended themselves? They fractional-reserve'd customer money without telling anyone and now they can't make ends meet anymore?), and they're hiding between KYC/AML to buy time.

Also, I wouldn't underestimate the abilities of British law enforcement. This is neither here nor there - personally, if I were a Bitstamp user I wouldn't be bothered by the police reviewing my data/transactions to see whether I have been giving money to terrorists or mobsters, but I understand that many members of this community would object to this as a matter of principle even if they don't have and never will have anything to do with criminal activity.

[MrPiggles]

Also, I wouldn't underestimate the abilities of British law enforcement.

Are these the same British law enforcement who send out letters to burglary victims without ever visiting the scene of the crime? Who claim there's no CCTV in central London when someone is mugged? Who don't even bother showing up when cars are stolen and just post out a crime number?

Which British law enforcement is there that you're familiar with?

[thecapitalr]

for what its worth i withdrew BTC from stamp 3 days ago or so with no issues

[tvbcof]

When I took a cursory look at Bitstamp, there was no indication of any actual people on the 'about us' page, and they seemed to operate in several jurisdictions and had a cloaked domain.

They also changed their methods to allow unverified user to send in BTC but not to retrieve BTC back out.  They didn't even send an e-mail warning but rather communicated this by a little fine print on their facebook account or some such.

As far as I am concerned KYC is much more critical when it comes to the parties who are holding value for others.  Namely the principles of a financial services business.  I only rarely, and under duress, take on risk of doing business with those who don't comply with this theme.  Whether Bitstamp has mended their ways by now I don't know.  I've no need to do business with them at this point so I've not looked in a while.

And I would be very reluctant to do business with anyone who changed had a history of holding a user's BTC hostage in exchange for high quality identity documents.  If anything smells like a rat it's a this aspect of their operations.

[bananas]

I've done some research into the matter and here's what I found:



a) Bitstamp's bank is subjecting the company to extended KYC and Bitstamp is in turn asking customers for the necessary data.


e) Bitstamp is undergoing financial difficulties, maybe connected with the recent downward swing in prices (they overextended themselves? They fractional-reserve'd customer money without telling anyone and now they can't make ends meet anymore?), and they're hiding between KYC/AML to buy time.

"a" cannot be true when we are talking about BTC, only possibly true when it is fiat.

"e" is completely true.

[bananas]

Also, I wouldn't underestimate the abilities of British law enforcement.

Are these the same British law enforcement who send out letters to burglary victims without ever visiting the scene of the crime? Who claim there's no CCTV in central London when someone is mugged? Who don't even bother showing up when cars are stolen and just post out a crime number?

Which British law enforcement is there that you're familiar with?

It is very rare to see any police officer in London, i thought they had CCTV everywhere?

[MrPiggles]

It is very rare to see any police officer in London, i thought they had CCTV everywhere?

Yeah but when I was mugged on a busy street next to an ATM (with a camera) I was told by the plod that no CCTV was in the area....lol

They don't want to solve crimes that land on their front doorstep let alone go on fishing expeditions through a slovenian exchange!