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In Fifty Days, Payments Innovation Will Stop In Silicon Valley

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Re: In Fifty Days, Payments Innovation Will Stop In Silicon Valley

#31

Post by rrc »

foobarbazetc wrote: post #10

Boohoo, cry PayPal a river. In most countries outside the US, PayPal is regulated like a bank. This means PayPal can't just lay claim to your money and never give it back to you.

Actually, I wouldn't be surprised if PayPal supported the law. Many regulations protect large, established players by raising the cost of entry for new market participants. PayPal can afford to post this bond, but many bootstrapped start-ups probably can't. This is just one of the ways regulation _can_ increase the price of products and services; they decrease competition, allowing established players to raise prices.

Re: In Fifty Days, Payments Innovation Will Stop In Silicon Valley

#33

Post by tapp »

pyre wrote: post #29
zackattack wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's that flawed. Would you elaborate?

Trustworthiness is not tied to money, the ability to make large sums of money, or the ability to convince others to loan you money/invest in you.

Depends on context; in some cases it absolutely is.

Courts often "trust" people to go free temporarily if they can post bail pending trial. Lenders will "trust" you with their money in the form of a loan if you can post collateral.

Re: In Fifty Days, Payments Innovation Will Stop In Silicon Valley

#35

Post by SwellJoe »

stephenr wrote: post #4

They want companies that operate like banks, such as PayPal, to be licensed. I'm not sure I see the downside. PayPal has a shocking record of abusing it's customers, and it can only do so because it isn't bound by the same laws as banks are. Personally, I think if you rely on PayPal/etc for your business, you're asking to get financially raped.

This won't affect PayPal in any way. They have plenty of money to cover the licenses and bonds and whatever else. They're part of the status quo and are not considered a threat by Visa/Mastercard in any way, shape, or form. In fact, PayPal is one of their best customers.

If you have a bone to pick with PayPal, you ought to be wishing for more competition, not supporting barriers to entry for their competitors.

Re: In Fifty Days, Payments Innovation Will Stop In Silicon Valley

#36

Post by SwellJoe »

foobarbazetc wrote: post #10

Boohoo, cry PayPal a river. In most countries outside the US, PayPal is regulated like a bank. This means PayPal can't just lay claim to your money and never give it back to you.

Boohoo, cry PayPal a river.

I don't understand what this has to do with PayPal. PayPal is large enough to easily jump through whatever hoops are required to keep doing business. This is a problem for new companies, that would compete with PayPal.

Re: In Fifty Days, Payments Innovation Will Stop In Silicon Valley

#37

Post by hessenwolf »

thinkcomp wrote: post #5
stephenr wrote: post #4

They want companies that operate like banks, such as PayPal, to be licensed. I'm not sure I see the downside. PayPal has a shocking record of abusing it's customers, and it can only do so because it isn't bound by the same laws as banks are. Personally, I think if you rely on PayPal/etc for your business, you're asking to get financially raped.

If they wanted companies to be licensed they could just require a license. Instead they require a license and a bond worth millions of dollars in some cases, nominally to protect consumers. Yet if you have a million consumers in a state and a $1,000,000 bond, that means that if the company defaults, each consumer gets back a dollar. This doesn't sound like consumer protection to me. It sounds like an artificial barri…

Yes... but you don't usually have 1 million customers and owe them all money at once. That's just daft.

Re: In Fifty Days, Payments Innovation Will Stop In Silicon Valley

#38

Post by pilif »

Here in Europe, PayPal (which is acting like a bank) had to get a banking license (like any other bank). As far as I know they didn't go bankrupt yet, so it can't be a wholly bad thing.

If I drive a vehicle that acts like a car, I need a drivers license. If I run a service that acts like a bank I need a banking license.

I really don't see a problem here.

Re: In Fifty Days, Payments Innovation Will Stop In Silicon Valley

#39

Post by tluyben2 »

pilif wrote: post #38

Here in Europe, PayPal (which is acting like a bank) had to get a banking license (like any other bank). As far as I know they didn't go bankrupt yet, so it can't be a wholly bad thing. If I drive a vehicle that acts like a car, I need a drivers license. If I run a service that acts like a bank I need a banking license. I really don't see a problem here.

They are talking innovation; sure Paypal can get licenses like that, but a startup can't. Most (by far) startups don't have 500k to lock away. And most don't have the money to pay the license fees. So yes, it's an issue as far as innovation of payment services goes; now suddenly you NEED to get millions in investment and that all doesn't go into the product but instead into government crap.

Re: In Fifty Days, Payments Innovation Will Stop In Silicon Valley

#40

Post by Groxx »

dublinclontarf wrote: post #28
technotony wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bitcoin is operating in a legally very grey area, you can bet your bottom-dollar that as soon as they get real traction laws like this are going to come down on the ecosystem extremely fast.

Im quite sure most of what Bitcoin is used for is already illegal, but that doesn't mean anything. It's just being used for what people have always done, this is the government outlawing perfectly normal things. Thanks to bitcoin (and it's growing network of services that operate from cypherspace) we nolonger have to dance to the governments tune.

I'm sure similar claims can be made for Linden dollars, which have been used for far more transactions over the years than Bitcoin has.

Why single out Bitcoin? Because it's new?

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