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We’re all criminals now

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Re: We’re all criminals now

#91

Post by mikewarot »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #47
axx0 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How exactly does this inhibit tax collection?

> How exactly does this inhibit tax collection? If you have something that lets you "transfer large sums of cash untraceably across the globe, with no way for the government to do anything about it," it's going to make it easier to hide income and assets. That inhibits tax collection. (Same way cash does.)

Crypto doesn't let you transfer cash. Someone has to sell you the crypto for cash, and someone has to buy the crypto for cash... at both ends, taxes and law enforcement can act.

Re: We’re all criminals now

#93

Post by gorgonzolachz »

ethbr0 wrote: post #25
infamouscow wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The point of crypto currency is to do the exact thing money laundering laws try to prevent No. That's not the point of cryptocurrency. > to transfer large sums of cash untraceably across the globe Wrong again. You can trace all transactions across the globe with cryptocurrency. > with no way for the government to do anything about it Why is that a bad thing?

> You can trace all transactions across the globe with cryptocurrency * Assuming KYC laws are enforced and account holders are listed

KYC only helps to an extent, right? My understanding of crypto is minimal, but if you run your own miner I assume you don't need to verify anything to anyone. You should be able to send out transactions to the network and have them be accepted anonymously, which is what most people who would be interested in money laundering would do.

Re: We’re all criminals now

#94

Post by twox2 »

rawtxapp wrote: post #52
twox2 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That wouldn't be a big hurdle to overcome. They will just outlaw self-custody and make it illegal for you to own your own wallet/private keys without some kind of money license. The institutions will be unaffected if they still want to play with crypto for whatever reason, but other folks are going to be screwed because they won't be able to move their money in and out of fiat.

Who is "they"? Nobody universally and single handedly decides rules and regulations. For every person that will advocate for what you're suggesting, there will be even more fierce advocates for the reverse of that.

"They" = the federal government.

Also, I'm not suggesting that this should happen, I'm just saying that it would be pretty easy to throw a wrench into the crypto machine.

Re: We’re all criminals now

#95

Post by asenna »

danscan wrote: post #77
RustyConsul wrote: post #46

I miss the old crypto. When it was this fringe, nerdy digital coin i could transfer to my friends to pay my bar tab. Yeah - Venmo/paypal/ a billion other systems that did the same thing, but to my friends btc and eventually eth was cooler. I could stake coins, provide liquidity, mine random coins from my laptop - It was fun. The concept of a global computer was awesome, interesting and nerdy. I've never used an excha…

SEC regulation would make the space nerdy and cool again? I agree that there are many ill-informed people are buying into scams in "crypto" because they think they're "getting in early on the next bitcoin". e.g. I have a close friend who is quite non-technical who is taking a naive approach by putting a significant portion of his funds into a "cryptocurrency" (not even a utility token) with a very cultish following a…

> I've looked into it, and the only buzz seems to be coming from the project core team patting themselves on the back with paid PR releases that overstate their "significant partnerships", bots, and people who want to retire off its "holder incentives". There is notably no buzz from actual developers or similarly credible people.

If I had to take a guess, Cardano?

Re: We’re all criminals now

#96

Post by ethbr0 »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #45
ethbr0 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The inversion of monetary control is the biggest reason my mind boggles that governments haven't clamped down harder. The only explanation I can come up with is that institutional banking / government regulation is so stodgy that they haven't played out the decade+ repercussions. Because after viable value is established, it's going to be a hard genie to put back in the bottle. It's much harder to make something that…

> institutional banking / government regulation is so stodgy that they haven't played out the decade+ repercussions Crypto is massively profitable. Wall Street hasn't seen margins like these in a long time. There aren't clear and present harms accruing to the electorate. That leaves no incentive, in countries without capital controls, to bother with it.

Afaik, the big (US) money was still prohibited from flowing into crypto? Or did leaks spring in that firewall?

Re: We’re all criminals now

#97

Post by ethbr0 »

gorgonzolachz wrote: post #93
ethbr0 wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You can trace all transactions across the globe with cryptocurrency * Assuming KYC laws are enforced and account holders are listed

KYC only helps to an extent, right? My understanding of crypto is minimal, but if you run your own miner I assume you don't need to verify anything to anyone. You should be able to send out transactions to the network and have them be accepted anonymously, which is what most people who would be interested in money laundering would do.

For proof of work, I think that's true.

When things start moving to proof of stake, less so.

Re: We’re all criminals now

#98

Post by nly »

RustyConsul wrote: post #46

I miss the old crypto. When it was this fringe, nerdy digital coin i could transfer to my friends to pay my bar tab. Yeah - Venmo/paypal/ a billion other systems that did the same thing, but to my friends btc and eventually eth was cooler. I could stake coins, provide liquidity, mine random coins from my laptop - It was fun. The concept of a global computer was awesome, interesting and nerdy. I've never used an excha…

What irks me most is how it's useless for day to day transactions. Ethereum has an average fee right now of over $6.50. Nobody is going to use these things seriously as a currency with fees this high.

Re: We’re all criminals now

#99

Post by nly »

rawtxapp wrote: post #55
ineedasername wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think we've hit that critical mass yet though. And increased regulation can simply kill it by inches so there's no sudden cliff to drop off of that gets people too upset.

To me, the Coinbase IPO was a major milestone in achieving critical mass, if you look through their numbers, it has already achieved pretty massive scale compared to it's age. Jury is still out, but I'm confident the cat is more or less out of the bag.

Ah Coinbase...where apparently you can't even exchange dollars for dollars (USD for USDC) without paying a hefty fee, and where I was only able to buy Tether and not USDC for...some reason.

Re: We’re all criminals now

#100

Post by nly »

mrverify wrote: post #6

Your honor, can the prosecution please be compelled to demonstrate where the bitcoin physically exists? Oh on this computer? Well, the key is memorized and there are several copies saved all over the world in cloud computers. Can the prosecution show the court, physically, where in the computer the asset exists?

In the UK you can face prison time for not disclosing passwords if compelled to by the authorities. A cryptocurrency key isn't that different.
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