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UK high street banks are quarantining from crypto

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61–70 of 131 posts

Re: UK high street banks are quarantining from crypto

#61

I first learned about blockchain years ago talking to some middle eastern clients who had implemented something with it. After looking at the technology from a data & software engineering pov, I thought it was basically useless and incredibly niche. I said as much, but they didnt believe me; they also thought ML was where you "fed data to a machine and it did everything" because that's what some lecturer had told the…

> What is interesting is that amongst professional finance much of this has been apparent the whole time.

It is important to note, that even if from looking from far outside, finance looks like one thing, in reality there is a big divide within finance regarding how "value" is defined. On the other hand, there is a simple notion that value of a thing is whatever someone is willing to pay for it. And on the other hand, there is a bit more complex idea that if you somehow know the value of a cash flow, then if you are able to create the same cashflow in some other way, then the other cash flow must have same value.

The first one is the home of powerpoints, VC capital and crypto. (It's also easy to recognize these professional financiers once you start to discuss whether sweat equity should be valued similarly to cash equity. They are completely appalled with the idea, because reasons.)

The second is home of financial regulation, really fancy maths and modern banking risk management.

The failure modes are different here. The first one, typical failure model is scam. The second, well, you can google LTCM for that.

And what comes to crypto, there is a clear and obvious difference. The first ones see no reason why not investing into crypto, after all, someone is paying 60k for a BTC, its value is thus 60k, what more do you want? The second ones scratch their heads. They see no positive net cash flows anywhere, thus the value must be negative. And this is the reason (in addition to regulation) why banks and professional bankers for the most part keep clear from crypto and struggle seeing value, while VC money is/was pouring in.

Re: UK high street banks are quarantining from crypto

#62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>that banks cannot be trusted to let you do what you want with your own money. Well that's because we put them partially on the hook for when we, Joey Public, fall for scams, we expect and demand that the banks give us back the money we were scammed for. I mean, I personally haven't, but I've read multiple newspaper articles about it.

I wish there was a switch that let me accept the consequences of my own actions but be allowed to take them in the first place. I don’t use crypto but it isn’t my bank’s job to tell me where I can send my money.

There is a switch. Don't associate with the banks for your finances. Take your money out. No one is forcing you to keep it there.

Re: UK high street banks are quarantining from crypto

#63
A friendly reminder that all the recent drama has zero to do with crypto, rather 100% to do with corruption at a human scale by 3rd party services which are not in any way crypto, they are traditional financial services peddling cryto wares.

Get your keys off banks and 3rd parties, thats the whole point of why this started ... Exactly because of crooks like ftx and those peotecting them.

Re: UK high street banks are quarantining from crypto

#64
post #46

They've banned crypto, but actual gambling is more popular and more heavily advertised then ever

This may be true but some banks also do a lot to prevent it, such as a need to specifically request betting transactions to be allowed on your account. I also think that people losing money from betting actually know what they are getting into though. The same can not be said for some other transactions.

There's also all the 'near-gambling' of F2P games with gacha/lootbox systems, which has none of the regulation of 'real gambling'

Re: UK high street banks are quarantining from crypto

#65
I really don't understand what place your bank has telling you where you're allowed to send money. If I want to throw a small percentage of my net worth into a hugely speculative investment then fine, why are they stopping me? Are they stopping me from using my bank card down at the dog tracks or at a casino? Can I withdraw cash for Poker but not blackjack?

Having said that, it's weird because I definitely have sent money from one of the banks that aren't crypto-friendly to Binance in the past, so who knows how strong these bans really are.

Re: UK high street banks are quarantining from crypto

#66
post #45

I first learned about blockchain years ago talking to some middle eastern clients who had implemented something with it. After looking at the technology from a data & software engineering pov, I thought it was basically useless and incredibly niche. I said as much, but they didnt believe me; they also thought ML was where you "fed data to a machine and it did everything" because that's what some lecturer had told the…

Bad take regarding black mark. Fintech and swinging for the fences is not a bad thing per se. As long as you aren’t an executive for a scam or something; I have never seen in my career experience being treated as a bad thing. Might perhaps get some added questions to get you, but it is also a unique selling point. Crypto essentially allows you to make trust less systems with tokens, what those tokens mean or not depe…

Okay, I may be a bit blunt, but to spend any significant time with crypto means that you are either a) illiterate in finance, b) illiterate in technology, c) into scamming people, d) into gambling or e) into illegal things. If a or b, you yourself probably do not realize it. Anyway, any combination of these would constitute black mark in my recruitment process for most of the jobs.

Re: UK high street banks are quarantining from crypto

#67
post #40
post #6

How about letting people do what they want with their own money?

People can do what they want with their money. In this case, they can move their money to one of the many banks who don't place restrictions on transactions. The beauty of the free market is that people are free to move their custom. And businesses are free to set the limitations necessary for profitable enterprise. Some banks have decided that the risk to having to support customers who engage in risky behaviour is…

In theory. I have lived in a country where all banks banned crypto exchange payments.

Re: UK high street banks are quarantining from crypto

#68

I first learned about blockchain years ago talking to some middle eastern clients who had implemented something with it. After looking at the technology from a data & software engineering pov, I thought it was basically useless and incredibly niche. I said as much, but they didnt believe me; they also thought ML was where you "fed data to a machine and it did everything" because that's what some lecturer had told the…

Bitcoin solves what is called the double spending problem without a central authority. Any other existing digital cash system, including the present-day fiat currencies and payment infrastructure relying on them as well as other digital currencies, require a central authority to maintain and dictate the true history of a monetary ledger, to make sure that the same units of money are not spent twice. Bitcoin instead decentralizes the bookkeeping and uses a proof-of-work system to maintain consensus between independent bookkeepers about the true history of the ledger.

Re: UK high street banks are quarantining from crypto

#69

> 47% of UK banks don’t allow customers to interact with crypto exchanges And yet the state asks you to pay your taxes when you make added-value on crypto. There are literally people who have taxes on added-value made on crypto due but are unable to pay them because their banks are refusing their money. Take 10 K EUR out: easy. Take 1 million+ EUR out: it's extremely difficult. The hypocrisy here is phenomenal: "cryp…

I don't understand the argument. 99% of UK banks don't allow customers to buy barrels of salted pork. But the state will ask you to pay your taxes if you make added-value selling barrels of salted pork

> There are literally people who have taxes on added-value made on crypto due but are unable to pay them because their banks are refusing their money.

If they have taxes on added-value, it means they sold tokens, so they can take that money out fo the exchange and use it to pay tax

> The hypocrisy here is phenomenal

you can be prosecuted for not declaring your drug earnings, on top of the actual crime of dealing drugs

Re: UK high street banks are quarantining from crypto

#70
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Better than giving it to crypto scammers

Not a crypto fan but I think you should be allowed to give your money to any scammer of your choice.

Just to be clear, even if I very much would like to agree with you in theory, in practice this is what you are advocating, like it or not:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyramid_schemes_in_Albania

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