21–30 of 194 posts
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Big payment networks do not want to appear complicit in money laundering.
HSBC/RBS/Citi were fine with it; and given the amount of the fines, it was plenty profitable and they’re likely still doing it.
WaveCrest seems to be the card provider for all major crypto debit card offerings. Its actually so popular among top searches for 'btc debit card' that I'm starting to think they are actually running the show and just have a few different front ends. Initially, they only closed visa cards for holders that were outside of EU, but now it seems to include everyone. The issue seems specific to EU-based Visa issuers. US o…
It's also, ahem, a house of cards for its investors, but that's another story told on my blog: https://gyrovague.com/2017/06/16/monaco-doing-the-math-on-an...
WaveCrest seems to be the card provider for all major crypto debit card offerings. Its actually so popular among top searches for 'btc debit card' that I'm starting to think they are actually running the show and just have a few different front ends. Initially, they only closed visa cards for holders that were outside of EU, but now it seems to include everyone. The issue seems specific to EU-based Visa issuers. US o…
The major exception is Monaco, although this is only hypothetical since they haven't actually issued any cards. It's also, ahem, a house of cards for its investors, but that's another story told on my blog: https://gyrovague.com/2017/06/16/monaco-doing-the-math-on-an...
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Ah, another classic "This is good for Bitcoin"
I didn't see it that way, more like advocating the development of some kind of open, permissionless payment network. Bitcoin could be it but it has ridiculous network fees, which opens the possibilities for challengers. If everything works very fluently with the traditional payment infrastructure, there is no big demand for that kind of payment network, and no incentives to develop it.
For example, XRB.
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The major exception is Monaco, although this is only hypothetical since they haven't actually issued any cards. It's also, ahem, a house of cards for its investors, but that's another story told on my blog: https://gyrovague.com/2017/06/16/monaco-doing-the-math-on-an...
I have always classified Monaco as one of those ICO projects where they don't even plan to actually implement the business model. Because why would you when you can just party 10 years in Ibiza with the raised ICO funds?
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I don't see this happening for bitcoin, though (or maybe for online orders, which don't need to be instant). Two years ago, I got sick of banks whose services I found of lesser and lesser quality, and tried a bitcoin/VISA debit card, just to see if it was working. The idea was this: I make a bitcoin transaction to add bitcoins in card provider wallet, and when transaction is complete, I could exchange it for fiat tha…
For online payments instant payments are actually not that important requirements. The process needs to happen just fluently from customers perspective. If the merchant is dispatching physical items, he can just wait for the transaction to confirm and dispatch the items after that. The customer won't see much difference because the biggest issue is the shipping time. For online payments bitcoin works quite well. Stil…
Bitcoin payments could, theoretically, work well - but that's not currently the case given the prohibitive transaction fees.
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I don't see this happening for bitcoin, though (or maybe for online orders, which don't need to be instant). Two years ago, I got sick of banks whose services I found of lesser and lesser quality, and tried a bitcoin/VISA debit card, just to see if it was working. The idea was this: I make a bitcoin transaction to add bitcoins in card provider wallet, and when transaction is complete, I could exchange it for fiat tha…
For online payments instant payments are actually not that important requirements. The process needs to happen just fluently from customers perspective. If the merchant is dispatching physical items, he can just wait for the transaction to confirm and dispatch the items after that. The customer won't see much difference because the biggest issue is the shipping time. For online payments bitcoin works quite well. Stil…
Many people who tried to buy stuff on Steam with bitcoin seem to disagree. In fact Steam recently stopped accepting bitcoin since they apparently couldn't make it work.
Then people made fun of it.
Now current institutions will have to choose between embracing it and fighting it. Some of them do one thing, apparently VISA chose another.
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I have always classified Monaco as one of those ICO projects where they don't even plan to actually implement the business model. Because why would you when you can just party 10 years in Ibiza with the raised ICO funds?
You just described most iCO really.
That weird. Bitcoin has been on up swing the last 3 months since the insider trading scandal has been dying down. https://www.coindesk.com/price/ Maybe there's a crack down from EU on Bitcoin backed cards WaveCrest didn't want to deal with it yet.