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Proposed SEC order to freeze, repatriate Binance.US assets

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Re: Proposed SEC order to freeze, repatriate Binance.US assets

#471

Post by talkingtab »

Animats wrote: post #318

This SEC action has nothing to do with Binance being a crypto exchange. It has to do with it being an exchange, a broker, an asset custodian, a market maker, and a trader for its own account, all at once, with no regulation. Sam Bankman-Fried was lobbying Congress to make that legal. That plan went nowhere. Binance just assumed they could get away doing all that. Worse, the SEC has already found large transfers out o…

Hmmm. It is really good to know that this has nothing at all to do with crypto, and that it is just a coincidence that this Mt. Gox, FTX et al. are crypto companies. I am completely reassured. Thank you.

Re: Proposed SEC order to freeze, repatriate Binance.US assets

#472

Post by alexb_ »

Tuna-Fish wrote: post #446
TheDong wrote: post #393

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The SEC certainly thinks gemini is running an illegal exchange, and said so quite clearly when charging them of that earlier this year: https://www.sec.gov/news/press-release/2023-7 The case has not been dropped, and I think pretty clearly states the SEC's opinion, which is quite consistent with what I said above. It is not legal to run a crypto exchange in the US (under current security laws I should add).

This is only true if you trade in crypto that is a security. Notably, Bitcoin is not a security. But every stablecoin, or any other more complex system that is in some way related to something that exists in the real world is. So you could run a Bitcoin exchange, but if you add any of the new, complex stuff you will end up getting shut down by SEC.

If Bitcoin looks like a security, acts like a security, trades like a security, is used by almost everyone as a security, then why are we pretending that it shouldn't be regulated like a security?

Re: Proposed SEC order to freeze, repatriate Binance.US assets

#473

Post by misnome »

PretzelPirate wrote: post #465
bugglebeetle wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

…and yet these systems all still outcompete crypto for the use cases you cite. We must therefore discern that the risk of getting fucked by payment processors is less than getting fucked by the crypto ecosystem.

It sounds like you don't work in the adult industry and don't have empathy for how difficult it is do deal with payment processors deciding you can't get paid anymore. This is a common problem in these discussions. The HN crowd tends to have better access to payment infrastructure and reliable income from their industry. Not everyone has those benefits and many people are punished by our existing system for doing com…

No, it sounds like the exact opposite of this: People who have no connection with the reality of a class of people they don’t understand or care about but want to use as puppets to prove a point.

It’s the people saying “Sex workers should just use crypto, it will solve all their problems!” who are lacking empathy, and not the people listing very plausible reasons why “Magic solution X” doesn’t make any problems go away.

Re: Proposed SEC order to freeze, repatriate Binance.US assets

#474

Post by jc_811 »

lordfrito wrote: post #469

After everything that's happened in this space, the number of "true believers" I'm seeing here is astounding to me. After a decade of use the tech hasn't found many real world uses beyond gambling, drugs, confidence schemes, money laundering, tax evasion, and other financial criminality. This is 100% the community's fault, as they're the ones burning a lot of real world capital to build this stuff but have very littl…

This is a great comment, I’ve always thought that the huge blind spot of true believers is that if something looks good on paper, it does not automatically mean it will transfer into the real world.

Crypto currency would work terrific in a society with fixed rules, unchanging laws & regulations, and constant rule followers. In other words, this would be amazing in a society filled with robots. Humans are not that. Humans are error-prone, emotional, conscious, questioning, moral, and very special creatures.

No matter how strong your passwords are, how “offline” your crypto wallets be, or how hacker proof your crypto holdings are - this doesn’t matter! All someone has to do is break into your house, hold a gun to your head and say “transfer your entire bitcoin holdings right now or we kill you”. Just like that you lose your entire life savings with absolutely no recourse or chance to reverse anything. We are immediately faced with an undeniable human issue. A human is breaking the rules of society. A human is fraudulently taking something that is not theirs. A human is using the threat of physical violence in the real world. Not only is Crypto/blockchain technology not equipped to handle this situation, not being able to do anything about this situation is a fundamental feature of the ecosystem.

Re: Proposed SEC order to freeze, repatriate Binance.US assets

#475

Post by misnome »

lordfrito wrote: post #469

After everything that's happened in this space, the number of "true believers" I'm seeing here is astounding to me. After a decade of use the tech hasn't found many real world uses beyond gambling, drugs, confidence schemes, money laundering, tax evasion, and other financial criminality. This is 100% the community's fault, as they're the ones burning a lot of real world capital to build this stuff but have very littl…

Crypto, Aliens, Science, and Equality are the topics that you really should’t look at discussions for here unless you know what you are getting yourself into, or just want to watch the burning dumpster fire. At least with Crypto it is relatively easy to spot the weird grudges or patently self-interested reasons for continuing to argue for a failed system.

I’m sure when this use case fails there will be another new use case that can be used as the Single Thing that crypto was made and defined for, you always need to find more sources of Greater Fools..

Re: Proposed SEC order to freeze, repatriate Binance.US assets

#476

Post by mtlmtlmtlmtl »

lordfrito wrote: post #469

After everything that's happened in this space, the number of "true believers" I'm seeing here is astounding to me. After a decade of use the tech hasn't found many real world uses beyond gambling, drugs, confidence schemes, money laundering, tax evasion, and other financial criminality. This is 100% the community's fault, as they're the ones burning a lot of real world capital to build this stuff but have very littl…

>I don't understand how...

It's actually fairly simple. They're financially invested, one of the strongest biases of all.

Re: Proposed SEC order to freeze, repatriate Binance.US assets

#477

Post by lordfrito »

jc_811 wrote: post #474
lordfrito wrote: post #469

After everything that's happened in this space, the number of "true believers" I'm seeing here is astounding to me. After a decade of use the tech hasn't found many real world uses beyond gambling, drugs, confidence schemes, money laundering, tax evasion, and other financial criminality. This is 100% the community's fault, as they're the ones burning a lot of real world capital to build this stuff but have very littl…

This is a great comment, I’ve always thought that the huge blind spot of true believers is that if something looks good on paper, it does not automatically mean it will transfer into the real world. Crypto currency would work terrific in a society with fixed rules, unchanging laws & regulations, and constant rule followers. In other words, this would be amazing in a society filled with robots. Humans are not that. Hu…

> Not only is Crypto/blockchain technology not equipped to handle this situation, not being able to do anything about this situation is a fundamental feature of the ecosystem.

Yeah, in it's pure form (no interop with fiat) it's the financial equivalent of anarchy. Rules/laws are impossible to enforce, no police or justice system to stop bad actors. It's lawlessness. This is a feature, not a bug.

Re: Proposed SEC order to freeze, repatriate Binance.US assets

#478

Post by logicchains »

lordfrito wrote: post #469

After everything that's happened in this space, the number of "true believers" I'm seeing here is astounding to me. After a decade of use the tech hasn't found many real world uses beyond gambling, drugs, confidence schemes, money laundering, tax evasion, and other financial criminality. This is 100% the community's fault, as they're the ones burning a lot of real world capital to build this stuff but have very littl…

>hasn't found many real world uses beyond gambling, drugs, confidence schemes, money laundering, tax evasion, and other financial criminality

Lots of people believe the war on drugs is a stupid, counter-productive endeavour, and indeed empirically there's no evidence of its success. The value on crypto is absolutely in that it gives common people a means to "fight back" against the power of the state and it's never-ending quest to control their private lives.

Most "financial criminality" in practice works out to "anyone doing anything the US government disagrees with", and not everyone believes the US has the right to police how the rest of the world spends its money. Nobody sanctioned the US when it killed hundreds of thousands of civilians in Iraq; do you think that's a fair system?

Re: Proposed SEC order to freeze, repatriate Binance.US assets

#479

Post by prottog »

Tuna-Fish wrote: post #446
TheDong wrote: post #393

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The SEC certainly thinks gemini is running an illegal exchange, and said so quite clearly when charging them of that earlier this year: https://www.sec.gov/news/press-release/2023-7 The case has not been dropped, and I think pretty clearly states the SEC's opinion, which is quite consistent with what I said above. It is not legal to run a crypto exchange in the US (under current security laws I should add).

This is only true if you trade in crypto that is a security. Notably, Bitcoin is not a security. But every stablecoin, or any other more complex system that is in some way related to something that exists in the real world is. So you could run a Bitcoin exchange, but if you add any of the new, complex stuff you will end up getting shut down by SEC.

> Bitcoin is not a security

What makes you say that?

Re: Proposed SEC order to freeze, repatriate Binance.US assets

#480

Post by lordfrito »

mtlmtlmtlmtl wrote: post #476
lordfrito wrote: post #469

After everything that's happened in this space, the number of "true believers" I'm seeing here is astounding to me. After a decade of use the tech hasn't found many real world uses beyond gambling, drugs, confidence schemes, money laundering, tax evasion, and other financial criminality. This is 100% the community's fault, as they're the ones burning a lot of real world capital to build this stuff but have very littl…

>I don't understand how... It's actually fairly simple. They're financially invested, one of the strongest biases of all.

Hadn't considered this. I just figured there are a lot of people here that "believe" in crypto in theory but just don't happen to be playing in this space yet, instead watching from the sideline with interest. I was doing this for a long while (watching since 2011) but never spent a dime until I could be firmly convinced, which never happened.

You're suggesting that most/all of these pro-crypto commenters have real skin in the game. If so, then there are a lot more people here than I guessed with with disappoint in their future.

This is a pretty intelligent crowd, so the blind spot surprises me. Such is human nature.

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