Category Archives: Fiat/BTC interfaces

Bitcoin History: Heroin Store Joe Job and the Bitcointalk Subpoena

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Earlier today Theymos of Bitcointalk revealed that he satisfied a subpoena by prosecutors in the United States related to the yet to be tried Ross Ulbricht case. He offered that he turned over posts related to the account "altoid" alleged to be connected to Ross Ulbricht. He also admitted turning a number of posts, including posts deleted by users from a thread titled "A Heroin Store" which posed and interesting thought experiment: Continue reading →

HSBC Cuts Ties with GABI

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HSBC has reportedly cut ties with the "regulated" Global Advisors Bitcoin Investment Fund (GABI) over concerns related to "money laundering" risks. Notably in 2012 HSBC settled with the United States for $1.92 billion related to assistance it allegedly provided drug cartels in laundering money in Mexico and Columbia, likely making the money laundering issue a very sore subject for the bank.

CoinJar Relocate From Australia To UK, No Longer Charging GST

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CoinJar has announced the relocation of its headquarters from Melbourne, Australia to the UK. As a result of the change, CoinJar customers are no longer subject to a GST of 10% when purchasing bitcoin via the platform.

CoinJar first began collecting the GST on bitcoin purchases as of October 3rd 2014. The addition of the GST made CoinJar the most expensive place to purchase bitcoin in Australia. After the GST was implemented, Qntra speculated that CoinJar customers had no reason to use the website as competitors, such as Circle, were now accepting credit cards from Australian users1 and did not collect the GST, making it a cheaper option despite currency exchange fees. Continue reading →

  1. Hit and miss depending on who issued the credit card. ↩

Ken Hess: Bitcoin Illegal, Tom Coburn: Maybe for Congress?

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In a piece appearing on ZDnet today Ken Hess wrote a about his letter campaign to inform United States Senators of "Bitcoin's illegality" and of how Tom Coburn's office responded. Mr. Hess's case for Bitcoin illegality consist of his reading of Article 1, Section 8, Clause 5 of the United States constitution which enumerates as a power of Congress: Continue reading →

MtGox Trustee Moves to Repay Creditors, Work With Kraken

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According to the New York Times, the liquidator in the MtGox bankruptcy case is moving in the direction of repaying creditors and will partner with the Fiat/Bitcoin exchange Kraken to do so. Among assistance Kraken might offer to the trustee is an evaluation of Mt Gox's assets and help investigating the collapse of MtGox. Any decision to repay the customers with Bitcoin though would happen at the discretion of the Trustee. Jesse Powell of Kraken offered a few informative quotes: Continue reading →

After Survery Vessenes' Foundation "Pivots"

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In a blog post the communications and marketing director of Vessenes' Bitcoin Foundation Jinyoung Lee Englund announced that they would be shifting their focus almost entirely towards the goal of funding "core development" in the wake of results from a member survey. In the past this Foundation has engaged in a mix of activities including lobbying, marketing, and "outreach" in addition to providing Gavin Andressen a salary to work on the Foundation's fork of Satoshi's Bitcoin codebase. After justifying the move in their post they offer the following: Continue reading →