Liberty Reserve Founder Arthur Budovsky Extradited

The most prominent department of the United States government that prosecutes persons today announced that it has extradited Costa Rican citizen Arthur Budovsky from Spain. Assistant US Attorney General Caldwell is quoted in the Department's press release noting that Budvosky had already renounced his United States citizenship, operated his venture in the country outside of the United States otherwise known as Costa Rica, and had at the time of his extradition been storing his corporeal form in Spain which is another country which is not in the United States.

Full Transcript of US Commodity and Futures Trading Commision Bitcoin Session

As announced earlier, the United States Commodities and Futures Trading Commission dedicated a portion of their meeting today to the subject of Bitcoin derivatives. The full video won't be released for a few days, but the full transcript of the session on Bitcoin derivatives is below. Continue reading

Ulbricht Attorneys File Response to Government

Attorneys filed a response following the 48 hour deadline imposed for the Ulbricht defense team to respond to the Justice Department's rejection of the Horowitz Declaration and assert 4th Amendment rights. The reply asserts the Justice Department's response failed to address any technical analysis or conclusions from the Horowitz Declaration, and that the government claims the right to "engage in criminal conduct with impunity in its pursuit of investigative objectives, and not be held accountable therefor." The reply also hammers on the discrepancy of the government's position in the case versus the Auernheimer case. Continue reading

U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission Meeting on Bitcoin Derivatives Today

The United States CFTC will be meeting today and one of the topics for discussion is derivatives contracts that reference Bitcoin and whether or to what extent the CFTC may perceive to have juridiction on the subject.  Also on the agenda is the separate discussion of Non-Deliverable Forwards and whether or not a clearing mandate may be appropriate. The meeting states at 1:30 PM US Eastern Time and continues to 5:00 PM with the Non-Deliverable Forwards discussion preceding the Bitcoin Derivatives discussion. There will be a live webcast at www.cftc.gov and video should be posted in two days on their site. Members of the public are welcome to also listen via conference call toll free at 1-866-844-9416 or one of several other international numbers.

Silk Road Lawyers Challenge Justice Department "Leaky Captcha Theory"

The defense team for Ross Ulbricht is challenging the assertion by the prosecution in a filing last month that the Silk Road servers and eventually the alleged Silk Road mastermind was found due to a leaky misconfigured captcha on the site. Among the documents released challenging the Government's assertion are configuration files and traffic logs according to Brian Krebs.