I just completed my first purchase from buttercoin and it went fine. I prefer them to Circle because their ACH transfers clear more quickly (maybe they don't wait for it to clear on their end, just the bank's end) and their weekly limit is twice as high ($5000 vs. $2500). So I'd say as long as you don't need more than $5000/week it's an option to consider, I'm planning on doing my second purchase from them soon.
But we really need an alternative that doesn't go through the banks. Any exchange or brokerage that relies on banks for fiat payments is mostly controlled by the banks, and the banks can shut it down at will. Remember CampBX? They used to be an option for buying bitcoin in the US, and now they're gone because their bank closed their account. I miss CampBX, they let you send fiat by money order, leaving the banks out of the fiat transfer stage. Maybe that's why they got shut down
But we really need an alternative that doesn't go through the banks. Any exchange or brokerage that relies on banks for fiat payments is mostly controlled by the banks, and the banks can shut it down at will. Remember CampBX? They used to be an option for buying bitcoin in the US, and now they're gone because their bank closed their account. I miss CampBX, they let you send fiat by money order, leaving the banks out of the fiat transfer stage. Maybe that's why they got shut down
CampBX is still around from what I can see.
Their prices are consistently 2-3% over the top exchanges, and according to bitcoinaverage.com their 24 hour trade volume is currently at just under 18 BTC. They may still be around in a sense, but not a viable option for trading. I guess you could say Mt. Gox is still around too
I do agree that 18 BTC is probably going to be somewhat low for someone who is trying to actively trade.
