I totally understand and agree with that.
But I have two problems for which I found no answers on bitstamp website:
1)Large part of my coins are from mining, from ages ago.
I have no paper trail to justify these coins.
How bitstamp deals with mined coins?
I see sometime that exchanges ask for paper trail about coins acquisition but... if you have mined your coins long time ago, what do you have to provide?
I may have some GPU receipts somewhere, for the hardware I used to mine.
But I doubt it is enough.
2)Part of my coins has been acquired on BTC-e, legally.
I have a paper trail for this, a wire fiat deposit to ok pay from my personal account.
I have seen that sometime licensed exchange froze coins obtained from gambling sites and other "unclear" sources...
I was wondering if my coins from BTC-e, although obtained legally, are somewhat "tainted" and therefore will be frozen due to recent events.
Thank you
This can be a dilemma as one never knows what might or could happen when trading on exchanges. They can be quite unpredictable. In any case, you need to be prepared for the unexpected or the inevitable. If you mined the coins, you may be asked to substantiate that. If you purchased them from BTC-e and if they are tainted, then you might be asked to justify the purchase.
Bitstamp probably subscribes to Elliptic's forensic services which does an excellent job in blockchain analysis.
Actually their blockchain analysis is not so excellent at all
they are making blatant errors and false claims. For example, I deposited from a cold wallet that was last used in 2013. I deposited directly to Bitstamp from that cold wallet address. They claimed that according to their "block chain analysis" those coins were connected to a particular cryptocurrency service. However, that cryptocurrency service was created in 2014. So there is no possible connection.edit: nevertheless, after 7 days they decided to give my withdrawal a green light (see their last response below)
Quote
thank you for your explanation.
We have successfully concluded the periodic review and have instructed our payments department to further process your pending withdrawal transfer. You will receive an e-mail notification as soon as the process is concluded and funds have been sent to the designated account.
However, we would like to remind you that this Bitstamp account is for your personal and non-commercial use and the possible liquidation of the Bitcoins, received as donations on your website, is not allowed.
Should you have any questions or require any assistance in the future we are at your service.
We have successfully concluded the periodic review and have instructed our payments department to further process your pending withdrawal transfer. You will receive an e-mail notification as soon as the process is concluded and funds have been sent to the designated account.
However, we would like to remind you that this Bitstamp account is for your personal and non-commercial use and the possible liquidation of the Bitcoins, received as donations on your website, is not allowed.
Should you have any questions or require any assistance in the future we are at your service.
So that said, I can conclude that at the end of the day, when you answer all their questions no matter how irrelevant those questions may sound, they are willing to process your withdrawal. It took me a week and I had to refer to certain TXs and Bitcoin addresses to prove the origin of my coins, but at least they did not delay it any further from the point where it became obvious that my coins are legit. Bitstamp is alright. Just be prepared for long interviews.
