Quote from: AgentofCoin link=topic=1817122.msg18106973#msg18106973
What is wrong with the definition on page 7?
Seems that would be appropriate.
The actual definition is Section 102.8 & 102.9.(a) through (d).
(There is an additional subsection 9 that must be a typo at P7.L16)
Same definition as the NYState BitLicense which is the one that was used to kill invocation in New York State.
If the document that was used in New York State is used elsewhere, can we assume that the same result everywhere ? Death of Bitcoin ?
The issues is: Is bitcoin a currency or a commodity?
Depending on the answer, different rules and laws would apply.
You are 100% correct; the debate is Currency (vs) Commodity.
If you read the State of New York reply to our Answer (page 3 to 11), if you think of it as a:
- Commodity, you will die laughing and dismiss the state argument or
- Currency, you will have to agree to the state and dismiss our case.
...
The Court needs to made aware of the fact that Bitcoin the protocol and bitcoin the
financial device, are constantly evolving and the government's position is essentially
that it does not. The technology behind Bitcoin (and the "blockchain") is so new that
lawyers, scientists, and others, still have no standard concept of what it is and what will
be its ultimate manifestation. A currency? A commodity? A hybrid? Or some device that
has not been defined yet?
You should use the example to the Court of individual States making their individual
citizens be required to get licensed and meet high financial hurdles, so that they could
use the internet. Where would the internet be today? It very likely would not have improved
the lives of certain individuals, or the world, because of that early restriction and improper
over regulation.
Any financial expert's testimony is pure speculation and any who claim to know or
define it within the current legal regulatory or financial framework, are at best,
misrepresenting the issues to the Court. The true issue is that the State can not have best
of both worlds in order to regulate Bitcoin, since it then creates discrimination against one
of the many different parties who participate within the Bitcoin community. Unless the State
outlaws Bitcoin outright or the Federal governments determines it to be illegal, what the
State has done is a wide spread net of discrimination.
For example, it is lawful for the State to require Bitcoin exchanges to KYC and AML as well
as be licensed, since they are money transmitters and exchangers, but under the broad
terms of the BitLicense which is what causes the discrimination, an average citizen with
their phone trading their bitcoins for anything, even a products, to another person with
their phone in NY State, would also be considered a money transmitter and would be
required to do due diligence on this stranger and be licensed. This is impossible and
possibly designed to force all transactions within the regulated exchanges. Yet those
exchanges are not for transactions, but only purchasing bitcoins. So the State effectively
prevents bitcoins from moving through the economy as a currency, which contradicts the
intentions and definitions of the BitLicense.
So what the State has really created is a regulatory structure that forces everyone,
even a poor homeless man on the street paying for a sandwich, to meet regulatory
compliance that can never in good faith be reasonably done by the homeless man.
Large profit making exchanges or like businesses that are using bitcoin as a commodity
for trading should have these laws applied to them, but individuals or small business
using it as a currency, should be made exempt as long as under a certain limit.
The BitLicense is arbitrary and capricious because it did not anticipate the foregoing
things, as well as others which has brought discrimination against these individuals,
due to its far reaching and for some individuals impossible requirements. The BitLicense
should be rewritten/amended to exempt these parties if they fall below a certain
monetary threshold.
You brought this action so that the Court can be made aware, with a proper record, that
the only concern should not be "consumer protection" or "tax enforcement", but also that
the citizens of NY are not inadvertently being discriminated against, by the State's attempt
figure out what Bitcoin is and how to deal with it. Their inability to figure out an answer
that fits all legal/financial contingencies is not an excuse to discriminate against their citizens.
*My statements are not a legal argument, legal opinion, or legal advice and the OP
knows and has or is counsel in the current matter being discussed and I have provided
my comments as an average citizen, who is only providing their individual non-legal
opinion. These comment may or many not apply to the current matter and the laws
or burdens in the State of NY.
