Topic: Free Market Trading & pricing for India [Split topic] - page 2. (Read 1556 times)

I completely agree with you subvolatil. We need a free market system in India that is independent of any exchange. However, i wanted you to note that your entire basis of the pricing is flawed. The concept that you are talking would work very well where buying of virtual currency is as easy as selling it like in USA, Canada and Europe. If i go to someone here and ask for a markup of 10%, then they will kick me in the face. Because people here can buy 1 btc for mtgox, campbx or any other exchange price and the transaction charges as less as 50 cents per transaction.
However, the case in India is completely different unless the traders in India are self sufficient by mining the requirements themselves within India. In that case, yes the concept that you are proposing would definitely work.

Moreover, when i say 10% markup, there are inherent costs involved in carrying out the transaction and 10% is not completely my profit.
Just to give you an idea, the cheapest and reliable funding method usually used by most USA residents Dwolla which charges $ 0.25 to fund mtgox (through my bank account) cannot be used to fund the bitcoins which i intend to sell in India because, at the end of the year, UNCLE SAM (US Federal Tax dept) comes back to me and says "Sir, you have transferred 10X amount of USD to MTGOX account, however you have received only 5X amount of USD in return. What happened to the rest of 5X amount.? ". So i should have a convincing explanation with paper trial. I cannot even claim that i lost them during trading because, MTGOX abides by the US, Canada and European AML laws. So i should choose cash deposit method which itself costs me about 4 - 5%.

Secondly, when i receive the funds through Bank transfer in India, i should get it back here to keep the money rolling for my business. Every bank here charges about 3 - 4 USD for using their ATM to withdraw using a International Indian Debit card. This fee is apart from the fee of Rs 125 INR or Rs 150.00 INR that will be charged by my bank in India.

Its not over yet. Indian Banks give you a very shitty exchange rate when you use their debit card to withdraw funds abroad. Usually Rs 0.50 less than any foreign exchange and sometimes even upto Rs 1.00 less per USD. That is a risk am taking.

I agree, there might be some other ways to route money from India to USA, but since the money is coming from India, it is very risky and it might end up being treated as t e r r 0 r 1 s t funding. Trust me, i work in the field of cyber intelligence and pretty much know what all the f e d s track.

After all those fees, am left with 2 -3 % per bitcoin.  I think that is a fair enough margin in any business for all the risk and pains that am taking to keep me motivated to come back the next day and keep me going.

Am not justifying anyone and i don't need to infact, am just letting you know that your perceived notion of 10% profit is wrong. And moreover, with the recent happenings and yesterday's news announcement, i don't think many people from USA / Canada (and Europe shortly) will consider trading of bitcoins as priority anymore to make money.
Am sure that you are aware that many retail websites in USA and Canada have started accepting bitcoins as payment. Yesterday's news was huge. A gift card company called GYFT started accepting bitcoin through bitpay (am sure bitpay uses mtgox exchange rate). They sell gift cards of almost every company in USA including Amazon, CVS pharmacy, Target, Walmart, Hollister, American Eagle, restaurants, flight and travel websites. That is turning my bitcoins to real cash legitemitely without the hassles of trading. Those shops are pretty much everywhere i shop. And the fee is just 0.89%. Infact i will end up paying more if i buy stuff from same places using my credit card. Hell ya, i can live my life with only bitcoins. I can buy everything right from my toilet paper to rice and grocery using bitcoins.
Most of my friends here feel the same and one of my friends even ordered a Radeon 7970 from amazon using that gift card.

Just my 2 cents..!! :-)

An that is the  reason  why  a  free  market  system of  bids  setting  prices,  is   far  more  better.  an  economical  system  would  collapse  if  scarcity drives  a monopolistic system of  rates. No one in india  would want to  buy  bitcoins  and no one   would  see any  use for it.   so  in  better terms, it  would be  dead in the  water  before  it  starts. 

Whats  happening  is  basically  every one  holds their  sell  till GOX  has a  high price and then  add another 10% to their  sale. which in its self  becomes  monopolistic, because  sale is  determined by one  exchange  being  at a high  price.   

A  free  market  rates  would be  determined by  supply and demand .  that the  demand is like in India  can be  gauged  properly   with this  system. 

I have split the thread at https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/500-usd-worth-btc-available-for-purchase-199432 as this deviates from the purpose of that thread.


I agree with the concept of pegging BTC to INR, but we also need to take the factor of scarcity into consideration.