Topic: RBC closed my commercial bank account for having Bitcoin related activities. - page 2. (Read 5848 times)

We should create a bitcoin credit union.

Wow, thats brutal.  I hate the banks here in Canada. In fact, I hate banks all together.  I find credit unions to be far better to deal with.  I was surprised how easy it was to send money to Virtex through my credit union.  I didn't think they would have Vogogo as a payee, but they did.  I haven't tried to pull my money out of virtex back into my credit union, so we shall see how easy that will be.

Credit Unions are definitely the way to go.

Sorry that happened to you, some banks like US Bank here in Colorado suck to work with.

My current bank Wells Fargo has been pretty good. I went and opened a new checking account to add to the one's I had so I could have a single account to move USD in and out of the exchanges with out touching my main established accounts.

When my banker asked me what it was for I told him about Bitcoin and crypto exchanges. His supervisor came over and got into the conversation, I was pretty amazed to be talking to 2 bankers, that had not even heard of the Bitcoin market much less what it was. When I told them there could be a day when these digital currency's could challenge there authority, they seemed to start talking notes. Kind of funny.

The meeting ended with, "thank you sir for your continued business. Oh and by the way did you want to open up another line of credit? Looks like our computer already approved you for another 10k"

Oh, sure. LOL

Rob

The problem with this is that companies with products cannot accept bitcoin without a way for them to pay for the products they sell.  There HAS to be a gateway for users of crypto-currencies to facilitate their real-world dollar values into existence.  If you close off FIAT <--> CRYPTO then how do the supporters of the crypto and those who accept crypto in lieu of 'fiat based payments' for their products or services, then how do you expect those people to deliver their services or products?  The ultimate solution would be for their suppliers to accept crypto as well (but then again, you have just moved the necessity of conversion from the 'middle man' to the supply point.  Electricity costs fiat - you cannot pay to operate a factory in crypto without there being a method for the crypto to have fiat leverage.

While your concept is everything that cryprocurrency stands for, you have to consider that until the MAJORITY of suppliers, vendors, and the likes move away from FIAT and over to crypto, there is NO conceivable way that crypto will ever have value other than the data space it consumes for the ledger. 

I run several FIAT based businesses - I lease managed/unmanaged dedicated servers (no VPS), I do web design and site building, among many other things IT related.  I would love to accept crypto - but I cannot without a method to convert into fiat so I can pay my vendors and suppliers.  If they accepted it, then they have to have a method.  You can't pay for your basic necessities of a business without fiat of some form.  Eventually, the money runs out. 

The banks have a shared database. It's used to identify high risk individuals; I've been refused a bank account before due to a $200 balance owed at a separate bank institution...

Just wait until banks refuse to open new accounts for anybody who's been flagged as a Bitcoin user.

We need to start getting more decentralized and stop relying on the banks... They hold way too much power over people.

They did give him a reason. Which part of the OP you dont understand?

Forget about bitcoin, there are many cases that banks refuse to provide service base on "high-risk" and they're not obligated to tell you about their investigation.

I respect your opinion, I must admit that I really don't know what would happen if we separate. The only thing I know is that there is not a single countries that regret the separation from their old countries, not a single one feel like they made a mistake and want to go back, and we're talking about 34 new countries in the last 24 years.
But that's my opinion and I don't wanna start a war about it. Like I said, I am not ok with the way Pauline want to make her new countrie (By dividing and create tension). So our opinions are not so far I guess

I thought Canada was very bitcoin friendly, I am surprised to hear they would simply shut you down without any reason.

Did an account manager speak to you first?

I'm not sure what point you are trying to make -- are you saying that Bitcoin is some kind of play money that has no value when exchanged with fiat currency?  Both have perceived value and as long as they do, there will always be exchange between the two.   The world is not going to wake up to some libertarian-anarchist utopia and stop using government-issued fiat currency overnight.

Banks are hostile towards bitcoin, it's obvious, because it challenges their profits.  They are providing resistance, which just causes people wanting to exchange between fiat and currency to find alternate methods that are more expensive, down to trading with moneypak joe.   The free market predicts that there will be entrepreneurs that will build systems that are safer, cheaper and more more efficient than what currently exists for trading between the two.  When banks see their profits from payment systems and wire transfers going down, they or their successors will start dealing in bitcoin.

Stop living in a lalaland and move out of your parents basement ....

Banks are private entities, they're not obligated under any law to provide you a service.

Banks shutting down acct isnt the same as freezing fund. They basically tell you to move your fund elsewhere and end relationship with you.

I think the bank is just being risk-adverse. After all bitcoin associated businesses are a small amount of their total customer base, so they really don't care.

There really should be some kind of law against this. As long as an account holder is not under investigation by law enforcement where freezing of funds is considered necessary, or there has been a conclusion in a court of law that the account holder is engaged in criminal acts, then the bank should be obliged to provide banking services.

The banks have a monopoly on banking (duh), so basically shutting out people like this can ruin their entire business.

But I guess there's no countries where you can actually sue a bank to make them give you access to banking facilities?

No you wouldn't - receiving those payments from CaVirtex is fine. To be clear the OP had a BUSINESS account that was related to Bitcoins. In other words banks are denying Bitcoin-related companies an account at the bank.

I used to have people do cash deposits from localbitcoins - I was told I cannot do this but the direct deposits from cavirtex are fine.

I don't live in Canada, so I have no way of doing this, but I think the idea is great. I think making noise without being violent is the way to make your voice be heard.

Total madness is spreading these days, let's hope for better times soon.

Of course you have a right to mention this, you live in Canada and Quebec is a part of Canada. Feel free to speak your mind, don't imprison your thoughts.

I'm just thinking out loud.

IF the bitcoin community got together and started a bitcoin friendly bank or credit union, could other banks then refuse to make transfers to this bank - or would that be illegal? If it was illegal, could this then be a smart way to avoid the banking troubles for the bitcoin community?

LMAO.. If you get 100 people to do this I'll donate the 100 t-shirts!

To protect yourself you need to separate your bitcoin activities from everything else. Preferably use a completely unrelated bank. I've heard of people who had to move everything from their bank (imagine all that hassle), just because they did some bitcoin dealings.

Is there a way that people could talk back against this?

I was thinking: What about 100-200 people get together, all people get t-shirts saying something like:

"Bitcoin is neutral, just like cash" on the front. And on the back it says:

"RBC is acting unethically
denying legit businesses"

Then once a week make a peaceful appearance at the bank. Walk into the bank, fist a few of you, then some more, and eventually the entire bank is filled with people with yellow t-shirts with your message. Have some good spoke person that handle the media, and make the case known. Also, if you can find the private addresses of some of the banksters of RBC, make sure to gather a lot of people outside their house on the street, do some barbecue or otherwise make your presence clear.

Also contact consumer organizations and politicians and make your stance clear. That would in fact be really cool if you bothered to do this.

If people just become mad and close their accounts, that will not really make any impact.

I was thinking it - but I am not from Quebec so I dont have the right to say it...but totally agree with you there