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Topic: Why Are Banks Refusing to Transfer Your Money Abroad? (To outside the US) (Read 651 times)

full member
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Merit: 100
Hi
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For a supposed first world country, I've been consistently flabbergasted at how archaic the US banking system is. Now the government is just piling extra pain on top.
The government imposes a crazy amount of regulations on banks. Compliance is one of banks largest expenses.
member
Activity: 109
Merit: 10
This where the savior bitcoin comes in. The universal money. Buy bitcoin from localbitcoins then move to another country withdraw exchange your bitcoin to fiat there.
full member
Activity: 132
Merit: 100
It's becoming increasingly harder setting up an offshore as an American citizen.
sr. member
Activity: 350
Merit: 250
'Slow and steady wins the race'
They are getting out of this service because the compliance risks are simply too high. The Obama administration has brought enforcement action on banks many times for minor technicalities, which has costs banks tens if not hundreds of billions of dollars.

It is simply not worth it for banks to engage in these kind of high risk transactions.
legendary
Activity: 4228
Merit: 1313
This article doesn't mention bitcoin, but it does emphasize a huge market opportunity there:

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Large financial institutions like Bank of America (NYSE:BAC), HSBC (NYSE:HSBC), Citigroup (NYSE:C), and JPMorgan Chase (NYSE:JPM) have dealt an expensive blow to immigrants and their families. As regulators crack down on money laundering and illicit international transfers of wealth, the world’s largest money movers have scaled back their cash transfer businesses. Most affected has been Mexico, as about half of the total remittances sent from the U.S. go there.

So why did banks decide to pull the plug on this business, which The New York Times calls the “the largest and arguably most effective antipoverty effort in the world”?

For banks, it is regulatory paranoia, among other reasons.
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http://wallstcheatsheet.com/business/why-are-banks-refusing-to-transfer-your-money-abroad.html/2/
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