As one of the top global financial services companies in the world, Switzerland’s UBS manages over $1 trillion in assets. When a company of that size publishes a report on bitcoin, investors the world over pay attention. Today, UBS published a paper titled “Bitcoins and Banks: Problematic currency, interesting payment system” outlining their perspective on…
If there’s anyone who should understand the mechanics of currency, it’s Edmund C. Moy. From 2006 to 2011, Moy was the Director of the United States Mint, government office in charge of both handling the nation’s gold and silver bullion and producing all of its coinage. With the recent decision by the IRS to treat…
Chinese news site Sina is reporting that the People’s Bank of China has issued a statement demanding that all banks and third-party payment processors in the country shut down accounts of the 15 listed bitcoin exchanges in the country. The still unconfirmed report (Google Translate version here) claims that the ruling would limit essentially limit…
One month to the day after he sent a highly controversial letter to the Treasury, Federal Reserve and other related financial agencies calling for the outright ban of bitcoin, West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin appears to have dramatically softened his stance. Speaking with the Washington Post, Manchin said the boom in private investment and regulatory…
In a post on the Bitcoin Foundation’s blog yesterday, Marco Santori, Chairman of the foundation’s Regulatory Affairs Committee responded to the recent decision by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to treat bitcoin as a stock-like class of property, rather than as a currency. The post notes that the foundation “appreciates the IRS’ hard work in…
Yesterday, the IRS declared that bitcoins were to be treated under the same rules as stocks under U.S. tax law, causing a wave of relief for seasoned investors and a chill of quiet panic among casual users. A literal interpretation of the rules would require an immense amount of bookkeeping for anyone who would use…
The venture capital world has been spreading their money around the bitcoin ecosystem in a big way this week. While much the attention is understandably going to the $17 million raised by Circle, two smaller VC investments may have even bigger impacts in the coming months. San Francisco-based bitcoin exchange Kraken has raised $5 million…
Earlier this month, Canadian virtual currency exchange Vault of Satoshi announced it was ceasing all U.S. currency transactions due to ongoing issues with regulators. In recent weeks, the exchange has been focused on becoming a legitimate financial institution in Canada, even though there are few formal rules for how bitcoin fits into Canadian banking law….
When the Auroracoin “airdrop” began yesterday, things did not look promising for the Icelandic alt-coin. A crush of users trying to claim their coins effectively caused DDoS attack on the site, and other technical glitches resulted in the site falling to the bottom of alt-coin value tracking site Coinmarketcap, landing just above CorgiCoin. And to…
After months of speculation, the Internal Revenue Service has released new rules for including bitcoin in annual tax filings (PDF). According to the rules, bitcoin is to be handled as a form of property, rather than currency, meaning bitcoin itself is to be treated like a stock. This puts many bitcoin buyers in the awkward,…