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Bitcoin News

A roundup of the top Bitcoin news from August 26 to September 1:

Tuesday, August 27

• FinCEN Gives Early Guidance on Bitcoin Regulation

Wednesday, August 28

• Bitcoin ATM RoboCoin Kiosk Goes on Sale for $20,000

Thursday, August 29

• Legal Firm Riddell Williams Hires Bitcoin Experts to Lead Payments Practice

Friday, August 30

• Bitcoin Exchange Tradehill Suspends Trading Due to Regulation Concerns

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Regulation on Bitcoin Heats Up in Washington Meeting

On Monday, the Bitcoin Foundation met with FinCEN, the crime enforcement division of the U.S. Department of the Treasury, as well as regulators and law enforcement officials.

Patrick Murck, general counsel for the Bitcoin Foundation, prepared a presentation on Bitcoin for agencies including the FBI, IRS, Federal Reserve, Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and Secret Service.

According to a report by the Wall Street Journal, FinCEN made a statement after the meeting giving preliminary guidance on the matter.

“Fincen’s recent guidance concerning virtual currencies made clear that virtual currency administrators and exchangers that provide services within the U.S. must register with Fincen as money-services businesses and that they share similar regulatory responsibilities with other financial institutions,” said Jennifer Shasky-Calvery, director of the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, in a statement after the meeting.

This activity comes on the heels of other regulatory interest in Bitcoin, including Germany’s ruling that Bitcoin is private money, Thailand’s guidance that Bitcoin is illegal, New York’s Department of Financial Services sending subpoenas to 22 Bitcoin companies, and the U.S. Senate launching its own inquiry.

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Is Bitcoin Hype or Reality?

That’s the question on many minds as the value of 1 BTC soars from $47 to $147 in just two weeks.

The key question for speculators is where Bitcoin is along the Hype Cycle. Is it about to crash from the Peak of Inflated Expectations or powering through the Trough of Disillusionment?

The New Yorker posted a editorial about the growth of Bitcoin that explains some of the interest in Bitcoin.

In Cyprus, after the government made a run on personal bank accounts, Bitcoin grew dramatically.

The following Monday, the price of the decentralized electronic currency bitcoin rose from forty-five to fifty-five dollars on the major exchanges, and by Wednesday it had nipped up to sixty-five dollars. The financial media generally agreed that the two dramas are related.

The evidence coming out of Spain is circumstantial—a spike in Google searches for “bitcoin,” and another on mobile-app downloads of Bitcoin-related software were widely reported

This episode called out the salient lack of trust in financial institutions.

The weakness in existing currencies stems from lack of faith in institutions—particularly central banks.

This is not a new concept. Looking at writings by Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto shows that Bitcoin was devised as a system for removing the possibility of corruption from the issuance and exchange of currency.

But, eventually the government will take notice to the rapid growth of value in an alternate currency. More from The New Yorker:

As it happens, a few days ago, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), the federal agency that enforces laws against money laundering, announced new guidelines requiring certain “virtual currency” trading entities to register as Money Services Businesses (M.S.B.s).

But is this pragmatic?

Since mining yields pocket change for most, even if it were technically a violation of the way FinCEN sees the law, mining without registering would be like “laundering” a twenty-dollar bill by taking it to the grocery store and asking for two tens… it’s hardly worth the resources for anyone to care about it, no matter how illegal they decide it should be.

Bitcoin: Real But Trust Takes Time

Is Bitcoin hype? Bitcoin Foundation’s Chief Scientist Gavin Andresen clearly sees a great future ahead, and offers a few words of wisdom:

Until now, society has underutilized cryptography. If people accept it more broadly, cryptography can facilitate many things: the exchange of money, transparent elections, transparent government.

Trust takes time.

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