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Thailand Government Declares Bitcoin Illegal
hypnosec writes that the government of Thailand "has declared Bitcoin illegal following which all trading activities related to the electronic currently have been suspended indefinitely. Through a message posted on its website, the Bitcoin Co. Ltd. has said officials of the Foreign Exchange Administration and Policy Department cited absence of applicable laws, capital controls "and the fact that Bitcoin straddles multiple financial facets" as reasons because of which the virtual currency is illegal. This ruling implies that activities such as buying & selling of Bitcoins, buying or selling any service in exchange of Bitcoins, sending Bitcoins to anyone located outside of Thailand, and receiving Bitcoins from anyone outside of Thailand are illegal. This has forced the company to indefinitely suspend operations."
Kids are always curious about things their parents forbid. Adults are always curious about things their government forbid.
The Streisand effect on BitCoin is going to be huge.
Get free satoshi (Bitcoin) and Dogecoins
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In a country where insulting the king carries a 10 year penalty, as far as the king is concerned, the concept of Rule of Law essentially means: I rule, you follow the law.
You can never know everything, and part of what you do know will always be wrong. Perhaps even the most important part.
I'd imagine karma points on /. to be the equivalent to any form of currency. It takes years of quality posting to bring up that karma and that's a lot of work. It's worth something, it's a token, and it's digital. Got a problem with that Thailand?
Countries that tightly control moving money in and out will restrict or ban bitcoin
Governments are not going to allow an alternate form of currency to gain traction that they have no control over.
so like... an anonymous, decentralized, secure, untraceable "problem" is being tackled by a public, centralized, unenforceable "law".
lel? lol? lmao? hurdur? keke? man... I don't have any acronyms for this one. why? because fuck you, that's why.
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huh? which company....bitcoin doesnt only run out of thailand, does it?
www.RacquetUp.org - Helping Detroit Youth
yes, the prohibition goes against economic freedom. but, considering that bitcoin production is extremely resource-intensive (and substantial negative external effects result from energy production and consumption), prohibiting it may actually improve economic welfare.
next we'll hear that "american goverment outlaws high interest savings" when Bank of America won't give someone a decent rate.
So Litecoin is ok I guess..
That's Thailand's problem. Here in the United States, we will continue to trade it, laws be damned.
At the conclusion of the meeting senior members of the Foreign Exchange Administration and Policy Department advised that due to lack of existing applicable laws, capital controls and the fact that Bitcoin straddles multiple financial facets the following Bitcoin activities are illegal in Thailand:
Based on such a broad and encompassing advisement, Bitcoin Co. Ltd. therefore has no choice but to suspend operations until such as time that the laws in Thailand are updated to account for the existance of Bitcoin. The Bank of Thailand has said they will further consider the issue, but did not give any specific timeline.
Suspend operations in Thailand. At least that's what I gather from other news outlets.
I was thinking the same thing. There are no Thailand-based bitcoin companies at all. And they say "trading activities related to the electronic currently have been suspended indefinitely." Um, no, it's encrypted and mostly unblockable. So unless they inspect every computer and remove the bitcoin client software, they can't block it.
I think the BS news that they're puffing up is that the Bank of Thailand is no longer accepting electronic fund transfers from the bitcoin exchanges. As for "stopping trading or use" all I have to say is lol, no.
I should thing their monetary authorities more concerned with money laundering around their globally infamous prostitution and heroin trades, rather than the drop in the bucket of illicit activity carried out via Bitcoin. Perhaps it's just that they haven't figured out how to take bribes via Bitcoin yet.
The Streisand effect on BitCoin is going to be huge.
No it isn't. Ordinarily I would agree with you but frankly very few people care about Bitcoin or have any reason to care about Bitcoin. NOBODY who is doing meaningful amounts of currency exchanges is going to want to bother with it. Since I don't buy or sell illegal drugs I honestly cannot conceive of any circumstance under which I would use it, even if I ignore the inherent exchange rate risk and liquidity problems.
You may call it a law, I call it a challenge.
So much for these officials ably serving the needs of the country.
Oh no, however will BitCoin cope with the inability to convert into Thai WhateverTheFucks.
Yes, Thai WhateverTheFucks, because although I know many currencies in the world off the top of my head, Thailand's is that unimportant I really can't even remember what their currency is called, if it was ever relevant enough for me to have ever known in the first place.
Call me when it can no longer be switched to US dollars, Euros, Pound Sterling or whatever and maybe then I'll care because whilst it can still be converted to one of those currencies it can then still then be trivially converted on to any other currency in the world including Thai WhateverTheFucks.
You might say that bitcoin operations are "thai'd up" at the moment.
Thai as I might, I can't ignore that pun.
Per Wikipedia, the Thai WTF is called the baht. Cheers!
Defending IP by destroying access to it? That makes sense, RIAA/MPAA. Go to the corner until you can play nice!
You seem to be unaware that the Asian Financial Crisis of 1997 was touched of by the collapse of the Thai Bhat. That is not unimportant.
The currency is known as the Baht, or THB (Thai Hooker Boys). The current exchange rate is 1 EUR for about 41 THB.
And expression popularized by the drug dealers on "The Wire".
funny
Bitcoin Co. Ltd is a Thai company. Obviously rhere's plenty others that deal in Bitcoin around the world, but this particular operation will have to shut down (for the foreseeable future).
so if Bitcoin is now outlawed I guess they can start using Litecoins or any other cryptocurrency. Just a moving target at this point. P2P always wins.
LiteTree Litecoin Exchange
You seem to be unaware that the Asian Financial Crisis of 1997 was touched of by the collapse of the Thai Bhat. That is not unimportant.
I would consider that very relevant to this news, actually!
As in, if I lived in SE Asia, right about now I'd do my damnedest to convert all my liquid assets to gold, ammo (if legal there), Euros, and yes, BTC.
History has a funny but pretty consistent trend, that when a country starts to get really paranoid about locking down control over its currency supply, that currency collapses shortly thereafter.
Well, now that you've posted this on the Internet, you'll probably have an opportunity to buy them with blow jobs and cigarettes very shortly.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
That was 16 years ago. Did you miss the rise of China, and the growth of India in the meantime? Even Indonesia's economy makes Thailand look irrelevant now.
That would be the Bitcoin Co Ltd exchange (https://bitcoin.co.th/) .. that's having issues with the Bank of Thailand (Thailand's central/reserve bank) ..bahtcoin is still open for the moment
This appears to be ramping up - last month bitspend had it's accounts frozen from Chase citing potential money laundering, and new allegations of ponzi schemes are making all the federal regulators nervous - as they should be
Many Americans are surprised to learn that in many Asian countries such as Thailand, Vietnam, and China, what is not specifically legal is viewed as illegal. If there are no laws about something, it is illegal there. Obviously the authorities do not choose to enforce the law against the vast majority of people's illegal actions, but that is the way their legal system works.
They also kill people for having a bag of drugs but you may fuck their children. Great legal system.
And in what is SURELY unrelated news, BitCoin's value has jumped in value $10+ USD over the past day or so.
Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! Now it makes sense! Bitcoin for years has been using the Bhat symbol on the keyboard to represent Bitcoin similar to $ for dollars. That explains why they're not thrilled.
More importantly, the baht has a symbol which is also used as the symbol for bitcoin:
The somewhat more common bitcoin symbol has two vertical lines (like the US dollar), but still - maybe the Thai government doesn't like the possibility of confusion?
The Bank of Thailand is both the central bank, like the US Federal Reserve, and the issuer of currency, like the US Treasury Department.
It is a government institution.
Here in the US, we've separated the two to some extent. The Treasury Department makes and enforces the rules, the government role.
The Federal Reserve is more like a "central credit union" than a central bank - it's primary role is to serve as "bank for banks", where banks can deposit money or get 24 hour loans. In Thailand, as in many countries, the two functions are combined.
"First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win." - Mahatma Gandhi
I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed or numbered. My life is my own.
So if our "bank for banks" is largely run by their customers, I guess it's more of a central credit union than a central bank.
Of course, unlike Thailand and some other countries, in the "bank for banks" is separate from the Treasury Department, which is purely governmental. The Bank Of Thailand is both the banking facilitator like the Fed, and also the issuer and regulator of currency, like our Treasury Department. I think I like having them split like we do.
by Cajun Hell (725246) Alter Relationship on Tuesday July 30, 2013 @03:15PM (#44423725) Homepage Journal I would agree with you but frankly very few people care about Bitcoin or have any reason to care about Bitcoin. You probably don't care much about Yuan-Dollar exchange rates much either, but you sure as hell have reason to care about it! We used to see the (approximate and debatable) 3% that Visa and Mastercard skims from nearly all sales transactions, as merely the cost of doing business, and a worthwhile expense in exchange for the service they offer. And yet, now The People have the tech to avoid that charge, so what used to be a 3% expense is considered 3% economic damage, a parasite. Most of us probably don't really have visceral bad feelings about Visa quite on the scale implied by the word "parasite" and yet, whenever you're buying a larger ticket item (a house, a car) you negotiate like hell over figures much smaller than 3%. And when I think about how much money I spent on my car, compared to how much money I have spend on fueling and maintaining my car with a plastic card, the plastic card's costs dwarf anything I ever negotiated with my car dealer. Visa and Mastercard's expenses are right there in your face, for anyone who looks into it. There's reason to move to something cheaper. Or threaten to move to something cheaper. You don't necessarily have to do it, as long as you can prove you're willing to do it. Who knows, maybe Bitcoin is what'll get Visa merchant charges down to 0.3%. Isn't it interesting that your grandparents had the same percentage skimmed off their lives, whereas you today live in a higher tech world where the expenses of providing transactions services, are tiny by comparison. In the end, Bitcoin is just another market force. There are plenty of indirect ones out there (exchange rates, decisions made by central banks, etc) that you don't think about much, or ever take actions on, and yet they have a profound effect on your economic well-being. It's fine to say you don't care, but for fuck's sake, don't say people don't have reason to care! --
The Thai government was concerned about the risk of confusion: The "bahtcoin".
Yeah. You just did the Batman TV theme in your head. Admit it.
Welcome to the Panopticon. Used to be a prison, now it's your home.
Thailand has experienced a lot of troubles from fund flow. Remember the Economic crisis in 1997? That's the result of uncontrollable fund flow. Since then Thailand learned that they need to be able to control and record fund flowing in and out of the country.
You probably don't care much about Yuan-Dollar exchange rates much either, but you sure as hell have reason to care about it!
The yuan is a significant factor in the world economy. Bitcoin is not. Bitcoin is a barely used, illiquid, volatile currency that most people don't understand and even fewer people actually use. Should bitcoin become significant someday, then I will reconsider my position. I don't realistically see that happening though.
We used to see the (approximate and debatable) 3% that Visa and Mastercard skims from nearly all sales transactions, as merely the cost of doing business, and a worthwhile expense in exchange for the service they offer. And yet, now The People have the tech to avoid that charge
Bitcoin is not that tech, nor does it offer any reasonable prospect of becoming that tech anytime soon. Visa and the rest have an existing global network, transaction processing infrastructure, and an installed base of users. Replicating/replacing even a fraction of that will cost HUGE amounts of money and will have to displace entrenched competitors. Bitcoin presently has no reasonable prospects of putting any kind of dent in the business model of credit cards for the foreseeable future.
Or threaten to move to something cheaper. You don't necessarily have to do it, as long as you can prove you're willing to do it.
Threats are useless unless they are credible threats. Bitcoin is not a credible threat to the existing transaction processing infrastructure at this time.
There's reason to move to something cheaper.
Of course there is. However once you account for all the externalities and risk, bitcoin is not cheaper right now except in rare corner cases. Perhaps that will change in time... but I doubt it.
does that make paypal illegal too?
Say I want to buy physical goods in person and pay with BTC. But Wi-Fi isn't available everywhere I shop, and cellular carriers charge $360 a year for a smartphone data plan, and I haven't found a U.S. carrier that takes payment in BTC. Are there BTC wallets that work without both parties having to have their own Internet connection at the time of sale?
this is sad. doing some calculations on a computer is AGAIN deemed illegal. i wonder how many times
the same (or very similar) calculations are made INSIDE the bank systems network.
that would be freaking ILLEGAL too!
methinks that people can pretty much attribute VALUE to anything they want.
so contest this "law". you can calculate ANYTHING you want on your computer.
of course it should be fairly simple to block the value from changing its identity, that is from being
a calculation (bitcoin) to reeeaaal thai money.
so there you go: calculating bitcoins and transferring them cannot be illegal. trading them for money can be illegal,
though i think nobody here gives a flying f... about bitcoins.
it's prolly easier to put on some makeup and a sweat dress, or join politics, or the military or police to make a quick buck here.
a sample local "law": "you cannot park on the left side of the road after 6 am". mind you this is a two way road *sigh*.
I can't believe this, all of you still don't get it. The reason these governments are cracking down on bitcoin is because they cannot control the value, amount or circulation of this currency. Governments are scared of this because officials work closely with Corporations to control value, amount and circulation of currencies and commodities so that they can easily control economies and actions of the people that they dominate. They are always going to need slaves to all the work and controlling money is one of the best ways that they do that. Silly Slashdotters.
- TeamBerserk
"concept of Rule of Law essentially means:" I am the law.
Haha
Nice Thai!
Three things:
The press release says that the government said existing laws don't take into account allowing an exchange to trade a virtual currency (yet).
The article sensationalizes this by saying "banned", implying that it was legal before.
Lastly, the author of the article seems to think without an exchange, Bitcoin can't be traded, which of course is false. So, by "banning" the existence of a commercial exchange, the author concludes that Bitcoin entirely has been banned in the country.
I could be missing something, but I don't think Bitcoin has been banned in Thailand as barter.
with cash, like normal people. They invented illegal drugs before bitcoin.
Lot of other individuals, corporations and governments arround the world rally around bitcoin, as their market share increased because of Thailand's new law.
Thailand lost some wealth.
He's said many times he does not want anyone in prison for insulting him, yet keeps the law enacted just in case someone he really does not like insults him so he can throw them in jail for 10 years? that's a great system of rule
Awwww shit.. I was looking forward to making all the underage girl prostitutes cry by paying them in bitcoins on my next visit.... I was so looking forward to that... :-(
I surely can't be the only one who has a problem with government controlled banks who will loan to certain groups of people (primary banks) and not others.
Shouldn't all people be on an equal footing with government owned and controlled banks, why can't I seek a loan of last resort or deposit money in the Federal Reserve?
are up in arms
So for a Thai, storing 33 characters of information on your computer is illegal? That's real tough to enforce. How long before a Thai tattoos a bitcoin on their arm to prove a point?
That story was nonsense from the beginning.
What actually happened:
One of the Bitcoin exchanges based in Thailand went to a branch of the Thai Government asking them to officially endorse Bitcoin trading for their company. This would have given them a huge commercial advantage, and would have made Thailand the FIRST country to legalize Bitcoin.
Thailand decided not to give this one exchange their official sanction for now - citing perfectly valid reasons.
All the story was based upon was a statement from the Thai Bitcoin exchange on their website - saying that they had been advised that trading Bitcoins had not been declared legal. Not legal is not the same as illegal. They closed their exchange, and they say that a decision from the Thai government is pending. You could speculate that their decision to close their exchange was based on a desire to appear compliant to the authorities rather than any actual legal ruling.
Why nonsense like this escaped the notice of the combined intellect of Slashdot is beyond my comprehension.
A hilarious post, yet wholly appropriate. Props to you.