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Coinbase Wants Wall Street To Resolve Its Bitcoin Trust Issues (bloomberg.com)
In an effort to use digital money to reinvent finance, cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase is trying to legitimize itself by convincing big money managers to trust it enough to trade on its exchange. They need to "reassure regulators that bitcoin isn't a silk road for hackers, money launderers and tax evaders," reports Bloomberg. From the report: Despite the table tennis, Coinbase shows glimmers of maturity. More than 10 million customers have used the company since it began, though it recently quit updating the tally on its website. About $57 billion of digital currency has traded on the exchange so far this year. It doubled its staff in that time and expects to do so again in 2018. Ultimately, Coinbase plans to go public. The firm said it's prevailed against security threats, helping it avoid the fate of Mt. Gox, the world's biggest bitcoin exchange before shutting its doors in 2014 after $480 million of customer funds went bye-bye. Coinbase stores 98 percent of users' digital currencies in offline safe-deposit boxes. The remaining 2 percent, which is vulnerable because it's online, is covered by insurance. The company holds more than $10 billion in digital assets. Developing ties with banks is one of the biggest challenges. Coinbase doesn't publicly disclose its banking relationships, but a person familiar with the matter said the company is partnering with Cross River Bank, Metropolitan Bank and Silvergate Bank in the U.S.
because Bitcoin was a currency for Silk Road....
The headline seems pretty inflammatory and off-base. I'd look at TFA but the link goes to some other story that doesn't mention Coinbase.
the equivalent of FDIC insurance.
Wall streets always looking for new ways to profit. If bitcoin wasnâ(TM)t a giant scam they would have already embraced it.
until after the bubble bursts, then you can see what makes sense and what doesn't.
Coinbase stores 98 percent of users' digital currencies in offline safe-deposit boxes
Using external USB drives?
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
bitcoin isn't a silk road for hackers, money launderers and tax evaders,"
Except when it is.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
The general public became aware of Bitcoin, in a large part, due to reports of illegitimate commerce and promises of anonymity. It's going to take a long time, and twice as much positive journalism to break that reputation.
This a dangerous thing for Coinbase to wish for. Once mainstream financial firms are involved, the regulators will want Coinbase to act more like a real exchange, or at least a real crossing network. With lots of regulations. It's a tremendous burden that existing exchanges have already hurdled.
Sounds like a great plan for everyone but the tax payer! #MAGA
I've been dealing in bitcoins since 2010. Let me just say:
"Traditional investors like crooked, lying, manipulative Wall Street assholes can fuck off and stay out og bitcoin. We don't care what you think." - Sincerely, everyone in the bitcoin community.
but if you get 51% of the power then you can change the rules of bit coin. Also the caps are to low for it to work as an day to day thing.
Coinbase is struggling to keep up with demand. And while that's going on, it's a mess. Wire transfers go missing, and customer support is a joke. Is your $90K in limbo? No problem, just call their... oh wait, the people who answer the phone have zero power to do anything. Anything at all.
Oh, so just submit a support ticket. Good luck getting a replay. Or, like me, watch your case just vanish into the ether.
No, Coinbase cannot be trusted with your money. Not at the moment.
David Whatley
Coinbase should legitimise there own business practices first. I dunno, like maybe telling users whether or not they can actually sell BTC on the Coinbase platform from their country of origin.
Oh you mean Coinbase wants wallstreet to legitimize the biggest criminal / ponzi / laundering / terrorist funding outfit in the world? Sure... Sheep to slaughter...
Because actual traders (not the amateurs currently pushing the Bitcoin bubble) know what a bubble is and know that Bitcoin is pure hot air and extremely high risk. Sure, they also fall for bubbes, but not when it is this blatantly obvious. So no, "Wall Street" does not have a trust issue here. They just see what is.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
Bitcoin is in a bubble. It and the other cryptocurrencies are primarily designed to be decentralized and anonymous. This is a feature but also a problem for the financial world, where regulations matter to limit risk. When you show the SEC how to prevent cryptocurrencies from being used for ransomware, money laundering, and the support of terrorism, and when you show that the value is based on something other than mere speculation, they will buy in.
how did coinbase become such a big player when the major advantage of bitcoint is claimed to be its independence from a central authority?
Bitcoin is decentralized. However, to convert to/from Bitcoin to a countryâ(TM)s currency you need to use an exchange like Coinbase.
Coinbase has been closing customer accounts all over the place for quite a while now, no explanation but the suspicion is that if you have forwarded coins to a darknet wallet then they don't want your business. Once bitcoin collapses as a get rich quick scheme and returns to being useful as a payment method that decision could really come back to bite them.
Rolling up untrustworthy and fluctuating investments with actual valued ones is exactly how the crash in the mid 00s happened. Coinbase wants Wall Street money and doesn't care if they fuck up our economy in the process.
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
Is anybody actually buying anything tangible with them? There was the guy that used two BTC a few years ago to buy a pizza (which is now probably a $20k pizza). This seems like the digital equivalent of beanie babies...
If you want mine your own crypto currency, you need a motherboard with 19 PCIe 1X slots to plug in 19 GPUs and a couple of 1200W PSUs.