FinCEN: Digital Currency Cloud Mining, Escrow Services Aren't Money Transmitters
The US Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) has issued new rulings indicating that digital currency-related cloud mining and escrow services should not be considered money transmitters. The two releases came via what appear to be responses to requests from businesses seeking to better understand FinCEN's policies. FinCEN, the bureau of the US treasury that collects and analyzes financial transactions, has previously released influential decisions regarding how consumer bitcoin miners and bitcoin investors should be regulated under money transmission laws. Published letter rulings....
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The US Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) has published a new Suspicious Activity Report (SAR) analysis and, notably, the bulletin covers bitcoin. FinCEN, which is a bureau of the Department of the Treasury, has already weighed in on bitcoin in the past. In the last six months, it has ruled that bitcoin miners and investors, as well as cloud mining and escrow services built on the bitcoin protocol, are not money transmitters. FinCEN is tasked with policing financial transactions in the US and all money transmitters are expected to register with the bureau. This issue has....
If there was any doubt about the fact as to whether or not FinCEN believes that digital currency payment processors in addition to exchange weren't money transmitters, there's now supreme clarity. This week, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) released two administrative rules covering a number of topics related to bitcoin. You can read them below: FIN-2014-R012. Here's the second one: FIN-2014-R011. As expected, members of the community aren't exactly thrilled about the news, but clarity when it comes to these matters are certainly important. What do you make of it all?
Some good news came out of the US Treasury Department for American Bitcoin miners. Anyone mining Bitcoins for his or her own purposes and not for the benefit of others will not be consider a money services business and will thus have no obligation to register with FinCEN, according to a ruling by the group. FinCEN, or the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, has thus far required any US-based Bitcoin business to register as money transmitters. But if you are mining Bitcoins simply for your own digital currency wealth and spending those earnings for your sole benefit, then you don’t fall....
The US Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) published two new rulings on 30th January that aim to bring clarity as to which players in the virtual currency space will fall under the Bank Secrecy Act's (BSA) definition of a money transmitter. FinCEN said that miners who mine virtual currency for their own use, as well as companies that purchase and sell convertible virtual currency solely as an investment aren't subject to this law. "The first ruling states that, to the extent a user creates or "mines" a convertible virtual currency solely for a user's own purposes, the user is not....
FinCEN has released two new Virtual Currency Guidance notes today. FIN-2014-R011 and FIN-2014-R2012 both detail FinCEN's response to requests "for Administrative Ruling on the Application of FinCEN's Regulations to Virtual Currency" Trading Platforms and Payment Systems. FinCEN has clarified that both would require a money transmitter license under their federal rules. FinCEN's clarifications, presented by Jamal El-Hindi, the Associate Director of FinCEN's Policy Division, may be the precursor to a new wave of Bitcoin company crackdowns. Recently, the SEC revealed that there were ongoing....