Quote from: repentance on March 19, 2013, 11:58:26 PM

Patrick, do we also run up against the issue of people laying themselves open to sanctions if they take intermediate steps to avoid these provisions - such as purchasing something with BTC they have mined but then selling their purchases? As the original source of the BTC isn't a "serious crime" or predicate offence (which is key in relation to how FATF defines money laundering), then it's hard to argue such a strategy is money-laundering per se and yet my instinct is that taking such steps could well be an offence in its own right (especially if done repeatedly).

That sounds an awful lot like Structuring (structuring transactions), which is one technique for laundering money. One example of structuring would be attempts to avoid triggering the FinCEN reporting that kicks in at $10,000 per transaction by breaking up high value transactions and sending them in sub-$10,000 batches. Most financial institutions have algorithms and other detection techniques to catch and report this kind of behavior and it can land you in very serious trouble.

As I recall, under the BSA you don't need a predicate offense to be found guilty of structuring. The act of avoiding or attempting to avoid BSA reporting is itself a crime.

In your example, it's not textbook structuring (or smurfing), because you are moving value from bitcoin to goods to real money (if I'm reading this correctly). In addition you are assuming there was no predicate offense, so it would appear that there is no money laundering issue.