Quote from: pjce on June 22, 2011, 10:00:56 PM

I don't WANT to have btc exchanges registered

contradicts

Quote from: pjce on June 22, 2011, 10:00:56 PM

but again I think the future is in expanding the market to the masses.

Exchanges need to be registered, I'm running one and the reason I'm not currently accepting EUR wires is that I want to feel safe, and not vulnerable to legal hazard.

My opinion is that since bitcoin is not legally recognized as a currency (in France at least) it should either be considered as :
- a security (fungible asset)
- a generic service (me selling bitcoins to you = me providing the service of signing a transaction we mutually see as acceptable)

AFAIK, the only way to legally run a bitcoin exchange is to buy coins from people and then sell them to other people (in a single transaction).
So the exchange would have to act as a counter-party to users.

It's not feasible in France though. The reason is that if I buy a 1 BTC for 1 EUR from a user, I'll have to immediately resell it adding VAT, which in France is 19.6%.

So you'd be buying one BTC from me at 1.20 EUR even though I bought it at 1 EUR (and I wouldn't be making any profit at all).