Post
Topic
Board Legal
Re: What are the two unregulated "Money Transmitter" states? (USA)
by
cbeast
on 23/07/2013, 15:33:45 UTC
According to this PDF document prepared by Thomas Brown at UC Berkeley the two free states are South Carolina and Montana.

Somebody found my cheat sheet!

I don't suppose you would be so kind as to share your opinion on what significance (if any) there is in SC and Montana not having these regulations, as it relates specifically to the Bitcoin legal landscape?

Is this more along the lines of an interesting piece of trivia or something that people who are starting up Bitcoin based businesses should possibly consider when choosing where to operate, incorporate, etc...?

I guess, I don't see any evidence of a whole bunch of current fiat-based institutions locating themselves in these states or anything (please correct me if I'm wrong), which tells me that the "free" states are sort of free in name only? 

My guess is:

If you are operating as a money transmitter in a state that doesn't require a license; then you would only need to register with FinCEN. But that would be if you are only doing business in that state. With the current guidance of FinCEN (until/if it is further clarified), the advantage I could see; is a miner would then be able to sell units that he/she mined on an exchange such as BTC-E. Again this is only a guess, as I'm not a lawyer.
Would South Carolina and Montana then be good places to install Bitcoin ATMs?