So i have been working with bitcoin since it started, i sold off all my holdings at 6k before the rise to the moon, but recently ive came back to buy some and all of the otc markets are gone, local traders require ID, the big exchanges either dont accept fiat or require your soul and mothers baby pictures.
So can somebody help me understand what happened? did the 2017 bubble kill off the anonymity or am i missing something?
It's been gradually getting worse for the last year or two. The price rise and increasing size of the market had a lot to do with it, I'm sure. FINCEN is watching... a bunch of Localbitcoins traders have been arrested on money laundering related charges. BTC-e, who allowed anonymous trading since 2011, got shut down by the US government and fined $110M for AML violations. Exchanges started either mandating KYC or prohibiting US customers. Localbitcoins started mandating KYC for "significant" trade volumes last April.
I understand the importance of a trust-circle but i am asking solely on the basis of send payment, get bitcoin using WU, cash deposit, Moneypak, etc.. without an in-group. It seems there isnt even a way anymore to find private sellers efficiently, just oceans full of buyers trying to pawn off paypal and itunes giftcards, OTC sellers requiring ID, and corporate exchanges that are even worse than mtgox.
Options are getting slimmer and slimmer. Paxful and Bisq are options, but they're both disappointing in terms of both volume and interface. There are traders on this forum as well -- try the Currency Exchange board.
So what actually caused this? Regulations shouldnt have effected the OTC market IMO.
I guess it's related to money transmission laws that were already on the books.