Replies (34)

Yeah, that’s a disadvantage. But apparently this doesn’t happen with Strike. Iβ€˜ll need to test it.
Ultimately for these services to be β€œcompliant” and to operate in Europe, there really is no way around the KYC regulations - P2P/face-to-face/zap-to-zap, is the only way.
Does Luxembourg not have KYC regulation? The UK, obviously not in Europe now, has its own draconian KYC and other rules, which have simply driven everyone away.
Oh it does, it’s much less draconian because Luxembourg is essentially an off-shore zone 😬 Also, in many cases Luxembourg simply wouldn’t disclose this KYC data and other tax data to the EU. This is why all rich Germans live or are registered there πŸ˜‚
So far my experience has been smooth. I deposited a few tens of euros, converted them to bitcoin, and sent to my Phoenix wallet – all worked like magic for me. The fees are only a little bit higher than what Relai and Pocket offer (1.29% vs. 1.5%), but if you stack above €1k/months, the fee drops below 1%. Also, I found that Strike covers on-chain fees, so you can send bitcoin directly to cold storage.
No, sending sats between your wallets is never a taxable event. But for example sending some cash to a friend via Strike could be in theory considered as one because there’s a swap in the middle. But I hope it’s a taxable event for Strike, not for us simple users…
I think I was talking about the following situation: You deposit some cash to Strike and send it to a friend, say, in the US (as cash). If I understand Strike correctly, the transactions are so fast and cheap, because they first swap your cash into BTC, then send this BTC to the friendβ€˜s Strike wallet via Lightning, where it gets immediately swapped back to cash (in this case dollars) and shows up in the cash tab. Now, this first swap is theoretically a taxable event for the friend (selling BTC) or, when the friend sends you some cash, it’s a taxable event for you.
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