6 ms·

In a world where cash is starting to dissapear, payment processors and banking in general should be regulated and treated just like some sort of utility company

In a world where cash is starting to dissapear, payment processors and banking in general should be regulated and treated just like some sort of utility company (Ex: Water, electricity). Advertising is a different beast altogether. Being able to to exchanges (money for goods, etc) is something quite a basic right(If I can call it that). That doesn't apply to making money though. I don't think it's normal in any way to force anyone to conduct business with someone they don't want to unless is a basic necessity in that particular day and age.

dotancohen 5y ago
I'm not a fan of digital currencies, but this is one of their shining points.
lotsofpulp 5y ago
It is supposedly coming, albeit decades late: https://www.frbservices.org/financial-services/fednow https://www.frbservices.org/financial-services/fednow
mcherm 5y ago
> In a world where cash is starting to dissapear, payment processors and banking in general should be regulated and treated just like some sort of utility company I'm not sure if you are missing contacts or providing irony. But the fact is payment processors and banking in general is extremely heavily regulated. A few years ago when you saw almost all banks and payment companies starting to crack down on spending money to buy and sell cryptocurrency, that was to no small extent because federal regulators gave them a little side-eye about the subject. No specific regulations, to be clear, but a few pointed questions. When every means of sending money overseas demands clear documentation of your identity, That's not so much because banks feel the need to know every detail of your business; it is strictly mandated by federal law. And while my examples all involve US banking, most governments around the world are similarly strict.
- woofcat 5y ago
  I think they're saying the regulations should include not excluding someones legal business because you 'dislike it' ala WikiLeaks.
  - londons_explore 5y ago
    Todays finance regulators require you to not do business with some people, often without good evidence. For example, if you do business with wikileaks, you will get a nudge from the regulator to 'reduce the number of high risk clients' you work with... They're not saying it's illegal, but they're also saying they're going to find some regulation to prosecute you with unless you do as they say. It's a sad state of affairs when these kind of regulations aren't written in stone, but instead are flexible and applied on a case-by-case basis.
    - matheusmoreira 5y ago
      This sort of thing is exactly why we need private and anonymous cryptocurrency like Monero.
    - webspinner 5y ago
      Is this still the case today, in 2021? I know that Wikileaks was blockaded for several years, but I thought those were all dealt with.
- superkuh 5y ago
  There are different types of regulation. The one that exists now and primarily is regulation such that individual human people cannot transfer or store in to large amounts of money without federal investigation of the source and identity. Banking and processors comply with these rules and generally go overboard making things hard for human people so they can keep their own corporate asses safe. But the type of regulation that is needed is regulation of the banks and payment processors themselves. Not of their clients or things related to their clients.
franga2000 5y ago
How credit card processing hasn't been classified and regulated as a utility is truly baffling to me. Especially with governments explicitly recommending contactless card payments instead of cash during the pandemic and many doing things like taking large bank notes out of circulation for years now. We don't need crazy things like crypto - we need decentralised and accountable banks and payment processors (not that the distinction between the two makes any sense either). Speaking of credit card companies: why do they exist?? Why can't my card just sign a digital request for transfer and tell the POS terminal to send it to my bank to be executed. A room of computer science students could write an open standard for that in like a month and have a working implementation within the year.
- psychlops 5y ago
  Crypto is the only competition that can force financial innovation in TBTF era.
  - franga2000 5y ago
    Innovation isn't what's needed, it's regulation. Making an alternative that does a couple things better but a thousand things worse isn't going to turn a broken market into a free one. There are multiple types of decentralization and the one we need for finance isn't the "everyone is (theoretically) equal and there are no rules" of crypto but the "distributed network of trusted providers" that we use for things like public key infrastructure and email. People WILL get hacked, lose their wallets, etc. so recovery MUST be possible and like it or not, law enforcement SHOULD have the power to freeze accounts and take back money that doesn't belong to someone.
    - mindslight 5y ago
      I'm no apologist for corporate power, but most payment network censorship seems to be driven by government regulations - Wikileaks, sex work, weed, and gambling are all things the government has passed laws to explicitly harm. As such, additional regulation is more likely to cement the current restrictions rather than repudiate them.
chuckee 5y ago
> Advertising is a different beast altogether. You are correct. Web advertising is long overdue for some trust-busting. But for some reason, antitrust law is rarely enforced.

dotancohen 5y ago

I'm not a fan of digital currencies, but this is one of their shining points.

lotsofpulp 5y ago

It is supposedly coming, albeit decades late: https://www.frbservices.org/financial-services/fednow https://www.frbservices.org/financial-services/fednow

mcherm 5y ago

> In a world where cash is starting to dissapear, payment processors and banking in general should be regulated and treated just like some sort of utility company I'm not sure if you are missing contacts or providing irony. But the fact is payment processors and banking in general is extremely heavily regulated. A few years ago when you saw almost all banks and payment companies starting to crack down on spending money to buy and sell cryptocurrency, that was to no small extent because federal regulators gave them a little side-eye about the subject. No specific regulations, to be clear, but a few pointed questions. When every means of sending money overseas demands clear documentation of your identity, That's not so much because banks feel the need to know every detail of your business; it is strictly mandated by federal law. And while my examples all involve US banking, most governments around the world are similarly strict.

woofcat 5y ago
I think they're saying the regulations should include not excluding someones legal business because you 'dislike it' ala WikiLeaks.
- londons_explore 5y ago
  Todays finance regulators require you to not do business with some people, often without good evidence. For example, if you do business with wikileaks, you will get a nudge from the regulator to 'reduce the number of high risk clients' you work with... They're not saying it's illegal, but they're also saying they're going to find some regulation to prosecute you with unless you do as they say. It's a sad state of affairs when these kind of regulations aren't written in stone, but instead are flexible and applied on a case-by-case basis.
  - matheusmoreira 5y ago
    This sort of thing is exactly why we need private and anonymous cryptocurrency like Monero.
  - webspinner 5y ago
    Is this still the case today, in 2021? I know that Wikileaks was blockaded for several years, but I thought those were all dealt with.
superkuh 5y ago
There are different types of regulation. The one that exists now and primarily is regulation such that individual human people cannot transfer or store in to large amounts of money without federal investigation of the source and identity. Banking and processors comply with these rules and generally go overboard making things hard for human people so they can keep their own corporate asses safe. But the type of regulation that is needed is regulation of the banks and payment processors themselves. Not of their clients or things related to their clients.

franga2000 5y ago

How credit card processing hasn't been classified and regulated as a utility is truly baffling to me. Especially with governments explicitly recommending contactless card payments instead of cash during the pandemic and many doing things like taking large bank notes out of circulation for years now. We don't need crazy things like crypto - we need decentralised and accountable banks and payment processors (not that the distinction between the two makes any sense either). Speaking of credit card companies: why do they exist?? Why can't my card just sign a digital request for transfer and tell the POS terminal to send it to my bank to be executed. A room of computer science students could write an open standard for that in like a month and have a working implementation within the year.

psychlops 5y ago
Crypto is the only competition that can force financial innovation in TBTF era.
- franga2000 5y ago
  Innovation isn't what's needed, it's regulation. Making an alternative that does a couple things better but a thousand things worse isn't going to turn a broken market into a free one. There are multiple types of decentralization and the one we need for finance isn't the "everyone is (theoretically) equal and there are no rules" of crypto but the "distributed network of trusted providers" that we use for things like public key infrastructure and email. People WILL get hacked, lose their wallets, etc. so recovery MUST be possible and like it or not, law enforcement SHOULD have the power to freeze accounts and take back money that doesn't belong to someone.
  - mindslight 5y ago
    I'm no apologist for corporate power, but most payment network censorship seems to be driven by government regulations - Wikileaks, sex work, weed, and gambling are all things the government has passed laws to explicitly harm. As such, additional regulation is more likely to cement the current restrictions rather than repudiate them.

chuckee 5y ago

> Advertising is a different beast altogether. You are correct. Web advertising is long overdue for some trust-busting. But for some reason, antitrust law is rarely enforced.