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Bitcoin isn't legal tender anywhere. One could argue that a currency is something which is legal tender somewhere in the world.

Tloewald 13y ago
Yes but the argument at hand is that BTC is not a sensible unit of exchange. How much for a hotel room .... now, oh wait now, no no no I mean now?
dllthomas 13y ago
So is the Somali Shilling no longer a currency? People use it to engage in commerce and settle debts, but the government that issued it doesn't exist anymore.
nly 13y ago
If I had 30 million British pennies it wouldn't be legal tender, because nobody is required to accept that volume by law. Does that mean my 30 million pennies aren't currency?
- jljljl 13y ago
  That is not what legal tender means. Legal tender means that the form of payment is a legally accepted option for extinguishing a debt. If you owed someone a debt of 30,000 British pounds, you could repay that debt with the pennies, and they would have to accept it. So pennies are both a legal tender and a currency in that case.
  - JetSetWilly 13y ago
    You are incorrect: http://www.royalmint.com/aboutus/policies-and-guidelines/legal-tender-guidelines http://www.royalmint.com/aboutus/policies-and-guidelines/leg... Pennies are only legal tender for amounts not exceeding 20p edit: Also, as the link makes clear, you don't have to accept them even below 20p. All that legal tender means is: > that a debtor cannot successfully be sued for non-payment if he pays into court in legal tender. It does not mean that any ordinary transaction has to take place in legal tender or only within the amount denominated by the legislation
    - nly 13y ago
      Yup, one of the common misconceptions about money. There's also no legal requirement to give change.
    - jljljl 13y ago
      I did not realize there was a limitation on Pennies as legal tender. Good to know. However, your second point agrees with what I was trying to say. The fact that a business does not accept change below a certain amount has nothing to do with whether a denomination is legal tender or not. Legal tender only has to do with cancelling out or paying debts. From the child post: >>Yup, one of the common misconceptions about money. There's also no legal requirement to give change. This also has nothing to do with whether a coin/denomination is legal tender or not.
  - DanBC 13y ago
    UK pennies are either bronze or copper plated steel. Bronze pennies are worth more than a penny, so paying someone with 30,000 pennies would give them some value of scrap metal. (If they were prepared to break any English law about destroying coin).
JetSetWilly 13y ago
In Scotland no banknotes at all are legal tender. But they certainly are used as a currency..

Tloewald 13y ago

Yes but the argument at hand is that BTC is not a sensible unit of exchange. How much for a hotel room .... now, oh wait now, no no no I mean now?

dllthomas 13y ago

So is the Somali Shilling no longer a currency? People use it to engage in commerce and settle debts, but the government that issued it doesn't exist anymore.

nly 13y ago

If I had 30 million British pennies it wouldn't be legal tender, because nobody is required to accept that volume by law. Does that mean my 30 million pennies aren't currency?

jljljl 13y ago
That is not what legal tender means. Legal tender means that the form of payment is a legally accepted option for extinguishing a debt. If you owed someone a debt of 30,000 British pounds, you could repay that debt with the pennies, and they would have to accept it. So pennies are both a legal tender and a currency in that case.
- JetSetWilly 13y ago
  You are incorrect: http://www.royalmint.com/aboutus/policies-and-guidelines/legal-tender-guidelines http://www.royalmint.com/aboutus/policies-and-guidelines/leg... Pennies are only legal tender for amounts not exceeding 20p edit: Also, as the link makes clear, you don't have to accept them even below 20p. All that legal tender means is: > that a debtor cannot successfully be sued for non-payment if he pays into court in legal tender. It does not mean that any ordinary transaction has to take place in legal tender or only within the amount denominated by the legislation
  - nly 13y ago
    Yup, one of the common misconceptions about money. There's also no legal requirement to give change.
  - jljljl 13y ago
    I did not realize there was a limitation on Pennies as legal tender. Good to know. However, your second point agrees with what I was trying to say. The fact that a business does not accept change below a certain amount has nothing to do with whether a denomination is legal tender or not. Legal tender only has to do with cancelling out or paying debts. From the child post: >>Yup, one of the common misconceptions about money. There's also no legal requirement to give change. This also has nothing to do with whether a coin/denomination is legal tender or not.
- DanBC 13y ago
  UK pennies are either bronze or copper plated steel. Bronze pennies are worth more than a penny, so paying someone with 30,000 pennies would give them some value of scrap metal. (If they were prepared to break any English law about destroying coin).

JetSetWilly 13y ago

In Scotland no banknotes at all are legal tender. But they certainly are used as a currency..