

San Francisco Open Exchange (YC S14) Aims to Be the E-Trade of Bitcoin - katm
http://techcrunch.com/2014/08/23/san-francisco-open-exchange-aims-to-be-the-e-trade-of-bitcoin/

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TheOsiris
Hi guys,

I'm one of the founders of SFOX.com. It's been great working on the product
with the great team at YCombinator. It was incredibly helpful to us.

Please let me know if you have any questions or feedback on SFOX.

Thanks!

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pstrateman
So... you're operating what is effective a commodities brokerage?

I assume you've got enough insurance to cover fighting with the CFTC and the
SEC?

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Avalaxy
Who is this aimed at? Reqular people buying some Bitcoin don't care about a
price difference of $1. Traders looking to do arbitrage probably already have
their own bots and scripts to do that.

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appenin
>Traders looking to do arbitrage probably already have their own bots and
scripts to do that.

I doubt this actually happens, at least in any significant scale, in real
life. Algorithmic traders already make enough money in less dangerous
environments than Bitcoin.

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kasey_junk
There after any number of algo trading opportunities in bitcoin. In fact, Algo
prop shops may be uniquely positioned to trade bitcoin as more established
entities can't or won't.

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dublinben
Treating Bitcoin like an investment commodity just harms its utility as a
currency. I wish they were focusing on how to make spending Bitcoin easier,
rather than making tools for speculators.

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kasey_junk
How are currencies not commodities?

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dublinben
Currencies don't have any inherent useful value, while commodities do.

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kasey_junk
So there are 2 major problems with that definition.

1) It's factually untrue. Currencies have both the value of their materials
and the art imposed on them. Now it is true, that the primary driver of their
price is not that "inherent" value. The primary driver of their price is that
they work as stores for value, as a medium of exchange, and that they are
fundamentally tied to the governance regime they are associated with. But
there are lots of commodities that have the same characteristics. Gold's price
is much more dependent on people's perception of it as a value store than on
it's usefulness as an input to industrial production or as an artistic element
and energy credits are commodities existent only within the governance regime
that created them.

2) Even if you don't buy that loosened definition of commodity in general, in
the context of an exchange currencies are universally considered commodities
because they have several important characteristics 1) there are both spot &
derivative markets for them 2) They are completely fungible, dollars made in
Philly are identical to ones made in San Fran 3) It is easy (trivial even) to
create standardized contracts around their delivery.

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scott00
Does a user need an account at each individual exchange, or is an account with
SFOX sufficient? In what states does SFOX hold a money transmitter license?

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TheOsiris
no, you just need an account with sfox.com

