
Coinbase (YC S12) Opens to Europe - nvk
http://techcrunch.com/2014/09/10/coinbase-europe/
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rdl
Congratulations! Given how strong the European bitcoin community is, this
seems like a very important step. I wonder how they picked the first countries
-- were they a set with reciprocal registration, or just with the most
reasonable requirements, or bigger markets, ...?

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jakozaur
Looks more about jurisdiction. They omit a few large markets (Great Britain,
Germany, Poland).

Quote: "Some countries have posted guidance on it, while others have been
totally silent about it".

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someguy1233
Well the UK does have guidance on it...

[http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/briefs/vat/brief0914.htm](http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/briefs/vat/brief0914.htm)

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davedx
Yay! I've had the Coinbase wallet installed on my phone for months now and not
used it because the killer feature for me was "being able to buy Bitcoins".
Now I'm glad I live in the Netherlands.

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IkmoIkmo
Can't quite see myself using Coinbase over Bitonic as the 'fast but pricy
way', or using it over Kraken as the 'slow but cheap way'.

Except on the selling end of things, Bitonic has great buy prices but selling
is pretty crappy.

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davedx
The whole attraction of Coinbase for me is the convenience. I want to use it
like Chipknip; for large/important stuff I'll stick to my local wallet and
whichever exchange has the best rate.

Mass adoption is important. I see Coinbase as a big driver of that.

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jonalmeida
I'm disappointed Canada still isn't supported, especially after being the
highest voted country in their poll when they asked where would you like to
see Coinbase enabled next.

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GigabyteCoin
Perhaps they're going for the low hanging fruit first?

Canada already has an established exchange with 10 ATMs located across the
country and an established debit mastercard program. Plus there's a second
exchange that has been advertising heavily for the past year.

Coinbase's efforts in Canada would probably fall on deaf ears at the moment.
Anybody in Canada wishing to purchase Bitcoin has been (somewhat) easily
capable of doing so for the past 3 years.

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jonalmeida
Coinbase gives the convenience of set-up and bank account linking that makes
it a perfect service for me.

Like I mentioned, there does seem to be a demand for it in Canada so it
wouldn't fall on deaf ears.

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GigabyteCoin
>it wouldn't fall on deaf ears.

I agree completely. I am only arguing that their efforts are better spent in
currently untapped markets.

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edanm
Excellent news. I'm waiting for it to open up in Israel, though we tend to get
short-changed with product launches since we're a small country.

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MattBearman
Considering the UK has pretty specific guidelines on bitcoin mining and
trading, I'm very surprised that I still can't buy through coinbase.

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IkmoIkmo
I guess they might still be awaiting some regulation, which is still heavily
in flux in the UK. And the UK is definitely outside of the EU on some issues,
in particular currency, as they retained the british pound. Onboarding tens of
countries by adding 1 currency makes a lot more sense for a startup than
adding just 1 country for 1 currency.

It'll definitely happen at some point though, in fact some weeks ago before
all of this was announced a dropdown menu with 'US' and 'UK' suddenly appeared
in the country selector, sparking speculation of their first foray outside the
US.

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pinaceae
i guess the true value of bitcoin has been in coaxing all those CC companies,
banks and stores into the Apple Pay scheme.

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mateuszf
No Poland? Come on ..

