Andreas M. Antonopoulos testimony for Australian Senate
Channel: aantonop
Date: 2015-03-04

This testimony was delivered at the Senate Economics References Committee of the Australian Senate, presenting on Bitcoin and digital currencies, on March 4, 2015.

Chapters
0:00 Opening Remarks
2:30 What is Bitcoin?
7:33 Do you still see that there is some regulation needed for Bitcoin companies that might provide more than just access to currency?
9:37 In Canada, would you think it is possible to apply the prudential consumer protection laws that exist for traditional banks to Bitcoin and digital currency-type banks, without major modification? Could they be brought into your financial regulatory space quite easily?
11:53 At the moment in the United States, do you see companies offering fractional reserve banking for bitcoin?
13:34 In the North American Bitcoin industry, are they calling for, or do they want to have, your financial regulators exercise oversight on them? Do they want that third-party assurance from the government?
16:18 Security risks
21:43 Governments will employ smart people who could find a way to still surveil our transactions if we were all using digital currencies. Is that not a risk, given that they are all public?
23:26 If we decide that this is too risky, that it creates too great a security threat. How effective could we be, even in coordination with other countries, in stopping digital currency?
24:48 Do you think digital currencies are another order of difficulty for taxation authorities in terms of tracking transfers and pricing, and related issues about the jurisdiction of profits?
27:18 Since you have just been through the Canadian inquiry, what evidence did you hear in that inquiry that most alarmed you?
28:17 How do we get the balance right between what the industry naturally wants, a regulatory framework to provide them certainty, so that your Visas and Mastercards can start properly investing, and at the same time, not creating too rigid of a framework that effectively displaces the benefits?
32:26 Do you think people will maintain their own keys for their digital cash on their own computers or do you think they will use third-parties to manage that process?
35:38 How long do you think it will be before Bitcoin becomes mainstream?


Text of the opening remarks:
http://antonopoulos.com/2015/03/03/opening-remarks-andreas-m-antonopoulos-testimony-for-the-australian-senate-committee-on-economics-references-march-4th-2015/

Testimony for the Canadian Senate: https://youtu.be/GP_eT6E4os8
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