Most people don't realize they're inside a plexiglass shielded financial jail until they try to do something like wiring money for some legal activity in someplace spicy or on the FATF grey list.
If you fall into the middle bands of uses, or in the upper class that can just bend or make the rules, then the financial system is well oiled and it looks like the people questioning it are just cranks.
It's true that a lot of those in the outer bands are criminals but others are things like "buying a truck to build an orphanage for starving Iraqi children just outside of terrorist territory" or "wanted an investment visa in some corrupt island paradise and as it turns out no bank will open up account for purposes of 'international wires to the Comoros' "
Oh yeah, "most people outside the US" are looking to build orphanages in deeply sanctioned war zones. How could I have forgotten.
Come on now, that's absurd. If this is your best use case for stablecoins - groping for concocted scenarios to rationalise their existence
- I stand by what I said earlier: they're a solution in search of a problem.
One of the two is very close to something that actually happened to me. I tried to open up a bank account for paying immigration related costs to a particular shithole country, which is both legal and was part of a fully legal endeavor, but no bank would do it.
The other example is somewhat concocted but rooted in the time I spent in Iraq and noting almost all transactions are performed outside the banking system, in part because banking is inaccessible and people often don't have access to KYC documents.
It's really not absurd. As soon as you start trying to do anything interesting the KYC/AML burdens get greater until eventually you realize the compliance officers are just trying to get you to go away (or just deny you outright), get interesting enough and then suddenly despite fully complying with the law you find the walls are closed around you. Most people never find out because they never have occasion to try, they do a bunch of boring domestic transactions plus maybe some international trade with a few well known entities, then they just shout people are making up absurdities.
Clearly your situation of trying to obtain residency in the Comoros by investment would raise eyebrows at banks whose job it is to monitor tax compliance. I don't think you're describing an everyman kind of scenario.
I also don't entirely understand why you're even rationalising the purpose of the account to the bank. Can't you just open an account for any purpose? It takes me five minutes to open an account online, and I've never once been asked to explain or justify anything (in many decades). I use my accounts robustly, including for international transfers (I've lived on two continents in the last four years). I even once paid for a trip to North Korea out of an ordinary bank account. My bank never batted an eye.
Maybe you're just dealing with a bad bank, or an over-regulated banking system (Europe?). You realise you can walk into any US bank right now and they'll just open an account for you with nothing more than some accurate ID? And the same holds for much of the rest of the world? The problem you're trying to solve is already solved.
>> The other example is somewhat concocted but rooted in the time I spent in Iraq and noting almost all transactions are performed outside the banking system, in part because banking is inaccessible and people often don't have access to KYC documents.
Unsophisticated semi-literate farmers are the last demographic anyone is reasonably expecting to open their crypto brokerage accounts and start trading synthetic USD derivatives.
These are just not realistic scenarios. This is what people say when they rack their brains trying to come up with some reason stablecoins might be useful. I feel like you're just confirming that they're a solution in search of a problem.
> You realise you can walk into any US bank right now and they'll just open an account for you with nothing more than some accurate ID?
There's an ocean in the way, not to mention how risky visiting looks right now. I changed my name recently and the one US bank that I managed to get an account with (so that US clients can pay me without weirdness) won't accept any kind of documentation without going there in person (and I'm not sure I can provide anything they'll accept even if I did go there in person). What now?
Well no matter what you say it's always nuh uh, doesn't count or some variation of why can't you just be an "everyman." It's hard to argue with a dogmatic position that is based on feelings. You can tell such person what's actually happened to me when I tried to open an account with only "accurate ID" (a US passport) and they literally won't do it while you are homeless because they require a proof of address for KYC even if you have none. Almost everything they have asserted is plainly false. They also claim to have used their bank account to pay for trade in North Korea, a comprehensively sanctioned entity, which seems to be a public written confession of committing a serious crime just to own the crypto use crowd for internet points lol.
People in the middle bands of uses are just ignorantly bliss. And moving between "2 continents" in some vague most likely semi-developed white listed countries in most cases doesn't fall outside the middle bands of uses. So you end up with people shaking their fists at the sky crying that crypto exists, with their fingers in their ears and loudly proclaiming anyone using it are just making up absurd contrived scenarios.
Pick an FATF grey list country that isn't sanctioned by your country. Then try to wire money there. Let me know how it goes and whether you really aren't asked to explain anything.
Running down a list of corner cases means that you've already accepted the central idea. It's a classic internet troll-as-in-fishing gambit for derailing conversations that's been weirdly normalized.
If you fall into the middle bands of uses, or in the upper class that can just bend or make the rules, then the financial system is well oiled and it looks like the people questioning it are just cranks.
It's true that a lot of those in the outer bands are criminals but others are things like "buying a truck to build an orphanage for starving Iraqi children just outside of terrorist territory" or "wanted an investment visa in some corrupt island paradise and as it turns out no bank will open up account for purposes of 'international wires to the Comoros' "