Jay Addison Technical and Media Advisor for CryptoBiz Magazine interviews Brian Koffler, President Koffler of Legal and Consulting Services. Brian is an attorney and entrepreneur based in New York City. While his practice focuses on cryptocurrency consulting and guiding start-ups to success, he also works as the General Counsel and Chief Technology Officer of K3 Learning, Inc., an education management firm.
Transcript
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foreign Bitcoins in Las Vegas with Brian Koffler the attorney from Koffler legal and Consulting Brian how you doing today doing great how are you I'm doing great thank you we got a couple questions for you do you fear the bit license will push businesses out of America to countries with more favorable legal framework I don't uh first of all the bit license currently in its current form is really just a New York regulation and it's not going to hit everyone like people believe they do um its intention is to really get at where the fiat currency is being created from the Bitcoin and from the virtual currency and I think the people looking at it like it's a major attack on bitcoin and it's not it's just the first regulatory yeah and it needs to be put in place I think it actually is a nice framework I've spoken with guys at DFS about this they um they know what they have in place is going to be bullet significantly but it's not going to push people away when it gets put in place they're going to see it's not asking for anything more than a typical Bank collection from its consumers and it's a it's not that much information at the end of the day right in fact it could actually open up the market it's going to open up the market I believe I know that there are people who are in the process of putting exchanges in place and they want a regulatory framework in place prior to that because they know that once that happens you're going to have the big Banks yes the Goldman Sachs everyone like that who's gonna say you know what now I'll put some money in I know what's going on here I'll do it that makes total sense yeah another question for you A lot of people bought mining equipment that will never turn them a profit can people benefit from these losses in any way at tax time was this question written about me and my mining equipment well I think it's just a general question why are you losing money on your mining equipment just like everyone else everybody else you know it's interesting because if you look at the community for example um the guys from coin Tower right here who have known for a while and we were just talking earlier about how this entire industry changes so rapidly so quickly yeah you know the guys who take coin terror is a great example they were making mining equipment now they're not really making mine equipment anymore they're selling Cloud contracts and just like everyone else the companies that are focusing on uh the hardware they're kind of dwindling and the real you know there's too many large players uh it's really impossible to make a profit at this point Come tax time it's going to be interesting sure is um you know especially here in America where you see the uh the treatment of Bitcoin currently as a property uh if you use the Bitcoin here or there how no one knows what's gonna happen uh if I bought a pack of gum are they going to look at that exact Bitcoin that was used and see what the value was when I first got it versus the value now and that's going to be either a taxable gain or loss no one knows right now is going to happen my guess is no I don't think that's gonna happen I don't not believe the IRS is capable of doing something like that but I think it's a interesting question I do believe yes people will certainly be writing off their equipment yeah it makes sense anyway do you expect any legal president to be set by the Ross Albright trial I think it's a very interesting trial uh it's a very interesting case in Bitcoin it's a you have a lot of people in the space who look at this case as something that's it's just against Bitcoin and bitcoin's bad uh this is the government government says bitcoin's bad and the people in the community say you know bitcoin's good so Ross shouldn't be prosecuted um my personal view again I don't know what can happen the trial um I don't know but I do believe that there's a good chance what he did was illegal and that's something that the government is going to prosecute it's not a precedent about Bitcoin right it is a precedent that was set many years ago in many other drug dealing and conspiracy cases in other cases have been it's not a new president we're following other precedents this is just simply a new vehicle for transmitting value that makes complete sense do you see future Innovations primarily being built on top of Bitcoin or do you think that one of the current or future 2.0 protocols will replace it you know that kind of goes to a question of all coins and how are all coins gonna interact with the Bitcoin community and I believe that my personal view here is the utilization of the Charlotte 256 algorithm to work on Bitcoin mining is not sustainable long term and I believe that's going to have to change uh whether it's something that changed automatically based uh upon the difficulty level hitting a certain level and then maybe the protocol automatically changes to a different algorithm a few proposals that I'm working on um I don't think it's sustainable as it is the Network's supposed to be decentralized and right now it's not decentralized anymore it's only been a few years in operation you're right um I thought we'd have at least another 18 months before we got to where we are right now but the reality is if you could throw 100 million dollars at a financial system take control of it which you could a year ago that's a problem yeah it cost you many billions to get to that point it's too cheap right now to get there so um I think that if we keep the shot 256 and the protocol doesn't change um I believe that there will be you know alternate blockchains that actually have more of the Bitcoin 2.0 infrastructure built upon them uh if you do something smart with our mining technology then Bitcoin can still be the one that that lasts long term sounds good of all the current generation so-called 2.0 or Bitcoin 2.0 Technologies which do you think has the potential to make the biggest impact concept of smart contracts and just ways to utilize the blockchain for non-financial means is something I think is great um I think that looking at the blockchain as a means of transferring stock and bond certificates like some people believe it will I think it will happen not in the near future um the reality is there are centralized systems that manage this and and while they cost money the banks that utilize them it's not really anything to them it might be 10 million dollars a year that's irrelevant to them so I don't think it has to change there's no reason to change it right now um I think that the contracts though if with a real peer-to-peer contract use that's where I see the real change because it's you don't need a central party yeah I think you're right I know and it's very exciting actually yeah yeah so here's the trick question that we ask everybody yes uh January 1st 2015 what do you think of the price of Bitcoin is going to be 520 that's a good number I like it yeah okay so Brian how do people get a hold of you if they want to uh inquire about any legal issues or if they want to hire your firm sure they could email me uh info coffeelegal.com it's the best way to get me can you spell your last name further k-o-f-f as in Frank ler fantastic uh and I'm always around and your website as well yes coffeewegle.com fantastic thank you very much I appreciate your time Brian thank you this is Jay Addison from crypto Biz magazine live from meckler media's inside Bitcoins conference in Las Vegas remember to subscribe to crypto Biz magazine at cryptobismag.com follow us on Twitter at cryptobizmag thanks for joining us and learn more at cryptobizmagazine.com