Replying to Avatar L0la L33tz

Another day, another exchange I am suspended from.

All of my funds are conjoined or swapped between LN/XMR for privacy before sending to exchanges, triggering all sorts of nonsense AML flags.

The exchange I am with now is requesting proof of funds, meaning it wants to see fiat coming into my bank account from an entity I have a business relationship with, asking me to "kindly assist them" in surveilling me.

Except that all of my business relationships are handled in bitcoin – meaning that it is impossible for me to show proof of fiat funds.

Alternatively, the exchange says, I could send them “the address” to which I received payment in the last year, matching the amount of money I have exchanged on their platform.

Obviously no such address exists as I create a new address for each transaction (and so should you). Additionally, much of my money comes in through donations, for which I simply do not have an invoice.

I could now send them every single zap I ever received on nostr in the past year – for context, that would be over 250 zaps in the past week alone, s/o to all the zappers – or I could move my business to Switzerland, where I can exchange up to 1000 CHF per day KYC-free (for now), which is what I’m going to do.

However, since I’ll be more heavily relying on peer-to-peer exchanges from now on, I’ll likely have my bank account flagged for receiving weekly payments from randos on the internet, making it fairly foreseeable that I’ll be losing my bank account in the coming months as well.

Fundamental rights violations aside, the amount of complete nonsense work – and with that costs – this system creates both for the Government and private institutions is absolutely astonishing. If there ever was a true bullshit job, compliance officer would no doubt be it.

It’s time we end the global discrimination complex inherent to the financial system in which we are all guilty until proven innocent, only to upkeep an inefficient system that is useless in preventing crime but formidable for imposing mass surveillance on the people.

So no, I will not "kindly assist you" in surveilling me, and if I die on this hill.

Until then, shill me your favorite tools to pay my bills in bitcoin 👇

Local community banks work best with p2p exchanges, in case they flag your account you can go there and talk to real people in person.

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Smaller the bank usually the more expensive they are to work with, from my experience

Its not that they're "expensive" in the sense of minimums or fees, they simply don't have access to certain large bank features like overdraft protection, large cash withdrawals, maximum ACH transfers, no home mortgages; let alone a car, etc.

My bank gets nervous when I ask for $1,000 cash as they know they don't have that in the vault; it must be ordered and takes several business days.

Here where I live it seems different, there is mainly a difference between digital-only neobanks (like Revolut) and the oldschool offline banks with branches in most smaller cities. They are for sure more expensive (monthly fees etc.) but seem way more chill when doing "unusual" stuff, e.g. just give you a call instead of locking the account. Best is to circumvent banks to begin with...

Yes the benefit I have with local bank is I've known them for decades and can talk to someone face-to-face

Always just have another larger account to which I can transfer to/from as needed.

Write several paper checks per month still