Texas Federal Magistrate Reaffirms Ruling that Bitcoin is Money

The question of whether Bitcoin can be considered ‘money’ from both a legal and tax perspective in the United States has been in the news a great deal recently, especially with multiple Judges ruling that Bitcoin was indeed money and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) seeming to contradict the courts with a stance that deems Bitcoin as property. The latest chapter comes again from Texas and Federal Magistrate Judge Amos L. Mazzant.
The case was filed against Bitcoin Savings & Trust founder Trendon T. Shavers, who is accused by Federal prosecutors of running a Ponzi scheme using Bitcoin.
Shavers is represented by Franklin Jason Seibert of FJ Seibert LLC in U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission v. Trendon T. Shavers et al., case number 4:13-cv-00416, in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Texas. The SEC is being represented by Jessica B McGee and Philip Moustakis. Moustakis has been active on Bitcointalk.org encouraging members of the community to get involved in the case.
Shavers is being accused by the SEC of using investment money from new investors to pay off interest payments for older investors in what seems to be a classic Ponzi scheme. The charges also claim that Shavers had been transferring investors’ money into his own personal day trading accounts.

This post was published at Coin Telegraph on Carlo Caraluzzo ./ 2014-08-28.