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Comment by zarzavat | Hacker News Reader

> This crypto ban by Starling comes off the heels of Santander’s decision to limit customer deposits to crypto exchanges to £1,000 per transaction and a monthly limit of £3,000

This, ironically, validates the argument for crypto that banks cannot be trusted to let you do what you want with your own money.

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>that banks cannot be trusted to let you do what you want with your own money.

Well that's because we put them partially on the hook for when we, Joey Public, fall for scams, we expect and demand that the banks give us back the money we were scammed for.

I mean, I personally haven't, but I've read multiple newspaper articles about it.

Indeed. UK papers have had many stories of late about people sending their savings to scammers and then complaining their bank didn’t do enough to stop them, putting the bank on the hook for compensation because of the Quincecare duty of care.

I wish there was a switch that let me accept the consequences of my own actions but be allowed to take them in the first place. I don’t use crypto but it isn’t my bank’s job to tell me where I can send my money.

There is/was before. You have to waive rights to get that switch enabled, in the past when I looked at what that meant - it was waiving litterally any recourse over any money extracted from your account by any means.

There is a switch. Don't associate with the banks for your finances. Take your money out. No one is forcing you to keep it there.

Real practical advice there.

Do you think that's a real problem, or a convenient (manufactured/inflated) problem?

I'm pretty sure they could simply add to their terms of service "no refunds for crypto purchases" and that'd be understandable, legal, and enforceable. Advertising this position prominently would make naive crypto "dabblers" second-guess themselves. So, in my opinion the problem you're referring to is not real.

There are no such limits/bans on gambling in general.

> I'm pretty sure they could simply add to their terms of service "no refunds for crypto purchases" and that'd be understandable, legal, and enforceable.

It definitely wouldn't work. I'm sure they have similar conditions for "don't read your PIN out on the phone" but people still do and still often get refunded for it.

Better than giving it to crypto scammers

Not a crypto fan but I think you should be allowed to give your money to any scammer of your choice.

Meh. Probably not, there are systemic risks from people losing all their money all at once. It's a good thing to incentivize catching and blocking transactions to scammers.

Just to be clear, even if I very much would like to agree with you in theory, in practice this is what you are advocating, like it or not:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyramid_schemes_in_Albania

I hate scammers with unbridled fury, but I will not transact with any bank that thinks it can impose what I do with my own money.

Do they remember this thing called asking? I will respect the opinion of bankers and investors if they ask me, or I ask them, but ultimately the decision should be mine.

Otherwise it is going to the banking equivalent of Google's customer service. Callous, automated, unreachable.

Yep, and if they're willing to limit deposits, they're liable to limit withdrawals too.

Ah, yes, the freedom to invest all your life savings in obvious unregulated scams such as FTX.

Cryptocurrencies advocate for a very libertarian point of view: you are the only responsible of your money, and if you get scammed, sucks to be you. Banks on the other hand are much more "social": they are protecting you against scammers, and sometimes against yourself.

I know a case of a person falling to a "Hello we're the FBI we need to get your money for an undercover operation but we'll give it back", wiring tens of thousands to scammers. The bank did everything they could, including "losing" the wire order until that person family and friends managed to bring the victim back to their senses. The same story would have been very different with Bitcoin.

People here on HN are tech savvy, and smart enough to not fall into these scams. But advocating for a system that will leave all the most vulnerable members of our society penniless is quite astounding to me. "Some of you may die, but that's a sacrifice I'm willing to make".

And what is the name of an institution that allows you to deposit unlimited amounts of money, but when you try to withdraw it they don’t let you? FTX? Yes. A bank? Also yes.

In Lebanon people are holding up the banks at gunpoint to withdraw their own money.

I am not pretending that banks are perfect. But regulations are made so these situations happen as little as possible. In cryptocurrencies, such frauds and gross mismanagement are called an ordinary Monday.

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