Digital Gold Currency Magazine is reporting that GoldMoney is suspending the ability to make and receive payments in precious metals to or from other GoldMoney customers due to the "global increase of compliance requirements for payment service providers." This capability was the key differentiator of GoldMoney to other online precious metal storage businesses. It is an unfortunate development for gold standard advocates. The decision was not entirely driven by increased regulations as GoldMoney also indicate that "our customers’ use of the metal payments and currency exchange services is not significant." Looks like a case of disporportionate compliance effort for GoldMoney on something that didn't drive business. Interesting then that customers have voted and said they aren't really interested in gold as money. Possibly this may change if those customers are faced with high inflation or banking system instability, but it will be hard for GoldMoney to restart the functionality and catch up with any regulatory requirements in place at the time (assuming there is any regulatory tolerance for alternative payment systems at that time). Freegold anyone?
