OmniPay Primary Dealer For e-gold Is Moving To Africa

Just announced over several private email lists, is the statement from OmniPay that their US operations have been purposely and temporally suspended while they move operations to Africa. This move, is long overdue.

The surprise here is NOT the fact they are moving jurisdictions (I hope e-gold Ltd follows) the surprise comes from the new African jurisdiction. However, its widely known that Africa has opened their business environment to foster new technology such as mobile payments and digital currency.

Just as Webmoney works with tailor made local regulations in it’s home town of Russia, e-gold’s OmniPay business model should be well accepted and ideally suited for positive growth headquartered in West Africa.

This area of the world has made a rapid sublimed move from no consumer banking directly into futuristic m-commerce and digital money. I’ve written about the growth of e-money and mobile banking in Africa many times. Its a great move for OmniPay and a real treat for Africa.

Democracy/Hypocrisy

The post 9/11 United States regulations, which are choking some of the life out of US online business, seem hell bent on defeating any future growth of digital money or private currency. That includes DGC (digital gold currency), GSM mobile commerce, private barter money such as the Liberty Dollar, payments for online gambling and the list goes on…. Instead of building constructive regulations and taxing online business, the US has fostered an environment of ‘fear’ which has ultimately killed many digital business deals in just the past 12 months.

Wow, with all my blogging about ‘bad US businesses’ I don’t want anyone to get the wrong impression that I am anti-government or anti-US. This is simply not true. While I disagree with a few of these business policies and regulations I understand rules are rules and when clearly defined, US businesses should not step over that legal line. I not only believe in following the rule of law but also the ’spirit’ of that law when testing the legal limits of any new online technology.

Rules and regulations are keeping Americans safe, and I am 100% in favor of anything that keeps people safe. If a safer US means that while visiting someone is listening to my overseas calls and I can’t play that hand of virtual poker from my US hotel room, that’s OK with me. Safety should always be priority number one. I may disagree but I understand and I’m not complaining. I make my permanent residence outside of the US.

Since the business climate in the United States is not conducive for long term Digital Gold Currency success, I’ve advocated, for many moons now, to change jurisdictions. I really hope that e-gold Ltd, their servers, offices and talented management will also be moving soon.

The following statement appears inside the OminPay web site when current client’s log in.

OmniPay temporarily suspends exchange to transition to OmniPay AfricaEffective immediately, G&SR will be leasing the OmniPay business to OmniPay Africa. All OmniPay exchanges will now involve e-gold transfers and money payments into/out of OmniPay Africa’s e-gold and bank accounts respectively. G&SR has contracted to serve as the Operator of OmniPay but will not be a party to actual exchanges.

In terms of immediate impacts:

• The OmniPay exchange service will suspend operation pending provisioning of a suitable bank account for OmniPay Africa. It is anticipated this service interruption will start May 24, 2007 with service resuming on or about June 18, 2007.
• With resumption, all bank wires from customers must be directed to the new bank coordinates which will be posted on the omnipay.com website.

The original plan was for OmniPay Africa to organize as a licensee of G&SR, the US company that owns OmniPay. A substantial development effort was underway to support the additional requirements for over-the-counter exchange operations such as biometric validation. However, recent actions of the US government, originating from a long-standing and misguided animus on the part of the US Secret Service, necessitate immediate action. Specifically, SEB Bank in Estonia has notified G&SR it is closing its bank account at close of business May 25, 2007 explicitly because of the Press Release from the US DOJ.

We regret the temporary interruption of OmniPay services. Just as the US government’s recent actions in seizing e-gold accounts of e-gold Ltd., G&SR, The Bullion Exchange, AnyGoldNow, IceGold, GitGold, The Denver Gold Exchange, GoldPouch Express and 1MDC (and forcing G&SR to liquidate the seized assets!) have severely damaged not only these exchange businesses but also their innumerable customers, their forcing this complex transition to be performed on an emergency basis is simply shameful.

We do not however regret the transfer of OmniPay responsibilities to OmniPay Africa. As will become abundantly clear in coming months, the OmniPay Africa team is highly qualified to guide OmniPay to a higher level, a genuinely global service that will foster a beneficial surge in e-gold’s emergence while bringing significant advantages to emerging economies.

Strategic Background

A major strategic emphasis for e-gold is to provide sophisticated remote payments capabilities to the majority of mankind underserved by or excluded by the banking system. An important focus is international remittances – payments from migrant workers living in advanced economies sending a portion of their earnings to their home country. For many developing economies, migrant remittances constitute a significant portion of foreign exchange income and even GDP. Traditional remittance mechanisms, however, are expensive and inflexible. It is estimated that lowering the net cost of remittances by a few percentage points could measurably enhance economic development. There is also increasing awareness that non-traditional banking such as micro-credit facilities can also aid in bootstrapping lesser developed economies.

OmniPay Africa, an entirely non-US company, majority owned by prominent business leaders from the Francophone countries of West Africa, was therefore organized to extend the usefulness of e-gold by providing support for over-the-counter exchange and by fostering the integration of e-gold into micro-credit lending institutions. The combination of e-gold (settling the international transfer of value with no need for a financial intermediary) and OmniPay (offering standardized, reliable, low cost exchange to/from local currency) will serve as a flexible low cost alternative to the traditional systems.

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