declan

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http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-67... /"Compared with moderate sodium intake, high sodium intake is associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular events and death in hypertensive populations (no association in normotensive population), while the association of low sodium intake with increased risk of cardiovascular events and death is observed in those with or without hypertension. These data suggest that lowering sodium intake is best targeted at populations with hypertension who consume high sodium diets."/

Eating too little salt can result in increased risk of cardiovascular events and death: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3558770/ /"we cannot extrapolate that lowering sodium consumption would reduce cardiovascular risk or premature death. In fact, randomized controlled trial evidence suggests just the opposite: that lower sodium intake may lead to worsened cardiovascular disease and earlier death."/

Low salt == higher risk of a heart attack resulting in death: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21540421 /"Among 3681 participants followed up for a median 7.9 years, CVD deaths decreased across increasing tertiles of 24-hour sodium excretion... Lower sodium excretion was associated with higher CVD mortality."/

Salt intake is not associated with blood pressure, although body mass index and age are: https://academic.oup.com/ajh/article/28/3/362/2743418/Relati... /"Considering their squared partial correlation coefficient, age and BMI were the most important parameters relating to SBP [systolic blood pressure] level. Salt intake was not associated with SBP in either sex after multiple adjustments."

If you do have high blood pressure, supplement with potassium: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26039623 /"Potassium supplementation is associated with reduction of blood pressure"//

Salt intake is not linked to heart problems for adults 71 to 80 years old: http://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/fullart... /"we observed that sodium intake estimated by FFQ [food frequency questionnaire] was not associated with mortality or risk for CVD [cardiovascular disease] and HF [heart failure] in a cohort of adults 71 to 80 years old. These findings extended to sex-based and race-based subgroups and in participants with and without hypertension at baseline."/

As for individuals transmitting cryptocurrency, I haven't spent enough time with the bill and the existing part of Title 31 to be able to answer that question. I would point out, though, that other sections of the bill make existing law even more onerous than it is today.

  (K) an issuer, redeemer, or cashier of travelers’ checks, checks, money orders, prepaid access devices, digital currency, or similar instruments, or any digital exchanger or tumbler of digital currency;

  as the Secretary may prescribe by regulation, coins and currency of a foreign country, travelers’ checks, bearer negotiable instruments, bearer investment securities, bearer securities, stock on which title is passed on delivery, prepaid access devices, and similar material...

  an electronic device or vehicle, such as a card, plate, code, number, electronic serial number, mobile identification number, personal identification number, or other instrument, that provides a portal to funds or the value of funds that have been paid in advance and can be retrievable and transferable at some point in the future.

Fincen (part of Treasury) said in 2013 that "A person's acceptance and/or transmission of convertible virtual currency cannot be characterized as providing or selling prepaid access because prepaid access is limited to real currencies." But that was based on the old definition, not the newly broadened one. (https://www.fincen.gov/resources/statutes-regulations/guidan...)

Now let's walk through some of the existing laws that reference these new definitions. A good start is the long list of existing Title 31 regulations primarily aimed at banks that would now get levied on any "issuer" or "redeemer" or "exchanger" of digital currency. That includes the obligation to:

- "Verify[] the identity of any person seeking to open an account" (31 USC 5318)

- "Maintain[] records of the information used to verify a person’s identity, including name, address, and other identifying information" (31 USC 5318)

- "Report any suspicious transaction" to the Feds (31 USC 5318)

- "Establish anti-money laundering programs, including, at a minimum" developing internal policies, compliance officer, training program, and independent audits (31 USC 5318)

- File reports on transactions (31 USC 5313)

- "Maintain appropriate procedures to ensure compliance with this subchapter and regulations prescribed under this subchapter" (31 USC 5318)

- "Guard against money laundering" (31 USC 5318)

- Allow the examination of "any books, papers, records, or other data of domestic financial institutions" related to reporting requirements (31 USC 5318)

- Be summoned by Treasury to "produce such books, papers, records, or other data" and give testimony under oath up to 500 miles away (31 USC 5318)

Note that many of the above sections of existing law give a heck of a lot of authority to the Treasury Department. Treasury could cough up very specific and narrow regulations that would lessen the impact. Or Treasury could follow the statutory text (aka go big or go home).

The bill also expands the sweep of existing criminal law. Existing criminal law (31 USC 5324) prohibits any attempt to "structure or assist in structuring, or attempt to structure or assist in structuring, any transaction with one or more domestic financial institutions." (Structuring is defined as "evading the reporting requirements" in which banks tip off the Feds that you're, say, moving high volumes of cash.)

Because an "issuer" or "redeemer" or "exchanger" of digital currency is now a financial institution, if you or I tried to dodge reporting requirements, we'd be looking at a federal felony punishable by up to 5 years in prison. Note that many other sections of Title 31 grant the Treasury Department discretion in rulemaking, so the blow could be lessened. At first glance this section does not seem to be one of those.

The bill also means that no financial institution (remember this now includes any "issuer" or "redeemer" or "exchanger" of digital currency) would be allowed to "issue" any "monetary instrument" (which includes any code "retrievable and transferable at some point in the future") unless "the individual furnishes the financial institution with such forms of identification as the Secretary of the Treasury may require." (31 USC 5326)

I'm getting a bit tired but did want to raise the question of whether or not the 31 USC 5332 rules against moving cash across the U.S. border now extend to digital currencies.

One section of the bill requires CBP to devise a "strategy to interdict and detect prepaid access devices, digital currencies, or other similar instruments, at border crossings and other ports of entry for the United States." (Emphasis added)

Existing law punishes anyone who: "Attempts to transport or transfer such currency or monetary instruments from a place within the United States to a place outside of the United States" -- and remember, "monetary instrument" is newly expanded. At least this seems at first glance to target only physical border-crossing and not electronic, and to require intent to evade reporting requirements. Would you have to declare a cold storage wallet if one happened to live on your electronic device? (CBP's forensic searches and scans just got a bit more worrisome...)

Anyway, that's my quick take. I may be wrong on some items--as I'd like to be! That means this bill would not be as broad and potentially worrisome as it seems to be at first glance.

It's a one-story room with a 9' ceiling height. The structural engineer specified two massive Simpson Strong-Walls, side by side. There was barely any room for the window, which had to be askew as a result. A local architect tells me the requirements were far less onerous even a decade ago.

Also foundation requirements have increased as well. You may be on a flat lot with no history of problems based on a soils analysis, but end up having to drill piers anyway. Just in case. Your municipality wants them. Which will likely increase foundation costs by tens of thousands of dollars--so much for affordable SF bay area housing!

I know one fellow building a new home on the SF peninsula who spent $500,000 to pour a roughly 1,000 sq. ft basement. (Small lot, not much outdoor space, so he was determined to have a place for his kids to play in.)

Hollister to Atherton is 68 miles. To get to Atherton by 8am tomorrow, Google says he should leave at 5:50am: https://goo.gl/maps/bfSBp4vFtJQ2

If cheaper housing could be built on the peninsula--where there happens to be lots of low-density housing and open space!--he could live closer to work and the 101 and the 280 would have one less vehicle twice a day. But for reasons we all know, this will not happen.

PS: The structured wiring guys on this project are driving in from Tracy in the Central Valley and staying at a hotel on the mid-peninsula. That commute is even worse than Hollister. Google estimates it at 2hrs 40min one-way (!) for an 8am arrival time tomorrow.