This is a system like paypal, we think.  It is a way of obtaining your money securily from what we understand.  
Does anyone out there know or understand how it works exactly?  If so, please explain.

I read something about it in Wired magazine months ago (the article was mainly about Paypal). Don't remember all the specifics. The one thing I think I remember is that it's headquartered in some 3rd world country - if you have a problem you'll be on your own. Too risky for me.

as an offshore safe means of transferring money without leaving a paper trail in the US that State and federal authorities can use against you.

How quickly you forget that PayPal turned over an entire CD-ROM of evidence against the late TBD. PayPal and Hotmail alike did not even fight the subpoenas in that and other cases.

E-Gold records, however, cannot be touched by US authorities.

Far from being a Third World country, Nevis is a sophisticated Caribbean resort island. The Nevis bank secrecy and offshore trust system is derived from British banking to protect tens of thousands of individuals and assets from nosy oppressive regulatory and taxing authorities you know where.

Offshore financial professionals usually consider Nevis one of the best ten places for private offshore safety in the world.

Offshore financial services, web hosting, e-mail, incorporation, and other mechanisms are particularly necessary in the escort and agency businesses, as people are learning slowly one-by-one, often the hard way.

If TBD had had offshore hosting, e-mail, incorporation, and banking, it would have been much more difficult to develop evidence against him, but nooooooooooooo  ... he thought he knew everything and was lacking in humility, to put it politely.

I  know a few people who use e-gold regularly, and they are content and quiet about the service. It goes without saying I have no connection with the company, but found it while searching for safe offshore financial services through which to purchase large numbers of sexually active female bonobos. LOL.

Dont know about this in particular, but thre are lots of offshore scams that can disappear at a moments notice with your money.

Id be careful of anything like that.

Personally, cash beats Paypal or egold in terms of its resistance to tracing and lack of paper trails. Paypal leaves a bigger paper trail than my Amex card.

If you are comfortable giving PayPal your money, then it's likely you'll risk giving e-Gold your money.

Like a credit card, you'll pay fees. No body is altruistic with financial transactions it seems. There's a fee to convert US$ into gold and a fee to convert it back, There's a fee to receive e-gold and a fee to store e-gold. The fees semm to be very similar to credit card fees, in that the merchant pays fees on each credit card transaction and there are annual fees.

Staying within e-Gold is the best way to save on the fees. In other words, don't convert the gold to currency.

Let's use some "hand wavy" numbers and see how it works.

You have US$1,000 and put it into your e-Gold account. If you do nothing, you will have less e-gold at the end of a year by the storage fee.

You contact a provider and she's e-Gold compatable, she'll quote you some number of grams of e-gold that is equivilant to her normal US$300 rate. This is identical to quoting in Yen or Canadian dollars, so for most, a fixed amount of gold, perhaps adjusted quarterly would work.  You then transfer your e-Gold to her e-Gold account. You can't get it back. That part of the transaction is identical to cash. So it's possible to have e-gold-and-dash girls too. 8-) You'll get three dates for your US$1000 deposit and still have a sliver of e-gold at the end of the year after fees.

On the provider's side, she'll receive a tiny bit less e-gold than she quoted. This is the fee and is equivilant to the credit card "discount" that Merchants pay.

As long as the e-Gold stays in her account, other than the annual storage fee, it stays. If she needs to convert this to US$ again, then, of course, there's a fee. However, if she can pay using e-Gold, it's terrific, because she doesn't pay fees, the receiver does.

Thus, the "trick" seems to be: 1) don't put more cash into e-gold than you would any other non-insured monitary insturment. (Stocks, bonds, PayPal, etc) and 2) find a way to spend it directly, with no fees. Perhaps those of you with landlords that still have family in third world nations will find them especially open to transactions in gold. 8-)

About e-gold from wired magazine...

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/10.01/egold_pr.html

It echoes much of what Mr. Schlong said, and also goes into the history of the company. I'm thinking it might be a really good alternative to paypal, who is by now RENOWNED for freezing people's accounts and refusing to give them their money.

Hugs*
Nicole