The Montana Senate just passed SB 370. There were 18 votes against, split evenly between Democrats and Republicans. It’s a bill to modernize the Uniform Commercial Code (UCC). But there is some very troubling text in the bill that seems to have escaped notice:

From page 5:

(y) “Money” means a medium of exchange that is currently authorized or adopted by a domestic or foreign government. The term includes a monetary unit of account established by an intergovernmental organization or by pursuant to an agreement between two or more countries. The term does not include an electronic record that is a medium of exchange recorded and transferable in a system that existed and operated for the medium of exchange before the medium of exchange was authorized or adopted by the government.

This defines existing cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin to be “not money.”

Why is our legislature removing crypto as a medium of exchange without even discussing it?

Is anyone paying attention?

Given what the banks and credit card companies are doing to track gun and related items purchases, which should be especially wary of attempts to limit our means of exchange.

This can be easily fixed with an amendment. Just delete the last sentence. There is absolutely no reason for it, and Montana should not embrace something like this without a very long discussion.