Of course he does. The part that tipped me off to exactly what was going on was when I followed a few particular trades that were made to certain individuals that ended right back in my wallet again. Then I started watching other trades through the same particular addresses. Then I started doing more, the details of which I can't go into on a public forum.
I guess I can't say for certain he knows he's working for SR. Maybe he's been working without asking questions like a good little mute. Then he can deny working for them, because he doesn't know who he's working for. I was under the impression he knew exactly who he was working for, though. If I were a betting man, I would still bet he's part of the crew, despite his denial. I'll explain why.
This might come as a surprise to you, but at any given point in time, three-or-more different largely trusted vendors of various products on SR are the exact same group of individuals. They rotate usernames in order to prevent detection, but sometimes they make mistakes and actually ship the same product in each other's merchandise. They typically tend to do this when they are moving on to their next username. They don't just have a "close relationship" with SR, either. They run it, or well, the geeks that run it know exactly who their biggest vendors are because they are close friends. I guess I thought, given who pirate is, that he was also part of this group of real life friends, but maybe for some dumb reason
he just randomly appears on the forums in Fall 2011 with a trusted group of people needing significant amounts of money for "loans".usagi is right, this won't continue forever, because he put a limit on how much you can invest. This limit exists because at some point they intend to either close up shop, or they understand that the authorities will be confiscating pirateat's wallet, and every coin in it will be property of the US federal government.
You want FUD? Ignore my warning now. Ignore usagi's warning. I complained that Bitcoinica could only make money at their customer's expense several months ago, and now people can't get their money back and the price of BTC is increasing. It's a little hard to call someone out on spreading FUD when you're still being secretive about exactly how you're able to find someone willing to lose about 7% in interest on a legal enterprise, and that's even before his cut. I can't imagine anyone in their right mind taking on those rates, even the foreign nationals I spoke to about remittance payments said 5% was pushing it.