One of the things that are missing on all Bitcoin exchanges, including MtGox is a market maker. No Bitcoin exchange has that and it's one of the factors that contributes direly to the volatility. A market maker would ensure there will always be someone there to buy or sell to you, even if users themselves are not.
If you could partner with a business to provide such service or do it yourselves, you'd soon become the exchange of choice for everyone.
Informative video on the topic:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IbSOHwCOnG0I agree. We're looking for a partner to help us out with market making. If you know anyone, send em my way!
I don't understand how a market maker would operate?
The necessity for a market maker seems to be build on a false premise that there are not always users willing to buy or sell. This is never true,
there are always users that want to buy from or sell to you, just not for the price that you like. So you don't like the price...
How can a market maker change that?
How can a market maker buy or sell bitcoins for the price that you like (which is always a better price than the users are willing to offer)?
Let's say he always puts up the most competitive bids and asks.
From what I see when the price goes up he would end up selling btc cheaper as he can buy them back, going broke. Correct?
Check this out. Pretty much answers your question
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IbSOHwCOnG0&feature=youtu.be&t=1m8sFor an exchange to be taken seriously, it would require a substantial amount of liquidity. That in itself will bring more players to that exchange generating even more liquidity. A market maker would pretty much solve the liquidity issue and people would no longer be concerned about trading volume.
Say for example one would want to unload 1000 bitcoins unto the market or buy 1000 bitcoins. A bitcoin investor would like to be able to do that easily. If he can't do that on X exchange he'll just migrate to Y exchange which can make that happen. Such big investor also jacks up the price of Bitcoin, making that exchange more attractive to customers, thus generating even more liquidity and higher spread when compared to other exchanges. High volume and high liquidity also means high profits for the exchange that partners with a market maker.
I agree. We're looking for a partner to help us out with market making. If you know anyone, send em my way!
Max Keiser probably had Exante in mind when he said was looking to partner with an exchange to implement market making services. They offer the Bitcoin Fund
https://exante.eu/products/BTC/ This is similar to the Winklevoss ETF idea just that it's privately traded. This fund holds 90k Bitcoins and could theoretically act as a market maker for you.
The fund currently manages a portfolio of 90,000 bitcoins
If they won't help you with the market making, they can at least point you in the right direction.