Topic: {ANNOUNCEMENT} WBX Exchange Frozen - page 8. (Read 45404 times)

There's actually nothing in the code to limit balances either.  The per-account setting only changes the text that displays the "limit" to the user.

It's vague on the website and I suspect that Andre never enforced the limit anyway.  He was shonky about everything else.


There's actually nothing in our AML/CTF Act which operates to limit the size of accounts.  I'm convinced he just put that there for show.

Wasn't the $5k limit only for AUD holdings, rather than a combined BTC + AUD value?

Also, it's possible that at the time of closing, the >$5k account was worth less than $5k, since BTC has roughly doubled in value since WBX's closing.

I only counted accounts with non-zero balances too.  There are many accounts which were created but never had any funds deposited.

I'm still in BC, Canada.  Just out in the sticks.

Where are you now?

Thanks for that breakdown dooglus, interesting to see. As for a holding of > $5000. I thought WBX imposed a limit of $5k account balances?

Also, glad to see that the majority of customers were not affected to any significant degree (63% with balances of < $5 )

I would say, assuming 1 BTC = $11, that the balances break down as follows:


So a total of 87% of accounts are less than $500.

To answer your question, I went to fire up the MySQL database.

It turns out I didn't even install the mysql-server package on this computer yet.

I've recently moved into a very remote location.  No power, water, phone service, etc.  So getting online is a challenge.  I'm using computers a lot less these days generally.

When I get a chance I'll download the MySQL server package and install it - then I'll be able to let you know how account sizes break down...

Edit: So slow:

That should make things easier.

Would you say the majority of creditors hold < $500 balances? If there are a lot of these accounts then my guess is at this stage, the customers involved have either forgotten or dont care anymore or have written it off as an annoying loss.

I received your details, and those of 2 others.  I'm surprised to get so few replies.  I guess most people who read this thread will see any announcement I make here and so don't need to contact me directly.

Just checking back into this thread and confirming that I'm still the holder of this debt. I'm will PM my email addy.

no, it was indeed brendio, not burtw... i was just remembering fuzzy.

and also i didn't remember that i had created a WBX code and transferred to his actual account... so that's all good. i was worried that the funds were still in my WBX account, which would have made things more difficult for you.

That's a good point.  As far as I know, yours was the only account that was sold.  I thought I remembered Brendio buying your account, but I guess either I remember it wrong or he has since sold it on.

Looking back, I see:


so you already transferred your balance to Brendio, and so I don't need to take that into consideration - Brendio's account will simply have $497.33 more in it than it used to.  Did Brendio since pass the balance on to BurtW?  That's the first I've heard about it if that's the case.

what about people who have sold their debt here on the forum?

iirc burtw is the current owner of my share.

When I have time, I'll set up a claim site which will allow people to log in using their WBX openid login, which will allow me to collect bitcoin withdrawal addresses in a secure manner.  This seems like the safest way to proceed, since I have no other way of authenticating WBX user accounts - for the most part I have no details at all about the account owners.

In the mean time, I would encourage any creditors of WBX to contact me by PM here or email to dooglus at gmail giving me your WBX user ID and email address.  Then I'll email everyone when I have the claim site in place.

I doubt anyone would have a claim which doesn't count as a "small claim".  I suspect Andre wouldn't bother turning up so people would win by default, but there's not much point in having a judgement you can't enforce, even if it's been cheap to obtain.  It would trash Andre's credit, but that's about it (and it's probably already trashed given what he posted on Yahoo last year about his mortgage problems).

Unlike the Bitfloor thread, there is agreement between the creditors here on how to proceed.  With no way to contact anyone else who may be owed funds by WBE, that's about as good as you're going to get.  The alternative would be returning the coins to Andre so that he can distribute them and no-one wants to take that risk even if it might be "technically" the appropriate course of action.  If the creditors on here represent a majority of funds owed, you're on pretty safe ground going along with whatever they'd agreed.  if people haven't taken legal action to recover their funds by now, they're not likely to do so over the manner in which those funds are returned.

Andre remains an absolute shit-heel for dumping this on Chris.

Fair point!

And I'd rather this be settled without expensive fees being taken out by lawyers. I've already consulted one who has told me for claims any less than $40k, its simply not worth it as the costs will outweigh the potential return. Official letters have to be sent to serve as notice and fees alone for these letters to start the process are around at least in the hundreds of dollars.

He's promoted WBE on his Facebook and that ties to his past and present real life activity.  If the bank account he was using was in his name, it was established by someone with sufficient ID to convince the bank they were Andre.  Likewise any business accounts that were used - Australian banks require documentation.

I know Patrick pulled the ASIC records related to High Net Worth Property.  He didn't release information about the other directors, but it would be interesting to see if they're people connected with Progressive Security or on his various social networks.

Thanks.  I'll do that and report back here.

Incidentally, do we have any proof that we were really dealing with Andre or High Net Worth Property and not just an anonymous Internet scammer using those identities?

I'd just contact ITSA for advice.  There's a toll-free number residents of some countries can use or you could email them if you want stuff in writing.

http://www.itsa.gov.au/dir228/itsaweb.nsf/docindex/contacts-%3Econtact%20us

I'm not convinced that the other directors of HNWP aren't just as liable as Andre, but that's only an issue if people are lodging lawsuits.  

Well, A gets 0.154 BTC which is $1.54, but he was only owed $1.00, so he's made a profit on the deal which doesn't seem right.  I don't see why anyone would be entitled to get more than 100% of what they're owed, unless everyone does.

I guess at the end of the day it doesn't matter what "seems right", it matters what's legal.  There must be laws about what to do in this situation.  Maybe not about bitcoin, but what if it was gold, or some other commodity.

I was reading the BitFloor thread yesterday.  The situation there is the exact opposite - the BTC are missing, but the dollars are whole.  There's lots of argument there.  The people with dollars on deposit argue that they don't want their dollars being used to reimburse the BTC holders, whereas the BTC holders argue that if the company is insolvent then its assets need to be distributed proportionally to all creditors.  Others say that it would be illegal to distribute any assets at all without bringing in a liquidator, and are telling Roman that he must seek legal advice before doing anything.

In the WBX situation it's more complicated I think.  I don't know if there was ever a company registered that owned the exchange, or if it was all a scam from the beginning.  Even if WBX was owned by High Net Worth, it seems the company registration lapsed while the exchange was still operating, and so some claim that Andre is personally liable for the debts.

So do I need to speak to an Australian lawyer about how to proceed?  I don't want to spend the little remaining funds on legal expenses, but also don't want to do the wrong thing and end up in legal trouble as a result.