Topic: Mt Gox Endgame - page 2. (Read 4223 times)

Live MtGox Protest:

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/mtgox-protest

How will this be actually sorted out to determine what is happening and happened? What is the proper and best way to do that??

Mt. Gox is incompetent, broke, or crooked. The endgame depends on which.

If Mt. Gox is crooked, at some point Karpeles will try to make a run for it. He can't just hide in Japan; he's a gaijin and there are lots of pictures of him. Getting out of Japan would be iffy for him. I would not be at all surprised if he's been quietly informed by some part of the Japanese government that trying to leave the country would be frowned upon. (Japan runs on "suggestions" like that.) It's too late for "take the money and run". He might have gotten away with it at the top a few months ago.

If Mt. Gox is broke, they can try stalling some more, but it's not going to work this time. They have zero credibility now and everybody who reads any major  news source from the Wall Street Journal to Russia Today knows it. At some point, they'll be faced with a demand to pay up or submit to an audit from someone who can make them - a big creditor, a bank, the Japan Financial Services Agency, or the Seattle court in the Coinbase case. One very likely possibility next week is that whatever bank handles their inbound wire transfers will dump them. Mt. Gox has always had "problems" with withdrawals, never deposits. (That's why the "US government is stopping them" argument is bogus. The US government can stop banks from dealing with non-US parties for a number of reasons, but when they do, it stops transactions in both directions.) If there's a "hiatus on deposits", assume their bank dumped them.

If customer funds are missing, Karpeles is going to jail in Japan.

If Mt. Gox is not broke, but merely incompetent, there's a chance Mt. Gox might get out of this situation. But it will be really difficult. If they're not broke, they could hire an outside audit firm and publish a financial statement to restore their credibility. (A video of Roger Ver won't cut it.) They'd need to hire a controller. someone respected, with experience. (A "controller" in a company is in charge of financial controls, banking relationships, cash management, signing checks, budgets, and all that boring stuff that's keeps a company from going broke. There's no indication that Mt. Gox has one.) That might restore enough credibility to get their problems fixed and withdrawals fully functional. If they actually paid out every requested withdrawal quickly, they might make a comeback. If they try to stall further, it's going to backfire. That unwinds the same way as being broke.

Plausible??!  Entirely possible.  Nothing prevents MtGox from taking advantage of this arbitrage opportunity.   Their BTC withdrawal problem are just a ruse to prevent people from discover Mt.Gox massive short position.

Now the current price at Mt.Gox is allowing them to again cover their short.   It was the same in April, when it hit $50.  Mt.Gox made up a technical glitch because they were massively short.

I wish I could buy a bitcoin for $91.50 ... but all the other exchanges are still above $500

Endgame is happening now as I type.. to ZERO with a Bullet.

$91.50

sounds plausible ... MtGox just hit $95

1)Buy panicked customers coins from their own exchange at $0.2 on the $1
2)Transfer and sell the coins at another exchange at market price while prevent everyone else from doing so
3)Rinse and repeat until the hole is filled and with a very nice profit in mark's pocket
4)Innocently reopen the btc transfer citing technical issue resolved...after wiping out majority of customers holdings
5) Retire and enjoy a wonderful life

mark karpeles is an absolute scum and thief, he would be in jail right now if this is any other currency but bitcoins.  I truly hope they catch this criminal.

But MtGox is completely shut off from the outside world. So the only people buying the coins owned by MtGox clients, are other MtGox clients. Honestly, if all the MtGox clients are selling, then WHO is buying? Probably the executives, and secretly they're saying to themselves, "Haha suckers!!!"

... maybe it didn't go down like this, but if you had that kind of power, it sure would be tempting ...

No one could get away with that I think.

1. Who regulates the exchanges?

2. Although bitcoin is semi-anonymous, can you tell from the blockchain where in the world etc. a transaction occurred (or other potential identifying information)?

If I was the owner of the largest bitcoin exchange, I would do something drastic to get everyone upset and sell off their coins until the price dropped to <$100, then I would secretly buy everyone's coins and subsequently release a statement, "problem fixed." Then viola, I'd be rich!!

How high is the volume. Is it higher or lower than normal? I would think everyone would be selling, but how do people even sell if selling is frozen??? Is all of the volume buy volume? I don't get it.

It is possible that someone is making a large amount of money from this.

I think this is really interesting.

Given the incredibly low market price I'm starting to think that Mt. Gox doesn't have the coins.  The only thing that puzzles me is why the huge volume on the site?

Ok, on a 100% probability scale, let's get people's best estimate on the probability that Mt. Gox survives. I say 65% chance of survival, but it is a total guess. I know most people have been saying lower.

How many people do you know that are buying Mt. Gox bitcoins? What is the profit potential if Mt. Gox survives?

Why would they need to do that. Isn't running an exchange a profitable enough business on it's own (especially when you have large market share)?

Unethical because if you sell BTC that isn't really backed by real BTC, then you can certainly squash the price.  Furthermore, by not allowing BTC withdrawal, there is no way to verify if the BTC anyone purchases is real.

Good point. In the US the profits of such trades would be seized but in Japan?

But is that unethical? People sell at these prices, nobody is forced to do so.

And blaming them for leaving the engine running is moot - people here would complain even more if they would stop trading, too.

If Gox had any common sense they would show the public keys of some of their (cold) wallets right on their front page so to soothe the market. 

Agree entirely,  Mt.Gox has no business running trades while they can't allow their customers to withdraw.

In addition,  any reputable exchange would have halted trading due to the massive discrepancy of their price with what other exchanges are quoting.