This goes partway toward explaining how they could lag behind MtGoxCAD by so much this week. I always expect a 10% difference or so, but come on.
I was really hoping Virtex would surge ahead during the insanity, like they did in April. I guess there are too many other Canadians with dollars sitting on Gox waiting to move back.
Yeah, it was really puzzling me why virtex was so far behind. They presently have 1460 people waiting to get verified (before they can even deposit money), yet, even with their new staff hires, they can only process 80 applications per day. Ignoring the *additional* verification requests they receive each day, it will take 1460 / 80 = 18.25 working days to clear the queue.
If the other exchanges have similar queues, this may explain why the runup never went full-retard (well except for BTCChina), and how we haven't crashed like we did in April. The verification process slows the flow of money such that the spike is reduced, but then money continually flows in to pay off the people eager to sell "before the crash." Note that last April you could deposit cash in cavirtex through BMO and buy bitcoin later that day. Now, since verification is mandatory and cash deposits are not permitted, it's several weeks between applying for your account and placing your first bid.
I'd love to get this data on BitStamp, BTC-e and Gox. Duing the March/April bubble, people were posting the Gox verification queue in the Speculation Forum on a regular basis.
So they process about 60-80 per day and have 100-120 incoming....
Perhaps with the 6-12 new people they hired/temps they can get caught up in the next 2 weeks.
I have been waiting for the surge of newbie money to come rushing in as market buy orders any time.