It seems like the $5M question is whether Stamp has spare BTC to cover the loss, or do they have to buy some of those 18K btcs in the market to return back to their users.
If they make everyone whole and swallow the loss, I wonder how Stamp users will feel? Do you switch because they were hacked, or do you stay loyal because they made everyone whole even after they fucked up. I mean shit happens, its nice to know that they are willing to take a hit to preserve their users' funds (like Blockchain did when some of their wallets were hacked).
How much do they make each day on average? Bitstamp's a ripple gateway in addition to a bitcoin exchange, so it makes money off the ripple system and people trading bitcoins.
The article link below is about the first day OKCoin.com beat Bitstamp by transacting nearly 16,000 BTC, compared with Bitstamp’s ~14,700 BTC and Bitfinex’s ~15,100 BTC.
https://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/okcoin-com-had-higher-daily-bitcoin-volume-than-bitstamp-and-bitfinex-today/I cannot remember exactly what fees Bitstamp charges, but if it's trading volume is ~14,700 BTC daily, then it must have earned far more than $5 million this year.
So that's what happened? Officially? Hackster got the hot wallet??
The statement is here.
http://www.coindesk.com/bitstamp-claims-roughly-19000-btc-lost-hot-wallet-hackThe full statement from Kodrič reads:
"Bitstamp customers can rest assured that their bitcoins held with us as prior to temporary suspension of services on January 5th (at 9am UTC) are completely safe and will be honored in full.
On January 4th, some of Bitstamp’s operational wallets were compromised, resulting in a loss of less than 19,000 BTC. Upon learning of the breach, we immediately notified all customers that they should no longer make deposits to previously issued bitcoin deposit addresses. As an additional security measure, we suspended our systems while we fully investigate the incident and actively engage with law enforcement officials.
This breach represents a small fraction of Bitstamp’s total bitcoin reserves, the overwhelming majority of which are are held in secure offline cold storage systems. We would like to reassure all Bitstamp customers that their balances held prior to our temporary suspension of services will not be affected and will be honored in full.
We appreciate customers’ patience during this disruption of services. We are working to transfer a secure backup of the Bitstamp site onto a new safe environment and will be bringing this online in the coming days. Customers can stay informed via updates on our website, on Twitter (@Bitstamp) and through Bitstamp customer support at
[email protected]."