There is no effective means of arbitrage at this time. The reason we have seen a consolidation of price is due to the levels of support at varying prices on different exchanges. Some exchanges had enough volume to push the price higher than others. Once the price comes down, the percentage difference diminishes the observable nominal price differences. And there was also a large manipulator on Gox, I don't know about the other exchanges.
I agree with you - though if you had been using my strategy to trade the spread previously, right now (all exchanges at same price) is a great opportunity to re-normalize your positions across exchanges by buying/selling BTC and transferring BTC between exchanges. And although there is 'noe ffective means of arbitrage' NOW, I expect the spreads to widen again as soon as we hit some new volatility.
I would also expect Gox to typically maintain at a minimum 5% premium to other exchanges, because this is how much it costs to withdraw fiat via wire transfer (unless you pay for the 5% expedited withdraw method you never see your money come out of Gox). So the ucrrent zero spread is quite strange, and probably reflects a lack of selling pressure (noone is in a big hurry to get their miney out of Gox, so they're less inclined to pay the extra to buy BTC and transfer them out).
Niothor - not sure what you were trying to show by quoting that as it wasn't
rpietila talking. I agree with the
Rampion's takedown of his trading/pricing recommendations though - I'm with
Dasheep and
Rampion that he sucks at trading.
The quote that is relevant to what I was saying was:
My trading strategy is currently such that there are major fluctuations in relative prices in BTC China and Bitstamp. I chart them and analyze them and have both fiat and bitcoins in both exchanges. I sell in China (buy back BS) when it goes like 10% ahead. When it goes back to 0%, I reverse.
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