4 ms·

The only reason I have confidence is because two years ago Magical Tux began transferring around 440k bitcoins in order to prove ownership of those coins: http:

The only reason I have confidence is because two years ago Magical Tux began transferring around 440k bitcoins in order to prove ownership of those coins: http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/n4a2o/someone_has_been_transferring_around_440k/ http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/n4a2o/someone_has_b... If he had 440k coins then, imagine how many he has now. Yes, he could have lost a lot, but on the other hand we'd probably have heard if someone pulled off that kind of heist. Here's how I expect things will happen: Gox will refund all "stuck" withdrawls. (Mine have already been refunded.) Then they will fix the technical problem, hopefully by Monday, but certainly within a couple weeks. Then they'll re-enable bitcoin withdraws. At that point, everybody will yank their bitcoin out of Gox. But then people will realize that there is value in trading on Gox as a platform, and Gox will be used for what it's meant to be used for: Trading, not storage. EDIT: To clarify, I don't believe it's possible they had a technical problem that led to them losing more bitcoins than the profits they've made from trading fees. (This is me being hopeful that people can't be that incompetent.)

XorNot 13y ago
It's not a technical problem. The problem is Mt. Gox is almost certainly doing arbitrage with the cash on hand, and the BTC on hand. The delays with withdrawals were almost certainly because they needed to liquefy some instruments to pay out. Of course seeing their origins and backing, they've screwed up - and BTC being volatile it has probably moved against them - so low and behold "technical problem" while they try to figure out how to get solvent again. Punchline: real cash gets refunded, the BTC will not be, anyone holding BTC is going to lose big as the price tanks.
- jrockway 13y ago
  The delays with withdrawals were almost certainly because they needed to liquefy some instruments to pay out. I would guess this is a fraud-stopping measure. Time is a fraudster's enemy; you may have guessed someone's password, but if they read the email that says someone changed their email address, they can react before the money disappears into the ether. Furthermore, Mt. Gox can probably predict in advance how much cash they'll need to fulfill withdrawals, and liquidate the instruments in advance to make withdrawals instant, if they so chose. Everyone loves a good conspiracy theory, but the reality of running a money transfer business makes Mt. Gox look pretty normal.
  - username223 13y ago
    > Time is a fraudster's enemy; If I agree to hold your money, then "need more time" to give it back to you, how exactly is time being my enemy?
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
anigbrowl 13y ago
But then people will realize that there is value in trading on Gox as a platform What value is this, exactly? You seem to be assuming that having fixed this problem the platform will never break down again, ever.
GigabyteCoin 13y ago
If he had 440k coins then, imagine how many he has now. Those ~440,000 Bitcoin were property of the Mt. Gox traders, not Mt. Gox the company. Mt. Gox was moving the money publicly in a show of good faith that they still controlled it. They have yet to do that in this new case. For all we know, Mt. Gox could have sent the ~40,000 missing Bitcoin to an unrecoverable/non-existant address by mistake.

XorNot 13y ago

It's not a technical problem. The problem is Mt. Gox is almost certainly doing arbitrage with the cash on hand, and the BTC on hand. The delays with withdrawals were almost certainly because they needed to liquefy some instruments to pay out. Of course seeing their origins and backing, they've screwed up - and BTC being volatile it has probably moved against them - so low and behold "technical problem" while they try to figure out how to get solvent again. Punchline: real cash gets refunded, the BTC will not be, anyone holding BTC is going to lose big as the price tanks.

jrockway 13y ago
The delays with withdrawals were almost certainly because they needed to liquefy some instruments to pay out. I would guess this is a fraud-stopping measure. Time is a fraudster's enemy; you may have guessed someone's password, but if they read the email that says someone changed their email address, they can react before the money disappears into the ether. Furthermore, Mt. Gox can probably predict in advance how much cash they'll need to fulfill withdrawals, and liquidate the instruments in advance to make withdrawals instant, if they so chose. Everyone loves a good conspiracy theory, but the reality of running a money transfer business makes Mt. Gox look pretty normal.
- username223 13y ago
  > Time is a fraudster's enemy; If I agree to hold your money, then "need more time" to give it back to you, how exactly is time being my enemy?

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

anigbrowl 13y ago

But then people will realize that there is value in trading on Gox as a platform What value is this, exactly? You seem to be assuming that having fixed this problem the platform will never break down again, ever.

GigabyteCoin 13y ago

If he had 440k coins then, imagine how many he has now. Those ~440,000 Bitcoin were property of the Mt. Gox traders, not Mt. Gox the company. Mt. Gox was moving the money publicly in a show of good faith that they still controlled it. They have yet to do that in this new case. For all we know, Mt. Gox could have sent the ~40,000 missing Bitcoin to an unrecoverable/non-existant address by mistake.