Bitcoin Forum

Everyone has heard of Bernie Madoff's ~$60B ponzi scheme. Long before he started his eponymous ponzi, Madoff was a penny stock trader and broker (aka shitcoin pumper).

This is a stock certificate issued to Bernard Madoff and has a notarized autograph on the back. I think this is a piece of financial history and in fact a similar Bernard Madoff certificate is on display in the Museum of American Finance in NYC.


Front: https://i.imgur.com/aZuxeCm.jpg
Rear: https://i.imgur.com/aubKG4k.jpg
It looks a lot flatter once it's framed!

I bought these stock certficates at a U.S. Marshal's auction and while I thought I was buying only 1 signed certificate and about a dozen unsigned ones, it turns out there was a second autographed certificate so now I want to get sell my duplicate.

I'm hoping to get somewhere in the range of 0.05-0.1 BTC for it which is quite a bit less than I see people asking for similar items online (and less than I thought I was paying for one). I wanted to gauge interest to make sure I'm not completely out of line. I'm also not sure if this forum is the best place to sell it, but I figured at least some of you are interested in finance and financial crimes.

I realize I'm a new user and would be happy to do escrow or local pickup in the SF Bay Area and will provide buyer with a scanned copy of the U.S. Marshal auction invoice and a cryptographically-signed message associated with my PGP key and/or my ENS domain name so you can prove provenance should you wish to resell it in the future.


As I mentioned, I also have about a dozen unsigned ones. They look identical aside from the serial number and they aren't autographed on the back. I'm not sure what to let them go for -- I was thinking about $30-$40 each based on what I've seen other Madoff memorabilia goes for.
Thanks!

edit: I'm trying to answer questions via DMs but unfortunately because I have a new account I'm limited to sending 2 DMs per day. I am on the Coin Council slack now though and can also talk via e-mail.

edit 2: sold so locking this thread. Once this transaction is complete I'll start selling the unautographed ones.

Pretty neat little piece of history, who knew Bernie was an OG shitcoin shiller  :D

Didnt know there was a market for madoff stuff but why not right.  This is probably a good place to sell this though gl with your sale and welcome to the forum.

He didn't have anything to do with crypto as far as I'm aware.  I don't know what OP is talking about.

This is kind of a neat thing--I've always loved stock certificates for some reason, though this one is kind of bland as far as design goes.  The only thing I would worry about here is authenticity.  It's damn hard to know what you've got here is genuine.  Maybe that's just me, but it seems like everything can be faked these days, especially signatures.

Edit: thanks for that link, OP.

Here's the original auction: https://www.txauction.com/lots/7913 The certificate pictured there is hanging on my wall.
I believe if I provide you with the invoice number and my name the auction house should confirm that I bought it.

Lovely piece of history you got there...I lived 2 blocks away from him when he was free. :D

No no I wasn't referring that either just an analogy of penny stocks to shitcoins was all.

heh I was on the fence over whether to make a shitcoin joke or something like "up until Satoshi, Madoff held the world record for making the most money out of thin air" but decided to go with the former because Bitcoin's value definitely doesn't come from thin air. I feel like nocoiners would find the latter funnier though.

Yeah I'd stick with the shitcoin reference than the thin air joke around here some people are touchy  :D

Sold to me.

thanks!