Bitcoin Forum

What happened?
Upon me (personally, not as a Hermes rep) sending an email to GLBSE talking about Hermes and what discussing what I would suggest we pay for an easy-transfer feature for Issuers to near-seamlessly switch securities from GLBSE to Hermes and talking about how much it'd otherwise cost us to "pinch" those GLBSE customers if the transfer feature weren't implemented, all BDK & JRO-related assets (BDK, BDK.BND, Zip.A, REBATE) were "limited," and Kronos.BND was canceled by the GLBSE team. This effectively cut us off from public fundraising on GLBSE. As such, we're working on solutions and are confident this will be resolved amicably.

As an investor in one of these securities, what should I know? Do I need to do anything?
If you currently hold BDK, BDK.BND, Zip.A, or REBATE, there is nothing you need to do right now. All dividends will be paid as scheduled - we are not restricted in that manner. Security-holders are still able to trade as they please, and there will be no changes to contracts. Eventually (this will either be in a few days or couple months depending if we can come to an agreement with GLBSE), we will be moving BDK & JRO securities over to Hermes. Assuming we get an agreement with GLBSE, this should be as easy as clicking "redeem," and entering the code given on Hermes. GLBSE security-holders will continue receiving dividends and be able to trade as they please. Security-holders will not be required to switch exchanges to receive dividends (I'm only speaking for BDK & BDK.BND here -- I don't have confirmation from JRO on what exactly he'll be doing). However, all new activity (issuance of shares, for example) by the Issuer will occur on the exchange we're primarily using. In the event of a buyback, securities on both exchanges will be purchased.

If you've reserved Kronos.BND units, Kronos.BND has been canceled, voiding your reservations. Nobody paid for those yet, so there's no need for us to issue refunds. BDK was a little more messy, as some people had already pre-paid. I've contacted those people and we've worked something out. If you have a remaining BDK reservation, two options exist -- you may keep your reservation and pay for shares to be issued on June 2nd (I currently do not know if this will be on GLBSE or Hermes), or you may cancel your reservation, which I completely understand. Everything should be ready to go as scheduled for the July 2nd offering and beyond. ETA: Nefario unlocked BDK and we had our offering as planned. I've been kept out of the loop lately, so I honestly (as of 6/9/12) don't know what's going on.

What the Hell is Hermes, anyway?
Hermes is, in part, a competing listing/trading platform. It is intended to have all the features of GLBSE with more devs able to spend more time correcting some lingering issues with GLBSE while adding on to that platform with features which emphasize the voice of Issuers for the sake of disclosure and marketing, high liquidity with minimal spreads, little or no transaction fees, and an additional feature-set for crowdfunding, Kickstarter-style. We'll make a full, more solid announcement within a month, possibly two.

How has this impacted Icehill & BDK operations?
The Kronos bond is canceled until further notice. Devs have been moved away from Kronos development and other projects to work on Hermes, under the initial assumption we needed to push out a service in alpha state immediately. But, this assumption may not be true as we work with GLBSE to come to agreement. Kronos launch has likely been delayed for at least a week, possibly longer. If we do not come to an agreement and we're still unable to fund-raise publicly through exchanges, we'll likely push out Hermes within a week with a basic platform, then building on it.

Since I've been unable to take the funds I originally planned for BDK & BDK.BND, I've had to cancel some buy reservations for others and have been trying to liquidate some of my GLBSE holdings - privately - so their value will not suddenly drop like a stone. BDK is not currently experiencing any liquidity problems.

Wait -- what? What's Icehill?
Please pardon us for having to make so many early announcements. Icehill is the name for what will be a publicly registered company in Iceland. Icehill handles all the implementations of software designed by RingCoin (Kronos, Hermes, ZipConf, and other projects in queue). It is not registered right now. The project leader is heading to Iceland shortly to talk to a lawyer working for Iceland's dominant payment processor. From there, we'll get Icehill registered and have a proper announcement for everyone. BDK is a xx% stakeholder in Icehill (this % will likely change frequently and perhaps dramatically within the next few months). (ETA: I'm in discussions with Icehill, now, and this situation may change depending on what we decide -- that is, instead of having bought equity in Icehill, BDK funds may be rolled over into another project on different terms I'll update everyone on once we're in agreement.)

So what's on the table of GLBSE & Icehill, anyway?
Right now, we're discussing an equity swap. For x% of Icehill, GLBSE gives us x% of GLBSE. Because we have to talk about Icehill and can't sell Hermes separately, things are a little complicated. However, relations between GLBSE & us are now at a friendly level, and our talks are productive. It's not a few people in a dark room shouting at each other through the scent of cigars and whiskey, threatening to call the prince of Nigeria to cut off the heads of the other party. Please give us more time to work out a deal. We appreciate the cooperation.

If you have questions beyond, feel free to ask here or PM them to me. I'll try to update people as soon as I see their questions.

-Ben

I can see why many companies keep their customers in the dark for a while after a major event happens, now. Things are changing constantly, and now I've provided misinformation in saying security-holders will necessarily have to go through the ghetto process of sending me their shares on GLBSE to verify, then manually sending everyone their shares on Hermes. It's now again on the table to do a GLBSE-Hermes equity swap which would allow all "limited" assets to be unlocked and have an easy-transfer feature implemented on GLBSE to allow Issuers to effectively export their asset (ETA: the way it would work - GLBSE would have an Issuer initiate a transfer, codes would be created, GLBSE would send us a list of codes and what they mean, then GLBSE users would get a code they enter on Hermes. The share-holder would have his shares on GLBSE destroyed, but have the same amount create on Hermes. The contract would remain in-tact.). GLBSE didn't originally take that off the table, we did, but now we have productive dialogue going again.

I probably should have let things settle more before giving a bunch of updates. Sorry about that. OP updated.

Still , this is much better than other "kept in the dark" events we have had in the community.

Yes, it's way better having to read too much and being surprised by sudden changes than being completely in the dark without having a clue about what's happening. I really appreciate openness on everything.

OP has been updated. If you want to know anything more, please ask me and I'll respond with a new reply and update the OP as well, so everyone's able to receive an update, too.

If anyone has any more questions, ask me now. Going to log off and enjoy life for a while in ~1h. Still no updates on the equity swap where restrictions on our GLBSE securities would be lifted. Waiting for decisions from others involved with Icehill.

ETA: Logging off. Will check threads again before going to bed. Cheers!

Kudos Kluge for being extremely professional, cool-headed, and proactive about this. You have shown exemplary conduct in an extremely challenging and perhaps unfair situation.

If Icehill ever launches an IPO, I for one will be an investor.

Assuming Nef agrees to unrestrict our securities, we'll be putting Hermes on the backburner for 2+ months, then reconsider development after that time. Trying to get a hold of him.

The actual deal on the table now is a "mutual options" contract, which gives both Icehill & GLBSE the ability to exercise that option in xx days, being an equity swap. GLBSE would get a % equity stake in Icehill, and Icehill would get a % equity stake in Hermes. Then, we have a symbiotic business relationship where we each have our own niche and there's much less incentive to try becoming a monopoly. Icehill's attorney is writing it up now and there's more internal discussion going on.

While it looks like a mutually-beneficial solution is imminent and Nef & I are on friendly terms again, I asked Nef to unrestrict BDK so I can go ahead with the June offering as scheduled.

Hermes has many unique ideas, and different target audiences than GLBSE (though there's also a lot of overlap). More than anything, having both parties agree to an equity swap proves that there are niches being filled independently by the two exchanges.

GLBSE's getting their way, and it is indeed my fault for being too loose-lipped. But, that's not to say Icehill is necessarily losing in this agreement, either. Nefario brings his own unique expertise to the table, and a more polite relationship has been established between Icehill & GLBSE (at least, more polite than would've been if we were talking to Nef & team with a straight face while secretly developing, then suddenly launching a partially-competing listing platform). As originally planned, Hermes wouldn't be launched for 2+ months. As looks like will be the case now, Hermes won't be launched for 2+ months, so not much change there.

BDK funds which were originally slated to go toward Hermes will likely now go toward Kronos so we can still launch within a few weeks. This is probably a better investment anyway, since Hermes was a longer-term commitment with a relatively large chunk of change. As well, since an amicable resolution seems imminent, I believe BDK will have its June offering as originally scheduled. All-in-all, very little has effectively changed from what was originally planned, the drama's nearly finished, and we can soon continue forward implementing innovative ideas.

 too many projects to follow

;D That's progress at the pace of Bitcoin.

Interesting stuff. I'll be watching this!  8)

Powerpuff'n that one.

Best not have a single point of failure?
The more the merrier says this noob 8)