A court will order compensation in USD.  They're not going to fuck around consulting creditors about what they want - if credtors could agree with Bitfloor on that, then the matter wouldn't be before a court in the first place.

Also, before initiating convoluted court cases, it's wise to remember that the legal fees of an insolvent estate come out of that estate and further reduce the amount available for distribution to creditors.

What court?  He hasn't even got legal advice yet and is - wisely - suspending the service until he has done so.

There is absolutely nothing to prevent someone who goes through formal insolvency proceedings from paying back every one of their creditors in full even decades later - that's a personal choice, not a legal requirement.

People willing to wait can also not file a claim against the insolvent estate - that would mean those who want quick and certain payment would be paid  out to the extent allowed by the assets while others could seek a different form of, longer term, repayment.

Historically what has happened is that the larger creditors and/or other service operators have sought to buy out the venture in trouble - Cartmell et all offered to do this with Bitcoinica.  World Bitcoin Exchange and Bitcoinica did not accept the offers which would have paid out all customers and left the operators with no remaining liability but it doesn't mean that Roman won't consider and accept any such offers.

I'd just like to point out the importance of Bitfloor consulting an insolvency specialist and not a general lawyer.  You need someone who'll advise you on all of the legal options available and their pros and cons.

If they have your contact details, then they would be obligated to inform you of what's going on using the contact methods they have for you.  One of the biggest dangers of using services which do not require real life contact details - or choosing not to provide them - is that you may miss out on important information.


While this is true, there is usually a requirement that you make a demand for payment of the debt and that it go unpaid for a period of time following that demand.  While a debtor is actively seeking solutions such as borrowing, selling personal assets, or selling equity in the enterprise, it's not necessarily smart to immediately petition for involuntary bankruptcy.

Bitcoinica losses would have been substantially reduced had users sought injunctive relief.

The laws apply from the moment the insolvency occurs (or can be anticipated) whether or not bankruptcy has been filed - that's why payments made prior to the filing of bankruptcy can be clawed back and why making preferential payments within a class of creditors is an offence in and of itself.

The possibility of trading out in some way exists here and Bitfloor is legally obliged to consider all options which would maximise the return to its creditors (including selling the business in part or in whole), but it cannot legally give preference to any unsecured creditors while it's insolvent (which it is at this point in time).

US insolvency requirements are "due process of law".  It's up to those who don't believe that US insolvency law should be applied in this case to petition the court with on point arguments and case law supporting that assertion - the cost of defending against any such actions will come out of the bankrupt estate.  Unless USD holders can establish that they're secured or preferential creditors as defined by US insolvency law, there are no legal grounds on which they can be paid in full in preference to other unsecured creditors without the agreement of those other creditors.

To be honest, I'm not sure that's a bad idea.  The Bitcoin world has grown large enough that it could probably sustain a stand-alone market-place messageboard, I think it would be a healthy thing if people relied less on this forum as a primary means of promoting their businesses.

Scams have come to dominate the conversation here because they've taken place here.  Had they not been launched and promoted here, there'd still be discussion of them but not thread after thread of "where's my money" across multiple forums.  The number and scope of scams is only going to increase so we need to think about ways to ensure that they don't continue to be the dominant topic of discussion here.

There's a hell of a lot more than that.  Google the address and there are a shit-ton of companies.  As mentioned upthread, Incorp Services operates from that address and they only charge $99 to act as registered agents for businesses.

We know Zack's role at TLP.


Rylan Shavers listed The Lending Partners on his old MySpace, so I think he probably worked for them.  I haven't come across anything which confirms that Trendon did, though (Rylan and Zack are linked on social media, so I think both Shavers brothers know Zack IRL).

Obviously not all of these companies can fit into Suite 500, 815 Brazos St.  There's likely an accountant or lawyer there acting as registered agent and the companies are using their office as a registered business address (this is common the world over and implies no connection between the companies themselves).

http://www.corporationwiki.com/Texas/Austin/815-Brazos-St-Ste-500-Austin-TX-78701-a17332777.aspx

The Lending Partners isn't some small time operation recently thrown together.

http://www.allmortgagedetail.com/mortgages/lenders/the-lending-partners-ltd-plano-tx.asp?yr=2010

Why the delay in making the announcement if whatever it's about is already certain (and if it's not certain, the why hype it up with a pre-announcement)?

I don't think it should be done purely for the sake of preventing the possibility of this domain being seized.  

I understand the desire of the mods to avoid having to make judgements about the various high risk investment opportunities being made here, but I think that sometimes works against the interests of the community.  

People can continue to post here as VIP members and promote other schemes even when one of their ventures owes large amounts of money to its users.  While I'm not sure that the "scammer" tag is appropriate for those people, the absence of any kind of "flag" can be seen as tacit endorsement given that people have been given the scammer tag for a whole lot less.  The scammer tag is of little use if it's not applied to people who are still actively peddling their wares here despite major, unresolved financial problems from other ventures.  

Moving some of the forums promoting high risk ventures to another domain might be one option for dealing with the perception that this community both allows and supports the promotion of scams.  I don't totally buy the argument that various scams damage the perception of Bitcoin per se, but I do think that scams which are born in this community and promoted in this community damage the credibility of these forums, and that we'll start seeing more legitimate operators abandoning this community to avoid having their own services associated with what currently looks like a scam incubator.

People were identifying him as Trendon Shavers and posting about his connections to other businesses and his arrest warrant at least as far back as May.

Their Metro bank account was being terminated at the end of August anyway.  Sounds like this happened a day early for some reason but people definitely shouldn't have been depositing into it once it was announced that the account would be closing.

Normally when banks close accounts which have balances, the total balance gets sent to the account-holder soon after the closure.  Sometimes they fuck up and do accept deposits for a short time after the closure of the account but if those deposits have been made electronically they're often reversed in time.

If Intersango's locked out of online banking, they need to organise getting a statement for their account ASAP so they can see the most recent transactions. 

Hope without action is useless and meaningless.  It's best left for situations where you truly have no agency and recognise that there is nothing you can do to affect an outcome or where you wish to acknowledge that you don't intend taking action.

Desire can be both a source of motivation and a source of frustration and misery - thus the Buddhist belief that attachment to desire is the source of all suffering.

Action is what tends to create results.  You're more likely to achieve desired outcomes while thinking negatively but taking action than you are by thinking positively but doing nothing.

Hopefully they're not going to planning to announce it at the London Conference.  The devs specifically chose to disconnect the forums from the Bitcoin Project in an attempt to keep the Project itself neutral and professional.  They can't maintain any appearance of neutrality if they make major announcements at an event being organised by shonky operators whose behaviour calls Bitcoin into disrepute.

The fact that Patrick Strateman is still a guest speaker at the conference speaks volumes about the extent to which it's a personal, pet project. 

They should invite Trendon Shavers to give a presentation, just for good measure.

It's disingenuous to promote the event to potential sponsors using the "700 people" line, too.  There's little reason to believe that another 500 people are going to buy tickets in the next 11 days.

I'd prefer to see it applied to Securities as a whole.  If we're going to add another sub-category, I'd prefer it to be HYIPs and for the Lending and Securities forums to be heavily moderated for a while so that people don't just promote their HYIPs in forums where there's no warning and don't have an incentive to mis-label their schemes.