Possible sale of LTC-GLOBAL site code to someone who wants to run a BTC exchange

[burnside]

I'm offering up for potential sale a perpetual license to run an exclusive bitcoin denominated stock exchange using LTC-GLOBAL site code.  (www.litecoinglobal.com)

I am very busy with my day job, my mining pool, and LTC-GLOBAL.  However with GLBSE's recent issues, Now is the time to roll out LTC-GLOBAL to the bitcoin community.  I simply do not have the time to do the business development and to take care of the day to day operations of what I know would be a very busy site.

I will point out that in terms of interface and site speed, the LTC-GLOBAL code should far surpass that of GLBSE.

I will also point out that LTC-GLOBAL's site code solves many of the primary complaints regarding using GLBSE on a daily basis.

The site should be easy to skin by changing the header, footer, and css.  Any reasonably competent graphic artist should be able to make it look very nice.  (Admittedly, I am great at making things work, but not great at making them pretty.)

Proceeds of the sale will be distributed to shareholders of LTC-GLOBAL on the LTC-GLOBAL exchange.

I'll discuss serious offers via PM.

Cheers.


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Just for reference: (and no, we do not value LTC-GLOBAL at this much.)
Theymos valued GLBSE in this thread here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=112402.0
17500 out of 77500 total GLBSE shares, representing 23%, asking 0.3 BTC per share.
By my math that's a rough valuation of 23250 BTC.  If their valuation was based on annual revenue, you can see the kind of potential this opportunity presents.

[k3t3r]

I hold shares of ltc-global so take an interest in this.

will this be an auction or open bids as this would potentially increase the price.

[burnside]

I am a hold shares of ltc-global so take an interest in this.

will this be an auction or open bids as this would potentially increase the price.

I would prefer to keep it out of public view, however if there are serious concerns with that I do not feel strongly about it.

Right now I'm just trying to gauge interest.  I think it would be a mistake to not launch a BTC exchange right now, I'm just hoping there are entrepreneurs out there that are interested so I don't have to do it all myself.

[Korbman]

I'd love to see someone take the reins on this one and pull it through. Having another reasonable BTC Exchange option would be wonderful 

[Stephen Gornick]

for potential sale a perpetual license to run an exclusive bitcoin denominated stock exchange using LTC-GLOBAL site code.  (www.litecoinglobal.com)

So you are selling the domain and licensing the software?

[burnside]

for potential sale a perpetual license to run an exclusive bitcoin denominated stock exchange using LTC-GLOBAL site code.  (www.litecoinglobal.com)

So you are selling the domain and licensing the software?

I'm not making any changes to Litecoin Global.

I am considering licensing the software for use as a bitcoin platform.

[burnside]

With GLBSE closing, (see: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=115669.0) ... this is someone's golden opportunity...

Could be up and running in a week or two...

[SaltySpitoon]

With GLBSE closing, (see: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=115669.0) ... this is someone's golden opportunity...

Could be up and running in a week or two...

I would advise that any potential buyers hold off on buying for a few days. +1 to Burnside for being a great exchange owner/manager, but I'm assuming at this point Nefario is getting strong armed by the gov, so we should probably wait and find out what they are trying to charge him with, and what legal issues could start sprouting out of crypto exchanges.

It would suck pretty badly if you purchased the exchange rights, started it up, and then got attacked immediately by the gov.

That being said, I'm interested as soon as all of this mess gets sorted.

[markm]

Presumably you would want to run as a Tor hidden service, in which case folks might prefer a system such as Open Transactions that is designed not to require trusting the server.

-MarkM-

[burnside]

With GLBSE closing, (see: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=115669.0) ... this is someone's golden opportunity...

Could be up and running in a week or two...

I would advise that any potential buyers hold off on buying for a few days. +1 to Burnside for being a great exchange owner/manager, but I'm assuming at this point Nefario is getting strong armed by the gov, so we should probably wait and find out what they are trying to charge him with, and what legal issues could start sprouting out of crypto exchanges.

It would suck pretty badly if you purchased the exchange rights, started it up, and then got attacked immediately by the gov.

That being said, I'm interested as soon as all of this mess gets sorted.

+1, you absolutely HAVE to have a plan in place if you are going to succeed.

This is in part why I am willing to license the code even though I know it could make far more if I operate it myself.  Because I am not in an ideal position (read: country) to be running it.

[burnside]

Presumably you would want to run as a Tor hidden service, in which case folks might prefer a system such as Open Transactions that is designed not to require trusting the server.

-MarkM-

OT has it's place, central exchanges have their place.  It's apples and oranges.

[markm]

Presumably you would want to run as a Tor hidden service, in which case folks might prefer a system such as Open Transactions that is designed not to require trusting the server.

-MarkM-

OT has it's place, central exchanges have their place.  It's apples and oranges.

Well trust and no need to trust really rather than apples and oranges.

If a server is to be anonymous to be hard to shut down, then not having to trust it is quite important.

If it is out in the open who owns it where its operating capital is stored and so on then Tor is likely not a good solution, instead some kind of "no extradition treaty" location might be needed.

(And don't bounty hunters just go kidnap people instead of extradition being used in those no extradition places? Since U.S. courts do not care whether kidnapping was used to cause the accused to appear in court?)

-MarkM-

[SaltySpitoon]

Presumably you would want to run as a Tor hidden service, in which case folks might prefer a system such as Open Transactions that is designed not to require trusting the server.

-MarkM-

OT has it's place, central exchanges have their place.  It's apples and oranges.

Well trust and no need to trust really rather than apples and oranges.

If a server is to be anonymous to be hard to shut down, then not having to trust it is quite important.

If it is out in the open who owns it where its operating capital is stored and so on then Tor is likely not a good solution, instead some kind of "no extradition treaty" location might be needed.

(And don't bounty hunters just go kidnap people instead of extradition being used in those no extradition places? Since U.S. courts do not care whether kidnapping was used to cause the accused to appear in court?)

-MarkM-

But at the same time, if you are intentionally trying to hide it, and then the gov finds you, its hard to claim stupid. Oh yeah, I just thought it would be a good idea to try to hide it, I didn't know that you would come after me, and shut me down.

I think the best case senario is that its not illegal in the first place, and you can legally have it running. I guess we should just wait and see how everything turns out with Nefario. If he was doing something frowned upon, and got busted, fine. If he wasn't doing anything frowned upon besides running the exchange.... well....

[markm]

Good point. Maybe all we need is someone who has passed the tests or whatever to become a licensed stockbroker and will put all securities interested in listing through whatever licensing requirements are needed before listing them.

Another possiblity might be to so a "common carrier", "software as a service" server on which anyone can create any asset and the operator of the server just keeps the software running without looking at what exactly people are having it number-crunch for them except to de-list anything that a court order orders to be de-listed.

-MarkM-

[Shadow383]

With GLBSE closing, (see: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=115669.0) ... this is someone's golden opportunity...

Could be up and running in a week or two...

Perhaps we can organise a consortium of glbse securities that can relist on sucha  thing at least for a little while.

How much would we need to raise to buy the code ?

The real issue, as far as I can see, is that for someone to be trusted to handle a customer database and a huge quantity of funds, they should be known and identifiable.
BUT being known and identifiable means that they'll face immense legal pressure almost immediately.

Do we have anyone in a suitable location where such things would be legal?

[Korbman]

The real issue, as far as I can see, is that for someone to be trusted to handle a customer database and a huge quantity of funds, they should be known and identifiable.
BUT being known and identifiable means that they'll face immense legal pressure almost immediately.

Do we have anyone in a suitable location where such things would be legal?

Could go the piratebay route and put servers in tons of different countries to avoid centralization.

Anyway, I'm happy to support this venture in any way I can. Though I can't offer any web designing or programming skills, I will happily invest in the project. Let's have a solid plan in place and try not to end up like GLBSE

[burnside]

The real issue, as far as I can see, is that for someone to be trusted to handle a customer database and a huge quantity of funds, they should be known and identifiable.
BUT being known and identifiable means that they'll face immense legal pressure almost immediately.

Do we have anyone in a suitable location where such things would be legal?

Could go the piratebay route and put servers in tons of different countries to avoid centralization.

Anyway, I'm happy to support this venture in any way I can. Though I can't offer any web designing or programming skills, I will happily invest in the project. Let's have a solid plan in place and try not to end up like GLBSE

I don't think the exchange itself is going to have issues with legality once sold "offshore".

The problem then becomes that asset issuers will have to issue assets at their own risk and on their own recognizance.  We might see a big drop in US based asset issuers once they realize regulatory requirements of issuing securities.    Or, more likely they'll all ignore it and go on their merry way.

[burnside]

Unfortunately if an American buys or sells on your site it makes you subject to the SEC. Its either go the silk road route or nothing.

If people think other stock exchanges are not going to go the way of glbse once they get "noticed" youre kidding.

I believe this is incorrect.  All exchanges in the world are not subject to the SEC.  Many exchanges have agreements with the SEC for information sharing, but many do not.  A company in Bermuda offering trading on the Bermuda exchange is not subject to the SEC in any way.

Now... the asset issuers, that's a whole different ball game.  If you are an american, and issue assets, no matter what exchange it is, you are subject to registration requirements by the SEC.  Based on the new JOBS act with it's crowdfunding exclusions, it has become much, much easier to register.

There's also always the "it's a video game" defense.  There are 100's of legal exchanges in the US.  Legal because they're 'virtual' or 'a game' or 'for training'.  Legal because when you join up you click through terms stating that you agree that nothing within the site is 'real'.  And even if some people trade your video game digital assets outside the game, does not mean it's not a game.  In game loot is traded on ebay every day.  That doesn't mean the games are not games.

[markm]

Maybe you can simply require all issuers to submit notarised affadivits asserting that their asset is fully compliant with all laws rules and regulations pertaining in their jurisdiction?

-MarkM-

[burnside]

Maybe you can simply require all issuers to submit notarised affadivits asserting that their asset is fully compliant with all laws rules and regulations pertaining in their jurisdiction?

-MarkM-

I love it, that's brilliant!