[BETA]Bitfinex.com first Bitcoin P2P lending platform for leverage trading

[zakoliverz]

i only traded half of the movements no short so far only longs and made a decent %

[unclescrooge]

Hello everyone,

Sorry I didn't answer sooner. Between thursday and friday was a sleepless night to cover mtgox outage at best. So if we appear a little stressed out in our answers, that's normal, don't take it wrong

So during these outage, some liquidation were not processed properly, since the link between Mtgox and Bitfinex was cut. So we have put those positions on hold (internal flag so they are not touched) while we manually liquidated them. The process of rematching the liquidation orders is not over, we hope to have that done during the week-end. While I had to stop and restart the engine many times 2 nights ago to adapt to the situation, it's all too possible that the interests calculation were not done right. I don't believe a recalculation is due. If tonight you feel interests are wrong again, please don't hesitate to ask us, but all should have come back to normal.

If you dear lenders are worried about our losses, don't. We are really doing well. This is the biggest stress test so far for Bitfinex, and it was very positive. We have been able to hold on Mtgox trades when it should have been hold on. Even if it didn't please some traders it was the right thing to do. So lenders, don't worry, no insurance had to come play here.

Which brings me to the last point: you asked some very pertinent question about "insured" loans. We have to find arrangements with individuals/companies that will be able to insure the loans and bring up real reserves. Until then we cannot put up this option, and that's why all of your loans are still uninsured. For now we rely on our very resilient system that, these last 2 days, proved to be able to cut losses the right way. We have our own reserves now that the team is bigger, but I don't think it's my job to disclose it, I let those concerned do it if they feel it's the right thing to do.

I hope I'm clear enough, I just woke up and these was a short night again

Let me know if you have any questions,
Best regards
Raphael

[simonk83]

Hello everyone,


So during these outage, some liquidation were not processed properly, since the link between Mtgox and Bitfinex was cut. So we have put those positions on hold (internal flag so they are not touched) while we manually liquidated them. The process of rematching the liquidation orders is not over, we hope to have that done during the week-end.

Hi Raphael

Are you saying there that it's possible that the person borrowing from me has been liquidated, but it hasn't been processed as yet, which is the reason for the lower interest?   That also raises a bit of an issue if so, as basically we have neither the interest, nor the funds, until it's fixed up.  That can add up to a fair potential loss depending on how much is held up.  I'm missing about half of my interest from yesterday, which is obviously a bit worrying

While I had to stop and restart the engine many times 2 nights ago to adapt to the situation, it's all too possible that the interests calculation were not done right. I don't believe a recalculation is due. If tonight you feel interests are wrong again, please don't hesitate to ask us, but all should have come back to normal.

Are you saying there that the extra interest will be added to tonights payout?  (assuming that point number 1 doesn't apply)

Thanks for the response, hopefully tonight will be nice and quiet for you guys so you can catch up on some sleep

[unclescrooge]

Hi Raphael

Are you saying there that it's possible that the person borrowing from me has been liquidated, but it hasn't been processed as yet, which is the reason for the lower interest?   That also raises a bit of an issue if so, as basically we have neither the interest, nor the funds, until it's fixed up.  That can add up to a fair potential loss depending on how much is held up.  I'm missing about half of my interest from yesterday, which is obviously a bit worrying

Simon,

No the lower interests has nothing to do with that. When you have a loan active, your interests are calculated based on this loan, no matter the situation of the position behind. What I'm saying was that when Mtgox halted their engine, I had to code a lot of switches to deal with the situation, ie continue to provide trading for my users but prevent Bitfinex from relying on Mtgox (for balance settlement,...). During these, I had to stop the various engines a lot of time, including the one that calculate interests for open loans and positions. I don't know how much has been missed, honestly I didn't keep track of that (no I didn't panic but still a lot to think).
So to be short, yes there is probably interests calculation that have been missed, and no I can't recalculate them. I don't think it amounts to half the interests as the VIR went a lot lower yesterday. I hope you pardon me these. I'd like to say it won't happen again, and I'll make everything for that. These were unusual time for Bitcoin, and I'm glad of the way we handled it, and Mtgox handled it (yes I think although there is a lot to say about them, they handle it quite well within their means).

Are you saying there that the extra interest will be added to tonights payout?  (assuming that point number 1 doesn't apply)

Thanks for the response, hopefully tonight will be nice and quiet for you guys so you can catch up on some sleep

No, as said above you probably won't get extra-interests but normal one. Watch if you think something is missing but normally all should come back in order.
Again sorry to not be able to look at all history individually. There is still a lot of mess to clean.

As always, if you have anything to ask, hit us on admin@bitfinex.com or here
Raphael
Bitfinex team

[unclescrooge]

By the way Sulkrim thanks for your spreadsheet

[simonk83]

Hi Raphael

Are you saying there that it's possible that the person borrowing from me has been liquidated, but it hasn't been processed as yet, which is the reason for the lower interest?   That also raises a bit of an issue if so, as basically we have neither the interest, nor the funds, until it's fixed up.  That can add up to a fair potential loss depending on how much is held up.  I'm missing about half of my interest from yesterday, which is obviously a bit worrying

Simon,

No the lower interests has nothing to do with that. When you have a loan active, your interests are calculated based on this loan, no matter the situation of the position behind. What I'm saying was that when Mtgox halted their engine, I had to code a lot of switches to deal with the situation, ie continue to provide trading for my users but prevent Bitfinex from relying on Mtgox (for balance settlement,...). During these, I had to stop the various engines a lot of time, including the one that calculate interests for open loans and positions. I don't know how much has been missed, honestly I didn't keep track of that (no I didn't panic but still a lot to think).
So to be short, yes there is probably interests calculation that have been missed, and no I can't recalculate them. I don't think it amounts to half the interests as the VIR went a lot lower yesterday. I hope you pardon me these. I'd like to say it won't happen again, and I'll make everything for that. These were unusual time for Bitcoin, and I'm glad of the way we handled it, and Mtgox handled it (yes I think although there is a lot to say about them, they handle it quite well within their means).

Fair enough Raphael.   I don't actually have any VIR loans as it turns out, they're all fixed interest and MUCH higher than the VIR at the moment so the loss was more substantial, but as you say, strange circumstances and desperate measures were needed, so I'll drop it    Hopefully things get a bit more stable with Bitcoin in general for us all

Are you saying there that the extra interest will be added to tonights payout?  (assuming that point number 1 doesn't apply)

Thanks for the response, hopefully tonight will be nice and quiet for you guys so you can catch up on some sleep

No, as said above you probably won't get extra-interests but normal one. Watch if you think something is missing but normally all should come back in order.
Again sorry to not be able to look at all history individually. There is still a lot of mess to clean.

As always, if you have anything to ask, hit us on admin@bitfinex.com or here
Raphael
Bitfinex team

Yep, fair enough.

[BuildTheFuture]

Hi, relatively I'm still a newb to all this, however as a tech entrepreneur myself I have to speak up and say that when there is a serious error such as interest not properly accumulating it should only be seen as something that must be fixed immediately. This is an opportunity for Bitfinex to demonstrate their qualities to current and potential customers.

My advice would be to prioritize near the top of your to-do list an improvement to your engine that allows for it to be paused if and when necessary in emergencies, but such that when it is restarted it takes note of any time gaps and calculates interest properly.

[DeaDTerra]

I can no longer see the % I get for my loans in the lending section.
Before I was given the USD % interest rate and the BTC % interest rate.
Anyway to change some settings to get that info back?
//DeaDTerra

[drawingthesun]

I can no longer see the % I get for my loans in the lending section.
Before I was given the USD % interest rate and the BTC % interest rate.
Anyway to change some settings to get that info back?
//DeaDTerra

They disabled it temporarily.

[DeaDTerra]

I can no longer see the % I get for my loans in the lending section.
Before I was given the USD % interest rate and the BTC % interest rate.
Anyway to change some settings to get that info back?
//DeaDTerra

They disabled it temporarily.

The interest rate or the info of the interest rate?
//DeaDTerra

[drawingthesun]

I can no longer see the % I get for my loans in the lending section.
Before I was given the USD % interest rate and the BTC % interest rate.
Anyway to change some settings to get that info back?
//DeaDTerra

They disabled it temporarily.

The interest rate or the info of the interest rate?
//DeaDTerra

Info in the right hand side bar around where the figures are for money lent out.

[Sukrim]

The info on the right.

My stance on the issue of lost interest is that it could have been worse probably. I had nearly all my loans cancelled on March 29th when vir exploded and got far worse returns percent wise for that day than yesterday. I'd write it off as 1 time event and growing pains. To put it into perspective: I earned with the interest that I still got more in a day than I would have gotten in a year in a traditional bank.

I hope on the other hand that this won't happen again, or if it does that it is possible to retroactively pay the due money. If I didn't get the correct amount, the remaining money probably also just staid with the traders, so bitfinex might not even have profited from that as they get commissions from interest...

Anyways I rather report these issues and deal with maybe a little grumpyness than risking that there are some issues overlooked and they go out of business...

[unclescrooge]

Hi, relatively I'm still a newb to all this, however as a tech entrepreneur myself I have to speak up and say that when there is a serious error such as interest not properly accumulating it should only be seen as something that must be fixed immediately. This is an opportunity for Bitfinex to demonstrate their qualities to current and potential customers.

My advice would be to prioritize near the top of your to-do list an improvement to your engine that allows for it to be paused if and when necessary in emergencies, but such that when it is restarted it takes note of any time gaps and calculates interest properly.

Hello BuildTheFuture,

This has actually been part of my yesterday work to quickly implement a lot of switches to avoid this in the future. That's why I aid it should not happen again (but I'm growing used to new problems every day...).

To all lenders, no we didn't profit as no interests means no cut for us.

By the way, we have implemented a small goody for traders: you now have the possibility to swap your loans for cheaper one without touching your position:

Borrow offers that interests you.
Wait until the funds are really borrowed (until they appear in the "Unused borrowed funds").
Then close the loans of your position that doesn't interests you. Your loans will be swapped until there is no loans (and then the rest will be force closed).

let me know if you have any questions
Raphael
Bitfinex team

[Sukrim]

A feature that might be interesting for some but that has again a bit of lag risks:

Allow going short with a USD balance and long with a BTC balance as collateral.
Interest gets traded on the spot when needed and paid to the lender.

E.g. Bob the Bear is not even daring to exchange his precious precious USD a few BTC to get a loan. He has 1k USD though in his account and borrows 1 BTC with that at 1% per day rates.
Every day, a few USD are traded automatically by bitfinex from his balance to pay the lender in BTC. Once the price tanks, Bob decides he wants his profit and cashes out (in USD of course!). He never really had to have BTC in his posession and everybody is happy.

Same goes for bulls who might find it easier/faster to transfer BTC they already own into the platform to profit from a rally.

Risks: Bitfinex needs to make sure that in a flash crash the BTC as collateral from bulls or in a flash price explosion (?!) the USD from bears are enough to cover the interest of the day so far. This might be migitated by calculating and paying interest hourly, so there would be max. 1 hour of interest on the line to be lost which decreases the risk 24-fold... and also creates a steady stream of smaller trades compared to sudden action every day at midnight UTC.


Oh by the way I'm really happy to see that recently I don't always lend out huge positions, but now also a couple of 20 USD loans or so at VIR - seems like a few poeple are actively trying to learn how everything works which is definitely a good thing!

Edit: AAAND we're getting goxxed again! Put in an order, watch an episode of your favourite series and by the end it might actually have reached the order book!

[simonk83]

Interest is all good today  

[superbit]

All my loans are coming back, where did all the margin traders go??

[drawingthesun]

All my loans are coming back, where did all the margin traders go??

How much are you lending for??

Notice that over $70,000 is waiting to be taken up at VIR, so if you want to attract a trader you may have to push your loans out lower than this rate.

I have been offering some loans at $40 less than VIR but still no takers.

Might have to go even lower....

https://www.bitfinex.com/pages/stats Says that just under half a million is being used for the margin traders, I guess not enough want the extra $70,000.

[simonk83]

Quick question about how the Maximum lending time (days) column works in Lending.

So I have a loan offering open at a certain percentage for 15 days.   At the time, I was the only loan open at that percentage.   Someone else has just put up a loan for the same percentage, but for 2 days.    That seems to have overridden my offer, and the column now shows the maximum days for that percentage to be 2 days.   This happens all the time, and is quite confusing.   I'm assuming potential lendees see the same information, which gives a misleading take on things. To them, they'd think that the Max they can borrow is 2 days, when really they could take a 15 day loan.

Not sure how to tweak this really.   Should you always show the actual Maximum amount of days (so in this case it'd be 15 days, rather than 2), which makes more sense, or should you just show two rows for that percentage, eg:

15 days    10%   40BTC   1
2 days      10%   20BTC   1

What does everyone else think?

I also agree with others that the minimum interest calculation time should be 1 hour (rather than calculating by the minute, but by all means implement that if it's possible).   Too often people will take a loan out for 5 minutes then cancel it.  That's just annoying    If they were to be charged an hours interest I suspect they'd think more carefully before clicking the button

[Deprived]

Fair enough Raphael.   I don't actually have any VIR loans as it turns out, they're all fixed interest and MUCH higher than the VIR at the moment so the loss was more substantial, but as you say, strange circumstances and desperate measures were needed, so I'll drop it    Hopefully things get a bit more stable with Bitcoin in general for us all

Just to add to this, I'm in the same boat as simon - had posted about it here:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=175210.0

As I didn't find this thread and couldn't work out how to get an invitation code to register for the bitfinex forums.

My loans were all at exactly the same rate (WAY over VIR) and I received about half the interest I should have got.  Had exactly same loans still open yesterday and got the full amount (well about 5% under what I calc it should have been but near enough not to matter).

Not too fussed about it - with the returns I'm making some issues are inevitable.  In fact they're desirable - as if there weren't occasional problems the site would be swamped in USD and we'd not get such good rates.

Here's mine for the record:

Currency    Amount    Rate (% per 365 days) *    Expire in    Auto-renew (lending offers)    Actions
USD    29.19032581    1798.0%    12 months    No    Renew loan   Notify
USD    2110.08319976    1798.0%    12 months    No    Renew loan   Notify
USD    152.63    1798.0%    12 months    No    Renew loan   Notify
USD    3638.7240986    1798.0%    12 months    No    Renew loan   Notify
USD    2422.5448393    1798.0%    12 months    No    Renew loan   Notify

And here's the interest payments for the last 2 days.  Yesterday there WAS one more loan of a small amount for a short time and I have shorted BTC a few times - but only in small amounts and with it being BTCl oans ay tiny rates it would have had a trivial impact.

Interest Payment on wallet deposit    186.3949       8539.6236    13 Apr 01:10
Interest Payment on wallet deposit    370.3316       8723.5152    14 Apr 01:11

As I say, I'm not fussed about the small loss - but it definitely IS the case that some people got around half what they should have.  Will provide my account name by PM/email if you (Raphael) want to look into it - but don't bother about it unless there's something you'd like to check out.  Obviously I don't post my account name here.

[Sukrim]

Damn, congrats on these 1800% loans!

I switched to VIR for today, to actually lend out my money instead of having it lying around. As Monday is approaching and there should probably be some money arriving at exchanges, I now decided again to put in some higher rates for any returned loans... let's see if the market is ready for 3-4% a day interests for lenders again.