[BTC-TC] Virtual Community Exchange [CLOSED]

[Lohoris]

Most people in bitcoinland are financial newbies, so these kinds of mistakes are common.

Perfectly understandable, but in the interests of everyone it would be better to fix those mistakes, switching securities to the correct category.
Is there a specific reason why this hasn't been done, or it's just because nobody cared or because burnside is too busy?

[Deprived]

Most people in bitcoinland are financial newbies, so these kinds of mistakes are common.

Perfectly understandable, but in the interests of everyone it would be better to fix those mistakes, switching securities to the correct category.
Is there a specific reason why this hasn't been done, or it's just because nobody cared or because burnside is too busy?

Well on the pass-through issue, whilst pass-throughs technically aren't stocks in many ways it makes sense to actually list them as stocks.  That's because, if operated according to contract, their behaviour is going to be identical (less management fee) to if they WERE actually stocks in the underlying asset.  So listing them as whatever the underlying asset is does, sort of, make sense - in terms of informing potential investors what they can expect if they invest.  For this reason the three pass-throughs I run myself (on LTC-Global) are all listed as stocks despite technically being funds.

Listing funds as bonds is a far more serious error.  Stocks and funds have a lot in common which is NOT shared by bonds.  Fundamentally the different is that bonds are debt (if you hold a bond you are owed a predetermined amount of money) whilst stocks and funds are both equity (you own a portion of either the company or its assets).  With bonds the amount owed should never change - with stocks and funds there's no defined value and what your shares/units are worth is determined by the performance of the company.

The issue is further confused because a lot of IPOs are stock-like in nature but claim not to be stocks (they explicitly state that the share do not represent ownership of the company).  This is largely a (totally futile if regulatory authorities ever take an interest) effort to try to pretend they aren't securities at all but does make classifying them difficult (they give most of the worst features of all types whilst omitting those recourses which investors would otherwise have).  Those haven't managed to invade BTC.CO much yet (Bitfunder has plenty of them) but probably will.

My view on it is that the classification (stock/fund/bond) should be the best fit for the behaviour investors can expect from the security - whether or not it's technically correct.  Whilst there are definite grey areas between stocks/funds (the primary difference is whether you own a company or only some part of its assets) there's no such grey area with bonds.

It's not an issue burnside can just go and solve.  Moving categories would just cause confusion unless, at the same time, contracts were also amended (often requiring a vote by investors).  Then operators would also need to update their threads, websites etc.  All of which takes time which, for many companies, could be better spent on other things - such as producing the accounts/lists of assets that many are so deficient in.

[Lohoris]

[...]

Wow, thanks again for this great post!

[miTgiB]

Noob question, I'm a bit confused: why is BTC-TRADING-PT considered a FUND, as opposite to a STOCK, like ASICMINER-PT?
I.e. which are the differences?
Unless I'm mistaken they are both passthroughs, they both grant dividends, they can both be redeemed...

ASIC-MINER-PT is a fund.

The important distinction between a "fund" and a "stock" is that shares of a stock represent ownership of the company, while shares a fund represent ownership of certain assets held by the company and not the company itself. That's why this is in the BTC-TRADING-PT fund's contract:

ASIC-MINER-PT is a ADR in my mind, but this is bitcoinland, where reason and reality never shall meet

[Deprived]

Noob question, I'm a bit confused: why is BTC-TRADING-PT considered a FUND, as opposite to a STOCK, like ASICMINER-PT?
I.e. which are the differences?
Unless I'm mistaken they are both passthroughs, they both grant dividends, they can both be redeemed...

ASIC-MINER-PT is a fund.

The important distinction between a "fund" and a "stock" is that shares of a stock represent ownership of the company, while shares a fund represent ownership of certain assets held by the company and not the company itself. That's why this is in the BTC-TRADING-PT fund's contract:

ASIC-MINER-PT is a ADR in my mind, but this is bitcoinland, where reason and reality never shall meet

It can hardly be an ADR when it isn't listed on a US exchange and isn't denominated OR traded in dollars.

[miTgiB]

Noob question, I'm a bit confused: why is BTC-TRADING-PT considered a FUND, as opposite to a STOCK, like ASICMINER-PT?
I.e. which are the differences?
Unless I'm mistaken they are both passthroughs, they both grant dividends, they can both be redeemed...

ASIC-MINER-PT is a fund.

The important distinction between a "fund" and a "stock" is that shares of a stock represent ownership of the company, while shares a fund represent ownership of certain assets held by the company and not the company itself. That's why this is in the BTC-TRADING-PT fund's contract:

ASIC-MINER-PT is a ADR in my mind, but this is bitcoinland, where reason and reality never shall meet

It can hardly be an ADR when it isn't listed on a US exchange and isn't denominated OR traded in dollars.

Maybe the A is out of place here, but it is certainly a Depository Receipt

[burnside]

In general, and where it is a crystal clear mis-categorization, I am happy to re-categorize issues.

As Deprived mentioned, most of the stock PT's are in the stocks category because they behave in most ways like holding the stock.  On those I'm not opposed to creating a new category and/or shifting ALL of them to funds though.  We just have to be consistent.  Maybe we should call them IDR's?  BDR's?  or CDR's?  (International DR... Bitcoin DR... or Crypto DR, keeping in mind I have to use the same category on LTC-GLOBAL.)

[ThickAsThieves]

In general, and where it is a crystal clear mis-categorization, I am happy to re-categorize issues.

As Deprived mentioned, most of the stock PT's are in the stocks category because they behave in most ways like holding the stock.  On those I'm not opposed to creating a new category and/or shifting ALL of them to funds though.  We just have to be consistent.  Maybe we should call them IDR's?  BDR's?  or CDR's?  (International DR... Bitcoin DR... or Crypto DR, keeping in mind I have to use the same category on LTC-GLOBAL.)

I think there are more important things to sort out

[Deprived]

Noob question, I'm a bit confused: why is BTC-TRADING-PT considered a FUND, as opposite to a STOCK, like ASICMINER-PT?
I.e. which are the differences?
Unless I'm mistaken they are both passthroughs, they both grant dividends, they can both be redeemed...

ASIC-MINER-PT is a fund.

The important distinction between a "fund" and a "stock" is that shares of a stock represent ownership of the company, while shares a fund represent ownership of certain assets held by the company and not the company itself. That's why this is in the BTC-TRADING-PT fund's contract:

ASIC-MINER-PT is a ADR in my mind, but this is bitcoinland, where reason and reality never shall meet

It can hardly be an ADR when it isn't listed on a US exchange and isn't denominated OR traded in dollars.

Maybe the A is out of place here, but it is certainly a Depository Receipt

I'm not actually convinced it is - though it's a pretty trivial point.

With a DR investors actually own the underlying stocks.  With most pass-throughs investors don't own the underlying stocks - they have entitlements to (most of) the benefits associated with them.  That said, calling them DRs would be more accurate than stocks OR funds - but probably less clear to the majority of investors.  If they were to be recategorised as anything I'd prefer them simply to be listed as "Pass-Throughs".

[burnside]

Any plans to setup a way to invest into LTC-GLOBAL or BTCTco using bitcoins instead of litecoins?

Take a look at BTC-TRADING-PT on BTC-TC.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=131891.0

While it's closer, all the holders of the passthrough get one collective vote. I would be looking to buy direct shares with BTC, though this would possibly involve splitting the exchanges (BTCT and LTC-GLOBAL) or allowing accounts to be linked in both directions (though that gets messier).

This comes up every once in a while.  I don't have the time/energy to operate this split across multiple exchanges.  Exchanging BTC for LTC is super simple anyway. 

One thing I really want to do is have a split.  1 for 10 or 1 for 100 I'm not sure, but I'd like to make the shares more affordable.  I plan to do this when our corporate registration comes up for renewal in a couple of months.

[btharper]

Any plans to setup a way to invest into LTC-GLOBAL or BTCTco using bitcoins instead of litecoins?

Take a look at BTC-TRADING-PT on BTC-TC.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=131891.0

While it's closer, all the holders of the passthrough get one collective vote. I would be looking to buy direct shares with BTC, though this would possibly involve splitting the exchanges (BTCT and LTC-GLOBAL) or allowing accounts to be linked in both directions (though that gets messier).

This comes up every once in a while.  I don't have the time/energy to operate this split across multiple exchanges.  Exchanging BTC for LTC is super simple anyway. 

One thing I really want to do is have a split.  1 for 10 or 1 for 100 I'm not sure, but I'd like to make the shares more affordable.  I plan to do this when our corporate registration comes up for renewal in a couple of months.

I never imagined it would be a small undertaking, or a huge priority. The two together generally don't make for it getting done with any haste, and for good reason.

Would the split change the effective cost of becoming a voting member any? Or just spread out the price of shares?

[burnside]

I never imagined it would be a small undertaking, or a huge priority. The two together generally don't make for it getting done with any haste, and for good reason.

Would the split change the effective cost of becoming a voting member any? Or just spread out the price of shares?

Just spread the price of shares.  It'd then take 100 or 1000 shares to be able to vote respectively.

[ar9]

burnside, what's the deal with ASICminer dividends now taking hours upon hours to receive?

They used to be quick, now they're slow.

I need that BTC ASAP, not at your convenience, bro.

[burnside]

burnside, what's the deal with ASICminer dividends now taking hours upon hours to receive?

They used to be quick, now they're slow.

I need that BTC ASAP, not at your convenience, bro.

Wrong thread. 

I posted the status in the ASICMINER-PT thread.  Basically 12 hrs, zero confirmations.  Sorry.   

[ar9]

burnside, what's the deal with ASICminer dividends now taking hours upon hours to receive?

They used to be quick, now they're slow.

I need that BTC ASAP, not at your convenience, bro.

Wrong thread. 

I posted the status in the ASICMINER-PT thread.  Basically 12 hrs, zero confirmations.  Sorry.   

It's cool, just thought you were sitting there twiddling your thumbs deciding when to issue them... if they ain't confirmed then no probs.

[Deprived]

burnside, what's the deal with ASICminer dividends now taking hours upon hours to receive?

They used to be quick, now they're slow.

I need that BTC ASAP, not at your convenience, bro.

Wrong thread. 

I posted the status in the ASICMINER-PT thread.  Basically 12 hrs, zero confirmations.  Sorry.   

It's cool, just thought you were sitting there twiddling your thumbs deciding when to issue them... if they ain't confirmed then no probs.

It may be an issue at friedcat's end again.  Now they're solo mining it's easy for them to mistakenly try to pay dividends using mined coins that aren't clear to transfer yet.  If they do that then the transaction will sit there for ages (could be days) before finally starting to confirm - this already happened once.

[inh]

Burnside,

Would it be possible to make the API always return an array for the order list in the get_portfolio oauth response? If there's one order, it's not an array, but if there's more than one order it IS an array. This inconsistency makes me have to do some hacky work-arounds in parsing the JSON since it's not consistent.

Thanks 

[ThickAsThieves]

When I paid out the TAT.AM dividend it partially failed. It looks like some people were paid, but not others.

I hope this doesn't mean that people who got paid, and bought more with the money will get more dividends...

[dance4x]

Burnside,

Please check your PMs. Thank you.

[fredtrader]

I had 373 TAT.ASICMINER shares at time of dividend, but have been selling some so I only have 291 now. Did they all fail or did some people really get it paid?

Even if I get my dividends for current shares I won't get the full amount.