Bitcoinica liquidator wants to hear from users

[dancingnancy]

We just got an Email.  Wont have a chance to read it though for the next hour.  Hopefully someone can summarize.

[ninjarobot]

There is nothing to read. Nothing happened.

MtGox still sitting on BTC funds. PKF taking what is left in USD funds as fees. FUBAR.

[nrd525]

They still haven't got the money from MtGox as MtGox is saying they cannot prove they own the accounts.  They haven't given up on MtGox.

They are still considering legal action and would need to raise the money from creditors to do it.

They are spending down the money that they do have on lawyers and have very little left.

[dancingnancy]

Jesus, it was like 1 page.  Am I reading it correctly where it says we have 64,000 BTC sitting in an account in total??

Then it states if gox doesn't respond they need to take legal action, which probably should have happened about 1 god damn year ago.  

I can't believe this shit.. what happens when gox goes down?  

Who has access to these funds?  There has to be 1 person with the password?? WTF??  What if this person dies?

[ninjarobot]

I can't believe this shit.. what happens when gox goes down?  

If Gox goes down we will have an insolvency within an insolvency. We must go deeper.

Comparing the glacier speed of the liquidation to the breakneck speed of the BTC ecosystem, I predict more FUBAR in the near future.

[nrd525]

Some ex-bitcoinica staffer should have the password, right?

And even if they forgot it, shouldn't they be able to reset it?

We could offer a reward for retrieving/remembering the password and handing it over to the liquidator.

[ninjarobot]

Some ex-bitcoinica staffer should have the password, right?

And even if they forgot it, shouldn't they be able to reset it?

We could offer a reward for retrieving/remembering the password and handing it over to the liquidator.

Patrick Strateman had the password for a long time but was not willing to hand it over to the liquidator until recently. The liquidator should have the password now, but MtGox insists on protecting your privacy. Bless their hearts.

[ninjarobot]

I'm so glad Mt Gox is protecting me from my BTC!

Exactly. God only knows what you would have spent it on otherwise... Crack Cocaine, Scooby Snacks, Goat Goodies...

Good to know Father Mark is looking out for us.

[dancingnancy]

If Patrick has the PW, why cant he just withdraw the funds?

[bitclown]

Code:

Period               Cash balance  Spent      Actions
-------------------- ------------- ---------- ------------------------------------------
Mar 2012 - Nov 2012  $ 100,872                Collected claims
Nov 2012 - May 2013  $  44,989     $ 56,022   Waited on Mt. Gox
May 2013 - Nov 2013  $  11,684     $ 35,143   Re-worded previous report and changed date

So, there were $11,684 left in the bank on 2013-11-01. At this rate, is there anything left to keep the liquidation going by now?

[dancingnancy]

35k to reword report and change date.. lol 

what a fucking scam this all is.

[tbcoin]

I have no words to describe my level of disappointment.

Would be nice that some media publish an article about this situation and the attitude of Mtgox, someone should be asking questions to Mark about this.

[epetroel]

Ignoring the complete lack of progress here, if I understand the liquidators report correctly:

1.  Gox is holding about $51 million and change in assets from Bitcoinica

2.  The total of all claims amounts to a measly $1.5 million

I'm assuming the $1.5 million number presumes a bitcoin valuation of $11 a piece. 

If legal action is taken, and the funds are reclaimed, then after the $1.5 million is repaid the remaining $49.5 million windfall (minus liquidator and legal costs) goes to Ator / Wendon Group?

If that's the case, the unsecured creditors have little incentive to pitch in when the liquidator decides to pass the hat to come up with money for lawyers.  Seems like Ator/Wendon has the most to gain from this, so I can't imagine anyone else footing the bill for it.  Unless of course they decide to pay back BTC claims at something closer to today's exchange rate, in which case the situation probably changes significantly.

Regardless, seems like $51 million in assets vs. $1.5 million in liabilities leaves enough room to launch a whole fleet of lawyers to Japan.

[dancingnancy]

Ignoring the complete lack of progress here, if I understand the liquidators report correctly:

1.  Gox is holding about $51 million and change in assets from Bitcoinica

2.  The total of all claims amounts to a measly $1.5 million

I'm assuming the $1.5 million number presumes a bitcoin valuation of $11 a piece.  

If legal action is taken, and the funds are reclaimed, then after the $1.5 million is repaid the remaining $49.5 million windfall (minus liquidator and legal costs) goes to Ator / Wendon Group?

If that's the case, the unsecured creditors have little incentive to pitch in when the liquidator decides to pass the hat to come up with money for lawyers.  Seems like Ator/Wendon has the most to gain from this, so I can't imagine anyone else footing the bill for it.  Unless of course they decide to pay back BTC claims at something closer to today's exchange rate, in which case the situation probably changes significantly.

Regardless, seems like $51 million in assets vs. $1.5 million in liabilities leaves enough room to launch a whole fleet of lawyers to Japan.

No shit.  We better get out BTC back that was ours to begin with.  

EDIT: How do we contact Wendon and ask them what the hell is actually going on with all of this? 

[ninjarobot]

EDIT: How do we contact Wendon and ask them what the hell is actually going on with all of this?  

You could try contacting Tihan Seale.

From the 2nd report:

ATOR limited, a company associated with Wendon, holds a General Security Agreement ('GSA') over all present and after acquired personal property of Bitcoinica LP.

Tihan is the director of ATOR:

http://businessprofiles.com/details/ator-limited/NZ-2123704/tihan-seale

His email is listed in Amirs Bitcoinica dump @ http://pastebin.com/Ya6iN8RT

tihan[AT]splashlab[DOT]com

Note that Tihan pledged to waive his rights as a secured creditor in this liquidation. So all the proceeds (in USD or BTC) should go to the customers.

I will get -nothing- for having entered this bloody fray, and you know well what I have risked to do so.  I will not see a second of my life back or a single satoshi. But by God the customers will.

The court appointed the principals of PKF Corporate Recovery & Insolvency to administer the liquidation. It will be their job to return funds to customers to the full extend possible. They will require the cooperation of MtGox and Bitcoinica's managing partners to accomplish this.

Also, what happened to the 15.000 BTC recovered after the Mt.Gox hack by Patrick Murck? I assume these were held in a separate non-frozen account that the Liquidator should have access to at this point?

When the hacker was ready to return 15,000 BTC, that transaction was delayed for days because the Consultancy would not provide a receiving address.

Thankfully, Mr. Murck stepped in as a licensed attorney to broker their receipt. He was subjected to a lot of hazing and invasion of privacy here for doing so. Without him, the coins might never have been recovered.

Those funds and any additional recovered funds will be placed under control of a receiver. This is a formal legal process that will allow Mt Gox et al to release funds to the receiver for distribution.

[dancingnancy]

EDIT: How do we contact Wendon and ask them what the hell is actually going on with all of this? 

You could try contacting Tihan Seale.

From the 2nd report:

ATOR limited, a company associated with Wendon, holds a General Security Agreement ('GSA') over all present and after acquired personal property of Bitcoinica LP.

Tihan is the director of ATOR:

http://businessprofiles.com/details/ator-limited/NZ-2123704/tihan-seale

His email is listed in Amirs Bitcoinica dump @ http://pastebin.com/Ya6iN8RT

tihan[AT]splashlab[DOT]com

Note that Tihan pledged to waive his rights as a secured creditor in this liquidation. So all the proceeds (in USD or BTC) should go to the customers.

I will get -nothing- for having entered this bloody fray, and you know well what I have risked to do so.  I will not see a second of my life back or a single satoshi. But by God the customers will.

The court appointed the principals of PKF Corporate Recovery & Insolvency to administer the liquidation. It will be their job to return funds to customers to the full extend possible. They will require the cooperation of MtGox and Bitcoinica's managing partners to accomplish this.

Also, what happened to the 15.000 BTC recovered after the Mt.Gox hack by Patrick Murck? I assume these were held in a separate non-frozen account that the Liquidator should have access to at this point?

When the hacker was ready to return 15,000 BTC, that transaction was delayed for days because the Consultancy would not provide a receiving address.

Thankfully, Mr. Murck stepped in as a licensed attorney to broker their receipt. He was subjected to a lot of hazing and invasion of privacy here for doing so. Without him, the coins might never have been recovered.

Those funds and any additional recovered funds will be placed under control of a receiver. This is a formal legal process that will allow Mt Gox et al to release funds to the receiver for distribution.

We have been in this thing for so long now, I am starting to forget what even happened in the first place.

I guess I can try to contact this Tihan @ wendon group to see if he can move this thing along.  Doubt it will help though.

I guess what I can't understand for the life of me is......

a) Why can't they just stop all this b.s. and just take the coins out of the mt gox account for distribution?  I mean if someone has the password to the mt gox account, why can't they just be withdrawn?  Is it because this Patrick guy is "on the hook" to Wendon because of what went down?

b) If this patrick guy is the only one with the PW, what happens if he becomes incapacitated?  Then the coins are essentially lost to the black hole on mt gox forever?

c) Why doesn't this liquidator just get on with suing these fucks at mt gox instead of just siphoning $50,000 a year to write 2 reports that maybe took about 2.5 hours to create?  I mean its been like 2 years or so I feel.  Why just continue to string this along.. obviously mt gox is a pos.. just lets get this fucker over with. 

I feel like I am taking crazy pills.  I guess I can try writing to Wendon  Group.  I am sure either a no response or brick wall. 

If you are correct about Wendon group giving up all rights as a secured creditor, we should be in the clear as far as distributions coming back to us. 

[ninjarobot]

I know the feeling.

The problem is that our funds are in the hands of people that don't care.

In fact their interests are largely aligned against ours:

• The liquidator is happy to have an excuse because the longer the liquidation takes the more fees they can rake in.
• MtGox appears to have had liquidity issues when the DHS seized their US accounts so locking up the Bitcoinica funds boost their reserves.
• Tihan does not care since he waived his rights as a secured creditor and if he touches anything he might lose his limited liability.
• The Bitcoinica Consultancy guys don't care because they never signed the paperwork for the General Partnership.
• Zhou does not care because he got away cleanly.

So this is going to take a while.

Let's hope nothing bad happens like MtGox becoming insolvent. I suspect the liquidator will run out of USD reserves to pay their fees soon and that will be the starting signal to collect more from the unsecured creditors to prepare for legal action. Legal action just means lawyers will get their piece of the pie.

[disclaimer201]

The liquidators should have sued MtGox over a year ago, as soon as they saw they are in fact not cooperating. You are probably right about the fees and delays, then again, I doubt there would have been enough money to sue them even a year ago. MTGox was close to being insolvent a long time ago and was known for freezing accounts on a random basis, I have no doubt they would just confiscate the coins to increase their liquidity. They probably needed them to survive too.

If there is a lawsuit, as there should be, I will not throw any more good money after bad money, meaning whoever has the most to gain here should lead that battle. Instead, I will continue to speak out against that BS named MTGox that calls itself an exchange, and advise anyone to stay as far away from it as possible.

Maybe, the only good thing out of all this delay and survival of MtGox is that the bitcoin price would have never gone to 1000. It may have been to our advantage (if you hold any BTC anymore that is) that this shitty exchange is still in business. Now that there are several bigger exchanges, we won't need to fear that Bitcoin will take a considerable hit and I hope Gox dies soon as it deserves.

[nrd525]

We could start an online petition to encourage MtGox to solve this.

I'm thinking a steady stream of blog posts, coindesk articles, and other news sources could put pressure on them to act.

[dancingnancy]

We could start an online petition to encourage MtGox to solve this.

I'm thinking a steady stream of blog posts, coindesk articles, and other news sources could put pressure on them to act.

good idea.  do you / anyone know who writes for coindesk?  with all the negative about mt gox i am even unsure if it will matter to them anymore.  but if you write that they are withholding 51MM dollars, that may make it a much more interesting headline.