Is Bitfinex turning into Mt. Gox?

[karmamiu]

They have suspended all FIAT deposits as well as USD withdrawal.

April 13 Announcement: https://www.bitfinex.com/posts/199

April 17 Announcement: https://www.bitfinex.com/posts/200

Reddit on Panic: https://www.reddit.com/r/BitcoinMarkets/comments/65vygu/bitfinex_stopping_money_deposits_while_we_develop/

iam not understand why bitfinex close deposit and withdraw use USD transfer wire
why bank account bitfinex is blocked, i think is bad issue bitfinex exchanger

I receive notice also once i opened my account at Bitfinex. I don't know what will happen next but luckily i wasn't able to transfer my funds to bitfinex, and i do wonder why they got suspended, did anybody here know the reason behind it?

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[lottery248]

i think bitfinex has failed to do something about AML in case. in the homepage, when you are not logged in, you can barely see the stuff inside. the design of the bitfinex website is not detailed and suspicious. hopefully you still can withdraw.

[pinkflower]

Has it been confirmed they ve halted withdrawals as well? I ve read only about wire deposits not working.

It was dollar withdrawals that were stopped first, then it became dollar deposits a while after. Crypto's still fine as are CHF and HKD withdrawals. I'm not sure what fiat deposits are possible right now.

Sure theyll say that its still ok because HKD and CHF withdrawals are fine. But you have to think, how many people make wire transfers using HKD or CHF? Not much I presume since most of the banks mainly offers USD, EUR and GBP wire transfers because they are the most acceptable fiat currencies worldwide.

What are the wallets of Bitfinex? Lets observe whats happening with the exchange.

[alyssa85]

Has it been confirmed they ve halted withdrawals as well? I ve read only about wire deposits not working.

It was dollar withdrawals that were stopped first, then it became dollar deposits a while after. Crypto's still fine as are CHF and HKD withdrawals. I'm not sure what fiat deposits are possible right now.

Sure theyll say that its still ok because HKD and CHF withdrawals are fine. But you have to think, how many people make wire transfers using HKD or CHF? Not much I presume since most of the banks mainly offers USD, EUR and GBP wire transfers because they are the most acceptable fiat currencies worldwide.

What are the wallets of Bitfinex? Lets observe whats happening with the exchange.

This. Most of their customers are Americans I think. The Europeans tend to use either Kraken or Bitstamp, and the Chinese use the Chinese exchanges.

[severaldetails]

The way I understand it is that the banks in Taiwan (where bitfinex has their accounts) got pressure from an American bank not to deal with bitfinex anymore.
So basically it's not that bitfinex has not enough money, it's more the fact that nobody want's to deliver it for them.
Of course it's not easy for them to be cut off from the fiat system.
We'll all see soon enough how this turns out, but my hopes are that bitfinex can find a solution to that problem.

[arwin100]

Has it been confirmed they ve halted withdrawals as well? I ve read only about wire deposits not working.

It was dollar withdrawals that were stopped first, then it became dollar deposits a while after. Crypto's still fine as are CHF and HKD withdrawals. I'm not sure what fiat deposits are possible right now.

Sure theyll say that its still ok because HKD and CHF withdrawals are fine. But you have to think, how many people make wire transfers using HKD or CHF? Not much I presume since most of the banks mainly offers USD, EUR and GBP wire transfers because they are the most acceptable fiat currencies worldwide.

What are the wallets of Bitfinex? Lets observe whats happening with the exchange.

They are ok for now since im pretty sure that they are doing their very best to get back the trust again of their users. But we can't erase the doubts on our minds that they will follow the track of mtgox since they have been compromised before and theirs a lot of possibilities that the same hacker would broke in again and steal some money on bitfinnex again. But same as you said lets just observe this one for now but for thinking to deposit on their well its different story for me to tell.

[ranlo]

The way I understand it is that the banks in Taiwan (where bitfinex has their accounts) got pressure from an American bank not to deal with bitfinex anymore.
So basically it's not that bitfinex has not enough money, it's more the fact that nobody want's to deliver it for them.
Of course it's not easy for them to be cut off from the fiat system.
We'll all see soon enough how this turns out, but my hopes are that bitfinex can find a solution to that problem.

I'm hoping they can get this issue resolved. And it doesn't just deal with BFX, but also Tether and some others. Seeing how they get around this fairly rough patch is going to be a hint as to what to look forward to in the future.

[pinkflower]

Has it been confirmed they ve halted withdrawals as well? I ve read only about wire deposits not working.

It was dollar withdrawals that were stopped first, then it became dollar deposits a while after. Crypto's still fine as are CHF and HKD withdrawals. I'm not sure what fiat deposits are possible right now.

Sure theyll say that its still ok because HKD and CHF withdrawals are fine. But you have to think, how many people make wire transfers using HKD or CHF? Not much I presume since most of the banks mainly offers USD, EUR and GBP wire transfers because they are the most acceptable fiat currencies worldwide.

What are the wallets of Bitfinex? Lets observe whats happening with the exchange.

They are ok for now since im pretty sure that they are doing their very best to get back the trust again of their users. But we can't erase the doubts on our minds that they will follow the track of mtgox since they have been compromised before and theirs a lot of possibilities that the same hacker would broke in again and steal some money on bitfinnex again. But same as you said lets just observe this one for now but for thinking to deposit on their well its different story for me to tell.

Thats doubtful. If I was a Bitfinex customer your post or word alone wont convince me from withdrawing all my coins out of there. There were popular people from the BTC community who said Mt.Gox was fine and the community trusted them until it was too late. If you are really sure that theyre ok I would then like to see you deposit all your BTC there.

[crazyivan]

Since BTCe and OKcoin have started suffering the same issue, this might be a bit wider problem not restricted to Bitfinex only. Hope this gets resolved soon, BTC price started increasing again, we dont need this kind of panic.

[el kaka22]

Since BTCe and OKcoin have started suffering the same issue, this might be a bit wider problem not restricted to Bitfinex only. Hope this gets resolved soon, BTC price started increasing again, we dont need this kind of panic.

Yes, they will find some right solutions very soon. But I do feel it would be too early to assume bitfinex for a mt.gox kind of collapse.

I believe mt.gox's collapse will remain as a peculiar case in rest of cyrptocurrency's history because mt.gox held major share of exchanges then and bitcoiner's almost used mt.gox as their wallet with both bitcoins and fiats. Now there are enough awareness among traders for not keeping balances within exchanges and we are into era of multiple established exchanges hence any problem with bitfinex will not infulence bitcoin prices unlike what we had with mt.gox's.

[richardsNY]

Problem with Bitfinex is that this exchange has been planning its actions in such a way, that you can't really consider it to be coincidence all the time. Even when this isn't solely related to Bitfinex -- people get in panic if something happens at the side of Bitfinex. It very well explains why exchanges as OKCoin and BTC-E don't experience inflated prices due to traders there not being able to cash out particular fiat currencies. People fear Bitfinex.

[Emoclaw]

Problem with Bitfinex is that this exchange has been planning its actions in such a way, that you can't really consider it to be coincidence all the time. Even when this isn't solely related to Bitfinex -- people get in panic if something happens at the side of Bitfinex. It very well explains why exchanges as OKCoin and BTC-E don't experience inflated prices due to traders there not being able to cash out particular fiat currencies. People fear Bitfinex.

Of course everyone panics when something happens at Bitfinex. It hasn't even been a year since 120,000 Bitcoins were stolen from them.
They did make it right though. Instead of filing for bankruptcy and closing down like many other exchanges would do they gave out temporary tokens which have been fully replaced/refunded now.
But why even use Bitfinex when there's Poloniex.

[maku]

But why even use Bitfinex when there's Poloniex.

As far as I am aware Poloniex doesn't offer direct fiat  <=> cryptocurrency trades. They use USDT instead.
Tethered dollars have limited functionality, so this is  the main reason Bitfinex is superior for vast majority of customers who don't care about altcoins.

[richardsNY]

Problem with Bitfinex is that this exchange has been planning its actions in such a way, that you can't really consider it to be coincidence all the time. Even when this isn't solely related to Bitfinex -- people get in panic if something happens at the side of Bitfinex. It very well explains why exchanges as OKCoin and BTC-E don't experience inflated prices due to traders there not being able to cash out particular fiat currencies. People fear Bitfinex.

Of course everyone panics when something happens at Bitfinex. It hasn't even been a year since 120,000 Bitcoins were stolen from them.
They did make it right though. Instead of filing for bankruptcy and closing down like many other exchanges would do they gave out temporary tokens which have been fully replaced/refunded now.
But why even use Bitfinex when there's Poloniex.

People have been refunded value wise. If you had 1000 BTC for example, and at that time the price was sitting at $600 -- the haircut of 36% would mean they took 360 BTC from you, and just refunded the value of the coins, and not the coins themselves. I would at no point agree to such a thing. Of course, it's better than Bitfinex not paying anything at all, but it's a nasty practice as people don't believe it was a back.

Other than that, there are many exchanges to choose from, but people for some reason decide to stick with that exchange. It's a wrong choice, but eventually they will realize that as well, but then it's already too late. People mostly only learn when it costs them a whole lot money -- this situation isn't any different....

[pinkflower]

Since BTCe and OKcoin have started suffering the same issue, this might be a bit wider problem not restricted to Bitfinex only. Hope this gets resolved soon, BTC price started increasing again, we dont need this kind of panic.

I heard OKCoin is having the same issue but not BTCe. This is beginning to become a big probem if thats confirmed. If one of the older exchanges like Bitstamp is also affected then nothing is stopping the banks to go after the other smaller exchanges. Maybe this started from the Chinese banks.

[iv4n]

Since BTCe and OKcoin have started suffering the same issue, this might be a bit wider problem not restricted to Bitfinex only. Hope this gets resolved soon, BTC price started increasing again, we dont need this kind of panic.

I heard OKCoin is having the same issue but not BTCe. This is beginning to become a big probem if thats confirmed. If one of the older exchanges like Bitstamp is also affected then nothing is stopping the banks to go after the other smaller exchanges. Maybe this started from the Chinese banks.

How do you mean that all this started from the banks, Chinese banks? I can't understand are you talking about overtaking or they are trying to destroy competition? This can easily be some conspiracy theory, what if this is just inside job, that is the first thing that falls on my mind.
Anyway I would like yo hear more about this theory, what is the interest of the banks in this case?

[alyssa85]

According to the following article, this is down to Taiwanese Banking Reforms:

http://www.livebitcoinnews.com/taiwanese-banking-reforms-cause-issues-bitfinex-bitcoin-companies/

Most cryptocurrency companies dealing with funds from international clients have signed up for a Taiwanese bank account due to less strict AML and KYC procedures. At one point, this loophole seemed worthwhile, yet it is coming to bite these companies in the rear as of right now.

Since the United States recently stepped up their internal banking requirements for USD transfers, other banks dealing with USD transfers must follow suit. This also means the Taiwanese megabanks will have to go through some major changes. Until that happens, US banks are free to refuse transfers from banks not complying with the new guidelines. It appears that is the real reason why Wells Fargo bounces iFinex, Tether, Xapo, and BTC-E transfers coming from Taiwan, and does not send money to the country either.

[Skarner21]

I think for betfinex the issue will stay for long time due to bank issue just lets hope that bitfinex will not be the same as other hack exchange site before like other mention MT.gox just lets hope that it will not the same as other crash or down  site and the reason is they are hack..
If it will be announce soon that bitfinex is totally gone and never resolve the issue it will be affected a lot in the market. expect for price drop.

[pinkflower]

Since BTCe and OKcoin have started suffering the same issue, this might be a bit wider problem not restricted to Bitfinex only. Hope this gets resolved soon, BTC price started increasing again, we dont need this kind of panic.

I heard OKCoin is having the same issue but not BTCe. This is beginning to become a big probem if thats confirmed. If one of the older exchanges like Bitstamp is also affected then nothing is stopping the banks to go after the other smaller exchanges. Maybe this started from the Chinese banks.

How do you mean that all this started from the banks, Chinese banks? I can't understand are you talking about overtaking or they are trying to destroy competition? This can easily be some conspiracy theory, what if this is just inside job, that is the first thing that falls on my mind.
Anyway I would like yo hear more about this theory, what is the interest of the banks in this case?

What I mean is the example the Chinese banks are showing might have given the other banks the idea to start doing the same thing. Banks cant allow anyone from moving money from one country to another with out having the risk of being used in a criminal's group money laundering schemes. The BTC network is one of the best channels to do money laundering on in case you dont know.

[pixie85]

According to the following article, this is down to Taiwanese Banking Reforms:

http://www.livebitcoinnews.com/taiwanese-banking-reforms-cause-issues-bitfinex-bitcoin-companies/

Most cryptocurrency companies dealing with funds from international clients have signed up for a Taiwanese bank account due to less strict AML and KYC procedures. At one point, this loophole seemed worthwhile, yet it is coming to bite these companies in the rear as of right now.

Since the United States recently stepped up their internal banking requirements for USD transfers, other banks dealing with USD transfers must follow suit. This also means the Taiwanese megabanks will have to go through some major changes. Until that happens, US banks are free to refuse transfers from banks not complying with the new guidelines. It appears that is the real reason why Wells Fargo bounces iFinex, Tether, Xapo, and BTC-E transfers coming from Taiwan, and does not send money to the country either.

And of course Wells Fargo... They are free to refuse transfers, but could show some good will and do it. If they have a chance to disrupt some Bitcoin sales they will always take it.

If the news are true there's no reason to panic and there won't be another MTGox scenario. Let's wait for the Taiwanese banks to tidy their back yards and see what happens.