Mt Gox vs Blockchain

[Phinnaeus Gage]

Why is there currently a price difference of ~$11 between the the exchange rate reported on Mt Gox and Blockchain, with BC showing the lesser amount? All the way up to earlier today, the prices were basically in footstep. Is one side or the other broken, or is there something else in play here?

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[Cyberdyne]

Why is there currently a price difference of ~$11 between the the exchange rate reported on Mt Gox and Blockchain, with BC showing the lesser amount? All the way up to earlier today, the prices were basically in footstep. Is one side or the other broken, or is there something else in play here?

Because bottom line, there is no 'THE' exchange rate.

There are many exchange rates, depending on what (method of) exchange you're talking about.

[davidpbrown]

I wonder, given the time to move money between them, that there's a slow interaction too.

[ruecanonrails]

Try this site.
http://bitcoinaverage.com/

It pulls data from various exchanges, including price, and volume. Then calculates weighted averages and gives you an overall price based on on several large exchanges.

Currently it's the most accurate way to get an overall market price.

[solex]

This page still seems to have the gox price though

https://blockchain.info/stats

I'm seeing:    Market Price   $112.86 USD (weighted)

[Abdussamad]

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=274077.0

[smoothie]

Price was about $15 difference earlier today.

Looks like a run on MTGOX BTC reserves in my view.

I could be wrong.

[Phinnaeus Gage]

I don't think I've received an answer.

Up until yesterday, the price at Mt Gox was virtually reflected on BlockChain within pennies. Starting yesterday, and still today, there currently is a ~$11 USD difference in price, with the Mt Gox rate being the highest.

I have never seen this before. One or two dollars I may be able to shrug off, but a double digit discrepancy is mindblowing.

I understand weighted averages to this extent: If there were only two exchanges that were being weighed, and one is reflected as being $11 higher, than the other must be $11 lower to see what I'm seeing.

What exchanges are being weighed that's making the Blockchain show such a big difference, given that up to less than two days ago, we were talking pennies, not double digit dollars?

[Phinnaeus Gage]

Less than a minute ago, the following is what was reported at Mt Gox and Blockchain:

Mt Gox: Last price: $112.36926

Blockchain: $98.13.

That is over a $14 difference.

At this speaking, I don't have the foggiest idea at what 1 BTC should be bought or sold at if I were to do such online or in person.

[Carlton Banks]

Gox is the outlier, all other USD exchanges have a 24 hour average of $10-$12 less than Gox. And this is the normal state of affairs really, just that the disparity has been growing in the last few weeks. Possibly just a reflection of the withdrawal issues in the US, as it's easier to insist on a premium for buying at Gox as the withdrawals are affecting USD and not BTC, so those with alot of USD at Gox are getting stung for the ability to move their BTC to an exchange that has less significant USD withdrawal problems.

[Phinnaeus Gage]

Gox is the outlier, all other USD exchanges have a 24 hour average of $10-$12 less than Gox. And this is the normal state of affairs really, just that the disparity has been growing in the last few weeks. Possibly just a reflection of the withdrawal issues in the US, as it's easier to insist on a premium for buying at Gox as the withdrawals are affecting USD and not BTC, so those with alot of USD at Gox are getting stung for the ability to move their BTC to an exchange that has less significant USD withdrawal problems.

Good answer! I still just don't see how I have never seen such a wide gap before yesterday after checking both several times a day for the past years.

Up to a day ago, I was able to buy or sell using Mt Gox's numbers rounding up or down, depending, to the nearest whole number and be damn close to what was reflected on Blockchain. Today, I can't do that.

As of yesterday, I've never seen such a wide gap. Today, I honestly don't know what a single bitcoin should be bought or sold for now that this gap has widened.

Prior to the penning of this post and before clicking, I just witnessed Mt Gox go down ~$2 and the price reflected on Blockchain go up $0.40.

This is fuckin' madness!

[Carlton Banks]

I comfort myself with the fact that all price discovery through market mechanisms are more than a little suspect these days. The intrinsic value of all these currencies is fundamentally a form of soft facism really, and Bitcoin is the modern day rebuke to the fiat system, they're not really directly comparable, despite what the market price is.

Value your Bitcoins like this: more Bitcoins is more valuable, and less Bitcoins is less valuable. At least it's believably correct!

[GigaDice]

A single of MtGOX losing it's monopoly as new exchanges such as Bitstamp start to emerge.

[Phinnaeus Gage]

A single of MtGOX losing it's monopoly as new exchanges such as Bitstamp start to emerge.

That's the only thing that makes sense, and it all started happening less than 48 hours ago.

As of only a few minutes ago, I witnessed a $14.67 spread between Mt Gox and Blockchain's quotes. I'm guessing that blockchain.info's developer changed the weighted algorithm.

If I were a rogue trader, I would buy on the street using Blockchain.info's quote and sell on Mt Gox. An easy task now that the word on the street is that Mt Gox's quotes are shit. There's is no fuckin' way I would have even thought of doing such two days ago.

Somebody(s) is making a ton of money using this arbitrage.

[Meni Rosenfeld]

Good answer! I still just don't see how I have never seen such a wide gap before yesterday after checking both several times a day for the past years.

It's not a mystery. Blockchain.info used to display prices based on Mtgox. Today they started displaying prices based on Bitstamp.

http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1keoti/blockchain_switched_their_api_away_from_mtgox/

Gaps between Mtgox and Bitstamp have existed for a while.

If I were a rogue trader, I would buy on the street using Blockchain.info's quote and sell on Mt Gox. An easy task now that the word on the street is that Mt Gox's quotes are shit. There's is no fuckin' way I would have even thought of doing such two days ago.

Somebody(s) is making a ton of money using this arbitrage.

If they sell on Mtgox they get... Mtgox USD. It's difficult to withdraw MTUSD, which is why MTUSD is worth less than a real USD.

If scalable arbitrage was possible, you wouldn't have these price gaps.

[Phinnaeus Gage]

Good answer! I still just don't see how I have never seen such a wide gap before yesterday after checking both several times a day for the past years.

It's not a mystery. Blockchain.info used to display prices based on Mtgox. A few days ago they started displaying prices based on Bitstamp.

Thank you, Meni. That's what I was looking for. I seriously wasn't aware of this fact, hence starting this thread seeking an answer. I have no problem with what Blockchain.info bases their quotes on as long as I know what's being used.

Is there a link to where I can read the memo I didn't get?

Later, bud.

EDIT: I found it: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=274564.0

Ironically, it was only discovered an hour ago. I wonder if this thread had anything to do with that discovery.

[zeroblock]

Good answer! I still just don't see how I have never seen such a wide gap before yesterday after checking both several times a day for the past years.

It's not a mystery. Blockchain.info used to display prices based on Mtgox. A few days ago they started displaying prices based on Bitstamp.

Thank you, Meni. That's what I was looking for. I seriously wasn't aware of this fact, hence starting this thread seeking an answer. I have no problem with what Blockchain.info bases their quotes on as long as I know what's being used.

Is there a link to where I can read the memo I didn't get?

Later, bud.

EDIT: I found it: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=274564.0

Ironically, it was only discovered an hour ago. I wonder if this thread had anything to do with that discovery.

Phinnaeus,

I've been following this development quite closely over the course of the last few months. 

The only bounty collected for proof of a USD withdraw is most likely a "preferred" whale trader.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=251895.msg2938298#msg2938298


*Speculative whale
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=179586.msg2932780#msg2932780

[gabridome]

The only way to have the money out of mt.gox is to buy bitcoins and to withdraw them.
I had to wait 6 weeks to have my euros back.
For this reason everybody is buying bitcoins on Mt.Gox and almost nobody is selling them. Bitcoin on Mt. gox are the only liquid currency. This has an obvious distorsive price effect on that market.
After having received the sum I had asked  6 weeks before I used the rest of my fiat to buy all the bitcoins I could and I withdrawed them to Bitstamp (in 1 hour they were there).

I don't think to be the only one: people is buying bitcoins on Mt.Gox because the only way to have the money in a reasonable time i to move them to an other market and the only money you can move out are bitcoin.
No much more than that.

As soon as Mt.gox finishes his "bureaucratic" (liquidity) problems the prices will come back to be nearly the same.

[Meni Rosenfeld]

EDIT: I found it: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=274564.0

Ironically, it was only discovered an hour ago. I wonder if this thread had anything to do with that discovery.

In my previous comment I linked to a reddit post discussing this, dated about an hour before you started this thread.

[Dps23]

The only way to have the money out of mt.gox is to buy bitcoins and to withdraw them.

I completely agree. It is the only reasonable way if you dont want to wait for ages and pay high fees.
usually when price go down, than differences (in $ price) are smaller (in comparison with other exchanges like Bitstamp).
When BTC declined to $66 at BitStamp this summer, on Mt Gox it was almost same - and also during these bottoms naturally it is good buying opportunity.
(on the contrary, yesterday when BTC was almost $15 more expensive on MtGox then elswhere it was not time to Exchange you $$ and withdraw BTC I would say)