Mt.Gox Multi-plaintiff Suit

[superduh]

Another question for the OP. Will your attorney ask for an order freezing all Mt. Gox accounts immediately?

It seems like one could make the argument for irretrievable harm given the possibility of someone taking off with the BTC. This could possibly justify freezing all their accounts, both their fiat accounts and BTC wallets.

At this point, I suspect it would be best for all concerned, and the BTC markets in general, if some legal authority was over-seeing this process.

I think the freezing of all assets is the only way gox customers are ever going to see their funds again.
I know some people will disagree, but this is how the world works. If gox have positive assets (BTC & Fiat) then all their accounts should be frozen immediately, and time given on a proper audit to ensure ALL customers who have funds in their system receive them back. It may take a while, but at least it will take. we are in a situation where the only one doing the taking is Gox itself.

just, lol -

people on bitcointalk don't know how the real world works and make too many assumptions.

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[raskul]

just, lol -

people on bitcointalk don't know how the real world works and make too many assumptions.

Elaborate please...

[superduh]

just, lol -

people on bitcointalk don't know how the real world works and make too many assumptions.

Elaborate please...

you don't "just" freeze company bank accounts and bitcoins wallet (noone can "freeze" their bitcoin wallet - something people on bitcointalk should know) when you get spooked, everytime you get spooked.

should target have closed down, what about kickstarter, how about any and every website that's went through a technical glitch or some "hack".

if your funds are gone they are gone anyways than whatever you propose is pointless. if the funds are still there than whatever you propose will only make it harder for you to get your money.

companies dont just get "audited" whenever someone on the internet requests so.

[raskul]

just, lol -

people on bitcointalk don't know how the real world works and make too many assumptions.

Elaborate please...

you don't "just" freeze company bank accounts and bitcoins wallet (noone can "freeze" their bitcoin wallet - something people on bitcointalk should know) when you get spooked, everytime you get spooked.

should target have closed down, what about kickstarter, how about any and every website that's went through a technical glitch or some "hack".

if your funds are gone they are gone anyways than whatever you propose is pointless. if the funds are still there than whatever you propose will only make it harder for you to get your money.

companies dont just get "audited" whenever someone on the internet requests so.

research Glasgow Rangers Football Club.

[Bitsinmyhead]

If any of you with fiat stuck on Gox want to get it out instantly instead of waiting for this to play out please PM me. I am currently able to help move about 10k out of there for a 3% fee. PM me to discuss.

[topynate]

If a Japanese or American court orders MtGox not to enable withdrawals of BTC or fiat until they can prove they can cover all customers' deposits, then that is what MtGox will do. Someone just needs to convince a court to make that order. I would be shocked if a good lawyer couldn't make that case given that the collapse in price on MtGox is universally attributed to fear that they're not solvent.

As I said further up the thread, this is the clean option. The messy option is that USD holders get cashed out, MtGox declares it can't cover BTC deposits and becomes insolvent, and then everyone who withdrew fiat becomes a target for clawback based on the principle of unfair preference. If you're a USD holder, do you want to face a lawsuit or multiple lawsuits from the BTC holders?

[ThePriest]

What should I do in order to participate in the law suit?

[Keyser Soze]

What should I do in order to participate in the law suit?

Read the OP.

[zyk]

After Joey Zasa took out the Commission Michael observed:

Joey Zasa would never pull something like this without backing. He's just muscle, he's an enforcer, he's nothing. He doesn't have the wit for that helicopter attack. He doesn't even have the ambition to wipe out the whole Commission. Certainly not the balls.

So now I put the question to you, gentlemen: Who is backing Mark Krap?

laywers...the best ones money can buy...and those who were selling as well knowing the books and the strategy...

[zyk]

If any of you with fiat stuck on Gox want to get it out instantly instead of waiting for this to play out please PM me. I am currently able to help move about 10k out of there for a 3% fee. PM me to discuss.

Me too, but only if you have a Euro- balance stuck there . Please pm me to discuss

[noeel]

Although I haven't got funds @mtgox anymore, I'll supply you with some information in order to support anybody who wants to sue mtgox because I'm very interested in seeing Mark Karpeles at court for his actions. lost quiet a bit during the last days when leaving mtgox.

throughout the last week immediately after the first press release of mtgox regarding halted btc withdrawals, you could observe huge rhythmic btc dumps @mtgox every 2-5 minutes following always the same pattern ("the whale of mtgox"). the sum of these dumps up to now is approx 140000 btc at an average price of around us$270. ie a us$38 mio sell-off. there were a few stuck levels eg at us$261.24 yesterday and us$148.15 the day before yesterday. these were manipulated levels by the whale serving all asks above these levels every 2-5 minutes. this is very difficult to do through the api of mtgox. but very easy if you're in charge of the order book itself.

Therefore, you'll have to deal with either a very risky investor who is going to sue mtgox as well for his us$38+ mio funds @mtgox pretty soon.

if you take into account that most of the trading fees at mtgox were paid in btc throughout the last years (default setting), it is more likely that the whale rushing all the btc on the market is mtgox resp Mark Karpeles himself. This would be an easy way to transfer the customers fiat collected throughout the last years to his own account reducing his liability in € and us$. if you further take into account, that maybe a good portion of btc stored at mtgox got stolen, mtgox might blame the bitcoin protocol ("transaction malleability") as a cause for the loss. the result: Mark Karpeles got the customers fiat, the customers got stolen btc. the customers could file a charge against an unknown person for stealing their btc.

what does this mean? --> all data on the servers of mtgox must be assured immediately in order to investigate the fraud.

ressources:
http://bitcoincharts.com/
http://bitcoinwisdom.com/
http://coinsight.org/mtgox.html

Exactely my observations and thoughts. I posted the following on reddit:

I posted the following post four days ago. Unfortunately the post was downvoted (I guess by people who wanted to weaken posts that may foster sells at the Mt Gox market). Taking into account the new price level, there is - IMHO -now some real need for the truth, so that I want to post my post again and add something to this afterwards.

16 Feb 2014: "I observed the Mt Gox live market for hours yesterday and I have seen that the price decline is caused just by one trader who is kind of always selling off large amount of coins after price is just slightly increasing. Yesterday there was a phase in which somebody sold approx. 250 BTC every few minutes for hours. The same started this morning again. You have seen and you can see that indeed everybody on the market is willing to pay more, but the high sells of this one trader are causing the low price around 330 to 360$ yesterday and below 300$ today. If you have been aware of this, you could made a lot of (book value) profit from it. (...) [What is the reason, why one trader is selling automatically so many coins?] My theory is: MtGox themselves are doing this. They want to drop the price so low, because they want that after it becomes obvious that they are not having the coins, they hope that people will panic sell their book value coins and that they have little money to give then, because of the little fiat balances then."

Another thing that happend at this time was the following: I started to make short trades, so I sold my coins and placed a new order afterwards. Normally I placed every new buy order in front of a big buy order. But then I placed by mistake one "at the top of an existing other big buy order". A new sell was coming in (one of the big ones as aforementioned). The weird thing was, that all coins have been bought from the buy order "under" mine up to exactely my Satoshi (I hope you all get what I mean, I am not a native speaker). This was not coincidence, the numbers have been completely random. For me, this is one more argument that Mt Gox (with market transparency) made these big sells.

The plan of Mt Gox could be the following. (They can do this, even if they do not have the coins.)

    1. Sell so many coins, that the market is completely crashed and that there is no more Fiat money in the system, that can make buys.
    2. Wait until people get used to the new price level at Gox. Avoid people putting too much new fiat money into the system, by fostering speculations about insolvency.
    3. At some point there are enough coins to buy to make a big profit.

And of course both is possible, Mt Gox may have lost some coins by theft and are doing this strategy to get equal balances again, or they are just megalomaniac and want to own a bigger piece of the bitcoin cake.

[BitCoinNutJob]

^ if thats the case & i think you might be right i'd rather just wait it out & just accept it

[BTCat]

Wallstreet and bankers will buy up all cheap BTC's and then it goes up again. If the community is weak they will get it cheap, if the community is strong they will have to pay a premium.

[S3052]

Although I haven't got funds @mtgox anymore, I'll supply you with some information in order to support anybody who wants to sue mtgox because I'm very interested in seeing Mark Karpeles at court for his actions. lost quiet a bit during the last days when leaving mtgox.

throughout the last week immediately after the first press release of mtgox regarding halted btc withdrawals, you could observe huge rhythmic btc dumps @mtgox every 2-5 minutes following always the same pattern ("the whale of mtgox"). the sum of these dumps up to now is approx 140000 btc at an average price of around us$270. ie a us$38 mio sell-off. there were a few stuck levels eg at us$261.24 yesterday and us$148.15 the day before yesterday. these were manipulated levels by the whale serving all asks above these levels every 2-5 minutes. this is very difficult to do through the api of mtgox. but very easy if you're in charge of the order book itself.

Therefore, you'll have to deal with either a very risky investor who is going to sue mtgox as well for his us$38+ mio funds @mtgox pretty soon.

if you take into account that most of the trading fees at mtgox were paid in btc throughout the last years (default setting), it is more likely that the whale rushing all the btc on the market is mtgox resp Mark Karpeles himself. This would be an easy way to transfer the customers fiat collected throughout the last years to his own account reducing his liability in € and us$. if you further take into account, that maybe a good portion of btc stored at mtgox got stolen, mtgox might blame the bitcoin protocol ("transaction malleability") as a cause for the loss. the result: Mark Karpeles got the customers fiat, the customers got stolen btc. the customers could file a charge against an unknown person for stealing their btc.

what does this mean? --> all data on the servers of mtgox must be assured immediately in order to investigate the fraud.

ressources:
http://bitcoincharts.com/
http://bitcoinwisdom.com/
http://coinsight.org/mtgox.html

Exactely my observations and thoughts. I posted the following on reddit:

I posted the following post four days ago. Unfortunately the post was downvoted (I guess by people who wanted to weaken posts that may foster sells at the Mt Gox market). Taking into account the new price level, there is - IMHO -now some real need for the truth, so that I want to post my post again and add something to this afterwards.

16 Feb 2014: "I observed the Mt Gox live market for hours yesterday and I have seen that the price decline is caused just by one trader who is kind of always selling off large amount of coins after price is just slightly increasing. Yesterday there was a phase in which somebody sold approx. 250 BTC every few minutes for hours. The same started this morning again. You have seen and you can see that indeed everybody on the market is willing to pay more, but the high sells of this one trader are causing the low price around 330 to 360$ yesterday and below 300$ today. If you have been aware of this, you could made a lot of (book value) profit from it. (...) [What is the reason, why one trader is selling automatically so many coins?] My theory is: MtGox themselves are doing this. They want to drop the price so low, because they want that after it becomes obvious that they are not having the coins, they hope that people will panic sell their book value coins and that they have little money to give then, because of the little fiat balances then."

Another thing that happend at this time was the following: I started to make short trades, so I sold my coins and placed a new order afterwards. Normally I placed every new buy order in front of a big buy order. But then I placed by mistake one "at the top of an existing other big buy order". A new sell was coming in (one of the big ones as aforementioned). The weird thing was, that all coins have been bought from the buy order "under" mine up to exactely my Satoshi (I hope you all get what I mean, I am not a native speaker). This was not coincidence, the numbers have been completely random. For me, this is one more argument that Mt Gox (with market transparency) made these big sells.

The plan of Mt Gox could be the following. (They can do this, even if they do not have the coins.)

    1. Sell so many coins, that the market is completely crashed and that there is no more Fiat money in the system, that can make buys.
    2. Wait until people get used to the new price level at Gox. Avoid people putting too much new fiat money into the system, by fostering speculations about insolvency.
    3. At some point there are enough coins to buy to make a big profit.

And of course both is possible, Mt Gox may have lost some coins by theft and are doing this strategy to get equal balances again, or they are just megalomaniac and want to own a bigger piece of the bitcoin cake.

If only a tiny part if this is true, MtGox should be raided by the police immediately and shut down

[zemario]

Wallstreet and bankers will buy up all cheap BTC's and then it goes up again. If the community is weak they will get it cheap, if the community is strong they will have to pay a premium.

Community? No, I care about my money. Community is cool and all, but you cannot possibly expect markets to be driven by community dynamics. I'm not so worried if bankers get it dirt cheap, I'll make sure I'll take advantage of such market situation too.
It's each and everyone's call. Do I care if hundreds of people I don't know get burned with their speculations on bitcoin because me or other bitcoiners didn't held strong as a community and instead sell out? Hell noes! This is money we are talking about. I'll go as far as tell you that I am sorry that I am stating the cold hard true. But it is a bit of advice for everyone, relly on comunity thinking and you'll see people getting rich while your assets' value deteriorate.
Perhaps those who are that naive do need enforced reality check.

[quone17]

Another question for the OP. Will your attorney ask for an order freezing all Mt. Gox accounts immediately?

It seems like one could make the argument for irretrievable harm given the possibility of someone taking off with the BTC. This could possibly justify freezing all their accounts, both their fiat accounts and BTC wallets.

At this point, I suspect it would be best for all concerned, and the BTC markets in general, if some legal authority was over-seeing this process.

Agreed.  If this was in the US you could def get an injunction.  However I don't know the law in Japan.  Even if you could sue Gox in the US, which I think you could, you would only be able to freeze their US assets (are there any?)

[superduh]

Another question for the OP. Will your attorney ask for an order freezing all Mt. Gox accounts immediately?

It seems like one could make the argument for irretrievable harm given the possibility of someone taking off with the BTC. This could possibly justify freezing all their accounts, both their fiat accounts and BTC wallets.

At this point, I suspect it would be best for all concerned, and the BTC markets in general, if some legal authority was over-seeing this process.

Agreed.  If this was in the US you could def get an injunction.  However I don't know the law in Japan.  Even if you could sue Gox in the US, which I think you could, you would only be able to freeze their US assets (are there any?)

already frozen

[okashira]

Those of you with BTC in Gox, and want them out at higher then $123 per coin, you can get them out now via https://www.bitcoinbuilder.com/ at ~0.45 per bitcoin. And you get them now. Just FYI for those who don't want to risk it.

[nmersulypnem]

Updated OP

[julz]

I think this is premature - and inviting intervention by the authorities at this point is likely to be counterproductive to all our interests.

If it comes down to liquidation - you can bet the lawyers will eat a huge slice of the pie.


Frankly I think all this panicking is unwarranted. 
People have been crowing about MTGox being 'fractional reserve' for years without evidence - and now the the anti-gox sentiment has reached hysterical proportions.  Yes, clearly there are real problems at the exchange - but my bet is they have more than enough BTC to cover balances.