SaveGox.com

[JonHolmquist]

Hey guys!

I'm on the SaveGox team. If you guys have questions for the team, please post them.

I'm opening this thread because Goat closed the other one.

Thanks,

-Jon

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[freedombit]

Hey guys!

I'm on the SaveGox team. If you guys have questions for the team, please post them.

I'm opening this thread because Goat closed the other one.

Thanks,

-Jon

Will your investment provide enough injection to cover the negative balance of lost deposits if there is one?

If not, then I have a second question.

How will the new exchange offer complete transparency to its books and balances?

[pblack4]

Do creditors get either a 20% of the 200K coins or a share of the new exchange or both?
How many years to recover the full 100%?
What happens after a creditor has recovered 100%? Does he continue to receive earnings from the exchange?

[tins]

Hey guys!

I'm on the SaveGox team. If you guys have questions for the team, please post them.

I'm opening this thread because Goat closed the other one.

Thanks,

-Jon

I am surprised that there is a save gox team. Most people in the BTC community would like gox to be forever wiped away from our history without reminders of the terrible events that took place with mt gox.

[sobriket]

Hey guys!

I'm on the SaveGox team. If you guys have questions for the team, please post them.

I'm opening this thread because Goat closed the other one.

Thanks,

-Jon

I am surprised that there is a save gox team. Most people in the BTC community would like gox to be forever wiped away from our history without reminders of the terrible events that took place with mt gox.

Such an incredibly uninformed, naive, silly comment. MtGox is forever engraved in the history of BTC and the whole ongoing and unresolved mess there, along with the loss of half a billion dollars, is one of the factors that negatively affect bitcoin and will haunt it for a long time if not resolved properly.

For all the others, including 127,000 affected depositors who may actually have an interest, consider watching this informative video: http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/24443x/live_google_hangout_mtgoxrehabcom_vs_liquidation/

[defyent]

If this team does obtain mtgox, will mtgox's wallet addresses be made public for the community to audit?

[BitCoinNutJob]

Hey guys!

I'm on the SaveGox team. If you guys have questions for the team, please post them.

I'm opening this thread because Goat closed the other one.

Thanks,

-Jon

I am surprised that there is a save gox team. Most people in the BTC community would like gox to be forever wiped away from our history without reminders of the terrible events that took place with mt gox.

Its not that simple

[sobriket]

I would like to use this opportunity to stress again that the Sunlot Holdings people tried to make a backroom deal with Mark Karpeles, and later through the court, to buy up the distressed debt. The deal, which recently surfaced through a leaked document, would have been quite a ripoff to existing creditors and was to be made, if Sunlot Holdings had their way, behind our backs. Fortunately, it was rejected.

They state that at that time they acted in an "information vacuum" and have since then changed their plan, apparently acting on newly available information to adjust the plan. To my knowledge, the only knowledge that has become available to them since then is that their original plan was rejected, and that the general public have got to know that it looks like they were about to be taken advantage of.

In conversations with a WSJ journalist, they stated that they have support for their plan from 70% of creditors, weighed by the size of the debt of individual creditors. This is pertinently untrue. Many of the large creditors they included in their potentially made-up figure of 70% have stated support for rehabilitation, but not for the Sunlot Holdings plan.

In the past weeks, while remaining unclear about exact terms of their new plan, which may still not include a debt-for-equity swap, they've hired John Holmquist as a PR person, who has since resorted to some silly scare tactics such as these.

To close, just posting the below link as a public service announcement when it comes to potential MtGox investors in general:
http://www.investopedia.com/terms/v/vulturefund.asp

[sobriket]

In addition, Sunlot Holdings was registered in December 2013. Of course that's no proof of nefarious purposes. However, considering they seem to be distressed debt investors, one wonders what "distress" signal they received (like in November 2013) that most others didn't?

[JonHolmquist]

Hey guys!

I'm on the SaveGox team. If you guys have questions for the team, please post them.

I'm opening this thread because Goat closed the other one.

Thanks,

-Jon

Will your investment provide enough injection to cover the negative balance of lost deposits if there is one?

If not, then I have a second question.

How will the new exchange offer complete transparency to its books and balances?

Phase 1: Complete audit and get everyone the coins and cash remaining back to them.

Phase 2: Launch new exchange. At this point we'll be investing a couple million dollars to get it up and running and profitable.

Phase 3: Coin holders will receive equity in the new company to help pay off their losses. This third phase is still not finalized yet.

[JonHolmquist]

Do creditors get either a 20% of the 200K coins or a share of the new exchange or both?
How many years to recover the full 100%?
What happens after a creditor has recovered 100%? Does he continue to receive earnings from the exchange?

Check the answer above.

No projections yet for how many years it will take. Depends on too many external factors. I presume they'll continue earning after the fact. This has yet to be finalized though.

[JonHolmquist]

If this team does obtain mtgox, will mtgox's wallet addresses be made public for the community to audit?

I will ask. I don't see the issue in releasing that info after the audit. I'd make it a priority to share the results of an audit or investigation to the community immediately.

[JonHolmquist]

In addition, Sunlot Holdings was registered in December 2013. Of course that's no proof of nefarious purposes. However, considering they seem to be distressed debt investors, one wonders what "distress" signal they received (like in November 2013) that most others didn't?

How about this? http://techcrunch.com/2013/08/23/feds-seize-another-2-1-million-from-mt-gox-adding-up-to-5-million/

[JonHolmquist]

I would like to use this opportunity to stress again that the Sunlot Holdings people tried to make a backroom deal with Mark Karpeles, and later through the court, to buy up the distressed debt. The deal, which recently surfaced through a leaked document, would have been quite a ripoff to existing creditors and was to be made, if Sunlot Holdings had their way, behind our backs. Fortunately, it was rejected.

Did you read the proposal? Included in there, in plain english: "- Court and creditor approval of a payment plan."

None of this was done behind your backs. It was contingent on the knowledge and approval of the creditors.


They state that at that time they acted in an "information vacuum" and have since then changed their plan, apparently acting on newly available information to adjust the plan. To my knowledge, the only knowledge that has become available to them since then is that their original plan was rejected, and that the general public have got to know that it looks like they were about to be taken advantage of.

We've been able to better identify the risks associated with the business and have been in talks with creditors. Plenty information regarding creditor wishes has been made available to us in the last month.

In conversations with a WSJ journalist, they stated that they have support for their plan from 70% of creditors, weighed by the size of the debt of individual creditors. This is pertinently untrue. Many of the large creditors they included in their potentially made-up figure of 70% have stated support for rehabilitation, but not for the Sunlot Holdings plan.

We have received support of our efforts from large blocks of customers who have self organized, as well as individual customers who have reached out to us through SaveGox.com, some formal, some informal.  We will be making an announcement shortly about formal support from international groups of creditors who support our revised rehabilitation plan for Mt Gox. That 70% included Okcoin at that time, who now seem to support their own plan. We still have an open dialogue with them.

In the past weeks, while remaining unclear about exact terms of their new plan, which may still not include a debt-for-equity swap, they've hired John Holmquist as a PR person, who has since resorted to some silly scare tactics such as these.


I believe John confirmed debt-for-equity yesterday. I think you're forgetting my other more silly tactics, like this one: https://i.imgur.com/7vyhIPm.jpg - Both of these were attempts aimed at the larger Bitcoin community to garner attention. Neither did well, I didn't push them any further.

[defyent]

If this team does obtain mtgox, will mtgox's wallet addresses be made public for the community to audit?

I will ask. I don't see the issue in releasing that info after the audit. I'd make it a priority to share the results of an audit or investigation to the community immediately.

Well I didn't ask about the info after an audit. That's just a story, and we've had enough stories. The bitcoin community has proven themselves to be the best at auditing the block chain. No amount of 'professionals' you throw money at will convince us that the story you're telling us is true unless you release ALL of mtgox's wallet addresses.

[janos666]

Well...
May be I misinterpreted the communication of this group though the media, but I think one of your promises was to be as transparent and verbose as humanly and/or professionally possible/allowed.
But I am yet to receive my very first "information package" on the email address I used to sign up.
All I know for a fact that some people with questionable/unclear histories/intentions want to do something with Gox if the Japanes court allows. And they are sweating the deal by promising they will try to recover all  losses.
And then there is this shadowy talk on these forums about "various things are in motion under the radar, more comes later". -> Not really transparent and verbose if you ask me.

[JonHolmquist]

Well...
May be I misinterpreted the communication of this group though the media, but I think one of your promises was to be as transparent and verbose as humanly and/or professionally possible/allowed.
But I am yet to receive my very first "information package" on the email address I used to sign up.
All I know for a fact that some people with questionable/unclear histories/intentions want to do something with Gox if the Japanes court allows. And they are sweating the deal by promising they will try to recover all  losses.
And then there is this shadowy talk on these forums about "various things are in motion under the radar, more comes later". -> Not really transparent and verbose if you ask me.

We should be sending something to your email soon.

Here's a press release, hot off the presses! http://www.savegox.com/press/Gox_Creditor_Settlement_Press_Release.pdf

[Phinnaeus Gage]

Well...
May be I misinterpreted the communication of this group though the media, but I think one of your promises was to be as transparent and verbose as humanly and/or professionally possible/allowed.
But I am yet to receive my very first "information package" on the email address I used to sign up.
All I know for a fact that some people with questionable/unclear histories/intentions want to do something with Gox if the Japanes court allows. And they are sweating the deal by promising they will try to recover all  losses.
And then there is this shadowy talk on these forums about "various things are in motion under the radar, more comes later". -> Not really transparent and verbose if you ask me.

We should be sending something to your email soon.

Here's a press release, hot off the presses! http://www.savegox.com/press/Gox_Creditor_Settlement_Press_Release.pdf

Two paragraphs in, and I already envision mass postings in this thread in 5...4...3...

[Nagle]

I'm on the SaveGox team. If you guys have questions for the team, please post them.

Please list the criminal records for all members of your team, including investors and advisors.

(This is a standard requirement for anyone proposing to become a broker or exchange under US law.)

[freedombit]

Well...
May be I misinterpreted the communication of this group though the media, but I think one of your promises was to be as transparent and verbose as humanly and/or professionally possible/allowed.
But I am yet to receive my very first "information package" on the email address I used to sign up.
All I know for a fact that some people with questionable/unclear histories/intentions want to do something with Gox if the Japanes court allows. And they are sweating the deal by promising they will try to recover all  losses.
And then there is this shadowy talk on these forums about "various things are in motion under the radar, more comes later". -> Not really transparent and verbose if you ask me.

+ 1 on EVERYTHING stated above

[freedombit]

Hey guys!

I'm on the SaveGox team. If you guys have questions for the team, please post them.

I'm opening this thread because Goat closed the other one.

Thanks,

-Jon

Will your investment provide enough injection to cover the negative balance of lost deposits if there is one?

If not, then I have a second question.

How will the new exchange offer complete transparency to its books and balances?

Hi Jon. Still seeking answers to these questions.  Will DEPOSITORS receive the full amount of lost deposits back - whether in the form of Bitcoin or FIAT. It appears that your plan will convert Bitcoin to Fiat based on some valuation.

[sobriket]

Total ripoff confirmed!

http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/248trz/mt_gox_class_action_lawsuit_important_announcement/ch4tk5d

[sobriket]

Hey guys!

I'm on the SaveGox team. If you guys have questions for the team, please post them.

I'm opening this thread because Goat closed the other one.

Thanks,

-Jon

Will your investment provide enough injection to cover the negative balance of lost deposits if there is one?

If not, then I have a second question.

How will the new exchange offer complete transparency to its books and balances?

Hi Jon. Still seeking answers to these questions.  Will DEPOSITORS receive the full amount of lost deposits back - whether in the form of Bitcoin or FIAT. It appears that your plan will convert Bitcoin to Fiat based on some valuation.

the leeches will first take $10 million out if they have their way. No way.

[sobriket]

From http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/248trz/mt_gox_class_action_lawsuit_important_announcement/ch4tk5d

This is a terrible, disgusting deal. Read the actual press release and see that those Sunlot bastards still try to take $10 million out of the existing assets and even try to reward themselves even more in the process of doing so.
"An Administration and Prosecution Fund would manage customer interests and the recovery of the approximately $275 million of stolen customer assets. Capitalized by $10 million (3.6% of stolen assets) in MtGox cash held in trust by Nobuaki Kobayashi, the administrator appointed by the Tokyo District Court, the fund would conduct forensic investigations and pursue prosecution of perpetrators. An incentive bounty of 10% of recovered assets would reward those participating in the recovery."
All this is a direct contradiction of things they've stated in their 'support gathering phase'.
They've shown themselves for what they are - vultures that can only get what they want through litigation or the threat thereof, of minor defendents. They pick on the half-dead bodies of affected creditors and try to suck out as much of the meat out of them as possible. Meanwhile, they tout themselves in the press as the saviours of the bitcoin economy.

[btc237ftw]

I just saw:
https://www.mtgox.com/img/pdf/20140424_order.pdf

Doesn't that mean there is now no more hope for a buyout? / bail out such as savegox?

Sorry if this is a stupid question, but I did not update for a few days,

Thank you

[gizmoh]

Gox customers will be scammed twice if this plot goes through:

Only 16.5% stake to customers
While a hefty $10m of customers money is misappropriated for investigation/audit.

Its a sweet deal only to sunlot shareholders, all that for the cost of 1 btc..

[cloon]

@ John

There's a statement i really'd like to have confirmed:

It only compensates people from US / Canada.
The majority of the MtGox customers were foreigners (including me).
These foreign customers are not included in this Class Action

is this true? I live in Switzerland and you will just keep my money cause i'm not from US/Canada?
I really apreciate the efforts you do, but there are so many informations, that make you less and less trustworthy.

[sobriket]

@ John

There's a statement i really'd like to have confirmed:

It only compensates people from US / Canada.
The majority of the MtGox customers were foreigners (including me).
These foreign customers are not included in this Class Action

is this true? I live in Switzerland and you will just keep my money cause i'm not from US/Canada?
I really apreciate the efforts you do, but there are so many informations, that make you less and less trustworthy.

of course not (not just for US creditors). Gee, MtGox isn't even American. Read their press release. I suggest you visit the reddit thread I linked above.

[Inspire]

Hi Jon,
Q1) Will you be using new software or are you going to use existing software for the bitcoin trading platform?
Q2) Are you the Jon that was in the Google Hangout Talk? (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vxJNgLibP4)

[JorgeStolfi]

Mr. Gay-Bouchery and Mr. McCaleb are said to be defendants in the earlier class-action suit (whose terms I have not had time to read yet) and to agree with this plan.  If this deal is approved by the court, will they be freed of any responsibility for their roles in MtGOX's collapse?

[JorgeStolfi]

Also, how can we trust that a private investigation by the new management into possible wrongdoings at MtGOX will be carried out earnestly and impartially, in the best interest of the former customers, and without regard for who the guilty parties may turn out to be?

Theft and fraud are common crimes that must be investigated by legitimate authorities.  The "bitcoin community" has no right to declare itself outside the reach of the law.

[CompNsci]

Hey guys!

I'm on the SaveGox team. If you guys have questions for the team, please post them.

I'm opening this thread because Goat closed the other one.

Thanks,

-Jon

Mr. Holmquist, I must admit I have to admire your nerve (some would say temerity) to post here.

I agree with Nagle, perhaps let's first get the criminal and background records on the team.

Perhaps you can also clarify then when Bruce Fenton first became aware of the financial troubles at Mt. Gox? And precisely what information was made available to him on that date? And more specifically, whether it included any information which would have led a reasonable person to believe that Mt. Gox had lost customer funds. I am very curious about this latter question, as I imagine a number of courts may be as well.

[CompNsci]

Well I didn't ask about the info after an audit. That's just a story, and we've had enough stories. The bitcoin community has proven themselves to be the best at auditing the block chain. No amount of 'professionals' you throw money at will convince us that the story you're telling us is true unless you release ALL of mtgox's wallet addresses.

Yes, exactly, if these people are serious then release the wallet addresses that were lost/stolen. It is simple enough, and they will be found eventually in any case.

[Nagle]

The "class action" has never been certified by a court as representing US and Canadian investors. That requires notice to all class members (not just publication) and an opportunity to opt out.  So they don't represent anybody but themselves.

On the other side, there's Sunlot, with no money, no business history, and questionable people involved.

That they made a deal with each other doesn't mean much.

[btcusury]

Regarding the issue of trust, it's a simple matter. Who'd you rather have decide the fate of MtGox and your missing funds? Karpeles, crypto-clueless Japanese lawyers, or Bitcoin entrepreneurs with a record of experience in the crumbling financial world? Hmmm, tough choice.

[Phinnaeus Gage]

Regarding the issue of trust, it's a simple matter. Who'd you rather have decide the fate of MtGox and your missing funds? Karpeles, crypto-clueless Japanese lawyers, or Bitcoin entrepreneurs with a record of experience in the crumbling financial world? Hmmm, tough choice.

It's worst than you think! How about entrepreneurs with records of fraud and experience in the crumbling financial world opting to carry over said expertise over to the cryptocurrency realm? The only thing left to add is Disney. Oh, wait...

[btcusury]

Guess I've missed the records of fraud, then. All I've seen is one allegation about one of the Sunlot people. Care to post a link with the full info about fraud?

[Praeconium]

@ John

There's a statement i really'd like to have confirmed:

It only compensates people from US / Canada.
The majority of the MtGox customers were foreigners (including me).
These foreign customers are not included in this Class Action

is this true? I live in Switzerland and you will just keep my money cause i'm not from US/Canada?
I really apreciate the efforts you do, but there are so many informations, that make you less and less trustworthy.

I am also from Europe and have stake. I do not understand how could that be possible? MtGox owes to everyone with equal rights.

If so, Europeans and other nations should organize and make appropriate claims so that we do not end up with nothing.

Could anyone from Sunlot confirm that nationals other than Canada and US will not be counted as creditors? Or that Sunlot will not compensate them in any manner?

[btcusury]

Could anyone from Sunlot confirm that nationals other than Canada and US will not be counted as creditors? Or that Sunlot will not compensate them in any manner?

I've assumed that this must be dis/misinformation, because like you said, it doesn't make any sense.

[Praeconium]

Could anyone from Sunlot confirm that nationals other than Canada and US will not be counted as creditors? Or that Sunlot will not compensate them in any manner?

I've assumed that this must be dis/misinformation, because like you said, it doesn't make any sense.

Me too but such disinformations should be stopped and they keep on throwing words "creditor support" which is not helping as I am sure that not all big players were from US/Canada, and I haven't heard about Class Action Suit up until now..

They somehow made agreements between themselves without having proofs of each person stake in it? And definitely without talking to ALL creditors, as this is unreasonable to be made but it should be public knowledge (maybe it is?).

I agree bankruptcy is not a solution and debt swap is good idea but there needs to be more explanation from them, even if they are trying to get MtGox only for US/Canada customers, other creditors have to know this information, or else they'll get screwed.

[JorgeStolfi]

Regarding the issue of trust, it's a simple matter. Who'd you rather have decide the fate of MtGox and your missing funds? Karpeles, crypto-clueless Japanese lawyers, or Bitcoin entrepreneurs with a record of experience in the crumbling financial world? Hmmm, tough choice.

I have yet to know a "bitcoin entrepreneur" to whom I would lend a pen without removing the cap first.  For one thing, Karpelès was one of the top board members of the Bitcoin Foundation.

Lawyers can and will hire experts to handle the technicalities, in bitcoin or any other field.

The thief (or embezzler, or fraudster) responsible for the missing MtGOX coins must be found by teh police and punished by law.   The issue is not just return the coint to his victims, but deterrence of future crimes.  If he walks away with his loot, why should not every exchange owner do the same?

[btcusury]

I have yet to know a "bitcoin entrepreneur" to whom I would lend a pen without removing the cap first.  For one thing, Karpelès was one of the top board members of the Bitcoin Foundation.

Irrelevant to the situation. You are not lending anything. Your goxcoins were never really yours. What you had was a promise to pay, just like with the banks. Karpeles got far in the Bitcoin world because he created the first exchange and the first price discovery mechanism, and made a fortune with BTC, not for reasons of trust.

Lawyers can and will hire experts to handle the technicalities, in bitcoin or any other field.

The technicalities of liquidation, not the technicalities of recovering the missing 650,000 BTC!

The thief (or embezzler, or fraudster) responsible for the missing MtGOX coins must be found by teh police and punished by law.   The issue is not just return the coint to his victims, but deterrence of future crimes.  If he walks away with his loot, why should not every exchange owner do the same?

And you really think the Tokyo police has a higher chance of solving the mystery than has the Tokyo police PLUS a restarted MtGox run by (presumably) competent people who have a bigger incentive to solve it?

[DubFX]

Good luck but you will need really big investment.

[JorgeStolfi]

Lawyers can and will hire experts to handle the technicalities, in bitcoin or any other field.

The technicalities of liquidation, not the technicalities of recovering the missing 650,000 BTC!

No, I mean technical aspects of the issue.  If it were a theft of chemical formulas they would hire chemical experts, if it was a theft of computer chip designs they would hire chip design experts, etc..

The police in countries like the US and Japan is quite compentent by now in the investigation of cybercrimes.  Bitcoin is not more complicated than the things they have already mastered.

On the other hand, the "crowd detectives" who poke at the blockchain so far have made a lot of noise, but have no concrete result to show, have they? In MtGOX or any other theft/scam...

And you really think the Tokyo police has a higher chance of solving the mystery than has the Tokyo police PLUS a restarted MtGox run by (presumably) competent people who have a bigger incentive to solve it?

The police certainly has a better chance than a team of unknown managers who MAY bring in the police (but almost certainly will not).

[Praeconium]

Hey guys!

I'm on the SaveGox team. If you guys have questions for the team, please post them.

I'm opening this thread because Goat closed the other one.

Thanks,

-Jon

Does Your plan involve people to whom MtGox owes money and do not reside in US and Canada in the same manner as those that do?

[Nagle]

And you really think the Tokyo police has a higher chance of solving the mystery than has the Tokyo police PLUS a restarted MtGox run by (presumably) competent people who have a bigger incentive to solve it?

Yes. Once enough evidence is collected for the Tokyo police to arrest and interrogate Mark Karpeles for their usual 23 days.

[Phinnaeus Gage]

Irrelevant to the situation. You are not lending anything. Your goxcoins were never really yours. What you had was a promise to pay, just like with the banks. Karpeles got far in the Bitcoin world because he created the first exchange and the first price discovery mechanism, and made a fortune with BTC, not for reasons of trust.

Hi Everyone,
I just put up a new bitcoin exchange.
Please let me know what you think.
https://mtgox.com

Name:   jed
Posts:   112
Activity:   112
Position:   Member
Date Registered:   February 28, 2011, 08:48:21 AM
Last Active:   September 30, 2013, 05:18:25 PM

I don't run mtgox any more.

Name:   MagicalTux
Posts:   617
Activity:   617
Position:   VIP
Date Registered:   November 06, 2010, 09:44:21 PM
Last Active:   September 14, 2013, 07:50:12 PM

Hi,

We're accepting BitCoin too!

https://www.kalyhost.com/?Currency=BTC

Services provided includes:

- Domain names (many extensions available)
- Web hosting (Europe or US, depending on your location)
- VPS (Europe)

Note that this is not a service specialized in "anonymous hosting", instead we are a regular provided adding support for BTC. Process is simple: choose your stuff, add to cart, register, and get on payment page. Once there you get a bitcoin address to send your payment to. You can send it in one go, or in small parts (ie. if you're paying for something with a friend).
Once the payment is confirmed, the order will be processed automatically, and you'll receive a confirmation email a bit later.

Jed McCaleb started Mt Gox, not Mark Karpeles.

[freedombit]

Regarding the issue of trust, it's a simple matter. Who'd you rather have decide the fate of MtGox and your missing funds? Karpeles, crypto-clueless Japanese lawyers, or Bitcoin entrepreneurs with a record of experience in the crumbling financial world? Hmmm, tough choice.

I have yet to know a "bitcoin entrepreneur" to whom I would lend a pen without removing the cap first.  For one thing, Karpelès was one of the top board members of the Bitcoin Foundation.

Lawyers can and will hire experts to handle the technicalities, in bitcoin or any other field.

The thief (or embezzler, or fraudster) responsible for the missing MtGOX coins must be found by teh police and punished by law.   The issue is not just return the coint to his victims, but deterrence of future crimes.  If he walks away with his loot, why should not every exchange owner do the same?

Agreed - truth must be uncovered. Whether Mark or anyone else.

[janos666]

Was there any information released regarding how Sunlot would convert the BTC balances into equity stakes?
For obvious reasons, I had only BTC left inside Gox. But for the same reason, those don't worth much if you count their ~100 $/BTC closing price.

[btcusury]

Lawyers can and will hire experts to handle the technicalities, in bitcoin or any other field.

The technicalities of liquidation, not the technicalities of recovering the missing 650,000 BTC!

No, I mean technical aspects of the issue.  If it were a theft of chemical formulas they would hire chemical experts, if it was a theft of computer chip designs they would hire chip design experts, etc..

The police in countries like the US and Japan is quite compentent by now in the investigation of cybercrimes.  Bitcoin is not more complicated than the things they have already mastered.

On the other hand, the "crowd detectives" who poke at the blockchain so far have made a lot of noise, but have no concrete result to show, have they? In MtGOX or any other theft/scam...

And you really think the Tokyo police has a higher chance of solving the mystery than has the Tokyo police PLUS a restarted MtGox run by (presumably) competent people who have a bigger incentive to solve it?

The police certainly has a better chance than a team of unknown managers who MAY bring in the police (but almost certainly will not).

Blockchain analysis can only go so far, but it does reveal some parameters of the puzzle. We need access to MtGox's accounting system. With that, we'd figure it out much faster than any cybercrime police team would. We are far greater in number and experience.

You place too much faith in authority. Hiring an expert in a field who does it for the money does not compare to the power the Internet has in bringing together the top experts, and this is especially true for something like cryptocurrency.

The Tokyo police was handed evidence several weeks ago, according to one of the MtGox press releases (authored by Karpeles under supervision). So the new Gox team could investigate in parallel, or assist the police investigation if indeed one exists.

And you really think the Tokyo police has a higher chance of solving the mystery than has the Tokyo police PLUS a restarted MtGox run by (presumably) competent people who have a bigger incentive to solve it?

Yes. Once enough evidence is collected for the Tokyo police to arrest and interrogate Mark Karpeles for their usual 23 days.

You're assuming Karpeles is the only one to blame (and that he's an evil genius). He had no reason to attempt grand theft. It seems unlikely that he faked his incompetence and staged the security problems that plagued MtGox.

Jed McCaleb started Mt Gox, not Mark Karpeles.

You're right! I should've written: Karpeles got far in the Bitcoin world because he purchased the first exchange and rode that wave. He got far in the Bitcoin world because he was an early adopter and then made a fortune after buying the first exchange from McCaleb, who knew it wouldn't scale so he wanted to get rid of it.

[viajero]

Hey guys!

I'm on the SaveGox team. If you guys have questions for the team, please post them.
I'm opening this thread because Goat closed the other one.

Thanks,
-Jon

hi jon, thanks for your communication effort. i have a question for you and johnbetts:

why are you guys don't join forces with the OKcoin team? from what i've heard, they offered their know-how and to license their trading software to make it easy for you, to restart gox as fast as possible.

i understand, that you want to run this on your own without the need to license anything. especially since you already put in a lot effort to make that deal possible. i'm quit sure your team has the legal capacity and a lot of experience in the financial business which are some badly needed qualifications. but you seem to forget, that dealing in bitcoin is quit special! at least i get that impression, when i read statements like that:

[09:10] <johnbetts> I have been involved in electronic trading Since 2004 - bitcoin is just another asset class, not different to stocks when it comes to trading (http://pastebin.com/SbH84VDr)

since your initial rehab plan was leaked (http://www.goxdox.org/) and everybody got the impression, that you don't care to much about the creditors, there is almost no support left for sunlot. statments like this only make things worse:

[09:06] <johnbetts> we could go and build a new exchange - though if we did that - who would be challenging the courts to protect the customers intersts, and creating a mechanism for them to earn back their losses, and go after the stolen funds?

[09:26] <johnbetts> fishfish - I said the OK Coin discussion of them joining us formally did not materialize - and I said I will not say anything negative, and wrote to them to give them support for their efforts (in the sense that we want the same thing, and if they win, we are just interested in customers being taken care of)

to me and almost everyone this reads between the lines like something more or less like this: "shit, our plan got leaked and now everybody knows that we only want to make a quick buck and don't give a shit about the creditors! lets tweak the plan a little and repeat everywhere how importand the creditors are to us, maybe that way we'll get their support back"

don't get me wrong, i'm not saying that's the case! i'm just saying it kind of sounds like that! there is absolutely no harm in admitting that this is business! it's about money and helping ppl can never be the first priority. we, the creditors, understand that! sunlot has to make money and there won't be any restart if you can't get a good deal for yourself. we don't blame you for that! but to get our support the deal has to be fair! as long as it feels like a total fuck over there won't be much support.

my impression is that the sunlot team learned from their mistake and is now trying to do better, i.e. work together with the creditors for a solution everybody or at least the majority can agree to. so far there is still much greater support for the OKcoin proposal or, lets say, for what the OKcoin proposal is expected to be.

my personal impression is, that OKcoin might be somewhat optimistic regarding the legal and regulatory hurdles and what they can promise the creditors without cripling the new gox right from the beginning. you guys might be somewhat optimistic when it comes to all the possible technical glitches that can fuck up a bitcoin exchange! ("bitcoin is just another asset class, not different to stocks when it comes to trading" johnbetts)

even if i'm wrong and you have the expertise, your leaked initial plan lost you the community support. OKcoin has our support and a approved bitcoin trading engine ready to go, sunlot has the connections and resources to deal with all the non technical issues.

sounds like a dream team to me!


and last, but not least: if there is no chance to join forces for whatever reason, you might want to come up with a better plan to get more support. i personally don't need 49% equity! but i can't trust sunlot as long as you just use mt.gox [our] assets at the beginning. i'm talking about the 10m you want to take out to get started. put a reasonable amount of your own money at stake! trust can be bought. at least in this case...

[sturle]

Blockchain analysis can only go so far, but it does reveal some parameters of the puzzle. We need access to MtGox's accounting system. With that, we'd figure it out much faster than any cybercrime police team would. We are far greater in number and experience.

If they deliberately disclose any of the personal details you would need from their accounting system, like bitcoin addresses conected to specific accounts, I am going to sue them to hell and back.  Please list all your own details here, if this is important to you, and people can start digging from that.

[Phinnaeus Gage]

Hey guys!

I'm on the SaveGox team. If you guys have questions for the team, please post them.
I'm opening this thread because Goat closed the other one.

Thanks,
-Jon

hi jon, thanks for your communication effort. i have a question for you and johnbetts:

why are you guys don't join forces with the OKcoin team? from what i've heard, they offered their know-how and to license their trading software to make it easy for you, to restart gox as fast as possible.

i understand, that you want to run this on your own without the need to license anything. especially since you already put in a lot effort to make that deal possible. i'm quit sure your team has the legal capacity and a lot of experience in the financial business which are some badly needed qualifications. but you seem to forget, that dealing in bitcoin is quit special! at least i get that impression, when i read statements like that:

[09:10] <johnbetts> I have been involved in electronic trading Since 2004 - bitcoin is just another asset class, not different to stocks when it comes to trading (http://pastebin.com/SbH84VDr)

since your initial rehab plan was leaked (http://www.goxdox.org/) and everybody got the impression, that you don't care to much about the creditors, there is almost no support left for sunlot. statments like this only make things worse:

[09:06] <johnbetts> we could go and build a new exchange - though if we did that - who would be challenging the courts to protect the customers intersts, and creating a mechanism for them to earn back their losses, and go after the stolen funds?

[09:26] <johnbetts> fishfish - I said the OK Coin discussion of them joining us formally did not materialize - and I said I will not say anything negative, and wrote to them to give them support for their efforts (in the sense that we want the same thing, and if they win, we are just interested in customers being taken care of)

to me and almost everyone this reads between the lines like something more or less like this: "shit, our plan got leaked and now everybody knows that we only want to make a quick buck and don't give a shit about the creditors! lets tweak the plan a little and repeat everywhere how importand the creditors are to us, maybe that way we'll get their support back"

don't get me wrong, i'm not saying that's the case! i'm just saying it kind of sounds like that! there is absolutely no harm in admitting that this is business! it's about money and helping ppl can never be the first priority. we, the creditors, understand that! sunlot has to make money and there won't be any restart if you can't get a good deal for yourself. we don't blame you for that! but to get our support the deal has to be fair! as long as it feels like a total fuck over there won't be much support.

my impression is that the sunlot team learned from their mistake and is now trying to do better, i.e. work together with the creditors for a solution everybody or at least the majority can agree to. so far there is still much greater support for the OKcoin proposal or, lets say, for what the OKcoin proposal is expected to be.

my personal impression is, that OKcoin might be somewhat optimistic regarding the legal and regulatory hurdles and what they can promise the creditors without cripling the new gox right from the beginning. you guys might be somewhat optimistic when it comes to all the possible technical glitches that can fuck up a bitcoin exchange! ("bitcoin is just another asset class, not different to stocks when it comes to trading" johnbetts)

even if i'm wrong and you have the expertise, your leaked initial plan lost you the community support. OKcoin has our support and a approved bitcoin trading engine ready to go, sunlot has the connections and resources to deal with all the non technical issues.

sounds like a dream team to me!


and last, but not least: if there is no chance to join forces for whatever reason, you might want to come up with a better plan to get more support. i personally don't need 49% equity! but i can't trust sunlot as long as you just use mt.gox [our] assets at the beginning. i'm talking about the 10m you want to take out to get started. put a reasonable amount of your own money at stake! trust can be bought. at least in this case...

I'm beginning to wonder if this deal was hatched under the covers: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=590970.0

[JorgeStolfi]

Blockchain analysis can only go so far, but it does reveal some parameters of the puzzle. We need access to MtGox's accounting system. With that, we'd figure it out much faster than any cybercrime police team would. We are far greater in number and experience.

You place too much faith in authority. Hiring an expert in a field who does it for the money does not compare to the power the Internet has in bringing together the top experts, and this is especially true for something like cryptocurrency.

The police can get subpoena all the internal accounting records, emails, and bank records of MtGOX and any persons they have evidence to suspect.  They can get connection logs and access non-public databases of various relevant data.  These things alone gives them immensurably more chances of finding the culprit than all the internet detectives put together.

A hired expert will have access to all that data.  Plus he will have the obligation to work hard to get to the bottom of things and avoid half-baked conclusions, PLUS he will not have to fear being sued by the people he finds evidence against, PLUS he will not be easily bribed by guilty parties.  (Soon after the MtGOX database leak, a website came up that posted some tantalising results, such as the identities of the most successful traders.  The website was suddenly taken down by the author without explanation.)

I repeat my question: what useful results have the crowd detectives obtained so far, in this or in any other bitcoin scam?

[CompNsci]

The police can get subpoena all the internal accounting records, emails, and bank records of MtGOX and any persons they have evidence to suspect.  They can get connection logs and access non-public databases of various relevant data.  These things alone gives them immensurably more chances of finding the culprit than all the internet detectives put together.

A hired expert will have access to all that data.  Plus he will have the obligation to work hard to get to the bottom of things and avoid half-baked conclusions, PLUS he will not have to fear being sued by the people he finds evidence against, PLUS he will not be easily bribed by guilty parties.  (Soon after the MtGOX database leak, a website came up that posted some tantalising results, such as the identities of the most successful traders.  The website was suddenly taken down by the author without explanation.)

I repeat my question: what useful results have the crowd detectives obtained so far, in this or in any other bitcoin scam?

But the experts can be hired by the police or the court, preferably prior to any settlement. There is no reason to accept the terrible deal proposed by Sunlot Holdings to hire experts.

[CompNsci]

If they deliberately disclose any of the personal details you would need from their accounting system, like bitcoin addresses conected to specific accounts, I am going to sue them to hell and back.  Please list all your own details here, if this is important to you, and people can start digging from that.

Unclear what you consider personal details here. Simply the fact that a particular bitcoin address was used to withdraw funds from a specific Mt. Gox account?

[CompNsci]

Soon after the MtGOX database leak, a website came up that posted some tantalising results, such as the identities of the most successful traders.  The website was suddenly taken down by the author without explanation.

What was that site? And does anyone have a copy of the database that was involved?

[JorgeStolfi]

But the experts can be hired by the police or the court, preferably prior to any settlement. There is no reason to accept the terrible deal proposed by Sunlot Holdings to hire experts.

Yes, definitely, that is what I meant.  If MtGOX is revived, by Sunlot or any other party, it is very unlikely that the new management will solve the crime. Even less likely than the intenet detectives.

[JorgeStolfi]

What was that site? And does anyone have a copy of the database that was involved?

The database has been saved by many people I suppose (but not me, sorry) and may be still available; google for "Mt.GOX leak".

The site was http://mark-karpeles.com/ but that URL now points to a form ostensibly created by Mark Karpeles for clients to confirm their claims against MtGOX.  Careful, it smells of a phishing attempt and it may be illegal since creditors should probably contact the bankruptcy court/executors rather than the unknown author of a dubious webpage.

[sobriket]

What was that site? And does anyone have a copy of the database that was involved?

The database has been saved by many people I suppose (but not me, sorry) and may be still available; google for "Mt.GOX leak".

The site was http://mark-karpeles.com/ but that URL now points to a form ostensibly created by Mark Karpeles for clients to confirm their claims against MtGOX.  Careful, it smells of a phishing attempt and it may be illegal since creditors should probably contact the bankruptcy court/executors rather than the unknown author of a dubious webpage.

I'm not sure I see the form you're talking about?

[Phinnaeus Gage]

What was that site? And does anyone have a copy of the database that was involved?

The database has been saved by many people I suppose (but not me, sorry) and may be still available; google for "Mt.GOX leak".

The site was http://mark-karpeles.com/ but that URL now points to a form ostensibly created by Mark Karpeles for clients to confirm their claims against MtGOX.  Careful, it smells of a phishing attempt and it may be illegal since creditors should probably contact the bankruptcy court/executors rather than the unknown author of a dubious webpage.

I'm not sure I see the form you're talking about?

http://web.archive.org/web/20140413182219/http://mark-karpeles.com/

[JorgeStolfi]

http://web.archive.org/web/20140413182219/http://mark-karpeles.com/

Thanks for searching the archive.  The pages I mentioned were at that URL on 2014-03-12, but unfortunately were either taken down that same day, or were purged later from the Web Archive.

Here is a post to another thread that mentions that analysis: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=178336.msg5665606#msg5665606

[Phinnaeus Gage]

What was that site? And does anyone have a copy of the database that was involved?

The database has been saved by many people I suppose (but not me, sorry) and may be still available; google for "Mt.GOX leak".

The site was http://mark-karpeles.com/ but that URL now points to a form ostensibly created by Mark Karpeles for clients to confirm their claims against MtGOX.  Careful, it smells of a phishing attempt and it may be illegal since creditors should probably contact the bankruptcy court/executors rather than the unknown author of a dubious webpage.

I have a copy of the database, if that's what desired.

[Phinnaeus Gage]

What was that site? And does anyone have a copy of the database that was involved?

The database has been saved by many people I suppose (but not me, sorry) and may be still available; google for "Mt.GOX leak".

The site was http://mark-karpeles.com/ but that URL now points to a form ostensibly created by Mark Karpeles for clients to confirm their claims against MtGOX.  Careful, it smells of a phishing attempt and it may be illegal since creditors should probably contact the bankruptcy court/executors rather than the unknown author of a dubious webpage.

I'm not sure I see the form you're talking about?

http://web.archive.org/web/20140413182219/http://mark-karpeles.com/

This, too, may work: http://archive.today/mark-karpeles.com

[JorgeStolfi]

This, too, may work: http://archive.today/mark-karpeles.com

Yes, thanks! Those are the pages I was referring to.

[JonHolmquist]

@ John

There's a statement i really'd like to have confirmed:

It only compensates people from US / Canada.
The majority of the MtGox customers were foreigners (including me).
These foreign customers are not included in this Class Action

is this true? I live in Switzerland and you will just keep my money cause i'm not from US/Canada?
I really apreciate the efforts you do, but there are so many informations, that make you less and less trustworthy.

Uh, the class action is only affecting the customers in that suit.

Our proposal is for all customers. Everyone will get paid back regardless of country of residence.

[JonHolmquist]

Hi Jon,
Q1) Will you be using new software or are you going to use existing software for the bitcoin trading platform?
Q2) Are you the Jon that was in the Google Hangout Talk? (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vxJNgLibP4)

1: We have new software that is all ready to go. The software isn't really the hard part, it's more about operations and making sure it runs smoothly.

2: Yes

[JonHolmquist]

Mr. Gay-Bouchery and Mr. McCaleb are said to be defendants in the earlier class-action suit (whose terms I have not had time to read yet) and to agree with this plan.  If this deal is approved by the court, will they be freed of any responsibility for their roles in MtGOX's collapse?

Q: Why are you working with Jed McCaleb and Gonzague Gay-Bouchery?

This process takes pragmatism rather than idealism, and without a deal, the assets will be liquidated and customers will have no recourse. We all want an outlet for our anger and frustration, and we all want retribution, but the immediate goal at hand is to get a deal done to avoid liquidation, because once that happens the company is gone and there will be no standing left to go after Mark or investigate the lost coins.

Q: What do Jed and GGB get out of the deal?

In return for their full cooperation in recovery and prosecution of those responsible, we have agreed to release both defendants from the claims in the lawsuit.

[JonHolmquist]

Was there any information released regarding how Sunlot would convert the BTC balances into equity stakes?
For obvious reasons, I had only BTC left inside Gox. But for the same reason, those don't worth much if you count their ~100 $/BTC closing price.

We're using a $500 per coin basis.

Cheers,

[JonHolmquist]

Hey guys!

I'm on the SaveGox team. If you guys have questions for the team, please post them.
I'm opening this thread because Goat closed the other one.

Thanks,
-Jon

hi jon, thanks for your communication effort. i have a question for you and johnbetts:

why are you guys don't join forces with the OKcoin team? from what i've heard, they offered their know-how and to license their trading software to make it easy for you, to restart gox as fast as possible.

i understand, that you want to run this on your own without the need to license anything. especially since you already put in a lot effort to make that deal possible. i'm quit sure your team has the legal capacity and a lot of experience in the financial business which are some badly needed qualifications. but you seem to forget, that dealing in bitcoin is quit special! at least i get that impression, when i read statements like that:

[09:10] <johnbetts> I have been involved in electronic trading Since 2004 - bitcoin is just another asset class, not different to stocks when it comes to trading (http://pastebin.com/SbH84VDr)

since your initial rehab plan was leaked (http://www.goxdox.org/) and everybody got the impression, that you don't care to much about the creditors, there is almost no support left for sunlot. statments like this only make things worse:

[09:06] <johnbetts> we could go and build a new exchange - though if we did that - who would be challenging the courts to protect the customers intersts, and creating a mechanism for them to earn back their losses, and go after the stolen funds?

[09:26] <johnbetts> fishfish - I said the OK Coin discussion of them joining us formally did not materialize - and I said I will not say anything negative, and wrote to them to give them support for their efforts (in the sense that we want the same thing, and if they win, we are just interested in customers being taken care of)

to me and almost everyone this reads between the lines like something more or less like this: "shit, our plan got leaked and now everybody knows that we only want to make a quick buck and don't give a shit about the creditors! lets tweak the plan a little and repeat everywhere how importand the creditors are to us, maybe that way we'll get their support back"

don't get me wrong, i'm not saying that's the case! i'm just saying it kind of sounds like that! there is absolutely no harm in admitting that this is business! it's about money and helping ppl can never be the first priority. we, the creditors, understand that! sunlot has to make money and there won't be any restart if you can't get a good deal for yourself. we don't blame you for that! but to get our support the deal has to be fair! as long as it feels like a total fuck over there won't be much support.

my impression is that the sunlot team learned from their mistake and is now trying to do better, i.e. work together with the creditors for a solution everybody or at least the majority can agree to. so far there is still much greater support for the OKcoin proposal or, lets say, for what the OKcoin proposal is expected to be.

my personal impression is, that OKcoin might be somewhat optimistic regarding the legal and regulatory hurdles and what they can promise the creditors without cripling the new gox right from the beginning. you guys might be somewhat optimistic when it comes to all the possible technical glitches that can fuck up a bitcoin exchange! ("bitcoin is just another asset class, not different to stocks when it comes to trading" johnbetts)

even if i'm wrong and you have the expertise, your leaked initial plan lost you the community support. OKcoin has our support and a approved bitcoin trading engine ready to go, sunlot has the connections and resources to deal with all the non technical issues.

sounds like a dream team to me!


and last, but not least: if there is no chance to join forces for whatever reason, you might want to come up with a better plan to get more support. i personally don't need 49% equity! but i can't trust sunlot as long as you just use mt.gox [our] assets at the beginning. i'm talking about the 10m you want to take out to get started. put a reasonable amount of your own money at stake! trust can be bought. at least in this case...

Thank you for this thoughtful post!

I agree with a lot of what you said. I think though a lot of this stems from the lack of transparency in this whole ordeal.

As for OkCoin, we're more than happy to work with them. We've been in talks with them and were under the impression that they would support our deal. They decided to do their own deal instead. Either deal is still better than liquidation.

[sturle]

1: We have new software that is all ready to go. The software isn't really the hard part, it's more about operations and making sure it runs smoothly.

Does your software have the same features which made people continue using MtGox despite all the problems?  Like APIs over multiple protocols, better than all the other exchanges APIs combined, and and multi-currency trading within the same orderbook? 

[JorgeStolfi]

Mr. Gay-Bouchery and Mr. McCaleb [ ... ]  If this deal is approved by the court, will they be freed of any responsibility for their roles in MtGOX's collapse?

Q: Why are you working with Jed McCaleb and Gonzague Gay-Bouchery?

This process takes pragmatism rather than idealism, and without a deal, the assets will be liquidated and customers will have no recourse. We all want an outlet for our anger and frustration, and we all want retribution, but the immediate goal at hand is to get a deal done to avoid liquidation, because once that happens the company is gone and there will be no standing left to go after Mark or investigate the lost coins.

Q: What do Jed and GGB get out of the deal?

In return for their full cooperation in recovery and prosecution of those responsible, we have agreed to release both defendants from the claims in the lawsuit.

I see.  Are you going to make the same offer to Mr. Karpelès, then?  Or is he the expert that you intend to hire to investigate the matter?

Now seriously: it is not a matter of "anger", but deterring further crimes from happening. 

It would be interesting to know, for starters, when did Mr. Gay-Bouchery became aware of MtGOX's insolvency, and what did he do about it then.

[janos666]

I see.  Are you going to make the same offer to Mr. Karpelès, then?  Or is he the expert that you intend to hire to investigate the matter?

Ok Mark. You should take your old office to get you comfortable. Let's sit behind your desk and drink your coffee. Now, your new job is to sit there and try to remember how exactly you lost all that money. We believe the best way to remember is to continue doing the exact same thing you did during the last years. So, turn your display on and pick everything up where you left it. Just act neutrally like this whole mess with the courts and the media never happed. Once you remember, you can go on doing what every you want. Good luck and welcome at home.

[renfr]

Was there any information released regarding how Sunlot would convert the BTC balances into equity stakes?
For obvious reasons, I had only BTC left inside Gox. But for the same reason, those don't worth much if you count their ~100 $/BTC closing price.

We're using a $500 per coin basis.

Cheers,

When the plan sails on and recovery is underway the price will easily shoot up back to $1000.
Very bad idea IMO

[Gotgoxed]

Was there any information released regarding how Sunlot would convert the BTC balances into equity stakes?
For obvious reasons, I had only BTC left inside Gox. But for the same reason, those don't worth much if you count their ~100 $/BTC closing price.

We're using a $500 per coin basis.

Cheers,

When the plan sails on and recovery is underway the price will easily shoot up back to $1000.
Very bad idea IMO

I don't get the idea of the equity stakes! Please explain!

[edmundedgar]

Hi Jon. Not a creditor so maybe it's none of my business, but I'm wondering: The FAQ says,

Q: Will people be free to withdraw their assets right away?

Yes. Any recovered assets will be deposited into customer accounts immediately with no withdrawal restrictions.

As you know,
1) People responsible for stealing bitcoins and/or hacking the database, whether insiders or external people, may have positive balances in the current system.
2) There is an ongoing police investigation into who is responsible for stealing bitcoins. This may turn up information that won't be available to Sunlot, since the police have a lot of powers that Sunlot doesn't.
3) Regardless of what happens in the bankruptcy, this investigation may not be completed very quickly.

Does Sunlot really intend to pay out before the police investigation is completed, even at the risk of giving the legitimate creditors' money to the people who have already robbed them?

Or would Sunlot in fact wait until the police investigation was complete, in which case things might not happen quite as quickly as the FAQ makes it sound?

[sturle]

Does Sunlot really intend to pay out before the police investigation is completed, even at the risk of giving the legitimate creditors' money to the people who have already robbed them?

I think this is obvious.  The press relase says: "Sunlot would immediately distribute Mt. Gox assets on a proportional basis determined by an independent audit"

The audit should reveal any mismatches between balances due to deposits, withdrawals and trading, and balances which are inflated due to manipulation of the database, double withdrawals due to malleability, etc.  Finding the people would be up to the police.  I assume Sunlot will verify the identity of people who want to withdraw their assets.

[edmundedgar]

Does Sunlot really intend to pay out before the police investigation is completed, even at the risk of giving the legitimate creditors' money to the people who have already robbed them?

I think this is obvious.  The press relase says: "Sunlot would immediately distribute Mt. Gox assets on a proportional basis determined by an independent audit"

The audit should reveal any mismatches between balances due to deposits, withdrawals and trading, and balances which are inflated due to manipulation of the database, double withdrawals due to malleability, etc. 

You're being very optimistic about the powers of the audit there. That should be possible if Gox had reliable systems, kept thorough, accurate, comprehensive records, kept proper, archived backups and didn't tamper with any of the data, but do all those things sound likely to you? Bear in mind we're talking about people who didn't even keep their code in source control...

Either way I'd like to hear Jon confirm that Sunlot intend to pay out to creditors without waiting for the police to finish their investigation, which presumably he'll do if it's as obvious as you say.

[sturle]

You're being very optimistic about the powers of the audit there. That should be possible if Gox had reliable systems, kept thorough, accurate, comprehensive records, kept proper, archived backups and didn't tamper with any of the data, but do all those things sound likely to you? Bear in mind we're talking about people who didn't even keep their code in source control...

Did you see the leaks?  We know we have logs of:
o Bank deposits and withdrawals (the banks keeps them for minimum 10 years, and can be checked against MtGox's records)
o Bitcoin deposits and withdrawals, to be verified against the blockchain.
o Every trade ever executed on MtGox.

There is a wildcard here. We don't know if all txids were saved in cases where a tx may be sent twice.  If only the last one was saved, this may be a problem.  It should still be possible to find those transactions using the spent outputs in MtGox's wallet.

This is enough to verify all balances.  Finding the people who stole BTC and/or money is a case for the police, but this is separate from the audit.

I have one suggestion to Sunlot: Pay out all BTC balances of 1 BTC or less than BTC in full at once.  This will get rid of 61840 creditors at a cost of maximum 7848 BTC (3.9% of the total amount of BTC), and I assume this will simplify dealings a lot.  You could do the same with users having less than the equivalent in fiat, and get rid of most of the rest at a similar cost.  (Cost will probably be lower, because most people's balances are less than the cost of withdrawing.)  Or is having as many owners as possible in Sunlot's interest?

[edmundedgar]

You're being very optimistic about the powers of the audit there. That should be possible if Gox had reliable systems, kept thorough, accurate, comprehensive records, kept proper, archived backups and didn't tamper with any of the data, but do all those things sound likely to you? Bear in mind we're talking about people who didn't even keep their code in source control...

Did you see the leaks?  We know we have logs of:
o Bank deposits and withdrawals (the banks keeps them for minimum 10 years, and can be checked against MtGox's records)
o Bitcoin deposits and withdrawals, to be verified against the blockchain.
o Every trade ever executed on MtGox.

There is a wildcard here. We don't know if all txids were saved in cases where a tx may be sent twice.  If only the last one was saved, this may be a problem.  It should still be possible to find those transactions using the spent outputs in MtGox's wallet.

This is enough to verify all balances.  Finding the people who stole BTC and/or money is a case for the police, but this is separate from the audit.

I have one suggestion to Sunlot: Pay out all BTC balances of 1 BTC or less than BTC in full at once.  This will get rid of 61840 creditors at a cost of maximum 7848 BTC (3.9% of the total amount of BTC), and I assume this will simplify dealings a lot.  You could do the same with users having less than the equivalent in fiat, and get rid of most of the rest at a similar cost.  (Cost will probably be lower, because most people's balances are less than the cost of withdrawing.)  Or is having as many owners as possible in Sunlot's interest?

Presumably the banking data should be OK but as far as the bitcoins go there are all kinds of uncertainties. You've got some logs, that may have been tampered with by hackers, insiders or both, created by software that is known to be broken in at least one serious way, resulting in the huge hole that you mention. You may well not have the software versions that wrote the logs, so you can't even tell _how_ it was broken. Wallets may or may not have been lost or deleted - who knows?

They may turn out to have surprisingly good records that will make it easy to follow the money, but the idea that you can be _confident_ that they did isn't credible.

[andy-bc]

I have one suggestion to Sunlot: Pay out all BTC balances of 1 BTC or less than BTC in full at once.

I second this motion. This would lower the cost and effort of the subsequent operations related to creditors' equity.
Moreover, such action might help to restore some confidence in Bitcoin amongst many (and possibly: not well-off) individuals who tried to buy a fraction of bitcoin out of curiosity and got Goxxed instead.

[JorgeStolfi]

I have one suggestion to Sunlot: Pay out all BTC balances of 1 BTC or less than BTC in full at once.

I second this motion. This would lower the cost and effort of the subsequent operations related to creditors' equity.
Moreover, such action might help to restore some confidence in Bitcoin amongst many (and possibly: not well-off) individuals who tried to buy a fraction of bitcoin out of curiosity and got Goxxed instead.

Yeah, it may get them confident enough to buy TWO bitcoins and leave them in the New MtGOX.

[andy-bc]

I have one suggestion to Sunlot: Pay out all BTC balances of 1 BTC or less than BTC in full at once.

I second this motion. This would lower the cost and effort of the subsequent operations related to creditors' equity.
Moreover, such action might help to restore some confidence in Bitcoin amongst many (and possibly: not well-off) individuals who tried to buy a fraction of bitcoin out of curiosity and got Goxxed instead.

Yeah, it may get them confident enough to buy TWO bitcoins and leave them in the New MtGOX.

Perhaps it may, but I rather doubt it.
Believe it or not, but when I wrote 'some confidence in Bitcoin' I meant literally Bitcoin and not any particular exchange or rehabilitation project.
Right now, Bitcoin does need as much good public relations as it can get, and a quick and full compensation for the small-fish victims of the MTGox disaster would constitute good PR indeed.
A large group of angry customers who get back their funds means many less people who have (somewhat understandable) motivation to actively criticize and oppose the whole Bitcoin project.

Besides, the idea of compensating smaller creditors with some preference over bigger creditors appeals to my sense of justice. (Despite the fact that I do not belong to the former group).

[JorgeStolfi]

Believe it or not, but when I wrote 'some confidence in Bitcoin' I meant literally Bitcoin and not any particular exchange or rehabilitation project.
Right now, Bitcoin does need as much good public relations as it can get, and a quick and full compensation for the small-fish victims of the MTGox disaster would constitute good PR indeed.
A large group of angry customers who get back their funds means many less people who have (somewhat understandable) motivation to actively criticize and oppose the whole Bitcoin project.
Besides, the idea of compensating smaller creditors with some preference over bigger creditors appeals to my sense of justice. (Despite the fact that I do not belong to the former group).

The idea of prioritizing small clients is not bad by itself, but that could perhaps be proposed to the liquidation court.  AFAIK, Japanese liquidation law already establishes a "socially just" priority scheme: first any unpaid salaries and benefits, then actual creditors (banks, suppliers, landlords, contractors, utilities, etc.), and lastly investors.  I don't know where MtGOX clients would fit in this priority ranking.

The Sunplot proposal obviously cannot change the priorities of employees and actual creditors; the court could not possibly agree to that.  It apparently inserts the new owners and managers, as well as the expert investigator (Mr. Karpelès?) into this ranking, before the clients.  Isn't that so?

There is also the question of what should count as the claim of a client against MtGOX:  (1) the account balance he had at some point before the final shutdown (when, exactly?) according to MtGOX's internal ledgers, or (2) the total amount he deposited, minus the total amount he withdrew?   It is known which approach the liquidators will follow?

Since it is possible that the ledgers may have been altered with fake trades, or that some clients may have used insider knowledge or other fraudulent means while trading, approach (2) would seem safer, besides being arguably more just.  (If we were to trust the crowd analyses of the leaked MtGOX database -- which of course can be itself fake -- Mark and several of his friends are among the largest BTC balances.)

Perhaps the implicit aim of the Sunplot proposal is also to ensure that any distribution of coins will follow approach (1), rather than (2) or some other scheme that would exclude suspicious balances?

[hardpick]

I have one suggestion to Sunlot: Pay out all BTC balances of 1 BTC or less than BTC in full at once.

I second this motion. This would lower the cost and effort of the subsequent operations related to creditors' equity.
Moreover, such action might help to restore some confidence in Bitcoin amongst many (and possibly: not well-off) individuals who tried to buy a fraction of bitcoin out of curiosity and got Goxxed instead.

I also think this is a good idea

50 % less creditors to deal with may make recovery quicker.


please note I think sunlot are buying mtgox at a bargain price
if mtgox had not "stuffed up" and lost all our money it could be worth as much as $700 mil ( about 700,000 customers at $100 per customer . )

at present I believe sunlot is the best option -see  sunlot FAQ

I would also like to see sunlot put some money in --- like $20 mil in a escrow account

-- okcoin and other plans are still un known - so cannot compare ----

[edmundedgar]

Believe it or not, but when I wrote 'some confidence in Bitcoin' I meant literally Bitcoin and not any particular exchange or rehabilitation project.
Right now, Bitcoin does need as much good public relations as it can get, and a quick and full compensation for the small-fish victims of the MTGox disaster would constitute good PR indeed.
A large group of angry customers who get back their funds means many less people who have (somewhat understandable) motivation to actively criticize and oppose the whole Bitcoin project.
Besides, the idea of compensating smaller creditors with some preference over bigger creditors appeals to my sense of justice. (Despite the fact that I do not belong to the former group).

The idea of prioritizing small clients is not bad by itself, but that could perhaps be proposed to the liquidation court.  AFAIK, Japanese liquidation law already establishes a "socially just" priority scheme: first any unpaid salaries and benefits, then actual creditors (banks, suppliers, landlords, contractors, utilities, etc.), and lastly investors.  I don't know where MtGOX clients would fit in this priority ranking.

The Sunplot proposal obviously cannot change the priorities of employees and actual creditors; the court could not possibly agree to that.  It apparently inserts the new owners and managers, as well as the expert investigator (Mr. Karpelès?) into this ranking, before the clients.  Isn't that so?

IANAL, but IIUC rehabilitation requires that you actually become solvent; You can't just unilaterally cram down your debts to everybody, even if the majority of creditors agree. An example of how this has actually worked would be Intrade, where the founder died trying to climb Mount Everest and the new management inherited a company without the money they should have had. You can follow what happened here:
http://www.intrade.com/v4/home/latest-news/

The key point about this is that they need to get creditors to agree to give up their claims on enough of the debt to make the company solvent. In Intrade's case they were missing less than half of the money, and they had a good chance of getting the rest back through litigation (which they ultimately did). Since it's a voluntarily agreement between the company and each individual creditor, they can apply whatever terms they want to, as long as each creditor is prepared to accept them. Apparently Intrade didn't bother asking people owed less than $1000 to agree to forbearance.

The problem here is that if you've only got the order of 20% to 25% of what you owe, it only takes a small proportion of creditors to say "No, I insist that you pay me in full" to torpedo the whole thing. Presumably that (plus the general mendaciousness and shadiness of the people involved) is probably why the court hasn't been taking the idea very seriously.

[JorgeStolfi]

The problem here is that if you've only got the order of 20% to 25% of what you owe, it only takes a small proportion of creditors to say "No, I insist that you pay me in full" to torpedo the whole thing. Presumably that (plus the general mendaciousness and shadiness of the people involved) is probably why the court hasn't been taking the idea very seriously.

Not disagreeing, just observing that the "concrete" debts (salaries, contractors, landlord, etc.), if any, must be much less than the remining assets.  So these  could get paid in full by liquidation.

I stil don't know how the clients will be handled by the liquidation court.  Will they be considered normal creditors, together with contractors and competing with them; or will they be considered a lower priority class?

[edmundedgar]

Another question for Jon. (I guess he'll answer my previous one when he wakes up.)

IIUC Mark Karpeles personally is a large creditor of Mt Gox the company, with a lot of bitcoins in his own exchange. A liquidation would put the claims of directors of the company last, but in rehabilitation you're supposed to pay everyone what they're owed, unless they specifically agree to forbearance.

Does this mean that Sunlot would be paying a large proportion of the remaining coins to Mark personally? If not, what would be the legal basis for not paying him?

[JorgeStolfi]

please note I think sunlot are buying mtgox at a bargain price
if mtgox had not "stuffed up" and lost all our money it could be worth as much as $700 mil ( about 700,000 customers at $100 per customer . )

This is quite incorrect. First, for the purposes of a recovery plan, each customer is worth a NEGATIVE amount equal to its account balance (that is what MtGOX owes him), plus a positive amount equal to the fees that he is expected to generate over, say 2 years.

IIRC, the sum of the accounts was found to be about 800'000 bitcoins, worth about 400'000'000 USD at current prices, plus a large amount of dollars.  That is the NEGATIVE part.

For the positive part, only active customers count; inactive customers, that do not trade, generate no income. IIRC, according to analysis of the database leak by @rpietila,  MtGOX had around 70'000 active customers, and that with a very generous definition of "active".  To pay 100 US$ of trading fees, a customer would have to trade a lot.  If the NewMtGOX decided to charge significant maintenance fees, most of those 70'000 customers would probably close their accounts.  So this positive term -- the value of MtGOX's customer base -- is very small, maybe only 1/100 of the negative term above.

The significant positive terms in the evaluation of MtGOX are the bitcoins and dollars that MtGOX actually had (I lost count, was it 220'000 BTC?).  Adding everything gives a huge NEGATIVE value for the company.  Who would pay even a satoshi for the "privilege" of having to pay hundreds of millions of dollars of debts?

The Sunlot proposal makes sense for them only because they propose to assume only the positive terms above, spend some of that money for certain expenses, and then perhaps distribute the crumbs to customers, thus declaring the debts extinct.

[Gyrsur]

*listen*

[sturle]

Two more questions:
A significant amount of BTC balances belong to very old accounts which haven't been touched for years.  93,442 BTC, 454,849 USD, 23,799 EUR, etc, in accounts not touched since 2012 or earlier.  MtGox had a clause in their ToS which allowed them to close accounts which hadn't been logged in to in more than 6 months.  Will those account owners be counted as creditors, or will the clause take effect and the account considered closed?  This will allow a significant higher payback to users.

Will there be a claims process where people have to actively make their claims?  If so, what happens to assets not claimed in this process?  Would payouts to the remaining creditors increase if some creditors fail to make their claim?

[Xelpherpolis]

Wouldn't trust it as far as I can throw it, something is just not right here..

[Nagle]

There is also the question of what should count as the claim of a client against MtGOX:  (1) the account balance he had at some point before the final shutdown (when, exactly?) according to MtGOX's internal ledgers, or (2) the total amount he deposited, minus the total amount he withdrew?   It is known which approach the liquidators will follow?

Approach (2) is the standard in US law. This was a big deal in the Madoff case, because there were lots of Madoff customers with huge account balances representing Madoff trades that never happened. But Madoff customers are being paid off based on actual deposits minus withdrawals, ignoring fictitious gains.

(There's some litigation over this in the Madoff case because the scam went on for 20 years, and some long-time Madoff customers want adjustments for US dollar inflation over the years. But that's not a big issue with Mt. Gox.)

[Anextech]

Didnt Madoff took alot of money out?

[JorgeStolfi]

Some posts on another thread about this topic:

US way of computing client claims probably hold for Japan too:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=178336.msg6650519#msg6650519

Example of the US way of evaluating client claims vs database balances:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=178336.msg6653000#msg6653000

Will clients get their 80% back:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=178336.msg6654273#msg6654273

Comparison with bitmarket.eu/bitalo:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=178336.msg6654566#msg6654566

Possible motivations of Sunlot:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=178336.msg6655051#msg6655051

Who would pay 200'000 BTC for 16.5% of a startup:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=178336.msg6655447#msg6655447

What MtGOX 2.0 should do to be trusted:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=178336.msg6656213#msg6656213

[Nagle]

Didnt Madoff took a lot of money out?

Yes, he did. It was taken away from him and given back to investors. Here's the auction of all his personal stuff. Here's the auction of his Manhattan penthouse. The auction of his boat.  You get the idea. Madoff himself is in Federal prison for the rest of his life.

[sturle]

There is also the question of what should count as the claim of a client against MtGOX:  (1) the account balance he had at some point before the final shutdown (when, exactly?) according to MtGOX's internal ledgers, or (2) the total amount he deposited, minus the total amount he withdrew?   It is known which approach the liquidators will follow?

Approach (2) is the standard in US law. This was a big deal in the Madoff case, because there were lots of Madoff customers with huge account balances representing Madoff trades that never happened. But Madoff customers are being paid off based on actual deposits minus withdrawals, ignoring fictitious gains.

There main difference between this case and Madoff, is that the trades actually happened, and people were making their own trading decisions.

Several poker sites have gone bankrupt over the years.  How were their creditors paid back?  Did players who lost all their money years ago get their deposits back, leaving nothing to those who gained their money from paying well, or was their final balance used to calculate their claims?

[JorgeStolfi]

There main difference between this case and Madoff, is that the trades actually happened, and people were making their own trading decisions.

I don't know what the court will say, but they could say that the people were trading non-existent coins, so the balances are meaningless.

Actual deposits and withdrawals are numbers that the court can verify with the banks and in the blockchain.  The trades inside MtGOX are recorded only in Mark's database, and any information that comes from him must be treated as a mere hint that needs independent evidence to be trusted.  The database may have been doctored to give large bogus balances to some clients.

[sturle]

There main difference between this case and Madoff, is that the trades actually happened, and people were making their own trading decisions.

I don't know what the court will say, but they could say that the people were trading non-existent coins, so the balances are meaningless.

Actual deposits and withdrawals are numbers that the court can verify with the banks and in the blockchain.  The trades inside MtGOX are recorded only in Mark's database, and any information that comes from him must be treated as a mere hint that needs independent evidence to be trusted.  The database may have been doctored to give large bogus balances to some clients.

Nope, trades were published in real time, and more or less complete records can be retrieved from many locations.  The only unknown is which accounts the trades belonged to.  Faking account balances afterwards by switching which account did the trade will require a lot of work to make everything match up, and even more to seem credible.  Not sure if it will be possible at all if everyone will be allowed to verify their own data.  People have already been able to verify their balances for a while, and I haven't heard of an complaints.  An audit will trivially reveal if the trade data matches the balances caused by deposits and withdrawals.

[JorgeStolfi]

An audit will trivially reveal if the trade data matches the balances caused by deposits and withdrawals.

An audit done by whom?  By Mark? Gonzague? Roger Ver?

(The PR guy has not said what they intend to do about Mark, has he?)

[sturle]

An audit will trivially reveal if the trade data matches the balances caused by deposits and withdrawals.

An audit done by whom?  By Mark? Gonzague? Roger Ver?

Why are you trying to make this more difficult than it is by playing stupid?  They have just as much interest as us in finding the lost funds.  Which means they will put capable people on the task of figuring out exactly what happened to out funds.  There will probably be a criminal investigation as well.

[JorgeStolfi]

They have just as much interest as us in finding the lost funds.  Which means they will put capable people on the task of figuring out exactly what happened to out funds.  There will probably be a criminal investigation as well.

What makes you think that they really want to find the lost funds? Just because they said so?

[edmundedgar]

There main difference between this case and Madoff, is that the trades actually happened, and people were making their own trading decisions.

I don't know what the court will say, but they could say that the people were trading non-existent coins, so the balances are meaningless.

Actual deposits and withdrawals are numbers that the court can verify with the banks and in the blockchain.  The trades inside MtGOX are recorded only in Mark's database, and any information that comes from him must be treated as a mere hint that needs independent evidence to be trusted.  The database may have been doctored to give large bogus balances to some clients.

Nope, trades were published in real time, and more or less complete records can be retrieved from many locations.  The only unknown is which accounts the trades belonged to.  Faking account balances afterwards by switching which account did the trade will require a lot of work to make everything match up, and even more to seem credible.  Not sure if it will be possible at all if everyone will be allowed to verify their own data.  People have already been able to verify their balances for a while, and I haven't heard of an complaints.  An audit will trivially reveal if the trade data matches the balances caused by deposits and withdrawals.

That sounds like a good way to reach a binary decision about out whether the database is correct or incorrect; You could look at the feed, the account history, the blockchain and the account balance and see if everything matches. If it does, problem solved.

But what if it doesn't? If any data is missing or unreliable, eg the database has been hacked at unknown times, the bitcoins have been sent to unknown addresses and not properly logged, the code sometimes put the wrong information in the database or the feed, customer support made transactions that didn't show up in the feed, etc etc, it may not be possible to work out _what_ about the database is incorrect. Once you have any condition where money fails to get logged or money gets logged but fails to get spent as described, it becomes very hard to work out what may have fallen through which hole. It takes reasonably competent design to create good audit logs, and we're talking about an operation that didn't even use source control, so not only was their design probably incompetent and possibly deliberately incompetent, it won't even be possible to track which mistakes the system was making at what times.

[JorgeStolfi]

trades were published in real time, and more or less complete records can be retrieved from many locations.

Is that true?  I know some places where one can download chart data -- OHLC price and total volume, in 1-minute intervals.  Do you know any place that saved the individual trades?

The only unknown is which accounts the trades belonged to.  Faking account balances afterwards by switching which account did the trade will require a lot of work to make everything match up, and even more to seem credible.

Obviously this proposal is not much concerned with credibility.    Seriously, if clients do not find the result of the Sunlot investigation convincing, what can they do? They will have only 16.5% equity at best, so they cannot prevail on management by vote.

People can fake Rembrandts and Hitler diaries well enough to fool many experts.  With a computer, one could do amazingly complicated doctoring of the database.  The stakes are much higher than the price of a Rembrandt.

Not sure if it will be possible at all if everyone will be allowed to verify their own data.  People have already been able to verify their balances for a while, and I haven't heard of an complaints.  An audit will trivially reveal if the trade data matches the balances caused by deposits and withdrawals.

The doctoring need not alter other people's balances, only inflate those of certain "friends".   As you pointed out yourself recently, there are many accounts with substantial BTC and/or money balances that have not had any activity for years.  I cannot imagine who would "forget" hundreds of thousands of euros, unless the owner died or that money was "dirty" in some way.  Some of those accounts could have been used to doctor the database -- e.g. by switching the balances of a dead account and that of a friend.

Money deposits and withdrawals can only be verified by obtaining MtGOX's bank accounts, many of them closed long ago.  Bitcoin deposits and withdrawals cannot be verified independentlry without knowing the addresses used by MtGOX.  It is not obvious that the new management will have access to those records -- all of them -- and they have no obbligation to release them -- all f them -- to the clients.  

Moving the discussion to a higher level:  the proposal implies that the clients will put their 800'000 BTC (the 200'000 that are there and the 600'000 that disappeared) and a lot of cash under control of certain people.  It is extremely naive to trust that those people will do what they say they will do, without making sure that they will go to jail if they don't do it.  This requires reading the proposal very carefully, keeping in mind that they may be dishonest (perhaps even the thieves themselves) and very smart.  Namely, if there is a loophole that will let them take some or all of that money without going to jail, you must assume that they will use it.  

[edmundedgar]

Moving the discussion to a higher level:  the proposal implies that the clients will put their 800'000 BTC (the 200'000 that are there and the 600'000 that disappeared) and a lot of cash under control of certain people.  It is extremely naive to trust that those people will do what they say they will do, without making sure that they will go to jail if they don't do it.  This requires reading the proposal very carefully, keeping in mind that they may be dishonest (perhaps even the thieves themselves) and very smart.  Namely, if there is a loophole that will let them take some or all of that money without going to jail, you must assume that they will use it.  

Right, especially when the people the creditors are supposed to trust are on record making clearly bogus and/or deliberately misleading claims, like saying Japanese bankruptcies take 10 years or implying that the trustee will somehow spend over a hundred million dollars administering the liquidation.

[KingOfSports]

Like anyone in bitcoin REALLY is willing to spend money on SAVING or CARING for someone / something else...NOT. Should have been red flag #1, everyone here is for themself, a scammer, or someone with a heart who eventually gets scammed and falls into category number 1.

[sturle]

They have just as much interest as us in finding the lost funds.  Which means they will put capable people on the task of figuring out exactly what happened to out funds.  There will probably be a criminal investigation as well.

What makes you think that they really want to find the lost funds? Just because they said so?

Ah, you are playing idiot again.  No, saying so makes no difference.

There are several parts to this: 1. Find out how the funds leaked out.  2. Find out to where.  3. Find out who received the funds.

1 and 2 should be possible though a thorough audit.  3 may be possible to the extent of finding accounts which received double payments, reversed bank transfers, etc.  Finding the people may be more difficult.  At least those people are unlikely to make any claims.

[sturle]

The doctoring need not alter other people's balances, only inflate those of certain "friends".

Have you done any accounting in your life?  Obviously not.  You cannot inflate the balances of anyone without lowering other balances.  And you will have to do this by altering trading records.  Bank records and the blockchain are in the hands hands of other people.

As you pointed out yourself recently, there are many accounts with substantial BTC and/or money balances that have not had any activity for years. I cannot imagine who would "forget" hundreds of thousands of euros, unless the owner died or that money was "dirty" in some way.  Some of those accounts could have been used to doctor the database -- e.g. by switching the balances of a dead account and that of a friend.

By changing trading records for years back, and have those match the other records all the way?  Good luck with that.  The fees has to match as well, and match previously leaked databases.  The high valued old accounts are known to be locked accounts, btw.  Bitcoinica, Baron, etc.

Money deposits and withdrawals can only be verified by obtaining MtGOX's bank accounts, many of them closed long ago.  Bitcoin deposits and withdrawals cannot be verified independentlry without knowing the addresses used by MtGOX.  It is not obvious that the new management will have access to those records -- all of them -- and they have no obbligation to release them -- all f them -- to the clients.  

The criminal investigation will have access to all of them, and their findings should match what other investigators find.  Another complicating factor if you want to fake trades.

[JorgeStolfi]

What makes you think that they really want to find the lost funds? Just because they said so?

Ah, you are playing idiot again.  No, saying so makes no difference. There are several parts to this: [ ... ]

Perhaps the problem will be easier to understand if explained in a bigger font:

What makes you think that they really want to find the lost funds?

[JorgeStolfi]

The criminal investigation will have access to all of them, and their findings should match what other investigators find.

That is the point: what criminal investigation?

[edmundedgar]

The criminal investigation will have access to all of them, and their findings should match what other investigators find.  Another complicating factor if you want to fake trades.

Up-thread you were saying they were going to pay out the bitcoins without waiting for the criminal investigation, because their audit would be able to find everything on its own.

[sturle]

What makes you think that they really want to find the lost funds? Just because they said so?

Ah, you are playing idiot again.  No, saying so makes no difference. There are several parts to this: [ ... ]

Perhaps the problem will be easier to understand if explained in a bigger font:
What makes you think that they really want to find the lost funds?

1. They have money invested themselves.  What makes you believe they want to lose their own money?
2. The finder is entitled to 10% of the lost funds.

[sturle]

The criminal investigation will have access to all of them, and their findings should match what other investigators find.  Another complicating factor if you want to fake trades.

Up-thread you were saying they were going to pay out the bitcoins without waiting for the criminal investigation, because their audit would be able to find everything on its own.

If they find everything on their own, and they can be sure of it, why wait for the criminal investigation?  The results should match, however.  If not, and the new owners have been altering the books, they will have a problem.  Likewise, if the previous owner altered the books, and the new owner didn't do their audit well enough.

[Nagle]

I'm more interested in the audit being done by the trustee appointed by the Tokyo District Court. I doubt the Sunlot deal will go anywhere until that happens.

[JorgeStolfi]

1. They have money invested themselves.  What makes you believe they want to lose their own money?
2. The finder is entitled to 10% of the lost funds.

I don't know how my experience with accounting compares with yours, but it seems that I have a bit more imagination. 

[JayJuanGee]

There main difference between this case and Madoff, is that the trades actually happened, and people were making their own trading decisions.

I don't know what the court will say, but they could say that the people were trading non-existent coins, so the balances are meaningless.

Actual deposits and withdrawals are numbers that the court can verify with the banks and in the blockchain.  The trades inside MtGOX are recorded only in Mark's database, and any information that comes from him must be treated as a mere hint that needs independent evidence to be trusted.  The database may have been doctored to give large bogus balances to some clients.

sure some of your speculation may be correct; however, if NO one is contesting their balance, then the rest of your speculation does NOT matter.  If customers agree that they had X amount of BTC and Y amount of Fiat, then what else is there to question?

[JayJuanGee]

An audit will trivially reveal if the trade data matches the balances caused by deposits and withdrawals.

An audit done by whom?  By Mark? Gonzague? Roger Ver?

Why are you trying to make this more difficult than it is by playing stupid?  They have just as much interest as us in finding the lost funds.  Which means they will put capable people on the task of figuring out exactly what happened to out funds.  There will probably be a criminal investigation as well.

Jorge likes to make matters difficult, to spread FUD, to exaggerate the most unlikely scenario, and to distract from meaningful communications.  He's a troll, and we probably entertain him too much, even though every once in a while he may make a good point.

[JayJuanGee]

What makes you think that they really want to find the lost funds? Just because they said so?

Ah, you are playing idiot again.  No, saying so makes no difference. There are several parts to this: [ ... ]

Perhaps the problem will be easier to understand if explained in a bigger font:

What makes you think that they really want to find the lost funds?

You do seem to have a good sense of humor, though... even though you ask trolling questions.... that have obvious answers.  Everyone wants to find the coins, except for the ones that stole them..,. You cannot necessarily assume all (or a majority of) actors have malicious motives, even though some actors may have malicious motives.

[JayJuanGee]

1. They have money invested themselves.  What makes you believe they want to lose their own money?
2. The finder is entitled to 10% of the lost funds.

I don't know how my experience with accounting compares with yours, but it seems that I have a bit more imagination. 

Agreed.  If one cannot think of anything positive to say about you, Jorge, at least, one can say you (and your team) seems to have a pretty good imagination.

[T.Stuart]

I wouldn't say that you need a particularly fertile imagination to suppose that the balances have been out for years, say because Mark or some associates decided to borrow, sell, short or whatever at the wrong time.

Then it would help to simply inflate the balances of those in on the scam. These are Goxcoins we are talking about here, remember; I don't see why inflating some balances would necessarily require deflating others.

One thing is for sure. The people wanting to take over have BTC in their eyes. Being one of those with "funds" in Gox I personally would like to see some kind of rehabilitation. But a 16.5% stake stinks. The sum of balance holders should have at least parity with the new owners - 50%, nothing less.

[JorgeStolfi]

if NO one is contesting their balance, then the rest of your speculation does NOT matter.  If customers agree that they had X amount of BTC and Y amount of Fiat, then what else is there to question?

Perhaps this will make things more clear:

Suppose there were only two clients, J and M.

In reality, when MtGOX collapsed, J had 200'000 BTC balance in his account, M had zero BTC, and MtGOX had 200'000 BTC in their wallets.  Then if those 200'000 BTC were distributed proportional to the balances, J would get 200'000 BTC, M would get nothing.

But, according to the doctored database, J still had 200'000 BTC, M had 600'000 BTC.  J checks the balance and says it is correct.  Then MtGOX should have had 800'000 BTC in their wallets, but unfortunately 600'000 were stolen by invisible goblins so only 200'000 are left.  Now, if those remaining 200'000 BTC were distributed proportional to the balances in that database, J would receive 50'000, and M would receive 150'000.

If MtGOX were liquidated by the court instead, the 200'000 BTC would be split between J and M according to their deposits and withdrawals, which are much harder to doctor since they can be checked against bank records and the blockchain.  So perhaps J would get most of the 200'000 and M would get close to nothing.

Is that clear enough, or should I use a bigger font?

at least, one can say you (and your team) seem to have a pretty good imagination.

Thanks for the compliment.  It must have been my team-sized paranoid imagination that made me write that MtGOX was obviously insolvent (because it did everything that every insolvent company does), back when most seasoned bitcoin experts insisted that everything was fine.  Because, one could not assume then that all (or a majority of) the MtGOX management and their improvised auditors had malicious motives.

[sturle]

If MtGOX were liquidated by the court instead, the 200'000 BTC would be split between J and M according to their deposits and withdrawals, which are much harder to doctor since they can be checked against bank records and the blockchain.  So perhaps J would get most of the 200'000 and M would get close to nothing.

In other words you don't believe there will be a criminal investigation to discover where the BTC went.  The court doesn't care about whether a deposit is real or not.  Why not? 

BTC deposit records are the easiest to alter by recording a real tx unrelated to MtGox as a deposit to a MtGox account.  This would go unnoticed if the court take the deposit records as a fact without doing a proper audit/investigation following all BTC from deposit to withdrawal.

[JorgeStolfi]

In other words you don't believe there will be a criminal investigation to discover where the BTC went. 

Quite the opposite.  If MtGOX is liquidated by the court, there may be a criminal investigation, initiated by the liquidators or by clients.  If Sunlot takes over, who knows.

We do not know who will do the audit. We know that Sunlot will distribute and spend the remaining coins without waiting for a criminal investigation.  We know that they will have no obligation to release all the audit data so that the public can check it. We know that they will let Mr. Gay-Bouchery off the hook even before the audit.  We know that their PR person has not answered when asked whether they will "pardon" Mark too.

[ You think that ] The court doesn't care about whether a deposit is real or not.  Why not? 

The court certainly will care.  Sunlot will not care about deposits/withdrawals, it will use the account balances.

[sturle]

In other words you don't believe there will be a criminal investigation to discover where the BTC went. 

Quite the opposite.  If MtGOX is liquidated by the court, there may be a criminal investigation, initiated by the liquidators or by clients.  If Sunlot takes over, who knows.

You are still trolling.  You have still not given any sensible explanation why Sunlot would want to lose a lot of money.

We do not know who will do the audit.

Why is this important?  We don't know who will do the criminal investigation either.  Sunlot however have self interest in getting the audit done properly.  I still don't get why you think they will want to throw the money away.

We know that Sunlot will distribute and spend the remaining coins without waiting for a criminal investigation.

Yes, of course, and I don't understand why you think this is a problem.  You don't need to wait until the criminals are in prison until you release the remaining funds.  You just need to know the balances are correct and who owns them.

We know that they will have no obligation to release all the audit data so that the public can check it.

I certainly hope not.  That would be a PR disaster.

We know that they will let Mr. Gay-Bouchery off the hook even before the audit.  We know that their PR person has not answered when asked whether they will "pardon" Mark too.

They will, but the police probably won't.  Not if they are guilty of anything criminal.

[ You think that ] The court doesn't care about whether a deposit is real or not.  Why not? 

The court certainly will care.  Sunlot will not care about deposits/withdrawals, it will use the account balances.

After an audit, which means they will check exactly that.  Please explain again why you think Sunlot want to burn their own money.  Why take over MtGox to do that?  A lighter will do the job much easier.  You are 100% troll.

[eiskalt]

I think this fits in here quite well.

From reddit:

http://pastebin.ro/cs5Lr0gO

I haven’t even gotten to the original content of Debonneville’s complaint that Pierce worked so hard to have stricken from all public records. As this is the internet, the sealed text is still available despite Pierce’s best efforts.
 
(...)
 
The statement from Debonneville reveals that Brock Pierce and Marc Collins-Rector were unusually close. The complaint also alleged that Brock Pierce misappropriated stock and about $200,000 of IGE’s money in order to pay the settlements in the civil cases against Pierce and Collins-Rector. Additionally, Debonneville revealed that Pierce made business decisions with Yantis behind Debonneville’s back. Specifically, Pierce knowingly agreed to Yantis’s plan to sell duped and exploited virtual currency and items to MMORPG players, something that IGE had taken a very public and vocal stand against in the months before its merger with Yantis.

Mtgox - Sunlot - Audit - Refund ?
 

[edmundedgar]

In other words you don't believe there will be a criminal investigation to discover where the BTC went. 

Quite the opposite.  If MtGOX is liquidated by the court, there may be a criminal investigation, initiated by the liquidators or by clients.  If Sunlot takes over, who knows.

We do not know who will do the audit. We know that Sunlot will distribute and spend the remaining coins without waiting for a criminal investigation.

Maybe nit-picking here but I don't think we do know that. Jon Holmes didn't answer my question about it on the other thread, and I don't think Surle has inside knowledge. My impression is that they've already spent quite a lot of money on this deal and they'll tell the community whatever they need to tell them to make it happen. The creditors want a fast payout, so they're telling them they'll get a fast payout. Once the creditors have agreed to the deal they'll be more concerned with avoiding litigation, which may well mean sitting on the funds for a while.

[JayJuanGee]

I wouldn't say that you need a particularly fertile imagination to suppose that the balances have been out for years, say because Mark or some associates decided to borrow, sell, short or whatever at the wrong time.

Then it would help to simply inflate the balances of those in on the scam. These are Goxcoins we are talking about here, remember; I don't see why inflating some balances would necessarily require deflating others.

One thing is for sure. The people wanting to take over have BTC in their eyes. Being one of those with "funds" in Gox I personally would like to see some kind of rehabilitation. But a 16.5% stake stinks. The sum of balance holders should have at least parity with the new owners - 50%, nothing less.

An investment group is at liberty to propose whatever terms that it wishes in order to attempt to persuade the various stakeholders and the court to go with that rehabilitation plan as the better of the evils. 

It would be hard pressed to find any investment group that would be willing to allocate that much equity (50%) to past customers.  Surely, I am NOT opposed to any such arrangement, and I would be very interested in hearing about any comprehensive and realistic proposal that had such a high level (50%) equity "sharing" arrangement.

[freedombit]

please note I think sunlot are buying mtgox at a bargain price
if mtgox had not "stuffed up" and lost all our money it could be worth as much as $700 mil ( about 700,000 customers at $100 per customer . )

This is quite incorrect. First, for the purposes of a recovery plan, each customer is worth a NEGATIVE amount equal to its account balance (that is what MtGOX owes him), plus a positive amount equal to the fees that he is expected to generate over, say 2 years.

IIRC, the sum of the accounts was found to be about 800'000 bitcoins, worth about 400'000'000 USD at current prices, plus a large amount of dollars.  That is the NEGATIVE part.

For the positive part, only active customers count; inactive customers, that do not trade, generate no income. IIRC, according to analysis of the database leak by @rpietila,  MtGOX had around 70'000 active customers, and that with a very generous definition of "active".  To pay 100 US$ of trading fees, a customer would have to trade a lot.  If the NewMtGOX decided to charge significant maintenance fees, most of those 70'000 customers would probably close their accounts.  So this positive term -- the value of MtGOX's customer base -- is very small, maybe only 1/100 of the negative term above.

The significant positive terms in the evaluation of MtGOX are the bitcoins and dollars that MtGOX actually had (I lost count, was it 220'000 BTC?).  Adding everything gives a huge NEGATIVE value for the company.  Who would pay even a satoshi for the "privilege" of having to pay hundreds of millions of dollars of debts?

The Sunlot proposal makes sense for them only because they propose to assume only the positive terms above, spend some of that money for certain expenses, and then perhaps distribute the crumbs to customers, thus declaring the debts extinct.

A company's value is relative to each individual's view. It is generally accepted that the current value of a public company is the latest trade value times the number of shares outstanding. If all of the public companies traded on Wall Street were valued as you propose above, the market would crash. Including banks. Most are traded on FUTURE earnings.


MtGox is worth much more than one bitcoin. When the dust settles, this will be the case whether a Savior enters a bid before liquidation, or we need to find the sum of all liquidation purchases.

[JayJuanGee]

if NO one is contesting their balance, then the rest of your speculation does NOT matter.  If customers agree that they had X amount of BTC and Y amount of Fiat, then what else is there to question?

Perhaps this will make things more clear:

Suppose there were only two clients, J and M.

In reality, when MtGOX collapsed, J had 200'000 BTC balance in his account, M had zero BTC, and MtGOX had 200'000 BTC in their wallets.  Then if those 200'000 BTC were distributed proportional to the balances, J would get 200'000 BTC, M would get nothing.

But, according to the doctored database, J still had 200'000 BTC, M had 600'000 BTC.  J checks the balance and says it is correct.  Then MtGOX should have had 800'000 BTC in their wallets, but unfortunately 600'000 were stolen by invisible goblins so only 200'000 are left.  Now, if those remaining 200'000 BTC were distributed proportional to the balances in that database, J would receive 50'000, and M would receive 150'000.

If MtGOX were liquidated by the court instead, the 200'000 BTC would be split between J and M according to their deposits and withdrawals, which are much harder to doctor since they can be checked against bank records and the blockchain.  So perhaps J would get most of the 200'000 and M would get close to nothing.

Is that clear enough, or should I use a bigger font?

I will grant that you made a lot of good points here, and you articulated your points fairly well.... in picking out an area in which I may have overstated the case that customers' verifications of their deposits is a very important starting point.  I will grant you that customer verifications is NOT the ending point, and partly based on the reasons that you stated.... I agree that if fraud could undermine the balances of the true stakeholders, then it would be best to identify those types of fraud, if they exist.

at least, one can say you (and your team) seem to have a pretty good imagination.

Thanks for the compliment.  It must have been my team-sized paranoid imagination that made me write that MtGOX was obviously insolvent (because it did everything that every insolvent company does), back when most seasoned bitcoin experts insisted that everything was fine.  Because, one could not assume then that all (or a majority of) the MtGOX management and their improvised auditors had malicious motives.

Now you may be gloating a bit too much. 

Accordingly, I am sure that you are NOT the only person who identified that there were potential problems with GOX and the GOX math was NOT adding up.

[JorgeStolfi]

[ ... ]

In a chess match, you cannot assume that the other player will do what you would like him to do.  You must assume that, at every move, he will do whatever he can that is best for him.  If he can take your queen, he will take it, no matter how much that upsets you. If he can checkmate, he will, even if that would be a PR disaster among you and your friends.

Same here.  Doing a thorough and honest audit, distributing the 220'000 coins fairly to clients, starting a criminal investigation to find the other 600'000 coins and distributing them to clients -- that is what you would like Sunlot to do; but that is completely irrelevant when trying to predict  what they will do.  You must ask what they can do -- ethical or not -- that will result in most money for them.  This includes telling lies, falsifying and omitting documents, making secret deals with anybody, etc.. 

(And then there is the issue of the two different criteria for distributing the coins, by final account balance or by input/output balance.  Each choice is good for some clients but bad for others.  Sunlot obviously has chosen which clients it likes the most.)

To set things clear, I could not care less about whether MtGOX clients get their coins back or not.  What I want is that all the criminals involved in the MtGOX scam and anyone who tries to help them get taken out of circulation and deprived of their money.  Anyone who doesn't like being robbed should want that too.

[JayJuanGee]

[ ... ]

In a chess match, you cannot assume that the other player will do what you would like him to do.  You must assume that, at every move, he will do whatever he can that is best for him.  If he can take your queen, he will take it, no matter how much that upsets you. If he can checkmate, he will, even if that would be a PR disaster among you and your friends.

Same here.  Doing a thorough and honest audit, distributing the 220'000 coins fairly to clients, starting a criminal investigation to find the other 600'000 coins and distributing them to clients -- that is what you would like Sunlot to do; but that is completely irrelevant when trying to predict  what they will do.  You must ask what they can do -- ethical or not -- that will result in most money for them.  This includes telling lies, falsifying and omitting documents, making secret deals with anybody, etc.. 

(And then there is the issue of the two different criteria for distributing the coins, by final account balance or by input/output balance.  Each choice is good for some clients but bad for others.  Sunlot obviously has chosen which clients it likes the most.)

To set things clear, I could not care less about whether MtGOX clients get their coins back or not.  What I want is that all the criminals involved in the MtGOX scam and anyone who tries to help them get taken out of circulation and deprived of their money.  Anyone who doesn't like being robbed should want that too.

I agree with you that we may want to consider this matter in term of what the new team can get away with, and that the new team will attempt to maximize their profits and get away with as much as they can get away with.   

Regarding convicting criminals, there may or may NOT be proof of criminal activity, and accordingly, a better result may be to attempt to make whole as many customers as possible.  We do NOT have enough information to make broad general statements to pursue one avenue at the exclusion of another, and we do NOT know the extent to which multiple avenues may be pursued simultaneously.

[JorgeStolfi]

Regarding convicting criminals, there may or may NOT be proof of criminal activity, and accordingly, a better result may be to attempt to make whole as many customers as possible.  We do NOT have enough information to make broad general statements to pursue one avenue at the exclusion of another, and we do NOT know the extent to which multiple avenues may be pursued simultaneously.

According to Mark, 600'000 BTC were stolen from his company, that is why he cannot pay to clients what they were due according to his terms of service. Whether he lied or told the truth, a crime obviously has been committed. 

[JonHolmquist]

1: We have new software that is all ready to go. The software isn't really the hard part, it's more about operations and making sure it runs smoothly.

Does your software have the same features which made people continue using MtGox despite all the problems?  Like APIs over multiple protocols, better than all the other exchanges APIs combined, and and multi-currency trading within the same orderbook? 

Not sure on the specifics yet. It's fast and secure though.

[JonHolmquist]

Mr. Gay-Bouchery and Mr. McCaleb [ ... ]  If this deal is approved by the court, will they be freed of any responsibility for their roles in MtGOX's collapse?

Q: Why are you working with Jed McCaleb and Gonzague Gay-Bouchery?

This process takes pragmatism rather than idealism, and without a deal, the assets will be liquidated and customers will have no recourse. We all want an outlet for our anger and frustration, and we all want retribution, but the immediate goal at hand is to get a deal done to avoid liquidation, because once that happens the company is gone and there will be no standing left to go after Mark or investigate the lost coins.

Q: What do Jed and GGB get out of the deal?

In return for their full cooperation in recovery and prosecution of those responsible, we have agreed to release both defendants from the claims in the lawsuit.

I see.  Are you going to make the same offer to Mr. Karpelès, then?  Or is he the expert that you intend to hire to investigate the matter?

Now seriously: it is not a matter of "anger", but deterring further crimes from happening. 

It would be interesting to know, for starters, when did Mr. Gay-Bouchery became aware of MtGOX's insolvency, and what did he do about it then.

My own personal opinion is that Mark is at fault.

Obviously someone needs to be held responsible for this event. Keep in mind this deal was made with creditors. I doubt any creditors would support a similar deal with Mark. I know I wouldn't.

You'd have to ask GGB, I haven't talked with him about the events leading up to collapse.

[JonHolmquist]

Was there any information released regarding how Sunlot would convert the BTC balances into equity stakes?
For obvious reasons, I had only BTC left inside Gox. But for the same reason, those don't worth much if you count their ~100 $/BTC closing price.

We're using a $500 per coin basis.

Cheers,

When the plan sails on and recovery is underway the price will easily shoot up back to $1000.
Very bad idea IMO

I don't get the idea of the equity stakes! Please explain!

Step 1: Audit. Figure out who is owed what and if there are any fake (or invalid) accounts in the database.
Step 2: Everyone gets equity on a pro rata basis. If you owned 1% of the money that went missing, you'd get 1% of the 16.5% going to creditors.
Step 3: Everyone is free to withdraw their funds after the audit is done.

[JonHolmquist]

Hi Jon. Not a creditor so maybe it's none of my business, but I'm wondering: The FAQ says,

Q: Will people be free to withdraw their assets right away?

Yes. Any recovered assets will be deposited into customer accounts immediately with no withdrawal restrictions.

As you know,
1) People responsible for stealing bitcoins and/or hacking the database, whether insiders or external people, may have positive balances in the current system.
2) There is an ongoing police investigation into who is responsible for stealing bitcoins. This may turn up information that won't be available to Sunlot, since the police have a lot of powers that Sunlot doesn't.
3) Regardless of what happens in the bankruptcy, this investigation may not be completed very quickly.

Does Sunlot really intend to pay out before the police investigation is completed, even at the risk of giving the legitimate creditors' money to the people who have already robbed them?

Or would Sunlot in fact wait until the police investigation was complete, in which case things might not happen quite as quickly as the FAQ makes it sound?

After an audit or once it appears that it is safe to allow withdrawals. We are aiming to get people paid out as quickly as possible while still staying safe.

[JonHolmquist]

I have one suggestion to Sunlot: Pay out all BTC balances of 1 BTC or less than BTC in full at once.

I second this motion. This would lower the cost and effort of the subsequent operations related to creditors' equity.
Moreover, such action might help to restore some confidence in Bitcoin amongst many (and possibly: not well-off) individuals who tried to buy a fraction of bitcoin out of curiosity and got Goxxed instead.

I also think this is a good idea

50 % less creditors to deal with may make recovery quicker.


please note I think sunlot are buying mtgox at a bargain price
if mtgox had not "stuffed up" and lost all our money it could be worth as much as $700 mil ( about 700,000 customers at $100 per customer . )

at present I believe sunlot is the best option -see  sunlot FAQ

I would also like to see sunlot put some money in --- like $20 mil in a escrow account

-- okcoin and other plans are still un known - so cannot compare ----

We're planning on throwing some skin into the game to the tune of a couple million. Expect an announcement sometime this month.

[JonHolmquist]

Another question for Jon. (I guess he'll answer my previous one when he wakes up.)

IIUC Mark Karpeles personally is a large creditor of Mt Gox the company, with a lot of bitcoins in his own exchange. A liquidation would put the claims of directors of the company last, but in rehabilitation you're supposed to pay everyone what they're owed, unless they specifically agree to forbearance.

Does this mean that Sunlot would be paying a large proportion of the remaining coins to Mark personally? If not, what would be the legal basis for not paying him?

I believe John has stated that Mark wouldn't be getting paid out. I'm not a lawyer so I don't know what the legal basis is.

[JonHolmquist]

Two more questions:
A significant amount of BTC balances belong to very old accounts which haven't been touched for years.  93,442 BTC, 454,849 USD, 23,799 EUR, etc, in accounts not touched since 2012 or earlier.  MtGox had a clause in their ToS which allowed them to close accounts which hadn't been logged in to in more than 6 months.  Will those account owners be counted as creditors, or will the clause take effect and the account considered closed?  This will allow a significant higher payback to users.

Will there be a claims process where people have to actively make their claims?  If so, what happens to assets not claimed in this process?  Would payouts to the remaining creditors increase if some creditors fail to make their claim?

Customers will have a couple months to withdraw their funds before their coins are released back to the pool of creditors.

[JonHolmquist]

An audit will trivially reveal if the trade data matches the balances caused by deposits and withdrawals.

An audit done by whom?  By Mark? Gonzague? Roger Ver?

(The PR guy has not said what they intend to do about Mark, has he?)

Top 4 auditing firm. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Four_(audit_firms) Take your pick.

Mark will be pursued for any wrongdoing that can be proven in a court of law.

[JonHolmquist]

What makes you think that they really want to find the lost funds? Just because they said so?

Ah, you are playing idiot again.  No, saying so makes no difference. There are several parts to this: [ ... ]

Perhaps the problem will be easier to understand if explained in a bigger font:

What makes you think that they really want to find the lost funds?

There is a sizable bounty in our proposal to give incentive to anyone to find them.

Not to mention we'll be releasing evidence we find to the Bitcoin community. These aren't just lost funds, they're the community's funds and everyone should be given the tools to help track them down.

[JonHolmquist]

Thank you guys for being patient for my responses, I've been sick the last couple days.

[JayJuanGee]

Regarding convicting criminals, there may or may NOT be proof of criminal activity, and accordingly, a better result may be to attempt to make whole as many customers as possible.  We do NOT have enough information to make broad general statements to pursue one avenue at the exclusion of another, and we do NOT know the extent to which multiple avenues may be pursued simultaneously.

According to Mark, 600'000 BTC were stolen from his company, that is why he cannot pay to clients what they were due according to his terms of service. Whether he lied or told the truth, a crime obviously has been committed. 

That's a good point that if the BTC were really stolen, then there is a crime.  If the BTC were NOT stolen, then there was a crime.  However, your earlier point was that you could give a fuck about the investors, so long as the crime is pursued.. and the wrong doers are punished.

There may NOT be enough evidence to resolve these potential criminal matters, and it would be really stupid and short-sighted to pursue this matter from only one angle....

At some point, it may be deemed to be a better course of action to discontinue the pursuit of the criminal angle, and those kinds of decisions would, in part, be affected by the existence of evidence and the willingness of prosecutors to pursue such direction in light of all developments and going forward agreements.

[JorgeStolfi]

Not to mention we'll be releasing evidence we find to the Bitcoin community. These aren't just lost funds, they're the community's funds and everyone should be given the tools to help track them down.

As a minimum, those tools should be the complete database of trades, deposits and withdrawals.  Some clients seem to object to that, though.  Whithout that information, what could people do?

[T.Stuart]

Step 1: Audit. Figure out who is owed what and if there are any fake (or invalid) accounts in the database.
Step 2: Everyone gets equity on a pro rata basis. If you owned 1% of the money that went missing, you'd get 1% of the 16.5% going to creditors.
Step 3: Everyone is free to withdraw their funds after the audit is done.

Could you give more details about how Sunlot came up with the figure of 16.5% equity to creditors?

As a creditor not directly involved with the US lawsuit I would appreciate a copy of the business plan or proposal that must have been presented to lawyers working on that case.

How is the rest of the equity divided?

Thanks in advance for the information.

[freedombit]

Hey guys!

I'm on the SaveGox team. If you guys have questions for the team, please post them.

I'm opening this thread because Goat closed the other one.

Thanks,

-Jon

Will your investment provide enough injection to cover the negative balance of lost deposits if there is one?

If not, then I have a second question.

How will the new exchange offer complete transparency to its books and balances?

Hi Jon. Still seeking answers to these questions.  Will DEPOSITORS receive the full amount of lost deposits back - whether in the form of Bitcoin or FIAT. It appears that your plan will convert Bitcoin to Fiat based on some valuation.

John, now that you are back, can you please answer these questions? Feel free to PM.

[edmundedgar]

Hi Jon. Not a creditor so maybe it's none of my business, but I'm wondering: The FAQ says,

Q: Will people be free to withdraw their assets right away?

Yes. Any recovered assets will be deposited into customer accounts immediately with no withdrawal restrictions.

As you know,
1) People responsible for stealing bitcoins and/or hacking the database, whether insiders or external people, may have positive balances in the current system.
2) There is an ongoing police investigation into who is responsible for stealing bitcoins. This may turn up information that won't be available to Sunlot, since the police have a lot of powers that Sunlot doesn't.
3) Regardless of what happens in the bankruptcy, this investigation may not be completed very quickly.

Does Sunlot really intend to pay out before the police investigation is completed, even at the risk of giving the legitimate creditors' money to the people who have already robbed them?

Or would Sunlot in fact wait until the police investigation was complete, in which case things might not happen quite as quickly as the FAQ makes it sound?

After an audit or once it appears that it is safe to allow withdrawals. We are aiming to get people paid out as quickly as possible while still staying safe.

That sounds sensible, but "once it appears that it is safe to allow withdrawals" is a very different thing to "right away" and "immediately". You might want to fix the FAQ... Are there any other bits of your public statements that read like things that you're promising to do but are really things that you're hoping to do?

[JorgeStolfi]

It would be interesting to know, for starters, when did Mr. Gay-Bouchery became aware of MtGOX's insolvency, and what did he do about it then.

You'd have to ask GGB, I haven't talked with him about the events leading up to collapse.

So he is being given immunity by Sunlot without even issuing a public statement about his role in the collapse?  (He was MtGOX's CFO, is this correct?)

My own personal opinion is that Mark is at fault.

Obviously someone needs to be held responsible for this event. Keep in mind this deal was made with creditors. I doubt any creditors would support a [ deal similar to GGB's ] with Mark. I know I wouldn't. [ ... ] Mark will be pursued for any wrongdoing that can be proven in a court of law.

IIUC Mark Karpeles personally is a large creditor of Mt Gox the company [ ... ] Does this mean that Sunlot would be paying a large proportion of the remaining coins to Mark personally? If not, what would be the legal basis for not paying him?

I believe John has stated that Mark wouldn't be getting paid out. I'm not a lawyer so I don't know what the legal basis is.

Thanks for the clarification.  However, is the intent to exclude the former management of MtGOX from the asset distribution a mere feeling and vague intention, or is Sunlot commiting to that in writing through a legally binding contract/proposal?

Otherwise, one big difference between the liquidation and the Sunlot proposal is that Mr. Karpelès (and Mr. Gay-Bouchery, and  Mr. McCaleb?) would get nothing from the first, and maybe a good slice of the 220'000 BTC from the second.

By the way, was Sunlot one of the potential MtGOX buyers contacted by Mr. Karpelès before he finally filed for bankruptcy?

[ The audit of the MtGOX database will be ] done by whom?  By Mark? Gonzague? Roger Ver?

Top 4 auditing firm. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Four_(audit_firms) Take your pick.

Again, is Sunlot commiting to this point in writing, in a legally binding document?  Have any of those firms been contacted to confirm that they would accept this task?  (I am asking because a reputable auditing firm will probably refuse to do an audit of something if it thinks that there isn't sufficient reliable data to support a useful conclusion.)

[JorgeStolfi]

Thank you guys for being patient for my responses, I've been sick the last couple days.

As you must be aware, there is another big difference between liquidation and the Sunlot proposal, which is how the claim of each client is computed.

IIUC, Sunlot will use the account balance that each client had in MtGOX's database, at some point in time; whereas the liquidators (if Japanes law is like US law) will consider the total amount deposited into MtGOX minus the total withdrawn, converted to Yen at the historical BTC prices, ignoring the trades made inside the exchange and the final balances in the database.

Obviously, some clients will have a strong preference for one criterion, some for the other criterion.  Does Sunlot intend to force the "database balance" criterion also on the clients who would prefer the "input-output" one?  Note that clients who have a large database balance might have no claim under the latter criterion, and vice-versa.  IIUC, clients with larger claims do not have more right to define the terms of the liquidation than those with smaller claims.

Moreover, when exactly will the balances be counted? 

Before MtGOX finally closed, there was a long period when withdrawals were blocked or nearly so.  During that period, MtGOX's clients were selling or buying bitcoins inside the exchange not for speculation, but in desperate attempts to get their money out, or to have a better change to recover after its probable collapse --- while there was still no information about the status of its assets.  Thus, using the balances after that frantic trading would be potentially very unfair to some clients, especally if some clients had inside knowledge and were able to acquire large balances through that unfair advantage.  (This, by the way, is another argument for using the "input-output" criterion instead of the "database balance" one to define the claims.)

[sturle]

liquidators (if Japanes law is like US law) will consider the total amount deposited into MtGOX minus the total withdrawn, converted to Yen at the historical BTC prices, ignoring the trades made inside the exchange and the final balances in the database.

This is pure speculation.  The liquidators might do this, but it is by no means a fact or an absolute requirement.  I asked before what they did in the liquidation of various online poker companies.  Did people who deposited many years before the bankruptsy, and lost their money, get money back?  There are plenty of bankruptsy cases to choose between, and so far I haven't found a single example of this in comparable cases.

[JorgeStolfi]

liquidators (if Japanes law is like US law) will consider the total amount deposited into MtGOX minus the total withdrawn, converted to Yen at the historical BTC prices, ignoring the trades made inside the exchange and the final balances in the database.

This is pure speculation.  The liquidators might do this, but it is by no means a fact or an absolute requirement.  I asked before what they did in the liquidation of various online poker companies.  Did people who deposited many years before the bankruptsy, and lost their money, get money back?  There are plenty of bankruptsy cases to choose between, and so far I haven't found a single example of this in comparable cases.

In what conditions were those online poker companies closed -- because their activities were illegal?  Did they have any assets to distribute at all?  Were they based in the US?  Did ANY clients get refunded?

IIRC two posters claimed that US law specifies the "input-output" criterion rather than the "database balance' criterion.  One of them cited Madoff's case as an example.

[sturle]

liquidators (if Japanes law is like US law) will consider the total amount deposited into MtGOX minus the total withdrawn, converted to Yen at the historical BTC prices, ignoring the trades made inside the exchange and the final balances in the database.

This is pure speculation.  The liquidators might do this, but it is by no means a fact or an absolute requirement.  I asked before what they did in the liquidation of various online poker companies.  Did people who deposited many years before the bankruptsy, and lost their money, get money back?  There are plenty of bankruptsy cases to choose between, and so far I haven't found a single example of this in comparable cases.

In what conditions were those online poker companies closed -- because their activities were illegal?  Did they have any assets to distribute at all?  Were they based in the US?  Did ANY clients get refunded?

IIRC two posters claimed that US law specifies the "input-output" criterion rather than the "database balance' criterion.  One of them cited Madoff's case as an example.

Online poker companies in the US and elsewhere have gone bankrupt or closed for various reasons over the last 20 years.  Some may have been involved in illegal investment of user deposits.  I assume there were assets left.  I don't know how to search for foreign court documents.

How about bank bankruptsies then?  If I deposited 100 USD back in 1914, and someone else borrowed 100 USD with no downpayments for the next 100 years.  Does the creditor and debtor both get/owe 100 USD?  No interest considered, just what they put in / got out?  How about online forex or gold trading coimpanies?

Another way to look at it, is to let every trade count as a withdrawal and deposit and fee payment.  In this case final balances will be correct.

[JorgeStolfi]

How about bank bankruptsies then?  If I deposited 100 USD back in 1914, and someone else borrowed 100 USD with no downpayments for the next 100 years.  Does the creditor and debtor both get/owe 100 USD? No interest considered, just what they put in / got out?  How about online forex or gold trading coimpanies?

According to the earlier poster, the Madoff clients are disputing with the courts to get dollar inflation over the 20 years considered.  That sounds reasonable. But the profits that they made according to Madoff's books, and did not withdraw, were ignored.

I don't know about forex and gold companies, but they probably work the same.  It may depend on the terms of service, but if whatever asset you deposited was worth 1000$ when you deposited it, iit is effectively the same as if you sold the asset on market just before depositing and deposited the 1000$.

That is the amount by which your wealth was diminished at the time.  Once you deposited, you did not own the asset any more, you owned a paper from the company promising you something.  Once the company failed, its promises became meaningless, only the wealth you lost when investing was still meaningful.  That is my understanding of the logic behind the inputs-minus-outputs criterion.

Another way to look at it, is to let every trade count as a withdrawal and deposit and fee payment.  In this case final balances will be correct.

No, in this case the inputs-minus-outputs will still be the original deposit, since those intermediate withdrawals and deposits will cancel out.  (Deposited 1000 BTC when price was 200$/BTC, withdrew 1000 BTC when price was 500$/BTC, deposited immediately 500'000$ = the inputs-minus-outputs balance is still 200'000$, not 500'000$.) This is in fact an argument for the input-output rule.

You may have some argument if the price at MtGOX was different than the assumed market price.  In the example above, if market price was 500 $/BTC but MtGOX price was 600 $/BTC, you could say that you withdrew 1000 BTC worth 500'000$ but deposited 600'000$.  But the court/adversary would say that you deposited exactly what you withdrew, whether you count that 500'000$ or 600'000$ (because you did not add a cent from your pocket in that operation); if MtGOX's books showed that you had 1000 BTC before the trade and 600'000$ after that, not 200'000$, it is only because MtGOX's accounting was bogus (like Madoff's').

[JorgeStolfi]

PS. I must add that courts of law generally do not count "missing an opportunity of some hypothetical gain" as a loss.  In particular, they won't be impressed by the argument "if I had not deposted my 1000 BTC into MtGOX in 2012, I could be selling them today for 500'000$". 

[T.Stuart]

Hello Jon Holmquist?

Could you provide details of how the equity distribution has been calculated?

Thanks.

[sobriket]

liquidators (if Japanes law is like US law) will consider the total amount deposited into MtGOX minus the total withdrawn, converted to Yen at the historical BTC prices, ignoring the trades made inside the exchange and the final balances in the database.

Think about it, this would be completely ludicrous. Madoff's example also isn't comparable with MtGox, a virtual currency exchange.

[ArticMine]

One question for the SaveGox team. Will existing MTGox customers be able to access their historical trading and account information? This may be needed in some cases for income tax compliance for example.

[JorgeStolfi]

Is there a link to that "favorable decision by the US court" about Savegox's plan?  (Not a news article, but the actual court paper?)
Thanks...

[sturle]

Another way to look at it, is to let every trade count as a withdrawal and deposit and fee payment.  In this case final balances will be correct.

No, in this case the inputs-minus-outputs will still be the original deposit, since those intermediate withdrawals and deposits will cancel out.

Only if you ignore the fee.  My bot paid generous amounts in fees over the years, to put it mildly..

What if you had two accounts?  I only deposited 10 BTC on my bot account, and withdrew much more than that.  Mostly to a verified MtGox account where I sold the BTC and withdrew fiat.  The value at the time of deposit was about the same as at the time of withdrawal, and I am probably very far in the negative on my bot account, while my normal account will have a positive balance according to your method.  If I knew about this rule, I would have exploited it hard to get as much money as possible from the bankruptsy just by moving BTC between accounts, and some people may have done that intentionally.  (If this rule is chosen, I will of course choose not to mention my bot account in my claim.)

You may have some argument if the price at MtGOX was different than the assumed market price.  In the example above, if market price was 500 $/BTC but MtGOX price was 600 $/BTC, you could say that you withdrew 1000 BTC worth 500'000$ but deposited 600'000$.  But the court/adversary would say that you deposited exactly what you withdrew, whether you count that 500'000$ or 600'000$ (because you did not add a cent from your pocket in that operation); if MtGOX's books showed that you had 1000 BTC before the trade and 600'000$ after that, not 200'000$, it is only because MtGOX's accounting was bogus (like Madoff's').

So far we don't know if MtGox's accounting was bogus or not.  Probably not.  The leaked data seems to be in good shape.  We just know they somehow lost a lot of BTC and some fiat, and we still don't know how this happened.  I believe Mark thought he had the BTC until he shut off withdrawals.  Madoff knew all along his books were bogus.

[JorgeStolfi]

No, in this case the inputs-minus-outputs will still be the original deposit, since those intermediate withdrawals and deposits will cancel out.

Only if you ignore the fee.  My bot paid generous amounts in fees over the years, to put it mildly.
[/quote]
Since MtGOX was not doing what clients thought it was doing, the fee

What if you had two accounts? [...] (If this rule is chosen, I will of course choose not to mention my bot account in my claim.)

I am pretty sure that the court will consider a creditor to be a person (or company), not an account.  Creditors will have to identify themselves and state their claims.

If you thought MtGOX was going bankrupt of course you would not have put your money and coins there in the first place.

People with multiple accounts may try to be smart and claim only accounts where they mostly deposited, omitting those from which they mostly withdrew.  That would be an attempt to defraud the court (like a contractor claiming a debt that was actually paid in cash), which means jail if caught.  For money withdrawals, the risk is too big.  For bitcoin withdrawals, the risk may be smaller but an audit with expert assistance may identify the owner of the omitted account.

So far we don't know if MtGox's accounting was bogus or not.  Probably not.  The leaked data seems to be in good shape.  We just know they somehow lost a lot of BTC and some fiat, and we still don't know how this happened.  I believe Mark thought he had the BTC until he shut off withdrawals.  Madoff knew all along his books were bogus.

The accounting was bogus in the sense that the coins that clients thought they were buyng and selling and/or the money they thought that Mark was keeping for them  did not actually exist.

It is risky to state publicly suppositions about crimes, but in restrospect there is only one plausible explanation for the withdrawals delays that started many months before the total block, including why the "malleability bug" was not understood and fixed promptly. 

There is another website devoted to the analysis of the database (the one with many colorful plots), whose link I cannot find now.  Some of those plots are hard to understand, they seem to show lots of trades at prices well removed from the then-current market prices. 

One of the main worries about that database is whether accounts of some "friends" were inflated in order to snatch a large portion of the remaining coins.   Also there is the possibility of insider trading, fudging with "dead" accounts, mislabeling of managers' accounts as accounts of friends, etc..  Basically, since the previous management was caught lying (about MtGOX's solvency), and their role in the disappearance of hundreds of millions of dollars has still to be explained, one cannot trust any information that comes from them.

[sturle]

No, in this case the inputs-minus-outputs will still be the original deposit, since those intermediate withdrawals and deposits will cancel out.

Only if you ignore the fee.  My bot paid generous amounts in fees over the years, to put it mildly.

Since MtGOX was not doing what clients thought it was doing, the fee

MtGox certainly did up to some point.

What if you had two accounts? [...] (If this rule is chosen, I will of course choose not to mention my bot account in my claim.)

I am pretty sure that the court will consider a creditor to be a person (or company), not an account.  Creditors will have to identify themselves and state their claims.

If you thought MtGOX was going bankrupt of course you would not have put your money and coins there in the first place.

There were a lot of speculation and buying and selling MtGox coins all the way up to the collapse.  Some made deposits of large amounts of BTC which they bought at only a few percent of market value.  You can't deny that.  People speculated in the collapse for days until it happened.  Some may have speculated very profitably in the outcome you are suggesting, and may have speculated in yourself.

People with multiple accounts may try to be smart and claim only accounts where they mostly deposited, omitting those from which they mostly withdrew.  That would be an attempt to defraud the court (like a contractor claiming a debt that was actually paid in cash), which means jail if caught.  For money withdrawals, the risk is too big.  For bitcoin withdrawals, the risk may be smaller but an audit with expert assistance may identify the owner of the omitted account.

The risk is pretty low.  In the beginning you didn't even need to supply an email address to create an account there.  You can always ask a family member to claim the other account, since you may have used the same IP for both most of the time.

So far we don't know if MtGox's accounting was bogus or not.  Probably not.  The leaked data seems to be in good shape.  We just know they somehow lost a lot of BTC and some fiat, and we still don't know how this happened.  I believe Mark thought he had the BTC until he shut off withdrawals.  Madoff knew all along his books were bogus.

The accounting was bogus in the sense that the coins that clients thought they were buyng and selling and/or the money they thought that Mark was keeping for them  did not actually exist.

We don't even know that, and we don't know when it started.  Could be as simple as lost private keys, which he thought he had stored securely.  The coins still exist, but are worthless for al practical purposes until the private keys are found.  For fiat (and even BC to some extent) there are uncertainties around seized funds and Coinlab.

[JorgeStolfi]

Still no answer to this question:

Is there a link to that "favorable decision by the US court" about Savegox's plan?  (Not a news article, but the actual court paper?)
Thanks...

Nor to several other questions...

[btc237ftw]

Should I "participate" and enter my gox related email, and other information?
If I won't, will I be left out of the settlement if such is reached?

I want to participate but I am afraid, with all these hacks and identity thefts going on...
Please advise,

Thank you

[JonHolmquist]

Should I "participate" and enter my gox related email, and other information?
If I won't, will I be left out of the settlement if such is reached?

I want to participate but I am afraid, with all these hacks and identity thefts going on...
Please advise,

Thank you

We have multiple named and known individuals in the community putting their weight behind this project. Your email and information will be safe with us.

You won't be left out of the settlement, the form on our site is purely to help use communicate with creditors and better communicate their wishes.

[JonHolmquist]

Still no answer to this question:

Is there a link to that "favorable decision by the US court" about Savegox's plan?  (Not a news article, but the actual court paper?)
Thanks...

Nor to several other questions...

Hey Jorge, sorry about the delay, I've been dealing with some personal issues lately.

Here's the file: http://www.mtgoxsettlement.com/Content/Documents/PartialSettlement.pdf

I'll be posting on SaveGox's blog in the next couple days with a document dump of any information that people following the situation might find useful.

[JonHolmquist]

Hey guys!

I'm on the SaveGox team. If you guys have questions for the team, please post them.

I'm opening this thread because Goat closed the other one.

Thanks,

-Jon

Will your investment provide enough injection to cover the negative balance of lost deposits if there is one?

If not, then I have a second question.

How will the new exchange offer complete transparency to its books and balances?

Hi Jon. Still seeking answers to these questions.  Will DEPOSITORS receive the full amount of lost deposits back - whether in the form of Bitcoin or FIAT. It appears that your plan will convert Bitcoin to Fiat based on some valuation.

John, now that you are back, can you please answer these questions? Feel free to PM.

They'll receive whatever is left, minus the 10 million that will go into the audit/investigation fund.

Also, they'll get back any recovered funds, if found, minus the bounty.

Lastly, they'll be able to sell their shares in the new company with minimal restrictions.

[JonHolmquist]

>So he is being given immunity by Sunlot without even issuing a public statement about his role in the collapse?  (He was MtGOX's CFO, is this correct?)
His official title is Business Development Manager. He mainly did advertising/pr.

>Thanks for the clarification.  However, is the intent to exclude the former management of MtGOX from the asset distribution a mere feeling and vague intention, or is Sunlot commiting to that in writing through a legally binding contract/proposal?
I don't understand the law behind it, but I'm confident that if the audit decides that the former management is at fault (how can't they be) then we can withhold their % of the coins.

>By the way, was Sunlot one of the potential MtGOX buyers contacted by Mr. Karpelès before he finally filed for bankruptcy?

Yes. We've contacted him multiple times.

>Again, is Sunlot commiting to this point in writing, in a legally binding document?  Have any of those firms been contacted to confirm that they would accept this task?  (I am asking because a reputable auditing firm will probably refuse to do an audit of something if it thinks that there isn't sufficient reliable data to support a useful conclusion.)

From the proposal: Caveats and Pre-requisites
1. Under this plan, the Supervisor shall appoint and compensate PwC (or equivalent
alternative agreed by Sunlot, if reasonable terms can not be agreed with PwC) to
provide an audit of customer accounts, customer assets, and provide an
accounting report on how Customer Assets were stolen (“Audit”). Sunlot and
Class Counsel shall oversee the Audit and ensuing report.

[JonHolmquist]

Hello Jon Holmquist?

Could you provide details of how the equity distribution has been calculated?

Thanks.

We came to that number based on discussions with large creditor groups, like the class action in the states and Canada.

[JorgeStolfi]

Is there a link to that "favorable decision by the US court" about Savegox's plan?

Here's the file: http://www.mtgoxsettlement.com/Content/Documents/PartialSettlement.pdf

Thanks!

>So [Mr. Gay-Bouchery] is being given immunity by Sunlot without even issuing a public statement about his role in the collapse?  (He was MtGOX's CFO, is this correct?)
His official title is Business Development Manager. He mainly did advertising/pr.

But when did he became aware that the company was insolvent, and what did he do then? 

>Thanks for the clarification.  However, is the intent to exclude the former management of MtGOX from the asset distribution a mere feeling and vague intention, or is Sunlot commiting to that in writing through a legally binding contract/proposal?
I don't understand the law behind it, but I'm confident that if the audit decides that the former management is at fault (how can't they be) then we can withhold their % of the coins.

This is rather, er, strange.  I understand that in bankruptcy proceedings, claims by the management are invariably considered only after all other creditors have been paid, even if there is no evidence wrongdoing -- because they are "guilty" of the company's failure, at the very least.  Moreover, in the case o MtGOX there clearly were many actions by the management that were unfair to the clients, such as allowing them to deposit and trade without warning them of the insolvency situation.

>Again, is Sunlot commiting to [the audit] point in writing, in a legally binding document?  Have any of those [auditing] firms been contacted to confirm that they would accept this task?  (I am asking because a reputable auditing firm will probably refuse to do an audit of something if it thinks that there isn't sufficient reliable data to support a useful conclusion.)

From the proposal: Caveats and Pre-requisites
1. Under this plan, the Supervisor shall appoint and compensate PwC (or equivalent
alternative agreed by Sunlot, if reasonable terms can not be agreed with PwC) to
provide an audit of customer accounts, customer assets, and provide an
accounting report on how Customer Assets were stolen (“Audit”). Sunlot and
Class Counsel shall oversee the Audit and ensuing report.

I understand this to say "there is no contract with PwC; Sunlot may propose to pay 0.01$ to PwC for the audit, and if PwC does not accept, then Sunlot alone will decide who will do the audit and how it will be done, while the Class Counsel will have to sit and watch."

Anyway, thanks for your answers.  Their former clients can have their opinion, but as a mere inhabitant of the same planet, I must say that I am quite upset at the idea that MtGOX's management may escape impartial investigation, and even be rewarded in the end.   That will only encourage them, or others in similar situations, to do the same thing again, to other victims. 

[Phinnaeus Gage]

A friendly bump to see if anybody else desires to weigh in prior to Jon H. coming back online to address the last post by JorgeStolfi.

[freedombit]

A friendly bump to see if anybody else desires to weigh in prior to Jon H. coming back online to address the last post by JorgeStolfi.

I would like to see Japanese and US authorities release what they know before making any decisions on what we should do with the MtGox entity. If authorities are unable to do that, at the very least Nobuaki should make public the current balance sheet and all transactions made in and out of the organization since he took over the entity. Again, BEFORE he takes final input from the public.