More proof that savegox.com is a sham.

[JayJuanGee]

Some things that should be obvious to anyone who has lived for a while in the real world:
* Once you find that someone told a flat out lie (such as "MtGOX is solvent and all your coins are safe"), you should not give ANY weight to absolutely ANYTHING he has said or will say, by voice or in writing. Ditto for any digital data that he may produce.
* Any digital document or database may have been altered or faked.  Yes, even cryptographically signed ones..
* An anonymous leak may have been leaked by ANYONE. Yes, even by that guy.  Or that other guy.
* When a huge pile of money disappears from inside a company, the first suspects are its top executives, then other staff, then outsiders, then the cat, then time-traveling lizards from an antimatter galaxy, and only lastly errors/bugs/accidents etc..
* Scammers ALWAYS sound and look honest, competent, reliable, etc.  If they didn't, they wouldn't be scammers.
* Someone who made a pile of money with a scam, and walked away free with it, is strongly motivated to do it again.
* If someone can pocket a large pile of money without any risk of concrete punishment, he most surely will.

Well, as I keep saying, the matter is in the hands of the Japanese court to weigh the various risks and likelihood of various outcomes.

As my current impression, I think that some form of rehabilitation of GOX would be better than liquidation, but if the rehabilitation proposals do NOT appear to be legit, then liquidation may be the better course of action.  I certainly do NOT have enough facts to make such a judgement, even though from what i read there are some pretty decent rehabilitation proposals out there that I believe have been proposed to the japanese court.. 

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[JorgeStolfi]

* If someone can pocket a large pile of money without any risk of concrete punishment, he most surely will.

Just to clarify this last point:
* What a company promises or "explains" on a forum or on TV is totally irrelevant, only contracts and legally binding documents matter.
* If a contract leaves any point optional or unspecified, one should assume the alternative that will maximize the money pocketed by the management.
* In particular, a contract must be carefully examined for loopholes like "after subtracting expenses" or "as determined by a future audit" or "at the discretion of management" etc.
* The  contract is worthless if the company is constituted, located, or registered in such a way that the management cannot be prosecuted for violating it.

[Bitcoin_is_here_to_stay]

Some things that should be obvious to anyone who has lived for a while in the real world:
* Once you find that someone told a flat out lie (such as "MtGOX is solvent and all your coins are safe"), you should not give ANY weight to absolutely ANYTHING he has said or will say, by voice or in writing. Ditto for any digital data that he may produce.
* Any digital document or database may have been altered or faked.  Yes, even cryptographically signed ones..
* An anonymous leak may have been leaked by ANYONE. Yes, even by that guy.  Or that other guy.
* When a huge pile of money disappears from inside a company, the first suspects are its top executives, then other staff, then outsiders, then the cat, then time-traveling lizards from an antimatter galaxy, and only lastly errors/bugs/accidents etc..
* Scammers ALWAYS sound and look honest, competent, reliable, etc.  If they didn't, they wouldn't be scammers.
* Someone who made a pile of money with a scam, and walked away free with it, is strongly motivated to do it again.
* If someone can pocket a large pile of money without any risk of concrete punishment, he most surely will.

Well, as I keep saying, the matter is in the hands of the Japanese court to weigh the various risks and likelihood of various outcomes.

As my current impression, I think that some form of rehabilitation of GOX would be better than liquidation, but if the rehabilitation proposals do NOT appear to be legit, then liquidation may be the better course of action.  I certainly do NOT have enough facts to make such a judgement, even though from what i read there are some pretty decent rehabilitation proposals out there that I believe have been proposed to the japanese court.. 

I could not find anywhere the details of the proposal - but how can they recover 650,000 BTC lost?

[Phinnaeus Gage]

Some things that should be obvious to anyone who has lived for a while in the real world:
* Once you find that someone told a flat out lie (such as "MtGOX is solvent and all your coins are safe"), you should not give ANY weight to absolutely ANYTHING he has said or will say, by voice or in writing. Ditto for any digital data that he may produce.
* Any digital document or database may have been altered or faked.  Yes, even cryptographically signed ones..
* An anonymous leak may have been leaked by ANYONE. Yes, even by that guy.  Or that other guy.
* When a huge pile of money disappears from inside a company, the first suspects are its top executives, then other staff, then outsiders, then the cat, then time-traveling lizards from an antimatter galaxy, and only lastly errors/bugs/accidents etc..
* Scammers ALWAYS sound and look honest, competent, reliable, etc.  If they didn't, they wouldn't be scammers.
* Someone who made a pile of money with a scam, and walked away free with it, is strongly motivated to do it again.
* If someone can pocket a large pile of money without any risk of concrete punishment, he most surely will.

Well, as I keep saying, the matter is in the hands of the Japanese court to weigh the various risks and likelihood of various outcomes.

As my current impression, I think that some form of rehabilitation of GOX would be better than liquidation, but if the rehabilitation proposals do NOT appear to be legit, then liquidation may be the better course of action.  I certainly do NOT have enough facts to make such a judgement, even though from what i read there are some pretty decent rehabilitation proposals out there that I believe have been proposed to the japanese court.. 

I could not find anywhere the details of the proposal - but how can they recover 650,000 BTC lost?

Simple. They can't! Especially if the reported amount of BTC on Mt Gox wasn't there in the first place. For instance, with my real 1,132 BTC claim on InstaWallet aside, I could claim to the insurance company that I had $1M USD worth of other people's barn wood stored in that barn that burned down. BTW, while I'm waiting for the insurance company to pay me, I'm in negotiations to sell the ashes - pennies on the dollar - to some pedophile investors out to make a quick buck on my lost. During the same time, I'll champion one lucky dude to fill an empty board seat on The Barn Wood Foundation.

[DrApricot]

Bitcoin_is_here_ sez

I could not find anywhere the details of the proposal - but how can they recover 650,000 BTC lost?

Phinnaeus Gage sez

Simple. They can't! Especially if the reported amount of BTC on Mt Gox wasn't there in the first place.

According to Google, the meanings for "lost" are
* unable to find one's way; not knowing one's whereabouts
* denoting something that has been taken away or cannot be recovered.
but, the meaning of "disappeared" is either
* cease to be visible
* cause to disappear, as by consumption
While I realize there is a fine line of distinction between these two words, it makes a world of difference so far as the disposition of the vanished bitcoins. The former implies a hopeless condition beyond one's control, whereas the latter connotes volition, and that the bitcoins may have been made to go away, and could just as easily be returned.

The popular belief has been that the bitcoins were stolen by hackers through a transaction malleability bug in Mt. Gox's software. This contention has been more or less thoroughly debunked <http://techcrunch.com/2014/03/27/experts-found-that-mt-gox-lost-a-mere-386-bitcoin-due-to-transaction-malleability/>, despite claims to the contrary in the supposedly-leaked Mt. Gox Crisis Strategy Draft <http://www.scribd.com/doc/209050732/MtGox-Situation-Crisis-Strategy-Draft>.

There is also $27 million in bank deposits missing which could not be on account of any software bug. If you heard on the evening news that the local bank had been robbed of that much money, the authorities would be all over it. Research by the Swiss investigative firm, CCI AG, supports the notion that Mt. Gox's banks have been implicated in manipulating information about this cash <http://www.mtgoxinvestigation.com/updates.html#/blog/2014/03/25/banks-knowledge-regarding-mt-gox/>.

It makes sense that the Japanese banking regulators such as the Financial Services Agency <http://www.fsa.go.jp/en/faq/index.html> must be looking into the activities of Mt. Gox's bank, Mizuho Bank Ltd., second largest Japanese bank. Someone in that organization probably knows exactly what happened to the "disappeared" $27 million.

When the Japanese regulators and financial authorities deal with the disappearance of cash from Mt. Gox in an affirmative way, it will go a long ways towards reassuring investors that Japan welcomes direct foreign investment, and that it is more than willing to meet and exceed foreign investor's expectations for safety and transparency. Helping to undisappear the the 650K still-missing BTC would turn them into heroes to investors around the globe.

[b!z]

Gox can't be saved.

[JayJuanGee]

Some things that should be obvious to anyone who has lived for a while in the real world:
* Once you find that someone told a flat out lie (such as "MtGOX is solvent and all your coins are safe"), you should not give ANY weight to absolutely ANYTHING he has said or will say, by voice or in writing. Ditto for any digital data that he may produce.
* Any digital document or database may have been altered or faked.  Yes, even cryptographically signed ones..
* An anonymous leak may have been leaked by ANYONE. Yes, even by that guy.  Or that other guy.
* When a huge pile of money disappears from inside a company, the first suspects are its top executives, then other staff, then outsiders, then the cat, then time-traveling lizards from an antimatter galaxy, and only lastly errors/bugs/accidents etc..
* Scammers ALWAYS sound and look honest, competent, reliable, etc.  If they didn't, they wouldn't be scammers.
* Someone who made a pile of money with a scam, and walked away free with it, is strongly motivated to do it again.
* If someone can pocket a large pile of money without any risk of concrete punishment, he most surely will.

Well, as I keep saying, the matter is in the hands of the Japanese court to weigh the various risks and likelihood of various outcomes.

As my current impression, I think that some form of rehabilitation of GOX would be better than liquidation, but if the rehabilitation proposals do NOT appear to be legit, then liquidation may be the better course of action.  I certainly do NOT have enough facts to make such a judgement, even though from what i read there are some pretty decent rehabilitation proposals out there that I believe have been proposed to the japanese court.. 

I could not find anywhere the details of the proposal - but how can they recover 650,000 BTC lost?

My understanding of the GOX rehabilitation plan is that about $10 million would be spent to conduct an investigation presumably to figure out what happened to various GOX assets and to recover any GOX assets, if such assets, such as BTC, are recoverable.  I presume the same would apply to fiat that may have disappeared and other assets or if it appears that some of these assets are in the hands of previous owners.  I agree that the details remain a bit murky.

There have been a few criticisms of such a proposed investigation into Gox:

1) Such an investigation should NOT cost $10 million
- actually, it may be true that such an investigation could be accomplished for less than $10 million, but if a serious investigation without limitations were to take place (which I highly doubt), such an investigation could well be worth $10 million to be carried out properly.


2)  Such GOX investigation may NOT be carried out genuinely b/c either the agreement (court order) may preclude a full investigation by placing limitations on such investigation or the incoming Gox saviors may be coming in with bad intentions.

- it seems very possible that the court may agree to enter into a limited agreement that would set parameters and limitation on the investigation or preclude investigating into certain company heads, such as Karpeles, yet I am NOT sure if there are real meaningful and/or tangible alternatives.  For example, I am NOT sure if the court has the power to hold Karpeles in a cell (to my knowledge, he has NOT been charged with any crime) until he cooperates or if there would be a way to get someone else, who was also high up in Gox to show where the bodies are buried.  I doubt the liquidation process will require or even allow for any meaningful investigation.  It may be practically difficult to get Karpeles or other higher ups in GOX to agree to some meaningful investigation - whether they need to agree seems to be a product of Japanese law, which seems quite deferential to corporate leaders

- I am NOT sure how to decipher bad intents of those coming in to save GOX, but the court should have some powers to set parameters and possibly even to retain some supervisory power over this transition.  Whether they exercise such powers seems doubtful b/c it would seem that the court may just want to figure out one way or another to quickly dispose of the matter (whether by liquidation or by rehab).  Seems that the court would NOT want to continue to be involved, if possible. 


Any thorough and comprehensive investigation should be able to trace a lot more specifics about what happened to the 650K BTC and should be able to inform about whether those BTC are recoverable or NOT.   I really doubt that a thorough and comprehensive investigation is going to take place.   Yet, I believe that the intention of the Save GOX plan is that in the worst case scenario that NONE of the 650K BTC are recoverable, then those 650K BTC would be earned back through the operation of the exchange in the next 10-20 years.

Surely, there are quite a few puzzles, including the fact that it is NOT clear about whether investors are going to be paid back in fiat or BTC ... which causes additional disputes regarding the pay back, if any, could be prolonged over several years.

In spite of these many uncertainties in the direction of the Rehab, if it were to occur, it seems to me that rehab (as opposed to liquidation) would be a much better course of action for the customers of GOX and for bitcoin as a whole.

[JorgeStolfi]

In spite of these many uncertainties in the direction of the Rehab, if it were to occur, it seems to me that rehab (as opposed to liquidation) would be a much better course of action for the customers of GOX and for bitcoin as a whole.

If the MtGOX thief/embezzler gets out in the end free and gets to keep the half a billion dollars he stole from MtGOX customers, and does so with full support of those customers, then perhaps those TV analysts will be proven right in the end: bitcoin owners may wish to pay to get rid of that cryptographic dunce-cap.

Simplifying all the positive and negative terms, and skipping the intermediate steps, the net result of the MtGOX-Sunlot affair will be: MtGOX customers lose 80-100% of their money, and in return drop all charges against Mark and Gonzague.

[subSTRATA]

Gox can't be saved.

When it comes to MtGox, what worries me a bit is http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation+13&version=NIV coupled with Winklevos index
at http://winkdex.com/#/ notice those 7 heads (exchanges) with a blasphemous name (USD, what USD really means well do a research for yourself) and then
notice "One of the heads of the beast seemed to have had a fatal wound, but the fatal wound had been healed. The whole world was filled with wonder and
followed the beast" and the rest of the revelation. Then add mandatory hand scan with Bitcoin ATMs and few other already fulfilled prophecies ... not good!

Dragon is USA, in case you wonder. So if you see USA "gave the beast his power and his throne and great authority" and MtGox "healed", well, run for hills!  

[JayJuanGee]

In spite of these many uncertainties in the direction of the Rehab, if it were to occur, it seems to me that rehab (as opposed to liquidation) would be a much better course of action for the customers of GOX and for bitcoin as a whole.

If the MtGOX thief/embezzler gets out in the end free and gets to keep the half a billion dollars he stole from MtGOX customers, and does so with full support of those customers, then perhaps those TV analysts will be proven right in the end: bitcoin owners may wish to pay to get rid of that cryptographic dunce-cap.

Simplifying all the positive and negative terms, and skipping the intermediate steps, the net result of the MtGOX-Sunlot affair will be: MtGOX customers lose 80-100% of their money, and in return drop all charges against Mark and Gonzague.

Certainly, I am NOT saying the same thing that you are saying. 

If our choices are between liquidation and rehab, then it appears to me that on the surface rehab is better as a whole.  Of course, I do NOT know the details or the extent to which Karpeles or Gonzague would be immunized from liability in a rehab scenario.    However, it does appear that the Japanese system is fairly deferential to corporate leaders - accordingly, it remains quite unclear how extensive or remedial any liquidation plan would be.

The court had already decided to liquidate, so currently, the procedural posture of the case seems to be getting the court to reconsider its decision to liquidate and to accept one of the rehab plans - and maybe the savegox plan is the best one that is currently on the table.

It is one thing to start out with a blank slate and to be able to do whatever you want, but it may be another thing to consider matters in the realities of the possibilities about what it is being proposed and what is being presented in the court system.

NO matter what the outcome, there will be ways to criticize it, of course.

[JorgeStolfi]

I do NOT know the details or the extent to which Karpeles or Gonzague would be immunized from liability in a rehab scenario.

We know about Gonzague, the Sunlot PR guy said it explicitly:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=587295.msg6511936#msg6511936

I do not know about Mark.  Ostensibly, AFAIK, it would depend on the results of that investigation. I asked the PR guy about it, but he did not answer.  In fact it seems that he stopped posting on that thread at about that time (a thread that he himself created for that purpose).

However, it does appear that the Japanese system is fairly deferential to corporate leaders - accordingly, it remains quite unclear how extensive or remedial any liquidation plan would be.

Maybe, but AFAIK in Japan, as in any coutry, the owners of a failed company have the lowest priority for asset distribution.  They only get what is left after all the other creditors (including employees, and, hopefully depositors) have been fully paid.  In this case, since assets < debts, that is nothing.

[jasinlee]

I think I need to take a silkwood shower.

[SoapMaker]

WOW Mark Rectum is perfect for the bitcoin foundation.
He would fit Right In There.
Nice n tight with the rest of those phony fkn assholes. Disband that scammy bunch already.
They have even listed Satoshi as a founder. Scammy, unethical bastards.
thanks.

[Phinnaeus Gage]

I think I need to take a silkwood shower.

An ex-girlfriend and a songwriter friend of mine, whose daughter is a Bitcoiner, are in a dance scene together in that movie, of which was filmed in Nashville.

Note to self: Dig up that pic of her, I and Chuck Seals taken at one of the shows I hosted. Chuck showed up with an RV full of 13 guys from California, all of which were over 21-years-old. Chuck was Dan's uncle, and he had one major hit under his belt, of which was sung by Patsy Cline's during her last recorded session: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7fklJZDtEM4

[JayJuanGee]

I do NOT know the details or the extent to which Karpeles or Gonzague would be immunized from liability in a rehab scenario.

We know about Gonzague, the Sunlot PR guy said it explicitly:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=587295.msg6511936#msg6511936

I do not know about Mark.  Ostensibly, AFAIK, it would depend on the results of that investigation. I asked the PR guy about it, but he did not answer.  In fact it seems that he stopped posting on that thread at about that time (a thread that he himself created for that purpose).

Maybe Savegox needs a better spokesperson? 

Savegox may be seeking to relieve certain folks from liability including Gonzague and Mccaleb; however, the power to decide to relieve some persons from liability is NOT merely with Savegox.  Various customers would need to choose to agree to such a waiver, and the court would need to be willing to go along with such waivers.  Additionally, waivers from civil liability would NOT necessarily relieve these guys from criminal liability - however, I doubt that any government authority would necessarily pursue criminal liability, if there were some meaningful global settlement agreement that effectively outlines a transition of GOX and a meaningful path forward for GOX.


A practical matter sometimes is to seek the cooperation of some persons within in order to gather evidence and to hold the most culpable persons responsible.  I am NOT sure about the practicality of this.. but if the hunch is that Mark took the coins, then it may be best to get the cooperation of the lower two guys.  On the other hand, if all three were running off with coins, then relieving 2 out of 3 might NOT be the fair and just approach.

However, it does appear that the Japanese system is fairly deferential to corporate leaders - accordingly, it remains quite unclear how extensive or remedial any liquidation plan would be.

Maybe, but AFAIK in Japan, as in any coutry, the owners of a failed company have the lowest priority for asset distribution.  They only get what is left after all the other creditors (including employees, and, hopefully depositors) have been fully paid.  In this case, since assets < debts, that is nothing.

If truly some investigation were to take place and more coins could be found or the personal assets of Karpeles or some of the other top folks could be taken, then maybe liquidation could go farther in the furtherance of substantive justice.  I doubt that would be the case, but maybe I am NOT knowledgeable enough  to realize that there could be some serious pursuit and tracing of the purported "lost" coins under a liquidation scenario.

[edmundedgar]

Maybe, but AFAIK in Japan, as in any coutry, the owners of a failed company have the lowest priority for asset distribution.  They only get what is left after all the other creditors (including employees, and, hopefully depositors) have been fully paid.  In this case, since assets < debts, that is nothing.

Yup, that's how liquidation works in Japan. Obviously if it was possible to avoid liquidation that would be a much better deal for Mark personally, who IIUC is owed huge amounts of Bitcoins by Gox the company, and outside a liquidation the company wouldn't be able to write off what it owes him unless he agreed to let them.

[jasinlee]

I think I need to take a silkwood shower.

An ex-girlfriend and a songwriter friend of mine, whose daughter is a Bitcoiner, are in a dance scene together in that movie, of which was filmed in Nashville.

Note to self: Dig up that pic of her, I and Chuck Seals taken at one of the shows I hosted. Chuck showed up with an RV full of 13 guys from California, all of which were over 21-years-old. Chuck was Dan's uncle, and he had one major hit under his belt, of which was sung by Patsy Cline's during her last recorded session: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7fklJZDtEM4

After reading that its the only way to get that fresh feeling.

[eiskalt]

@Phinnaeus Gage

Thank you very much for the information about sunlot and Brock Pierce.

I remember the case Bruce Wagener and how mtgox (Mark Karpales) defended its affiliation with him, even when there was no doubt about his shady/criminal history.

Yet back then, bitcoiners did generally not tolerate, that a pedophile conartist promotes their beloved investment.

Today it seems to be different. A simple google search is required to reveal the shady history of Brock Pierce and yet this guy gets not only a lot of positive media attention, but also a director seat at the Bitcoin Foundation.


Someone kick these bitcoin-media-sunlot-cheerleaders please.

[jcpham]

wtf is this serious ?

Nah! I made it all up for my thesis on trolling. The professor said that the facts where pretty good, but the grammar and presentation sucked, so he gave me a D- for deffort. 

i found this humorous. hi Phinn! still gumshoeing on forums i see? good work!

[Phinnaeus Gage]

wtf is this serious ?

Nah! I made it all up for my thesis on trolling. The professor said that the facts where pretty good, but the grammar and presentation sucked, so he gave me a D- for deffort. 

i found this humorous. hi Phinn! still gumshoeing on forums i see? good work!

Damn straight, with case in point I did some more gumshoeing via Google and you won't believe what I discovered. I discovered what gumshoeing is. BTW, thanks, bud.

@Phinnaeus Gage

Thank you very much for the information about sunlot and Brock Pierce.

I remember the case Bruce Wagener and how mtgox (Mark Karpales) defended its affiliation with him, even when there was no doubt about his shady/criminal history.

Yet back then, bitcoiners did generally not tolerate, that a pedophile conartist promotes their beloved investment.

Today it seems to be different. A simple google search is required to reveal the shady history of Brock Pierce and yet this guy gets not only a lot of positive media attention, but also a director seat at the Bitcoin Foundation.


Someone kick these bitcoin-media-sunlot-cheerleaders please.

And, thank you, too, bud. (a five word sentence with three commas, that can't me right, thus Google it)