{ANNOUNCEMENT} WBX Exchange Frozen

[repentance]

Well, A gets 0.154 BTC which is $1.54, but he was only owed $1.00, so he's made a profit on the deal which doesn't seem right.  I don't see why anyone would be entitled to get more than 100% of what they're owed, unless everyone does.

Fair point!

And I'd rather this be settled without expensive fees being taken out by lawyers. I've already consulted one who has told me for claims any less than $40k, its simply not worth it as the costs will outweigh the potential return. Official letters have to be sent to serve as notice and fees alone for these letters to start the process are around at least in the hundreds of dollars.

I doubt anyone would have a claim which doesn't count as a "small claim".  I suspect Andre wouldn't bother turning up so people would win by default, but there's not much point in having a judgement you can't enforce, even if it's been cheap to obtain.  It would trash Andre's credit, but that's about it (and it's probably already trashed given what he posted on Yahoo last year about his mortgage problems).

Unlike the Bitfloor thread, there is agreement between the creditors here on how to proceed.  With no way to contact anyone else who may be owed funds by WBE, that's about as good as you're going to get.  The alternative would be returning the coins to Andre so that he can distribute them and no-one wants to take that risk even if it might be "technically" the appropriate course of action.  If the creditors on here represent a majority of funds owed, you're on pretty safe ground going along with whatever they'd agreed.  if people haven't taken legal action to recover their funds by now, they're not likely to do so over the manner in which those funds are returned.

Andre remains an absolute shit-heel for dumping this on Chris.

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[dooglus]

When I have time, I'll set up a claim site which will allow people to log in using their WBX openid login, which will allow me to collect bitcoin withdrawal addresses in a secure manner.  This seems like the safest way to proceed, since I have no other way of authenticating WBX user accounts - for the most part I have no details at all about the account owners.

In the mean time, I would encourage any creditors of WBX to contact me by PM here or email to dooglus at gmail giving me your WBX user ID and email address.  Then I'll email everyone when I have the claim site in place.

[payb.tc]

I'll set up a claim site which will allow people to log in using their WBX openid login, which will allow me to collect bitcoin withdrawal addresses in a secure manner.  This seems like the safest way to proceed, since I have no other way of authenticating WBX user accounts - for the most part I have no details at all about the account owners.

what about people who have sold their debt here on the forum?

iirc burtw is the current owner of my share.

[dooglus]

what about people who have sold their debt here on the forum?

iirc burtw is the current owner of my share.

That's a good point.  As far as I know, yours was the only account that was sold.  I thought I remembered Brendio buying your account, but I guess either I remember it wrong or he has since sold it on.

Looking back, I see:

official statement:

i am selling my total WBX funds to brendio.

i have sent him a WBX code for a little over $497.33 and brendio has agreed via PM to send me 11 BTC for it.

edit: i've now received the 11 btc.

so you already transferred your balance to Brendio, and so I don't need to take that into consideration - Brendio's account will simply have $497.33 more in it than it used to.  Did Brendio since pass the balance on to BurtW?  That's the first I've heard about it if that's the case.

[payb.tc]

what about people who have sold their debt here on the forum?

iirc burtw is the current owner of my share.

That's a good point.  As far as I know, yours was the only account that was sold.  I thought I remembered Brendio buying your account, but I guess either I remember it wrong or he has since sold it on.

Looking back, I see:

official statement:

i am selling my total WBX funds to brendio.

i have sent him a WBX code for a little over $497.33 and brendio has agreed via PM to send me 11 BTC for it.

edit: i've now received the 11 btc.

so you already transferred your balance to Brendio, and so I don't need to take that into consideration - Brendio's account will simply have $497.33 more in it than it used to.  Did Brendio since pass the balance on to BurtW?  That's the first I've heard about it if that's the case.

no, it was indeed brendio, not burtw... i was just remembering fuzzy.

and also i didn't remember that i had created a WBX code and transferred to his actual account... so that's all good. i was worried that the funds were still in my WBX account, which would have made things more difficult for you.

[brendio]

what about people who have sold their debt here on the forum?

iirc burtw is the current owner of my share.

That's a good point.  As far as I know, yours was the only account that was sold.  I thought I remembered Brendio buying your account, but I guess either I remember it wrong or he has since sold it on.

Looking back, I see:

official statement:

i am selling my total WBX funds to brendio.

i have sent him a WBX code for a little over $497.33 and brendio has agreed via PM to send me 11 BTC for it.

edit: i've now received the 11 btc.

so you already transferred your balance to Brendio, and so I don't need to take that into consideration - Brendio's account will simply have $497.33 more in it than it used to.  Did Brendio since pass the balance on to BurtW?  That's the first I've heard about it if that's the case.

no, it was indeed brendio, not burtw... i was just remembering fuzzy.

and also i didn't remember that i had created a WBX code and transferred to his actual account... so that's all good. i was worried that the funds were still in my WBX account, which would have made things more difficult for you.

Just checking back into this thread and confirming that I'm still the holder of this debt. I'm will PM my email addy.

[dooglus]

Just checking back into this thread and confirming that I'm still the holder of this debt. I'm will PM my email addy.

I received your details, and those of 2 others.  I'm surprised to get so few replies.  I guess most people who read this thread will see any announcement I make here and so don't need to contact me directly.

[Seal]

Just checking back into this thread and confirming that I'm still the holder of this debt. I'm will PM my email addy.

I received your details, and those of 2 others.  I'm surprised to get so few replies.  I guess most people who read this thread will see any announcement I make here and so don't need to contact me directly.

That should make things easier.

Would you say the majority of creditors hold < $500 balances? If there are a lot of these accounts then my guess is at this stage, the customers involved have either forgotten or dont care anymore or have written it off as an annoying loss.

[dooglus]

Would you say the majority of creditors hold < $500 balances? If there are a lot of these accounts then my guess is at this stage, the customers involved have either forgotten or dont care anymore or have written it off as an annoying loss.

To answer your question, I went to fire up the MySQL database.

It turns out I didn't even install the mysql-server package on this computer yet.

I've recently moved into a very remote location.  No power, water, phone service, etc.  So getting online is a challenge.  I'm using computers a lot less these days generally.

When I get a chance I'll download the MySQL server package and install it - then I'll be able to let you know how account sizes break down...

Edit: So slow:

Code:

40% [Waiting for headers]                                   8,452 B/s 17min 32s

[dooglus]

Would you say the majority of creditors hold < $500 balances? If there are a lot of these accounts then my guess is at this stage, the customers involved have either forgotten or dont care anymore or have written it off as an annoying loss.

I would say, assuming 1 BTC = $11, that the balances break down as follows:

Code:

  44%  <  5c
   9%  >= 5c    < 50c
  10%  >= 50c   < $5
   8%  >= $5    < $50
  16%  >= $50   < $500
  12%  >= $500  < $5000
   1%  >= $5000 < $50000

So a total of 87% of accounts are less than $500.

[Seal]

Would you say the majority of creditors hold < $500 balances? If there are a lot of these accounts then my guess is at this stage, the customers involved have either forgotten or dont care anymore or have written it off as an annoying loss.

I would say, assuming 1 BTC = $11, that the balances break down as follows:

Code:

  44%  <  5c
   9%  >= 5c    < 50c
  10%  >= 50c   < $5
   8%  >= $5    < $50
  16%  >= $50   < $500
  12%  >= $500  < $5000
   1%  >= $5000 < $50000

So a total of 87% of accounts are less than $500.

Thanks for that breakdown dooglus, interesting to see. As for a holding of > $5000. I thought WBX imposed a limit of $5k account balances?

Also, glad to see that the majority of customers were not affected to any significant degree (63% with balances of < $5 )

[Seal]

I've recently moved into a very remote location.  No power, water, phone service, etc.  So getting online is a challenge.  I'm using computers a lot less these days generally.

Where are you now?

[dooglus]

Thanks for that breakdown dooglus, interesting to see. As for a holding of > $5000. I thought WBX imposed a limit of $5k account balances?

Also, glad to see that the majority of customers were not affected to any significant degree (63% with balances of < $5 )

Wasn't the $5k limit only for AUD holdings, rather than a combined BTC + AUD value?

Also, it's possible that at the time of closing, the >$5k account was worth less than $5k, since BTC has roughly doubled in value since WBX's closing.

I only counted accounts with non-zero balances too.  There are many accounts which were created but never had any funds deposited.

I'm still in BC, Canada.  Just out in the sticks.

[repentance]

Wasn't the $5k limit only for AUD holdings, rather than a combined BTC + AUD value?

It's vague on the website and I suspect that Andre never enforced the limit anyway.  He was shonky about everything else.

Default maximum account size limit is AUD 5,000; if you would like to raise this limit, please submit a Request to Support and we will guide you through the AML/CFT process as mandated under the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Act 2006. (AML/CTF Act) received Royal Assent on 12 December 2006.

There's actually nothing in our AML/CTF Act which operates to limit the size of accounts.  I'm convinced he just put that there for show.

[dooglus]

It's vague on the website and I suspect that Andre never enforced the limit anyway.  He was shonky about everything else.

Default maximum account size limit is AUD 5,000; if you would like to raise this limit, please submit a Request to Support and we will guide you through the AML/CFT process as mandated under the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Act 2006. (AML/CTF Act) received Royal Assent on 12 December 2006.

There's actually nothing in our AML/CTF Act which operates to limit the size of accounts.  I'm convinced he just put that there for show.

There's actually nothing in the code to limit balances either.  The per-account setting only changes the text that displays the "limit" to the user.

[Seal]

It's vague on the website and I suspect that Andre never enforced the limit anyway.  He was shonky about everything else.

Default maximum account size limit is AUD 5,000; if you would like to raise this limit, please submit a Request to Support and we will guide you through the AML/CFT process as mandated under the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Act 2006. (AML/CTF Act) received Royal Assent on 12 December 2006.

There's actually nothing in our AML/CTF Act which operates to limit the size of accounts.  I'm convinced he just put that there for show.

There's actually nothing in the code to limit balances either.  The per-account setting only changes the text that displays the "limit" to the user.

Aah, I personally kept to that limit as it seemed sensible for my own risk limitations. I thought it was added to prevent him from being sued by any specific party for significant amounts.

[dooglus]

Aah, I personally kept to that limit as it seemed sensible for my own risk limitations. I thought it was added to prevent him from being sued by any specific party for significant amounts.

I think everyone kept to the limit.  I guess when you have $5000 on the line you don't want to break any 'rules'...

[Seal]

Hey dooglus, have you decided an approach or timescale for repayments to begin?

Have many more creditors contacted you?

[dooglus]

Hey dooglus, have you decided an approach or timescale for repayments to begin?

Have many more creditors contacted you?

Hi.

I've not made any further steps towards getting the repayments to happen.  I didn't have time to contact ITSA yet.  That's something I think I need to do first.  I've been very busy recently, but will get to it soon.  If they advise that I should pay back the WBX creditors then I should be able to do that soon.

In other news, I'm about to move the funds to a different address.  The address they're currently at was generated using vanitygen.  I figure it's possibly safer to use an address generated by the bitcoin client itself.

I'll be moving the 1768.9876932 BTC from 1DodGYjF5LFoKg186jANZV9U8znXjagSzS to 1BGjvqSQWgXtjZk1A8nda9b5HqBbecNHoF in the next few minutes.

Edit: I forgot to answer your 2nd question.  A total of 9 creditors have contacted me since I asked for contact details.

[repentance]

I'll be moving the 1768.9876932 BTC from 1DodGYjF5LFoKg186jANZV9U8znXjagSzS to 1BGjvqSQWgXtjZk1A8nda9b5HqBbecNHoF in the next few minutes.

LOL @ the "dodgy" vanity address.