Karpeles back to living large in one of the most expensive apartments in Tokyo

[TheFootMan]

Well, as everyone knows his address, I wonder when the first big bitcoin heist will take place... ...oh wait!

[Harley997]

Wonder how many people got screwed over this.

What I wonder is how many people are in the same position now where it could happen again.  Personally, I try not to leave more that $10 USD worth of Bitcoin on exchanges at any given time.  But I often wonder how many people, even after the gox fiasco and all this anger over Karpeles living the high life, how many still keep hundreds or even thousands on an exchange instead of in cold storage where it should be.  Satoshi envisaged Bitcoin as peer to peer money, so the fact that so many people rely on exchanges means we're generally doing this all wrong.

I'm not making any excuses for they guy, but as disgusting a creature as Karpeles is, it never would have happened if people were using Bitcoin as intended.

You're forgetting that Bitcoins best use is as a speculative financial instrument. The big Bitcoin economy would be so very much smaller without day traders. It's impossible to buy and sell at an exchange without having something in your account. I have had thousands at an exchange before. I transfer it out only when I know I'm not trading for a while.

there are a number of ways you can speculate with bitcoin without entrusting your funds to an exchange for long periods.

[QuestionAuthority]

Wonder how many people got screwed over this.

What I wonder is how many people are in the same position now where it could happen again.  Personally, I try not to leave more that $10 USD worth of Bitcoin on exchanges at any given time.  But I often wonder how many people, even after the gox fiasco and all this anger over Karpeles living the high life, how many still keep hundreds or even thousands on an exchange instead of in cold storage where it should be.  Satoshi envisaged Bitcoin as peer to peer money, so the fact that so many people rely on exchanges means we're generally doing this all wrong.

I'm not making any excuses for they guy, but as disgusting a creature as Karpeles is, it never would have happened if people were using Bitcoin as intended.

You're forgetting that Bitcoins best use is as a speculative financial instrument. The big Bitcoin economy would be so very much smaller without day traders. It's impossible to buy and sell at an exchange without having something in your account. I have had thousands at an exchange before. I transfer it out only when I know I'm not trading for a while.

there are a number of ways you can speculate with bitcoin without entrusting your funds to an exchange for long periods.

Even short periods are risky if your all in during a shutdown like with Gox.

[TheFootMan]

When thinking of it. 16k usd pr. month for a flat. how long can he stay there pr. million usd?

1 million gives you 62 months which is 5 years.

Not sure of his age, but let's say he's 30 now and that he will die of a heart attack because of an unhealthy lifestyle at 58.

That means he needs to pay the rent for 28 more years which brings us to the ballpark of 5.4 million dollars. If he took 400 million, it seems like he can afford it, and even have some more to play with. What about some luxury travels, and some new cars? Perhaps he could join up with Kim Jong-un and Dennis Rodman? He could then release NKoin, and supervised by the milliitary of NK, it's pretty sure MK dicipline would improve, he might even benefit from daily exercise. And perhaps he could even buy a yacht and denouce all citizenships, and become a sailor of the high seas?

Watch as the story untolds, very soon!

[TheVoodooDevil]

his life got goxxed

[Swordsoffreedom]

When thinking of it. 16k usd pr. month for a flat. how long can he stay there pr. million usd?

1 million gives you 62 months which is 5 years.

Not sure of his age, but let's say he's 30 now and that he will die of a heart attack because of an unhealthy lifestyle at 58.

That means he needs to pay the rent for 28 more years which brings us to the ballpark of 5.4 million dollars. If he took 400 million, it seems like he can afford it, and even have some more to play with. What about some luxury travels, and some new cars? Perhaps he could join up with Kim Jong-un and Dennis Rodman? He could then release NKoin, and supervised by the milliitary of NK, it's pretty sure MK dicipline would improve, he might even benefit from daily exercise. And perhaps he could even buy a yacht and denouce all citizenships, and become a sailor of the high seas?

Watch as the story untolds, very soon!

I'm sure if Karpeles signed a movie deal and licensing agreement
Or a couple books about his time with Mtgox and the earliest days of Bitcoin someone would buy it and his royalties might add up to pay for it
Of course with raging shareholders/users grabbing all of the copies they can get and burning them with fire ^_^
*Shareholders meaning those who got left holding the goxcoins and now want reparations.

[Snorek]

Oh my god. Look at that bathroom, exhibitionist's heaven

[jonald_fyookball]

Oh my god. Look at that bathroom, exhibitionist's heaven

maybe it could have loudspeakers attached to the outside of the building
so you can blast the noises of you taking a dump...lol sorry just thought
it was a funny thought.

[TheFootMan]

Oh my god. Look at that bathroom, exhibitionist's heaven

Are you still an exhibitionist if you show yourself but nobody sees you?

[ThomasCrowne]

Oh my god. Look at that bathroom, exhibitionist's heaven

Yup...fat heads way of proverbially telling the whole world to kiss his fat ass everytime he takes a dump!!

[Mikez]

Hats off to you dear Sir, your investigative skills left me in awe. .

[Harley997]

Wonder how many people got screwed over this.

What I wonder is how many people are in the same position now where it could happen again.  Personally, I try not to leave more that $10 USD worth of Bitcoin on exchanges at any given time.  But I often wonder how many people, even after the gox fiasco and all this anger over Karpeles living the high life, how many still keep hundreds or even thousands on an exchange instead of in cold storage where it should be.  Satoshi envisaged Bitcoin as peer to peer money, so the fact that so many people rely on exchanges means we're generally doing this all wrong.

I'm not making any excuses for they guy, but as disgusting a creature as Karpeles is, it never would have happened if people were using Bitcoin as intended.

You're forgetting that Bitcoins best use is as a speculative financial instrument. The big Bitcoin economy would be so very much smaller without day traders. It's impossible to buy and sell at an exchange without having something in your account. I have had thousands at an exchange before. I transfer it out only when I know I'm not trading for a while.

there are a number of ways you can speculate with bitcoin without entrusting your funds to an exchange for long periods.

Even short periods are risky if your all in during a shutdown like with Gox.

The point was to allow for short period of holding bitcoin to provide sufficient time to sent fiat to the exchange buy the bitcoin and then withdraw to your wallet whose private keys you control.

There is little to no way around this risk as exchanges offer a very efficient way of buying/selling bitcoin that is not otherwise possible as of today. You could spread out your purchases/sells over time so you only have 10% of what you are buying at the exchange at one time and send more fiat once you have withdrawn the bitcoin you have purchased.

[Keyser Soze]

http://online.wsj.com/articles/mt-gox-head-believes-no-more-bitcoin-will-be-found-1403850830

TOKYO—Scared, frustrated and angry—that's how Mark Karpelès, head of defunct bitcoin exchange Mt. Gox, says he felt when he realized in February that the exchange had lost nearly half a billion dollars' worth of the internet currency.

He said he has spent many sleepless nights since then. "I was always worried: 'What if all the bitcoins got stolen?" the 29-year-old Frenchman told The Wall Street Journal.

The Tokyo-based exchange blamed hacking attacks for the loss of 850,000 bitcoins, mostly those of customers. Since then Mr. Karpelès has rediscovered 200,000 bitcoins, but he doesn't believe more will be found.

"As the company head, my mission was to protect customers and employees," Mr. Karpelès said in the interview, his first with media since a Feb. 28 news conference to announce the exchange's bankruptcy filing. "I'm deeply sorry. I'm frustrated with myself."

From his 33rd-floor apartment in Tokyo's upscale Meguro neighborhood, he said he plans to auction off domain names as one way of keeping his other business alive and repaying creditors. Among them: bitcoins.com and akb.com, short for AKB48, a popular Japanese pop group. He didn't say whether the domain of mtgox.com would be for sale.

The high-profile collapse of Mt. Gox—once the world's largest bitcoin exchange--raised questions about exchanges' safekeeping of customers' bitcoins. A court-appointed trustee in Japan said in April that Mt. Gox was to be liquidated. On June 18, a Texas bankruptcy court approved Mt. Gox's application for bankruptcy protection of its U.S. assets.

Mr. Karpelès is still the CEO of Mt. Gox, though he has transferred all the funds to a court-appointed trustee. He has been busy trying to keep alive his web-services company, Tibanne, which was the de facto operator of Mt. Gox. He said the trustee would monitor the sale of domain names, and any extra proceeds after Tibanne has been funded through the end of the year would go to Mt. Gox creditors.

He says he wants to find a new head for Tibanne--named for his orange-and-white cat, which stayed close during the interview. He will then stay on as an engineer to help develop the company's services.

That decision comes from his experiences at Mt. Gox, where he says the failure to find experienced executives to help him deal with day-to-day operations was a critical mistake. Instead of focusing on the company's technology, he often spent hours each day in meetings with lawyers and bankers.

"The weakest point of my company was management," said Mr. Karpelès, who was the sole executive of the company. "I failed to lay out appropriate corporate structures."

Mr. Karpelès says he would prefer for someone to take over the exchange and that there are several groups interested.

Mr. Karpelès suggested he is concerned that one such plan, backed by child-actor-turned-entrepreneur Brock Pierce has proposed using Mt. Gox customer money to rehabilitate the exchange.

"To begin with, remaining customer money should not be touched," he said.

A police investigation is still under way in Japan concerning the missing bitcoins. Mr. Karpelès said un addition to hacking attacks taking advantage of a system weakness called transaction malleability, there were physical break-ins at the company's offices and that at least one former employee pilfered electronic data. A Metropolitan Police Department spokesman said on Friday that he couldn't say anything about the investigation.

"If anyone wants to start a bitcoin exchange, I would say, 'Be sure to have 24-hour security guards,'" Mr. Karpelès said.

Mr. Karpelès indicated that the exchange's fast growth had been too much for him to handle without experienced help. Just in the three months after he bought Mt. Gox from founder Jed McCaleb in March 2011, the number of accounts surged 20 times from 3,000, he said. Mr. Karpelès tried to hire experienced managers but profits in the early days weren't enough, he said.

Mr. Karpelès says that since Mt. Gox fell apart he has returned to the habits of his early days in Tokyo, including eating less-than-$2 instant noodles. He wakes continues to work after he comes home at night, trying to find customers for a new Tibanne service.

Though he is staying far away from bitcoins, Mr. Karpelès said he wants to participate in meetings of Tokyo's bitcoin community some day and would be willing to share his story with fledgling bitcoin businesses.

"My experience would be valuable to them, especially if they are thinking of starting up a bitcoin business," Mr. Karpelès said. "I can tell them what they should do and shouldn't."

I guess he needs to save on food to afford this apartment. 

[Bit_Happy]

http://online.wsj.com/articles/mt-gox-head-believes-no-more-bitcoin-will-be-found-1403850830

TOKYO—Scared, frustrated and angry—that's how Mark Karpelès, head of defunct bitcoin exchange Mt. Gox, says he felt when he realized in February that the exchange had lost nearly half a billion dollars' worth of the internet currency.

He said he has spent many sleepless nights since then. "I was always worried: 'What if all the bitcoins got stolen?" the 29-year-old Frenchman told The Wall Street Journal.

The Tokyo-based exchange blamed hacking attacks for the loss of 850,000 bitcoins, mostly those of customers. Since then Mr. Karpelès has rediscovered 200,000 bitcoins, but he doesn't believe more will be found.

"As the company head, my mission was to protect customers and employees," Mr. Karpelès said in the interview, his first with media since a Feb. 28 news conference to announce the exchange's bankruptcy filing. "I'm deeply sorry. I'm frustrated with myself."

From his 33rd-floor apartment in Tokyo's upscale Meguro neighborhood, he said he plans to auction off domain names as one way of keeping his other business alive and repaying creditors. Among them: bitcoins.com and akb.com, short for AKB48, a popular Japanese pop group. He didn't say whether the domain of mtgox.com would be for sale.

The high-profile collapse of Mt. Gox—once the world's largest bitcoin exchange--raised questions about exchanges' safekeeping of customers' bitcoins. A court-appointed trustee in Japan said in April that Mt. Gox was to be liquidated. On June 18, a Texas bankruptcy court approved Mt. Gox's application for bankruptcy protection of its U.S. assets.

Mr. Karpelès is still the CEO of Mt. Gox, though he has transferred all the funds to a court-appointed trustee. He has been busy trying to keep alive his web-services company, Tibanne, which was the de facto operator of Mt. Gox. He said the trustee would monitor the sale of domain names, and any extra proceeds after Tibanne has been funded through the end of the year would go to Mt. Gox creditors.

He says he wants to find a new head for Tibanne--named for his orange-and-white cat, which stayed close during the interview. He will then stay on as an engineer to help develop the company's services.

That decision comes from his experiences at Mt. Gox, where he says the failure to find experienced executives to help him deal with day-to-day operations was a critical mistake. Instead of focusing on the company's technology, he often spent hours each day in meetings with lawyers and bankers.

"The weakest point of my company was management," said Mr. Karpelès, who was the sole executive of the company. "I failed to lay out appropriate corporate structures."

Mr. Karpelès says he would prefer for someone to take over the exchange and that there are several groups interested.

Mr. Karpelès suggested he is concerned that one such plan, backed by child-actor-turned-entrepreneur Brock Pierce has proposed using Mt. Gox customer money to rehabilitate the exchange.

"To begin with, remaining customer money should not be touched," he said.

A police investigation is still under way in Japan concerning the missing bitcoins. Mr. Karpelès said un addition to hacking attacks taking advantage of a system weakness called transaction malleability, there were physical break-ins at the company's offices and that at least one former employee pilfered electronic data. A Metropolitan Police Department spokesman said on Friday that he couldn't say anything about the investigation.

"If anyone wants to start a bitcoin exchange, I would say, 'Be sure to have 24-hour security guards,'" Mr. Karpelès said.

Mr. Karpelès indicated that the exchange's fast growth had been too much for him to handle without experienced help. Just in the three months after he bought Mt. Gox from founder Jed McCaleb in March 2011, the number of accounts surged 20 times from 3,000, he said. Mr. Karpelès tried to hire experienced managers but profits in the early days weren't enough, he said.

Mr. Karpelès says that since Mt. Gox fell apart he has returned to the habits of his early days in Tokyo, including eating less-than-$2 instant noodles. He wakes continues to work after he comes home at night, trying to find customers for a new Tibanne service.

Though he is staying far away from bitcoins, Mr. Karpelès said he wants to participate in meetings of Tokyo's bitcoin community some day and would be willing to share his story with fledgling bitcoin businesses.

"My experience would be valuable to them, especially if they are thinking of starting up a bitcoin business," Mr. Karpelès said. "I can tell them what they should do and shouldn't."

I guess he needs to save on food to afford this apartment.  

"My experience would be valuable to them, especially if they are thinking of starting up a bitcoin business," Mr. Karpelès said. "I can tell them what they should do and shouldn't."
^^^He feels qualified to give business advice?
Either Mark is a huge thief and considers most of the world very stupid, or he is in a fantasy world from which he will never return. (...or elements of both)

[jonald_fyookball]

a desperate ploy to make us think he's broke, while
he's living like a fat cat in a $15,000/month penthouse.

[zvs]

Japan rocks.  I'm certain that exposed toilet would violate several laws here in the US (ed: and leave you open to a variety of civil lawsuits)

[moriartybitcoin]

Why wouldn't he live large? Stole half a billion dollars worth of bitcoin ..

[QuestionAuthority]

Why wouldn't he live large? Stole half a billion dollars worth of bitcoin ..

The same reason man walked on the moon, because he can. lol

[TheFootMan]

It's funny how he says he's back to his old lifestyle of eating 2usd nudles while still living in that apartment.

Also he had a good quote in the wsj interview: "In the future, I would like to participate in the bitcoin community, as I've experienced what to do and what not to do and can help others in that regard".

[Bit_Happy]

It's funny how he says he's back to his old lifestyle of eating 2usd nudles while still living in that apartment.

Also he had a good quote in the wsj interview: "In the future, I would like to participate in the bitcoin community, as I've experienced what to do and what not to do and can help others in that regard".

This community clearly needs good role models.