The terrible story of Mt. Gox (and maybe of Bitcoin)

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Jackolantern
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The terrible story of Mt. Gox (and maybe of Bitcoin)

Post by Jackolantern »

To those that don't know, Mt. Gox was a website originally started to trade Magic the Gathering Online cards (MtGO Xchange), but instead started dealing in Bitcoins since the early days. After being sold to a European developer, it became the #1 Bitcoin trading site in the world, dealing in tens of millions of dollars daily at its peak. Then, earlier this month it stopped allowing withdrawals of Bitcoins. And then last week, the site disappeared, taking with it $400 million worth of Bitcoins.

Here is the story of what happened to Mt. Gox.
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vitinho444
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Re: The terrible story of Mt. Gox (and maybe of Bitcoin)

Post by vitinho444 »

I've hard about this.. this is one reason i don't trust bitcoins, they are too "weak". USD has the US economy backing it up. Euro has the European Union backing up, Bitcoin has... some algorithm.

What happens to the users bitcoins now?
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hallsofvallhalla
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Re: The terrible story of Mt. Gox (and maybe of Bitcoin)

Post by hallsofvallhalla »

Bitcoins have fallen like crazy in the past few months and when China released they would not allow it then it plummeted. This news will only destroy it more.
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Jackolantern
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Re: The terrible story of Mt. Gox (and maybe of Bitcoin)

Post by Jackolantern »

vitinho444 wrote:I've hard about this.. this is one reason i don't trust bitcoins, they are too "weak". USD has the US economy backing it up. Euro has the European Union backing up, Bitcoin has... some algorithm.

What happens to the users bitcoins now?
They're gone. Mt. Gox's Bitcoins were stolen, and the users won't get them back. The company declared bankruptcy in Japan (where they were headquartered), and since they weren't a bank, there was no FDIC or similar international guarantee on investor's money. They have to just chalk it up on their taxes as a loss.
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vitinho444
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Re: The terrible story of Mt. Gox (and maybe of Bitcoin)

Post by vitinho444 »

Oh my god... That's horrible... Now people will just lose their money :/
That's what you get when you bet on Bitcoins i guess.
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hallsofvallhalla
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Re: The terrible story of Mt. Gox (and maybe of Bitcoin)

Post by hallsofvallhalla »

This may just end anything like bitcoins for a while too. Think about it. Who would buy them now? Who would touch any currency like this for many years to come?

WARNING Conspiracy theory:
This makes me wonder if this wasn't some kind of planned attack by a certain "group" to end this kind of thing.
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vitinho444
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Re: The terrible story of Mt. Gox (and maybe of Bitcoin)

Post by vitinho444 »

Thats possible halls, but what's the gain for them?
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Xaos
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Re: The terrible story of Mt. Gox (and maybe of Bitcoin)

Post by Xaos »

hallsofvallhalla wrote:This may just end anything like bitcoins for a while too. Think about it. Who would buy them now? Who would touch any currency like this for many years to come?

WARNING Conspiracy theory:
This makes me wonder if this wasn't some kind of planned attack by a certain "group" to end this kind of thing.
I'm not a big conspiracy guy, but I can believe that one.
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Re: The terrible story of Mt. Gox (and maybe of Bitcoin)

Post by a_bertrand »

It could well be an attack of some group, but it shows also how vaporware are those currency. If you ever wondered what makes a currency solidity is basically how trusty is the government which delivers it. Currencies which are not open to trade for example of some odd small countries don't actually have any value outside of this country. Bitcoins and any digital currency do have exactly the same risk, when (and not if) somebody will discover a way to produce it at will the value of that digital currency will be 0.

Imagine that I create tomorrow a new currency called ABValue, and stat exchanging it for 1000$ = 1 ABValue. Nothing actually prevent me to do something like that right? Now... what if I produce myself millions of those ABValue, would you exchange those yourself? Would you accept those values as well? Do you trust me enough that those values will continue at that price? No. So bitcoins are => as long as people trust them, they do have a value, as soon as people stop trusting them they are not worse more than a MD5('you foul') string ;)

So stop believing in those things... Yes some people may have made money, but it ends up that a lot will have lost it too.
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vitinho444
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Re: The terrible story of Mt. Gox (and maybe of Bitcoin)

Post by vitinho444 »

Yeah alain you're right... My red flag with bitcoins was when you could "mine" them... Really? You can mine money? That's cool...-.-
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