Bitcoin Discussion

[cambriamarsh]

Ok who shorted it this week?

I’d like to have but can’t find any put options. It’s too volatile firms to use futures to that!

 

[Buzzard]

According to XE a coin is currently worth AUD 22,136.24
HOLY HELL!
I was told not to get in at around 7K which was only a month or two ago.
When will this madness stop?

 

[moa999]

Maybe last week.
Hit a high of US$19k, then dumped down to 10.5k on Fri US before returning to about US$13k

 

[JohnK]

I was told not to get in at around 7K which was only a month or two ago.
When will this madness stop?

I think the latest drop has put some doubts.

 

[amaroo]

Not sure if I was too lazy or too smart to let this bubble pass me by

 

[jb747]

Sinking towards its actual value.....zero.

 

[tgh]

Sinking towards its actual value.....zero.

Disagree, you should always be able swap a bit coin for a tulip…….

 

[daft009]

if only I'd jumped in in 2010 when a friend told me.
He managed to mine enough (around 20-30 a day for ~2yrs) to pay for a PPL license, quite a few holidays and now just flies himself everywhere on a rented aircraft (lives in Europe)

 

[juddles]

if only I'd jumped in in 2010 when a friend told me...

as my father would say, about "ifs": If my auntie had balls she would be my uncle.
The whole bitcoin thing is fascinating. I am truly in awe of the technical genius that its creator had. I hope (and am sure he retired off this very nicely. But it's real value was only ever in what was perceived. The only people to ever make money from this did so at the loss of others. that is the reality here.

 

[Daver6]

as my father would say, about "ifs": If my auntie had balls she would be my uncle.
The whole bitcoin thing is fascinating. I am truly in awe of the technical genius that its creator had. I hope (and am sure he retired off this very nicely. But it's real value was only ever in what was perceived. The only people to ever make money from this did so at the loss of others. that is the reality here.

I'm not sure if it's still the case, but at the peak, the create Satoshi Nakamoto (obviously an alias) had never transferred a single coin. That's thje beauty of bitcoin, the ledger is public. Therefore didn't actually get rich off it. Now he could easily have had a second wallet and made some dosh that way though. Suspect we'll never really know. As you said, forgetting the whole bubble thing, its pretty cool/fascinating.

 

[amaroo]

What a story! Particularly like the one where his wife has changed her name three times in the past two years and purchased 16 properties - hilarious.... as long as you don't have money invested with this mob.

Conspiracy theories rage over $265m taken to Gerald Cotten’s grave

The young Canadian man was already close to death when he was admitted to a hospital in the Indian city of Jaipur in early December. In the hours that followed doctors tried in vain to save him from a raging fever, septic shock and a perforated intestine. After a series of cardiac arrests he was declared dead the following evening, his wife at his side.

What the doctors and police did not realise as they signed the paperwork authorising the release of his body for return home was that the man was gatekeeper to a $265 million fortune in cryptocurrency. Two months on, those funds remain sealed in an online black hole, with his company claiming that access to the encrypted money died with him.

Investors have launched legal action as wild conspiracy theories sweep the internet, including claims that the death in Jaipur was faked.

Gerald Cotten, 30, was the founder of Quadriga CX, Canada’s largest cryptocurrency exchange. He leaves an encrypted laptop and a widow who has suffered abuse and threats as she tries to uncover his secrets.

Sympathy is in short supply among the panicked investors, however. Among the unanswered questions is why the company took more than a month to announce the death. Throughout December, knowing he was dead, it continued to placate investors with apologies for delays in accessing their funds.

On January 15 Quadriga finally revealed its terrible secret. “It is with a heavy heart that we announce the sudden passing of Gerald Cotten,” his widow, Jennifer Robertson, announced on Facebook.

There was uproar. Grief among friends of Mr Cotten was soon obliterated by panic as investors tried in vain to pull their money from the exchange. Instead, Quadriga’s website went down and the company went off grid, emerging days later to drop another bombshell. “The laptop computer from which Gerry carried out the company’s business is encrypted and I do not know the password or recovery key,” Ms Robertson said in documents submitted to a court.

Crisis has engulfed the company. Ms Robertson’s affidavit claims that most of Quadriga’s funds had been moved into “cold storage”, an offline wallet unconnected to the internet, to which Mr Cotten had sole access.

The court documents also revealed that Mr Cotten filed a will on November 27, days before he died. He had enjoyed the high life, owning many properties, a yacht and private jet - all of it left to his wife apart from $100,000 set aside to care for his two pet chihuahuas, Nitro and Gully.

The documents show Ms Robertson said that her husband died from complications related to Crohn’s disease, an inflammatory bowel ailment. Doctors in Jaipur said that his symptoms were consistent with this and a death certificate was issued on December 13.

Ms Robertson’s affidavit also included a certificate from a funeral home in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

For more than 115,000 investors with an outstanding balance with Quadriga it was already inconceivably reckless for the company to be run with no backup access to the cold storage.

With some investors claiming they are owed more than $730,000, there are plans for a private investigation into Mr Cotten’s death.

Quadriga had been suffering liquidity issues in the year before Mr Cotten’s death, fuelling suspicion among investors. If their funds cannot be retrieved, they cannot turn to the usual financial regulators but will have to take their own legal action.

Many have questioned why Mr Cotten, facing financial and legal issues, would choose that time to fly to India to perform charity work. His wife, who has changed her name three times, purchased 16 homes between May 2016 and October 2018.

- With Tom Knowles in San Francisco, and Saurabh Sharma

- The Times

 

[daft009]

Relatively Very easy to fake your death in India so story could have some merit imo