Re: MtGox withdrawal delays [Gathering]

I don't get it. What is new here? The Dwolla seizure has been known for a while. Have you been living in a cave for the last three months?

No. What Karpeles is confirming is that the USD withdraws are being halted by the US gov. NOT due to problems with Mt.Gox's banking connections, which they have used as an excuse the last 2 months. This essentially means that USD withdraws will not resume for quite some time, if ever.

This is pure speculation. From the context I assumed, and still assume, he was referring to the Dwolla case which significantly increased the load on USD bank wires. Why don't you ask him yourself? He is frequently active and answering questions in #mtgox on freenode. I'm sure he would have been there a lot more if it hadn't been for the zombies nagging about scamcoins they want on MtGox whenever he types something. It is early morning in Japan now. He'll be there soon.

Here are some new IRC quotes for you, reordered for readability:

Code:

13:43 < sturles> SEPA has been delayed for as long as I can remember. I wish
MtGox had more SEPA banks, but they generally don't like
Bitcoin buisnesses. Perhaps the one in Slovenia which
Bitstamp is using could be worth a try? Could be troubled
with the same issue, of course.
13:48 <@MagicalTux> sturles, we already applied to that one
13:53 < sturles> MagicalTux: Great! Lower SEPA delays would do wonders! In
fact all good news regarding delays would be wonderful at this
time..
13:54 <@MagicalTux> sturles, we've been reducing SEPA delay day by day
13:54 <@MagicalTux> things are much better than one month ago
13:54 < sturles> Have your limits increased?
13:54 <@MagicalTux> nope

This is great news!

Code:

13:50 < samson_> MagicalTux: Would you say we're facing a banking embargo on
the entire Bitcoin business ?
13:51 <@MagicalTux> samson_, things are not easy, but it's far from what you
could qualify as "embargo"
13:51 < samson_> ok thanks

Difficulties (we know that from many countries, e.g. UK), but no organized embargo.

Code:

13:58 < sturles> Btw, there are roumous now that USD withdrawals are somehow
blocked entirely. Is there any truth to that? Some people
intepret this as "US government are blocking all USD
withdrawals": <@MagicalTux> cyro432: not much we can do right
now because of US govt
13:59 <@MagicalTux> sturles, "blocked" is not the correct word
14:00 < sturles> What is the exact problem then? You can see here how the
speculations go:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=179586.msg2918767#msg2918767
14:01 <@MagicalTux> sturles, we are not allowed to talk about the exact problem
(doing so would only make things worse)

That's no explanation of the problem, but explains the lack of news. For other currencies:

Code:

13:58 < SleepersTide> MagicalTux: Are Australian bank transfer withdrawals
being processed normally?
13:58 < SleepersTide> (also how long do those take?)
14:00 <@MagicalTux> SleepersTide, right now all SWIFT transfers are processed
up to the limits of our current bank (up to 10 transfers
per day - we should be able to increase that as soon as we
have more banking partners ready - it's taking longer than
expected because of the time required by the people at the
bank to understand our business)
14:10 < sturles> MagicalTux: Why only 10 SWIFT transfers per day? Is that
commonplace for customers in your bank?
14:12 <@MagicalTux> sturles, most companies in Japan will do one, maybe two
SWIFT transfers a month to providers overseas (actually
most will do zero)14:14 < Delerium> when you say transfers per day you mean 10 swift runs
(containing LOADS of transfers within) or literally just 10
transfers
14:16 <@MagicalTux> Delerium, literal
14:17 <@MagicalTux> when we were in the second largest bank in Japan, we
represented more than half of all the volume of SWIFT
processed by that bank (almost overloading their systems a
couple of times)

With only 10 withdrawals per day in all other currencies than JPY and EUR, it is going to take time. And he confirms again that MtGox are in fact overloading their bank. The discussion is still going on, btw. About ordering and more about transparency:

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14:17 < rfish> MagicalTux: I think you owe it to customers to make the numbers
of swift transfers you are doing per day more public and explain
the reasons
14:18 <@MagicalTux> rfish, rather than spending time on this, fixing it is
likely going to bring more on the long term
14:18 < rfish> MagicalTux: And you should be fair about which you do, like
wires greater than X amount, in the order they are received
14:19 <@MagicalTux> those wires are processed in received order, nothing else