Quote from: Alias on February 19, 2014, 12:04:27 PM

Quote from: led_lcd on February 19, 2014, 11:03:13 AM

Quote from: led_lcd on February 19, 2014, 12:11:32 AM

All,

I've been discussing with busoni who operates Poloniex the possibility of Poloniex basically issuing and underwriting the value of 1 XBTC = 1 BTC.

I have already issued 21M XBTC (divisible, non callable). It isn't locked because I'm getting an error locking it but this will be done prior to any sale of XBTC.

The idea is that Poloniex will create an service which will buy and sell XBTC to BTC at a fixed value of 1:1. The fee will be kept low + tx fees.

Pros
* Frictionless trading against XBTC
* More choice in the way the DEX is utilized

Cons
* Further centralized risk on Poloniex

If the idea goes forward, I'll transfer the asset to himself so there will be no more XBTC in circulation than what he sells.

How does everyone feel about this?

I'm going to attempt to instigate more feedback on this.

I'll explain one big advantage of the above. If Poloniex proves to be trustworthy, then a XBTC will have and maintain the same buying power as a BTC.

This means you can trade XCP for XBTC without using btcpay. You can totally avoid the troll orders because XCP and XBTC can be both held in escrow.

This will hold true for any Counterparty asset vs BTC.

While this is a good idea overall, I don't think that Poloniex should be the only backer. This should be decentralised as much as possible. And Poloniex should be 100% transparent about their balances and reserves of XBTC and BTC for their own sake.

Is there not an issue with the fact that there are 21 Million XBTC and just over 12.4 Million BTC (including all the burned and lost coins!)?

I do like the idea that it would be possible for more than one backer to underwrite the value.

As you said, it would be possible for a backer to disclose their holdings of BTC.

The 21M of XBTC in theory shouldn't be a problem. Basically the underwriter(s) would enforce a constrained supply - they should never sell or transfer XBTC for any less or more than 1 BTC. There will therefore never be any more XBTC in circulation than BTC.

Now, let's say Joe is having some troubles with finances and wants to liquidate his XBTC quickly. Maybe he doesn't like using an underwriter which will return a 1:1 ratio and uses the DEX and sells at a discount of 50%. The purchaser of the XBTC would likely want to cash out at a rate of 1:1, thus returning back to market value. Also, it would be possible for the underwriter to buy back on the DGEX but then returning XBTC back to his pool and maintaining a constrained supply.