Quote from: JorgeStolfi on June 20, 2014, 04:42:51 AM

Quote from: BTCfan1 on June 20, 2014, 04:18:27 AM

am I the only one who thinks the price will stay 580-620 until after the auction in order to have a "low" starting price for bidding?

There is no "starting price". Each bidder submits one sealed bid, for 1 to 10 lots of coins, and that is it. The USMS may cancel the auction at their discretion, presumably including if if they get only "joke" bids, but I haven't seen any explicit minimum price in their announcement. http://www.usmarshals.gov/assets/2014/bitcoins/

I'm pretty sure the prof is accurate in his assessment of how it will go down.

Still doesn't change the fact that this is a closed system where only the bid takers know the price of the big makers. such old-school black-box type operations.

Transparency and Privacy, and all that grey area in between.