It must be Google Translated or something: the English is awful.

I can confirm one of my withdrawals from Gox was a doublespend. This is systematic.

I just did two transfers with no address problems.

The first one was for 10 BTC, it has not reflected on the blockchain for about 20 minutes as of right now. The other was for 4.99 BTC and reflected in about 5 minutes. It is erratic. Could be as you guys have pointed out, due to hot/cold wallet logjam.

Their withdrawal feature is erratic. I can confirm I got "Invalid Address" several times. I hit one that finally worked, but the withdrawal hasn't appeared on the blockchain yet (been about 10 minutes).

But it is true that their green address sees a good number of withdrawals. Seems (again) more like incompetence.

For options, I suggest having a beta site and working with market makers before releasing into production.

A lot of the SEC rules are hopelessly obsolete for the purposes of Bitcoin investments (many of them are obsolete for the current US Equities market!). Also, there is the FINRA angle? Maybe?

MSantori, is there anything further that you can offer about the consequences of this with respect to established securities law? Possible exemptions? I know it's a very broad question, but I'm sure it's on everybody's minds.

ie, will one have to be a registered Broker-Dealer just to trade in BTC securities? Series 7/63/55? It just seems ridiculous, the model is entirely different in BTC securities (everybody is a member of the exchange) vs cash equities (exclusive set of members, who act as brokers for the public).

bitcoincharts is more trustable in my opinion, but anyway, even bitcoinity shows that Gox still leads the volume. This situation may significantly change in the coming months.
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Understood; what can we expect from you as far as guidance in case that situation arises? What data source will you look at, will you announce a change, etc? That is more what I'm asking.

Fireball, any comment on whether we will have a change of reference exchange for final settlement? I guess Gox is still in the lead for August and probably September, but it's conceivable that Bitstamp could take over as the benchmark in the coming months.

I am simply saying that it hasn't progressed to the point where we have many rules. That's the distinction I'm making, not scale. We meet, talk about things, trade, but the trading process is not very formalized.

I think he actually incorporated.

TBH, Satoshi Square is more of a meetup (granted, with a primary purpose of facilitating trade) than an "exchange" at this point. And that's fine. It suits my purposes perfectly.

While the press is bad, the news itself is positive.

I had assumed BTC scammers would never be tracked down. That the SEC would actually care and find the guy adds legitimacy.

They are settled at Highest Volume Exchange VWAP at expiry, but clear mark-to-market twice a day at the last sale.

Edit: Used to say "Gox VWAP at expiry", this could change going forward.

When are we getting a VWAP (or some other mechanism) to set the clearing price? While I'm not personally very concerned as far as my own trading, a better mechanism would add to the legitimacy of the exchange. This is in response to akwfleaspirit, who, while certainly misinformed about a lot, is right that it's way too easy to manipulate the clearing price.

A "clearing cross" like NYSE's open/close crosses might help, and as a bonus you can put in margin called positions so they have access to the hopefully greater liquidity. It's also an established point in time to do lots of liquidity - if you can get traders to gather at these times, you may see more trading overall. A good cross can also simplify trading for those who don't want to babysit their limit orders.

The only reason the contracts are disconnected from the market is a lack of liquidity/market makers. And no they are not completely disconnected, the spread has come in a LOT since I first started trading there.

You can theorize WHY the contract traded away from spot, and indeed there can be many reasons. But, the primary reason for it to trade IN LINE with spot is arbitrage. Buy in one place sell in another, driving the price up in the first place, down in the other. There has to be significant capital/automated strategies in place for that to happen, and that just isn't the case with ICBIT.

I told you when leverage makes volatility a factor and when it doesn't - it all has to do with the option of the contract holder to default (as you pointed out), but both Long and Short can default, so such an effect should only increase the bid/ask spread, not spot-futures spread. Honestly, go pick up a copy of Hull (Options Futures and Other Derivatives), because you clearly have no idea what you're talking about.

I acknowledge ICBIT is being manipulated, but from where I'm sitting, it's most likely not the owners, just traders. It's just a market with orders, people are going to trade around. And besides, recently it's been pretty close to spot - not more than say 10 points off (with a wide spread).

Finally, I am not trying to impress anybody, I am just correcting some really bad misinformation. I have no affiliation with ICBIT except that I trade there and they actually got their contract design correct. I've also given them advice on how to correct some of the more glaringly bad things they do. I would like for there to be more liquidity in their market.

akwfleaspirit, you are incredibly misinformed about futures.

In an efficient market, cash and carry arbitrage will force the futures price to equal the discounted (using a risk free interest rate) spot price net of carrying costs (btw, Fireball explicitly posted how to execute this strategy). NOWHERE does volatility enter as a parameter to valuation (that only happens in nonlinear instruments like options). Trust me, I'm a quant.

There IS the embedded "default option" ie, walking away from a bad position, when leverage is involved. This was a problem before, as admin waited too long to margin call/liquidate a trader, thus their position ended up being negative and counterparties were liquidate away from market.

However, the "life" of this default option is only the amount of time between margin call and actual liquidation of a position. This used to be (I'm guessing) 24-48 hours, now it's only 1 hour, and so it's much less valuable now.

Also, this default option would not necessarily cause a premium, as a short can default just as a long can.

Finally, since shorting spot bitcoins is difficult, it is much harder to bring a backwardated futures market back in line with spot (to do so you would have to long futures and short spot). It's much "easier" to bring contango down.

Now, it IS true that manipulation happens and that it's bad practice to use the Last Sale as the clearing price. It's unfortunate and quite frankly strange that the contract clearing price hasn't been changed to some type of average. However, I will say that I have never lost money on manipulation on ICBIT.

Sayulita, consider very carefully how you structure the confirmations / time allowances.

Time delays should be minimized because any delay is market risk for one party.

It is true though that since once the deposit is made, the transaction is so to speak "binding", it's at least not a free option to any party (being short these options is my constant worry with anything like this).

A comment on the mechanics of this (in connection with your other thread discussing how you guarantee the price to the seller).

This is how I would structure it...

1) Seller deposits BTC to Bitcoin Brokers.
2) Bitcoin Brokers lists only 80% (20% cushion for market volatility) of those coins for sale. Or maybe it can be an estimated vol.
3) Buyer agrees to pay a fixed FIAT amount (makes it easy for the buyer). They have 24 hours or whatever time frame - this can be fed to estimate volatility and adjust the available coins. In fact, you can make the time frame enterable - the faster you can pay after clicking "buy", the more coins available for sale.
4) Buyer goes and deposits money, takes the pictures of the slip + teller's card.
5) Brokers verifies this information, clicks a button (or something).
6) Button triggers a macro that snaps/timestamps + screenshots Gox prices, and sends it through an API to the seller (or maybe just updates their account, which the seller polls).
7) Seller receives update and immediately executes the offsetting transaction.

There still seems to be a manual step of verifying pictures, unfortunately, which means you'd need enough people to cover 24 hours, or cut the hours.

I get the feeling this exchange needs more marketing.

I was just thinking, at the end of Othello, just before he kills himself, he makes a speech that refers to Aleppo, the city the Syrian rebels are trying to hold. And how does the plot get set into motion? Othello sails to CYPRUS to defend it against the Turks!

In addition, it's not well known who Shakespeare was, there are various theories as to his identity:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baconian_theory_of_Shakespeare_authorship

Shakespeare was the Satoshi of the English language (it's sometimes called Shakespeare's language). Who were these men, who made such great works, that everybody knows, yet nobody knows? Might they not be one and the same?

There are passages in Shakespeare that are remarkably complex, with references pointing everywhere. You'd need a parser to make sense of them - clearly he was showing off his mastery of grammar, syntax, and indirection, which are used heavily in computer science today.

In addition, Francis Bacon was known to have dabbled in crypto - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baconian_theory_of_Shakespeare_authorship#Baconian_cryptology

He was ahead of his time, more intellectual than those in power (just like Satoshi).

With all this evidence, what am I forced to conclude? Satoshi = Shakespeare = Francis Bacon!